Hi!Building a new PC for FSX:- Asus Maximus Extreme MB- QX9650- Radeon HD 3870 X2 (1 GBy Video RAM)- 1.2 kW Thermaltake PS (for that "mainframe" feel)So, should I load:- Win XP with 4 GBy RAM and DX9, or- Vista 32 with 4 GBy RAM and DX10, or - Vista 64 with 4 GBy RAM and DX10, or- Vista 64 with 8 GBy RAM and DX10 ??Questions:----------- With XP's GDI+ video architecture the 1 GBy video RAM is mapped into FSX's address space so FSX and XP are left with only 3 GBy to use, right?- With Vista 32's WDDM video architecure, is the 1 GBy video RAM mapped into the app address space as with GDI+, is it mapped into Vista 32's address space or does the video RAM "exist" in its own address space?- How does WDDM video RAM mapping change for Vista 64?- With 8 GBy RAM, would FSX be able to use a full 4 GBy for itself? (with the remaining 4 GBy for Vista 64 and other apps?)Sorry for all the questions but I have been reading-up on this forum, PT's blog, the Anandtech Vista review, but I still can

If I were going to go with 4 gb or 8gb system ram, I would go with Vista 64.As you probably already know, the video ram mapping was one of the things that has reportedly been fixed with the latest Vista hotfixes, although it appears (from all I've seen) that this issue was most prevalent on 32-bit versions of Vista. I do not know the specific video memory management scheme V64 uses, but I think for the benefits of the usage of 4 gb or 8gb of system ram alone, means that V64 is a good choice if you choose to run with that much ram and a high-ram video card.Regarding your system build, you aren't cutting any corners, are you? :)You might as well do it right, and get 8 gigs of DDR3. :)RhettAMD 3700+ (@2585 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2gb Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8 (1T), WD 150 gig 10000rpm Raptor, WD 250gig 7200rpm SATA2, Seagate 120gb 5400 rpm external HD, CoolerMaster Praetorian

The 64bit op system solves all that memory stuff. Don't even bother with anything else. Go with the 64bit op system. Get 8gigs-O-ram. Running the sim, I'm seeing 3+ ram loads all the time . . . and this stuff is soo cheap. I have 4 and wish I had 8. The difference between DDR2 and DDR3 is just speed grades (withing going into circuit design), so . . . 400-450 FSB speed is about as far as you'll want to go. There is No advantage to DDR3. Good DDR2-800 will generally hang with a 450mhz FSB. So, DDR2-800 is Plenty, follow? Get Patriot, Crucial, or AData. Get 8gigsofit.

I'd opt for XP. Seems like XP runs anything Vista can with only a fraction of the issues. Plus, it's easier on the cpu. Also, just read at tom's hardware that the 3870 is getting a huge price cut to $189 here in the US after tonight. So maybe consider CrossFire and save a few bucks?

>The 64bit op system solves all that memory stuff. Don't even>bother with anything else. Go with the 64bit op system. >>Get 8gigs-O-ram. Running the sim, I'm seeing 3+ ram loads all>the time . . . and this stuff is soo cheap. I have 4 and wish>I had 8. The difference between DDR2 and DDR3 is just speed>grades (withing going into circuit design), so . . . >>400-450 FSB speed is about as far as you'll want to go. SamHow are the Core2's handling what I've seen called "underclocking" (say, 8 x 500)? Dropping the multiplier and upping the bus?Is this a viable o/c method with them?If it is, then would DDR3 have some advantage?If it is not a viable method, then for sure I think DDR2 would be the way to go...RhettAMD 3700+ (@2585 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2gb Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8 (1T), WD 150 gig 10000rpm Raptor, WD 250gig 7200rpm SATA2, Seagate 120gb 5400 rpm external HD, CoolerMaster Praetorian

The FSB is not a bottleneck. 300x10 will provide the same performance as 500x6. In other words, dropping the multiplier and increasing the FSB won't increase performance. Also, increasing memory speed only helps benchmarks. It'd take a statical analysis of a population of FRAPS runs to extract any evidence of real world performance gains from memory running at 800 vs 1066 vs even 1600.The trick is to buy ram that will run at your predetermined FSB target. Remembering DDR means "Double the Data Rate of the FSB." If your FSB target is 400, then you need DDR2-800 ram (400x2). Get the cheapest DDR2-800 ram you can find. Ram timings are strictly "hobbycraft."

