I recently purchased a new PC with dual-Core processor, mainly to run FSX, and so far have been dissapointed with the profromance.(my system stats are at the end of this post) I admit to knowing very little about this technolagy. I seem to be having problems with clouds, I'm running FE and UT USA and UT Canada/Alaska. My Framerate is much better under clear skys, near double. Is there a FAQ or guide to help me with configuring my toy?RayOS Name Microsoft Windows XP Professional Version 5.1.2600 Service Pack 2 Build 2600 OS Manufacturer Microsoft Corporation System Name YOUR-4DACD0EA75 System Manufacturer HP Pavilion 061 System Model RC647AA-ABA m7680n System Type X86-based PC Processor x86 Family 6 Model 15 Stepping 6 GenuineIntel ~2133 Mhz Processor x86 Family 6 Model 15 Stepping 6 GenuineIntel ~2133 Mhz BIOS Version/Date Phoenix Technologies, LTD 3.01, 6/30/2006 SMBIOS Version 2.4 Windows Directory C:WINDOWS System Directory C:WINDOWSsystem32 Boot Device DeviceHarddiskVolume1 Locale United States Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "5.1.2600.2180 (xpsp_sp2_rtm.040803-2158)" User Name YOUR-4DACD0EA75HP_Administrator Time Zone Eastern Standard Time Total Physical Memory 2,048.00 MB Available Physical Memory 1.47 GB Total Virtual Memory 2.00 GB Available Virtual Memory 1.96 GB Page File Space 2.34 GB Page File C:pagefile.sys [Hardware Resources][Conflicts/Sharing]Resource Device I/O Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 PCI bus I/O Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 Direct memory access controller IRQ 20 Intel® 82562V 10/100 Network Connection IRQ 20 OHCI Compliant IEEE 1394 Host Controller I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE IRQ 23 Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2834 IRQ 23 Intel® ICH8 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 283A IRQ 23 Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2830 IRQ 23 Intel® ICH8 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 2836 IRQ 16 Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 IRQ 16 NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE IRQ 16 Intel® ICH8 Family PCI Express Root Port 1 - 283F IRQ 16 Data Fax SoftModem with SmartCP Memory Address 0xE0000000-0xEFFFFFFF Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 Memory Address 0xE0000000-0xEFFFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE IRQ 19 Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2835 IRQ 19 Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2831 IRQ 19 Wireless LAN PCI 802.11 b/g adapter WN5301A IRQ 19 Intel® ICH8R/DO/DH SATA RAID Controller Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF PCI bus Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE Memory Address 0xFA000000-0xFCFFFFFF Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 Memory Address 0xFA000000-0xFCFFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE [DMA]Resource Device Status Channel 4 Direct memory access controller OK [Forced Hardware]Device PNP Device ID [i/O]Resource Device Status 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 PCI bus OK 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 Direct memory access controller OK 0x00000D00-0x0000FFFF PCI bus OK 0x000003B0-0x000003BB Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 OK 0x000003B0-0x000003BB NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE OK 0x000003C0-0x000003DF Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 OK 0x000003C0-0x000003DF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE OK 0x0000FF00-0x0000FF1F Intel® 82562V 10/100 Network Connection OK 0x0000FE00-0x0000FE1F Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2834 OK 0x0000FD00-0x0000FD1F Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2835 OK 0x0000FC00-0x0000FC1F Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2830 OK 0x0000FB00-0x0000FB1F Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2831 OK 0x0000FA00-0x0000FA1F Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2832 OK 0x0000DF00-0x0000DF07 Data Fax SoftModem with SmartCP OK 0x00000A79-0x00000A79 ISAPNP Read Data Port OK 0x00000279-0x00000279 ISAPNP Read Data Port OK 0x00000274-0x00000277 ISAPNP Read Data Port OK 0x00000010-0x0000001F Motherboard resources OK 0x00000022-0x0000003F Motherboard resources OK 0x00000044-0x0000005F Motherboard resources OK 0x00000062-0x00000063 Motherboard resources OK 0x00000065-0x0000006F Motherboard resources OK 0x00000074-0x0000007F