Well I upgraded to a MSI 9800GT, but my framerates didn't seems to move! It does run with less jerky movement, but even this card cant seem in increase the FR's in congested areas. I still only get about 9-12 at KATL (Imaginesim) and similar at other payware airports, slightly higher at FlyTampa airports. At the stock FS airports the FR's did increase, and at the smaller fields I don't see any decrease. My old card would sometimes do that, this one is pretty consistent. KMRC is one of the airports I fly into often, and it usually had 18-20fr with the 7950. On the 9800 it is up to 26-30. Anyone know what it will take to get this at KATL, KLAX, ect?I really dont want to upgrade this machine, I am saving for a far superior one. Is there anything I can do to get a minimum of 15fr's everywhere?The new machine should be able to do it, but I wont have that until this summer or later.Current machines specs in my sig, new machine is going to be an i7Core 965 Extreme based system. I hope that it can run FSX! FSX runs like garbage on this system even with the 9800GT! :(

Your Athlon is what is holding back your FPS here as FSX is very much a CPU limited application. For FSX you'd want your dual core as near to 4GHz as you can get it. Add-ons just compound the problem - giving FSX (and your CPU) even more to do.You could drop in a GTX280 and your FPS would remain roughly the same as it is now.Turn down a few sliders (autogen and ai traffic is the place to begin), disable light bloom etc until you have a useable minimum FPS in most situations. Then once you get your i965 you can go mad! Just keep in mind that there is no consumer pc on the planet capable of running FSX with all sliders maxxed out, and that includes the i965/X58 platform.

Well, I guess I'll just retire FSX and stick with FS9 then. Aces really screwed the pooch with FSX.

At Toms Hardware search for the Graphics Card Charts 2008.To your surprise you will see that a 8800GTS card is the best card to use for FSX.Not a 280 , not a 260.Not a 9000 series.Simply said : those heavy cards are overkill for FSX and therefor decrease perfromance compared to a 8800 card.Just like when putting to much memory in your pc. You need another processor first.The best for FSX is the E8600, not the quad series.That is because those 2 cores run much faster than the 4 cores form the quadcore processors, and even though you can tell FSX that you have multi-multi-multi core, it best performs on a dual core system. Myself I have an E8500 ( much cheaper) but overclocked , so I outperform an E8600.

Well, I guess I'll just retire FSX and stick with FS9 then. Aces really screwed the pooch with FSX.

Just retire FSX until you get your Core i7 system.You'll love it then :(

At Toms Hardware search for the Graphics Card Charts 2008.To your surprise you will see that a 8800GTS card is the best card to use for FSX.Not a 280 , not a 260.Not a 9000 series.Simply said : those heavy cards are overkill for FSX and therefor decrease perfromance compared to a 8800 card.Just like when putting to much memory in your pc.

Not quite true - first - it has been said before that Tom's tests are suspect. Second it really depends on your processor. I had a q6600 clocked to 3.6 with an 8800GTS and it was great. Went to a q9650 at 4ghz and saw an increase in fps (expected) but no improvement in visuals and performance (unexpected). Went to a 280 and got a big boost in visuals and smoothness. The big cards are fine as long as you have a big processor pushing them. In a poorly tuned system or a slow processor - 8800gts would be the way to go.

You need another processor first.The best for FSX is the E8600, not the quad series.That is because those 2 cores run much faster than the 4 cores form the quadcore processors, and even though you can tell FSX that you have multi-multi-multi core, it best performs on a dual core system.

ONLY true if you do not overclock. And FSX will use all 4 cores - it uses the first two mainly during the initial load but spreads it out during normal operation. Bring up task manager and watch all four cores in operation.I believe that it has been since SP1 that FSX will use all cores - so you're not giving out correct info.If you are just saying that a stock dual at 3.0 will outperform a stock quad at 2.6 - I agree but it is ONLY due to the speed - has absolutely nothing to do with the cores. If you had a stock dual at 3.0 and an overclocked quad at 3.0 - the quad will outperform the dual every time.Vic

