I was basically only referring to this sentance:"Also, I have been using both PMDG 747 and LDS 767 in FSX without issues."Getting 15fps not only at Heathrow is for me a big issue. With both PMDG and LDS. Like many other people, I fly heavies, and I like realism and the feel of it.As for AA/AF, a simulation without it, is for me no simulation. It just looks too terrible. I have tried tweaking FSX extensively, simply not getting satisfying results. Flying around one island is unfortunately for me usually no option.I am running my FS9 with many many addons on many airports, aircraft and 3rd party stuff beside in 1600x1200 with very high AA/AF. Which simply looks better than the screenshot above. Fact is though, that FS9 doesn't have the resolution necessary, and will texture-wise NEVER look as good as FSX, but neither will FSX with todays hardware deliver what FS9 delivers realism-wise.Wish you lots of fun!

Word Not Allowed, thank you for elaborating on your previous comment. It had me crawling up the walls in my office for awhile ;) Been tweaking and tweaking FSX for months now so guess your comment came as a bit of a shock. I had been using FS9 with all sort of addons for quite some time, but one day I felt like it was time to move on. Was running them both at some stage too. With no issues I simply meant that it's stable... I'm not getting great performance at all. It's just that I recently sorted out my FSX lockup/OOM issues and finally have a STABLE system. Getting 10-15 fps on final approach for KLAX is not what I call fun but sadly that's the situation at the moment. I could turn down the scenery settings a bit, but performance increase is not dramatic, sadly. I have never even considered turning on AF/AA in FSX. Due to my experience with some games, it just led to such a massive fps loss that it was just not worth it. To my surprise this didnt happen in FSX, although I cannot say that the difference is that considerable though. I see that you are running some sort of 3rd party AA/AF solution - I am not familiar with this. I am curious though, to see a screenshot from you, if what you're saying is true, that it looks way better than the screenshot I posted. If that turns out to be true, I might find myself looking back at FS9 once again lol.

Concerning 3rd party AA/Af - yes - Nhancer for Nvidia cards, using it to set per game settings. Even with Crysis I had AA/AF set (not the same as in FS9, but nevertheless), Crysis ran with mid settings, awesome graphics and very good fps (I did not measure, just felt very good, and not stuttering), in 1920x1200 on 24incher.See, I would rather have a bit lower resolution, and a decent playability. And also a thing to notice, you are using Megascenery here. Now, a real comparison would be FS9 Megascenery vs FSX Megascenery. You should post some scenery that doesn't reflect the photographic scenery, since it does not cover the whole earth.So, here are some shots, though already compressed and prepared for AVSIM (so you will just have to imagine 1600x1200), and maybe not the best reference, but still. Note also that all the following shots represent 40fps performance and complete fluidity, in every situation.http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/187625.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/187626.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/187627.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/187628.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/187633.jpg

Here are couple of new ones:Now you can possibly unterstand why AA/AF, otherwise aircraft wouldn't look as beautiful as this:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/187635.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/187636.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/187637.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/187638.jpg

