The only time I really get good performance with FS2004 is when I fly the slower aircraft like the Cessnas or other older prop aircraft. My nearly 2 year old P4 2.8 GHz with a 9800 pro video card is getting a little long in the tooth to handle the demands of FS2004.Today I was flying out of Alice Springs in Australia for some unknown reason in the 737 and I was shocked to find out I was still getting 50-60 frames per second with most of the settings maxed except for that unrealistic autogen scenery which I always run in the off mode. Now I know that performance aircraft can run smoothly in FS2004 "If" you are flying over areas that are "Extreamly" limited in scenery detail.Now the trick will be to find the sweet spot where I still get good smooth performance and still have something to look at out the windscreen.Terry

That is exactly the trick...I fly a P4-2.8 with a Ti4200 card and aim to get at least 25 fps (locked at 30).The biggest impact is weather... then detailed airports with AI traffic.Also water effects, try running with them off while watching the fps counter..Autogen is not as big an issue on my system.

I've got a mobo and card identical to bert's...the key for me has been an upgrade to the 80.40 nividia beta driver at www.guru3d. I give it a big thumb's up!one of the things I like about this driver is that even when fps drops, i never have stutters or slide shows...Sherm