Not quite true - first - it has been said before that Tom's tests are suspect. Second it really depends on your processor. I had a q6600 clocked to 3.6 with an 8800GTS and it was great. Went to a q9650 at 4ghz and saw an increase in fps (expected) but no improvement in visuals and performance (unexpected). Went to a 280 and got a big boost in visuals and smoothness. The big cards are fine as long as you have a big processor pushing them. In a poorly tuned system or a slow processor - 8800gts would be the way to go.ONLY true if you do not overclock. And FSX will use all 4 cores - it uses the first two mainly during the initial load but spreads it out during normal operation. Bring up task manager and watch all four cores in operation.I believe that it has been since SP1 that FSX will use all cores - so you're not giving out correct info.If you are just saying that a stock dual at 3.0 will outperform a stock quad at 2.6 - I agree but it is ONLY due to the speed - has absolutely nothing to do with the cores. If you had a stock dual at 3.0 and an overclocked quad at 3.0 - the quad will outperform the dual every time.Vic

Vic is absolutely correct here... The video card perf with the 280 will increase with the CPU/memory buss and that is why i7 clocked is much better served on a 260/280 cardThe use of cores past 1 and part of 2 go to Autogen, Terrain, some AI functions however all cores are used up to 256 and a quad will in fact allow FSX to run much smoother when equal or even slighty higher clocks on the dual are present. The only decision around going dual or quad relates to CPU speed... if the dual will be run or clocked 500-800MHz faster than the quad, the dual presents a better choice however when you get into the 4050MHz range.. would go with the quad unless the dual is running well over 4500The myths and BS that are wide spread and rampant on this forum is quite amazing

Well I upgraded to a MSI 9800GT, but my framerates didn't seems to move! It does run with less jerky movement, but even this card cant seem in increase the FR's in congested areas. I still only get about 9-12 at KATL (Imaginesim) and similar at other payware airports, slightly higher at FlyTampa airports. At the stock FS airports the FR's did increase, and at the smaller fields I don't see any decrease. My old card would sometimes do that, this one is pretty consistent. KMRC is one of the airports I fly into often, and it usually had 18-20fr with the 7950. On the 9800 it is up to 26-30. Anyone know what it will take to get this at KATL, KLAX, ect?I really dont want to upgrade this machine, I am saving for a far superior one. Is there anything I can do to get a minimum of 15fr's everywhere?The new machine should be able to do it, but I wont have that until this summer or later.Current machines specs in my sig, new machine is going to be an i7Core 965 Extreme based system. I hope that it can run FSX! FSX runs like garbage on this system even with the 9800GT! :(

Don't expect miracles from the 965.

I find this to be a constant source of frustration.SHAME on MS for not writing the FSX code PROPERLY to offload to the GPU!Just got Black Shark and my video card is properly leveraged and I see the results.This issue drives me nuts.

I think I will wait for FS11. I am still up in the air about the 965 v 9950. I also play FPS (CS DOD BF2) as well as do the occasional video editing. I know that this next upgrade is either to the AM2+ or the LGA 1366.Anyone know of a in depth and unbiased head to head review out there?

If you have read Pc Pilot from october / november / december special you would see that at the same clockspeed the system with the dual core outperforms the quadcore.Ofcoarse you can let FSX run over multiple cores, but that won't help if those dual cores are fast enough.Regarding the Toms hardware charts --> search at the Graphics Card forum and there you can read that also with a high end system the 8800 GTs outperformed the 260 and 280, even at a resolution of 1920x1200 with AF and AA .I contected the tester myself today and he claimed that FSX sliders where set to high.Getting a big boost with a 260 or 280 seems not what other people experience if you read multiple Fs forums.Everyone knows that fSX is a hanging on the processor and that the graphics card is less important.This weekend I am able to test with a XFX 260 Black Edition myself and will let you all know in this thread what came out of it.BtwToday I heard from the Fs expert at the Dutch Aviation Megastore that they got an extra boost in framerates on a mid end system just by installing Windows 7beta. He claims that bad perfromance of FSX is also due to the OS.

Well, I guess I'll just retire FSX and stick with FS9 then. Aces really screwed the pooch with FSX.

That's amazing. Since installing FSX I have only run FS9 once in 5 months! Couldn't go back now!Noel