Motherboard resources OK 0x00000091-0x00000093 Motherboard resources OK 0x000000A2-0x000000BF Motherboard resources OK 0x000000E0-0x000000EF Motherboard resources OK 0x000004D0-0x000004D1 Motherboard resources OK 0x00000800-0x0000087F Motherboard resources OK 0x00000294-0x00000297 Motherboard resources OK 0x00000880-0x0000088F Motherboard resources OK 0x00000020-0x00000021 Programmable interrupt controller OK 0x000000A0-0x000000A1 Programmable interrupt controller OK 0x00000080-0x00000090 Direct memory access controller OK 0x00000094-0x0000009F Direct memory access controller OK 0x000000C0-0x000000DF Direct memory access controller OK 0x00000040-0x00000043 System timer OK 0x00000070-0x00000073 System CMOS/real time clock OK 0x00000061-0x00000061 System speaker OK 0x000000F0-0x000000FF Numeric data processor OK 0x00000400-0x000004BF Motherboard resources OK 0x0000F900-0x0000F907 Intel® ICH8R/DO/DH SATA RAID Controller OK 0x0000F800-0x0000F803 Intel® ICH8R/DO/DH SATA RAID Controller OK 0x0000F700-0x0000F707 Intel® ICH8R/DO/DH SATA RAID Controller OK 0x0000F600-0x0000F603 Intel® ICH8R/DO/DH SATA RAID Controller OK 0x0000F500-0x0000F51F Intel® ICH8R/DO/DH SATA RAID Controller OK 0x00000500-0x0000051F Intel® ICH8 Family SMBus Controller - 283E OK [iRQs]Resource Device Status IRQ 9 Microsoft ACPI-Compliant System OK IRQ 16 Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 OK IRQ 16 NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE OK IRQ 16 Intel® ICH8 Family PCI Express Root Port 1 - 283F OK IRQ 16 Data Fax SoftModem with SmartCP OK IRQ 20 Intel® 82562V 10/100 Network Connection OK IRQ 20 OHCI Compliant IEEE 1394 Host Controller OK IRQ 23 Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2834 OK IRQ 23 Intel® ICH8 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 283A OK IRQ 23 Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2830 OK IRQ 23 Intel® ICH8 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 2836 OK IRQ 19 Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2835 OK IRQ 19 Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2831 OK IRQ 19 Wireless LAN PCI 802.11 b/g adapter WN5301A OK IRQ 19 Intel® ICH8R/DO/DH SATA RAID Controller OK IRQ 22 Microsoft UAA Bus Driver for High Definition Audio OK IRQ 18 Intel® ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2832 OK IRQ 17 Hauppauge WinTV PVR PCI II (26xxx) OK IRQ 0 System timer OK IRQ 8 System CMOS/real time clock OK IRQ 13 Numeric data processor OK [Memory]Resource Device Status 0xA0000-0xBFFFF PCI bus OK 0xA0000-0xBFFFF Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 OK 0xA0000-0xBFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE OK 0xC0000-0xDFFFF PCI bus OK 0x7FF00000-0xFEBFFFFF PCI bus OK 0xFA000000-0xFCFFFFFF Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 OK 0xFA000000-0xFCFFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE OK 0xE0000000-0xEFFFFFFF Intel® P965/G965 PCI Express Root Port - 29A1 OK 0xE0000000-0xEFFFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE OK 0xFB000000-0xFBFFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE OK 0xFDFC0000-0xFDFDFFFF Intel® 82562V 10/100 Network Connection OK 0xFDFFF000-0xFDFFFFFF Intel® 82562V 10/100 Network Connection OK 0xFDFFE000-0xFDFFE3FF Intel® ICH8 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 283A OK 0xFDFF4000-0xFDFF7FFF Microsoft UAA Bus Driver for High Definition Audio OK 0xFDFFD000-0xFDFFD3FF Intel® ICH8 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 2836 OK 0xF4000000-0xF7FFFFFF Hauppauge WinTV PVR PCI II (26xxx) OK 0xFDEFF000-0xFDEFFFFF OHCI Compliant IEEE 1394 Host Controller OK 0xFDEE0000-0xFDEEFFFF Wireless LAN PCI 802.11 b/g adapter WN5301A OK 0xFDED0000-0xFDEDFFFF Data Fax SoftModem with SmartCP OK 0xFFB80000-0xFFBFFFFF Intel® 82802 Firmware Hub Device OK 0xFDFFC000-0xFDFFC7FF Intel® ICH8R/DO/DH SATA RAID Controller OK 0xFDFFB000-0xFDFFB0FF Intel® ICH8 Family SMBus Controller - 283E OK 0xF0000000-0xF3FFFFFF Motherboard resources OK 0xD4A00-0xD7FFF System board OK 0xF0000-0xF7FFF System board OK 0xF8000-0xFBFFF System board OK 0xFC000-0xFFFFF System board OK 0x7FEF0000-0x7FFEFFFF System board OK 0x7FEE0000-0x7FEFFFFF System board OK 0x0000-0x9FFFF System board OK 0x100000-0x7FEDFFFF System board OK 0xFDFFA000-0xFDFFAFFF System board OK 0xFEC00000-0xFEC00FFF System board OK 0xFEE00000-0xFEE00FFF System board OK 0xFFB00000-0xFFB7FFFF System board OK 0xFFF00000-0xFFFFFFFF System board OK 0xE0000-0xEFFFF System board OK