Hi Jahman,I just built something similar using the pricey QX9650. It's an overclocker's delight, and well should be for the price!Sam's right: no point in DDR-3. You will not need to increase the FSB--just set it at 333 and use DDR-2. Theoretically you could use DDR2 667 (PC2 5400) which is around $39/2GB module since you will be overclocking your CPU to well over 4GHz at stock FSB of 333x4 = 1333MHz. I bought DDR2 800 and really didn't even need that as I've benched 1333MHz FSB versus 1600MHz FSB at the same CPU clockspeed of 4.0GHz and they come out the same (actually, the 1333MHz was actually very slightly faster for the Sandra benches for FPU and Multimedia etc.) You'll save money to help pay for your QX! These CPUs really run cool, and require little increase in Vcore to overclock well. I haven't bothered to find out the upper limits of this CPU as I just don't need it right now. I don't have FSX installed! I ran Prime95 at 4.0GHz/1.285 vCore and it was rock solid and ran cool. Extra cooling is hardly required either. I am using retail HSF, but I do have a fan blowing on the CPU when I benched it at 4GHz.You might consider the regular old and cheaper ASUS P5E: it's all you need with the QX9650, so you can save a buck there too. Between this mobo and cheaper memory, you are saving about $130, with memory if you go with DDR2-800 another few hundred.I am intrigued by the 3870x2 as well. I was considering it for two reasons: to be able to CrossfireX it with another for quad GPU, and also cuz I like AMD's image quality a little better. From Anandtech's article, quad GPU has it's signficant issues. You have the right PS tho:Anandtech:Power ConsumptionIn our 3-way SLI review we saw power consumption figures close to 800W at the wall outlet, thankfully with cooler running GPUs the CrossFireX numbers aren't as bad:Number of GPUs Idle Power Load Power (Bioshock) 1 x Radeon HD 3870 148W 257W 2 x Radeon HD 3870 (1 X2) 181W 361W 3 x Radeon HD 3870 (2 X2 + 1) 211W 406W 4 x Radeon HD 3870 (2 X2) 240W 538W With four GPUs we're over 500W of power consumption at the wall when running our Bioshock benchmark. There's still no clear need for greater than 1kW power supplies, but the better-safe-than-sorry mentality appears to be in full effect. Final WordsWe have to give AMD credit, there was no cherry picking of titles for this preview - for the most part, the benchmarks AMD itself selected showed no real need for 4-way CrossFireX over 3-way. We do appreciate the honesty, but it's clear that the world just isn't ready for a quad-GPU solution. Due to the state of AMD's driver optimizations DX10 games currently only scale well to 3 GPUs and not much beyond (Crysis/Bioshock), while DX9 games will generally scale better all the way up to 4 GPUs. We expected the opposite to be true but AMD provided us with technical insight as to why it is the case:"The biggest issue is DX10 has a lot more opportunities for persistent resources (resources rendered or updated in one frame and then read in subsequent frames). In DX9 we only had to handle texture render targets, which we have a good handle on in the DX10 driver. In addition to texture render targets DX10 allows an application to render to IBs and VBs using stream out from the GS or as a traditional render target. An application can also update any resource with a copy blt operation, but in DX9 copy blt operations were restricted to offscreen plains and render targets. This additional flexibility makes it harder to maximize performance without impacting quality.Another area that creates issues is constant buffers, which is new for DX10. Some applications update dynamic constant buffers every frame while other apps update them less frequently. So again we have to find the right balance that generally works for quality without impacting performance. We are also seeing new software bottlenecks in DX10 that we continue to work through. These software bottlenecks are sometimes caused by interactions with the OS and the Vista driver model that did not exist for DX9, most likely due to the limited feature set. Software bottlenecks impact our multi-GPU performance more than single GPU and can be a contributing factor to limited scaling.We

Noel your rig is very close to what I am looking at building for my FS computer.Are you running 4 2gig sticks of memory? Is that the recommended config if one is running 8 gigs?RhettAMD 3700+ (@2585 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2gb Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8 (1T), WD 150 gig 10000rpm Raptor, WD 250gig 7200rpm SATA2, Seagate 120gb 5400 rpm external HD, CoolerMaster Praetorian