Well, I was secretly hoping that your screenies would look awful, just so that I could make some smartass comment, but no... They simply look very nice - heck some of them are even gorgeous :D Nr. 2 and 3 (first post) looks quite harsh though, to my taste anyway. Airplanes look very sharp in all of them though, probably due to your high AA/AF. All screenshots in post #2 look great - on par with my MegaScenery screenshots. I still however disagree with your initial comment re: my Hawaii/Dillingham SS - surely that's not "very poor"... Guess we cannot agree here, but hey, I'm fine with that!"Nhancer for Nvidia cards" - where did you get this? I guess I am not very well informed about the technology behind AA/AF, will read up more on this though. Just didnt see a very huge improvement when I turned it on via the FSX menu settings - except the aircraft perhaps looks a bit sharper. "Now, a real comparison would be FS9 Megascenery vs FSX Megascenery".Check this out, lots of comparison screenies: http://www.megascenery.com/megasceneryxdisc.htmEDIT: will post some here for side-by-side comparison:FSX defaulthttp://img398.imageshack.us/img398/1199/20...14423562ds2.jpgFS9 MegaScenery (4.75 meters per pixel) http://img240.imageshack.us/img240/7418/20...44133343xt9.jpgFSX MegaScenery (1.19 meter per pixel)http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/3835/20...14403631ku0.jpg"You should post some scenery that doesn't reflect the photographic scenery, since it does not cover the whole earth". Not sure what the point would be here - my point in all of this has been how good FSX can look with some scenery packages, with it's 1m per pixel possibility - on it's own FSX is almost as mediocre as FS9, sadly. But anyway here goes - scenery complexity, autogen density, level of detail radius and global texture resolution all on max: http://img410.imageshack.us/img410/2941/010xq6.jpgJust HAVE to post one more MegaScenery screenie for comparison. This time I will dig out my favourite so far. Tell me what you think - surely the scenery here is better than in ANY of the screenies you just posted, no? http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/5072/006ga3.jpg"Note also that all the following shots represent 40fps performance and complete fluidity, in every situation". Now that's really something. With this I gather you also mean on final approach to EGLL with 100% AI traffic ;) (guess you're on vatsim)? I suspect you're also running some add-on scenery there, as FS9 didnt look so good as per my memory - it's been awhile now though. Care to share as to which add-ons you are using?Thanks for taking the time to post those screenshots though. Btw I just installed FTX AU BLUE which covers the southern (temperate) portion of Australia. Did a flight from Melbourne to Sydney in the LDS767, and experienced fairly appaling frame rates - lowest I saw was 3.3 haha not many other options than a full autoland here... Average was well below 20 I'm guessing for the whole trip. A few screenshots below (low visibility due to weather): http://img353.imageshack.us/img353/5285/20...84738759jn3.jpghttp://img240.imageshack.us/img240/5716/20...84744841ve9.jpghttp://img231.imageshack.us/img231/6421/20...84756988eu8.jpgFrom the FTX website http://fullterrain.com/index.html :"Unlike FS2004, with FTX it's a case of the lower you fly, the more detail you will see!"and"The unanimous opinion of the FTX beta testing team is that they rarely, if ever, run FS2004 again once they have flown over FTX landscapes. That's saying something."Just to be crystal clear on this: I'm not in any way affiliated with the FTX team (nor MegaScenery lol) just trying to make a case for how great FSX can look (compared to FS9) with the right scenery installed. Lol we should start a new thread in the screenshot section before we both get evicted from this thread... kinda hard to keep below the 10 images limit per subject...

Maybe I was just a bit wee too harsh. Maybe to clarify: very poor is for me not only the quality, but quality versus FPS.Also, AA and AF not only make aircraft smoother, but AF also has impact on textures in the distance, making them look clearer and not blurry.Only setting AA and Anisotropic Filtering in FSX won't do the job.If you have a Nvidia card, you can download Nhancer for free (www.nhancer.com), and set yourself all the settings you want for FSX. Keep in mind that, as far as I know, in FSX AA and AF have to be set for Nhancer to work. There are many posts on that subject, just do the search around these forums.Now, you see, you said it yourself. It is as mediocre as FS9. Meaning, without photographic scenery, what's the point...The shot you posted from top above, is really good, I must admit.As to comment on 40fps, on approach to EGLL, depending of course which aircraft, but in PMDG/LDS on Vatsim with people online, I get between 30 and 40 fps, and its very flyable.I love the last shots you posted, but they must be a s-llll-iiii-dddd-eeee-show :DI guess Microsoft did a real flop with Vista and FSX. Remember Windows ME? Same thing... they are going to release new windows in a year, so who cares about Vista. And FS11? I bet also...

I will make it 60/50. Go with XP. Can I personally offer you benchmarks? No. But the information is right here in this forum. There have been benchmark postings of folks who have tried both. I would even recommend the home version of XP if your willing to give up some functionality. I have been through #### I think in the last week trying to find out what is real and what is hype. I just purchased a system from a fella who not only knows systems well, but also knows the OS's as well as FSX. But, it really comes down to what you believe.Bob

>altough i thought that xp was better vista can run in both>DX9 and DX10 so it is probably better because you will also be>able to run future games and games like Crysis etc which look>ALOT better in DX10 so probably go with vistaJourdog FYI there is a workaround for all the features allegedly that are only with DX10 in Crysis that gets you all the features of DX10. IQ is fantastic and perf is quite good.>