Hi Ray,Well that CoreDuo E6400 can run very nicely at higher speeds, you picked a good CPU. As to configuring it for FSX, well that cant really be done since the Demo isnt that great to benchmark it. However you can tweak it to try to get the most of it, based on results that FS9 would give. Firstly though i need some additional info.How many harddrives do you have? As far as i see only one, right? If one i'd suggest make a partition for FS or even better buy an extra HD dedicated to FS, Why you ask?, well simply whilst running the sim it doesnt have to wade through all of the WINXP files and that in terms will benefit FS performance. Also make sure that certain services are off, like "indexing services" etc.. Other services you need to turn off to get max. perf. you can do that using various tools like FSautostart, SmartClose etc.. Also take note of the pagefile.sys. since you have 2GB of RAM the best performance you'll get is making a fixed sized pagefile and size it to be 1.5 x the RAM you have, dont use the automatic option from WINXP, because thats only really ment for Servers. Also make sure that you that the pagefile wil NOT be on the FS HD. As far as the rest of that system, that 7300LE geForce will only run FSX through DX9, inorder to render the sim in DX10, you will need to purchase a new card based on the new cores (yet to be released). I can help more and give you more info on howto optimize. First though lets keep it to this and tell me if sofar you can understand what i said here :)

I think the answer is very simple. Your nVidia card is antialiasing all of the clouds. This is a common problem with nVidia cards. Mine does it too.RhettAMD 3700+, eVGA 7800GT 256, ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 GB Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8, etc. etc.

My post is more reff. to the other question "configuring my toy" that system (excl.card) can do very very good once optimized so to beable to get somewhat ok perf. And great performance whith a highend GPU

Hi Ray, depending on your screen resolution(s), the poor performance could be due to the display adapter? IMHO, an '0xE0000000-0xEFFFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 7300 LE OK' can probably not be seen as OK for hi-res gaming. ;-) Hope this adds to thoughts, kind regards Jaap

I totally agree with Japp...7300LE isn't gonna cut it...Maybe a 7600GT as an intrum card until the really nice DX10 cards are out......I'd really suggest a 7900GT...

Me too. Who specified that card for that system - its so unbalanced I can't believe a specialist would be involved! Warehouse job?It's like buyng a Ferrari, then finding the factory only put first gear in the box! I think there are mobile phones with more graphics power. :)Allcott

Thanks for the info guys! Davis, I only have the one HD now and currently use enditall to close back round programs. I think it best to wait for the dx10 cards, as fars as upgrading the graphics card. (although I have been thinking that it was the main culprit) Now as to changing the pagefile system, that makes my a little nervous. Do you have a walk through for that? I will consider purcasing a new HD.Thanks,Ray

Rhett, The clounds do have a huge impact, how do you handle the issue? Just turn off the antialiasing?Ray

Best Buy. But, I think I'll wait for the new DX10 cards...Ray

>Rhett,> The clounds do have a huge impact, how do you handle the>issue? Just turn off the antialiasing?>>>RayWell turning off AA might do it--you should experiment. You see, I don't know if your system is doing the slowdown no matter how many clouds you have, or if you only get the slowdown with lots of clouds. I also don't know if you have ActiveSky or not.On my system, it only happens when there are lots of clouds and multiple layers. And I use ActiveSky with the highest (512 x 512 texture) settings. I need to experiment and see what's best for smoothness.Do you know about the "High Performance Clouds for FS9" file? It is some replacement cloud textures that look (imo) the same as stock clouds, but are smaller size files and thus use less gpu/cpu/mem.That's here at AVSIM in the file library. The file name is something like HIP***.ZIP or something like that.That should help some. Also, I don't know if you have ActiveSky, but you can turn down the cloud texture sizes (128 x 128, 256 x 256, 512 x 512, etc.) and there's not much difference in visuals.If it's any consolation, in FSX, it appears clouds have less of a frame rate hit.RhettAMD 3700+, eVGA 7800GT 256, ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 GB Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8, etc. etc.