Rhett I put 4 x 2gb modules of $79 mushkin. They POST fine, but I currently only have XP installed, so only 3.25Gb as showing up which is normal. I have Vista 64 Ultimate in a box ready to install but wanted to get XP up n running n cloned before complicating matters.I am planning on NOT doing the normal dual boot configuration. Instead I hope to use the P5E's BIOS to select which drive to boot to, thereby keeping both OS completely independent. I believe this will work but haven't confirmed it. There are some issues (and possible workarounds) for dual booting XP/Vista (disappearing restore points in Vista after booting to XP in a typical dual boot setup). There WERE some issues with Vista 64 and having 8GB of memory installed from the get go, so I may follow the old advise and remove two modules, install Vista and it's service packs, then add the other 2 modules. I am VERY pleased with this rig: it's quieter, cooler, and 300% of the thruput of my old 3.5GHz P4. Very sweet! I REALLY prefer the IQ of the AMD cards. This is a HARDWARE issue, not a driver issue. Even so, this 8800GT is way fine for FS9, FSX, and even Crysis, which is quite cool! I think after ready Anand's article I may wait til AMD's next single or x2 solution, or if I get too impatient for the superior IQ of the AMD card maybe pick up a single 3870x2.QX9650 @ 4.0GHz/1.285 vCore / 8GB PC-800 Mushkin (cheap!) / evga 8800GT @ 660Mhz / 2xSATA 2 drives /

>I am planning on NOT doing the normal dual boot configuration.> Instead I hope to use the P5E's BIOS to select which drive to>boot to, thereby keeping both OS completely independent. I have thought about doing that exact thing.I think I would rather try doing it that way, than messing around with dual-boot configs. If each OS doesn't know the other one is there, and cannot access the other hard drive, you can absolutely RULE OUT the cause of any problem being cross-installed OS's or drivers.Oh and thanks for the heads up on the Anand article, I missed that one.RhettAMD 3700+ (@2585 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2gb Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8 (1T), WD 150 gig 10000rpm Raptor, WD 250gig 7200rpm SATA2, Seagate 120gb 5400 rpm external HD, CoolerMaster Praetorian

Well, I know people have problems with Vista x64, but I too am going to recommend that, with 8GB of RAM, for futureproofingMy gut says go with the gf 8800GT 512, but a lot of people are liking the new 3870x2. HOWEVER, I read that some older games will NOT run with the 3870x2, such as Falcon 4 - a classic... sooooooo, do what you want!If you don't want Vista x64, I'd either go with 3GB RAM with XP Pro SP2(config 2x 1GB + 2x 512mb matched pairs)

Really, Vista 64's just fine. Programs, drivers, everything works. The world is finally coming 'round to 64 land. All those goofy memory problems are Over. I've had SP1 for a couple of weeks now. Still OK.I use the old hibernate mode "sleep." I also got a kill-a-watt gizmo. Ya know it costs ~ $20 a month to keep a 'puter on 24/7? (@.11/KWR). Using hybernate buys me breakfast once a month! SP1 made quite a difference there. It recovers from sleep almost instantaneously. Pretty amazing, actually.

>Well, I know people have problems with Vista x64, but I too>am going to recommend that, with 8GB of RAM, for>futureproofing>>My gut says go with the gf 8800GT 512, but a lot of people are>liking the new 3870x2. HOWEVER, I read that some older games>will NOT run with the 3870x2, such as Falcon 4 - a classic...>sooooooo, do what you want!If that's true thanks bunches for letting us know, because I use Falcon 4 AF alot. I know with 4xAA (nVidia latest WHQL) Falcon 4 AF doesn't fly either, but with 8x supersampled it works great. I wonder if that is the issue with the 3870x2 . . .

>>>I am planning on NOT doing the normal dual boot configuration.>>Instead I hope to use the P5E's BIOS to select which drive to>>boot to, thereby keeping both OS completely independent. >>I have thought about doing that exact thing.>>I think I would rather try doing it that way, than messing>around with dual-boot configs. If each OS doesn't know the>other one is there, and cannot access the other hard drive,>you can absolutely RULE OUT the cause of any problem being>cross-installed OS's or drivers.>Have you thought of using external eSATA drives for this?(i.e. plug-in the drive with the desired OS before booting).The drives themselves of course would be inside the PC housingwith just the 2 eSATA cables poking out.I

Rhett, Sam, Chase, Noel,Much obliged for the info and advice you all shared!I realize DDR3 offers little advantage over DDR2 at this point, but unfortunately they are electrically incompatible, so since I build a new PC about every 5 years (that's 3.33 18-month Moore's Law cycles, i.e. an increase in 2**3.33 = 10x for the same price point), it looks like I'll initially be going with Vista-64 on 4 GBy DDR3 and then add the other 4 GBy as prices come down and FSXI goes full 64-bit and 100% multi-threading and multi-GPU (adding a secong 3870 X" at that point would cost me $150?).Heck, I'm running FSX with a 32 MBy video card right now (ALL sliders ALL the way to the... left! Yikes!) So until I build my new PC by the end of March (aaand she boots) this is still all conjecture.Cheers,-jahman.