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DaryllB25840

Simulator Questions

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I haven't found the answers to these questions elsewhere, so I have decided to ask the forum.1. In the FS2002 Scenery Library it askes you to specify a cache size.It only states that the more MBs in the cache, the better (smoother) your scenery will run. How much should be specified? I think the default setting is 100 MBs. I don't know what limits there are. The "empty cache on exit" box can be checked to free up hard disc space when you quit the program. This makes me think that the cache size that is available is the remaining hard disc space that you have.2. In that same vane as above, I just emptied my recycle bin of about 2.5 GBs of discarded downloaded sim files. A lot of the files were doubles of either scenery, aircraft, or utility files. After I dumped the recycle bin I picked up the same amount of hard disc (18 GB hard drive) space AND the FS program seems to run better in graphics & sound. How can this be? I have 256 MBs of RAM but I think the hard drive still swaps back in forth to run the program. After I emptied the recycle bin it took about 4 hours to defragment the disc.3. After selecting the aircraft, weather, location and time/date and then clicking the "fly now" button. The loading bar starts advancing along the scale. I have had trouble sometimes when it gets to about 16% (scenery textures), I get a microsoft error message and the program restarts itself. The same message appears when I'm flying enroute when I get close to an ADDON scenery area and the graphics stop but the sounds can still be heard. Can the loading bar % tell anything about the problem? My solutions so far have just been to unzip the scenery again from my download archives and reinstall.Thanks for any replies.Daryll

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Guest Lindy

1. It's my understanding Daryll that the FS cache is really only used if you have not done a full install of FS2K2, i.e. need to run the program with a CD in the drive. If the program has to access scenery from the CD, then yes, the cache is used to "store" the mb limit you set. But if you do a full install, everything is already on the hard drive and the program can access it without the need for a cache.2. Can't really help here, but I know I try to keep my recycle bin empty.3. I've also noticed that if a scenery problem is going to manifest, it generally does so at about 16 percent of the loading. I always associate this with some error in the scenery, a missing texture maybe or something like that. The only "fix" I've found (so far) is the same as yours -- delete the scenery and reinstall it.Sorry I can't be of much more help.-Lindy :-wave

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1) If you have installed all of the FS scenery to your HD you do not need the cache, however you cannot disable it nor set it to zero so set it to its lowest value (10).If you still have scenery on the FS CD then you DO need the cache.Alway tick the 'empty cache on exit' box.2) It sounds like FS is using the swap file. By emptying the recycle bin you have freed up some HD space, as you found out, and allowed more space for the swap file.You don't say how mmuch free space you have on your HD, this will affect the swap file size. Although 4 hours to defrag sound excessive you don't say how long it has been since you last defragged. It is worth doing this once in a while so that complete files are in one location and not scattered about the HD, this way the files will load more quickly.About once a month should suffice for defragging, or after a heavy bout of file moving or deleting.Try to make a habit of emptying the recycle bin after each session of file deletions, that way it will not become full of----trash :-)You don't say what operating system you are running but I would suggest doubling your RAM if you can afford it.Win98 uses least RAM of the current OS's but is not very good at managing it.Win 2k & XP need more RAM for the system than 98 but manage RAM better.If using Win98 you may benefit from manually setting the min & max values of the swap file to say 300MB.3)Sounds to me as if you may have some corrupt scenery files and/or a corrupt scenery.cfg file.I would be inclined to remove all add-on scenery from the scenery library and move those scenery files from wherever you placed them in the FS folder to somewhere outside the FS folder. That way you can more easily put them back.Now try FS again and see if it runs OK, if not reduce all the display settings and try again.If your system is being put under strain by FS (you don't give the spec of your system), reducing the display settings should help it to run better.If FS does run OK with just the default scenery try adding your add-on scenery one by one and note if you need to add any 'exclude' lines to the scenery.cfg file.Once FS runs OK you can then start increasing the display settings one at a time until you get problems again, then back off to the last good setting.HTHEDIT: PS I note Lindy snuck in while I was typing ;-).Make sure you have any 'extras' your add-on scenery needs. Often designers use generic textures from other sources, such as the VOD textures and NOVA textures.If these 'extra' are needed the scenery 'readme' file will tell you.

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Thanks HTH and Lindy for the replies.I am an old disabled airplane mechanic and my system costs are very important to me. I am running an old Pent.III 700 mhz with an 18 GB hard drive, 256 MB RAM, an nVida 440 MX card with Windows ME. I think sometimes that I'm just catching up with the rest of the world in learning how a computer operates. The free hard disc space got down to about 4.5 GB. When I emptied the recycle bin it got back up to 7 GB. To me the only reason the computer was invented was for Flight Simulation ! I fly mostly in the 10 fps world, I need the scenery and Gerrish's trees. I had the the nVida MX card for several months until a fluke aircraft cfg file turned on my reflections for ONLY ONE computer session. I researched the forums and found the fix in gf4mxdsp.zip (?). I didn't know what I had been missing. I now have polished aluminum & chrome. Oceansfx & Oceanstx makes the water look great now too. I have fully installed FS 2002.I think I'm finally clear on the cache issue, thanks.Does Windows ME have a Min/Max "swap file" setting for the hard drive? You recommended 300 MB. If so I'm not familiar with it.I defrag quite frequently. The reason that it takes so long is that the defrag program has to continually restart. It writes for so many squares then it starts again. I'm not running anything else (I don't think), the task bar only has the defrag program showing, to the right I have a speaker symbol and the SideWinder icon is deactivated. To the left of the task bar; Media player,Launch Outlook express,Launch Internet Explorer, Show Desktop, I don't think are running programs while I'm defragging. I have had some problems with Naji's scenery (Moudin farms, Fox 1, Shore point) they had been working ok. Reinstalled but that didn't work, so I unchecked the boxes in the scenery library. I'm not real clear on how the scenery should be numbered in the library except putting the most frequently used at the top.I also have Northwoods SAR scenery installed. The scenery works fine but one day I tried to land the Beaver off the departure end of 3 in the ocean near the island. The water was hard ! I could lower the wheels and take off without a splash. Don't know ??Thanks for any helpDaryll

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Hi Daryll,Thanks for the other information.A lot of people have had problems with FS and WinME, maybe that is the cause of your problems.>I think sometimes that I'm just catching up with the rest of the world in learning how a computer operates.The free hard disc space got down to about 4.5 GB.I need the scenery and Gerrish's treesDoes Windows ME have a Min/Max "swap file" setting for the hard drive? System ->PerformanceThen click on the Virtual memory tab.I would think ME has the setting in the same place.>The reason that it takes so long is that the defrag program has to continually restart

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Vulcan;I opened Task Manager. It showed Explorer, Loadqm, Rundll32, Systray, Swtrayv4, Wkufind.I could only highlight one program at a time. The only one I could "End Task", and still have control of the computer was Swtrayv4, which was the SideWinder program. I didn't try Explorer or Systray per your suggestion. When I tried to "End Task" on Loadqm, Rundll32 and Wkufind the computer froze and I had to Ctrl+Alt+Del to exit and restore the desk top. Defragging this time was faster, I could only do 98% of the disc though. Maybe tomarrow it will be different :) ThanksDaryll

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If you are having trouble with a defrag program continuously restarting, an easy solution is to run the defrag program in safe mode.Emptying the Recyling Bin could create a large continuous vacant area on the hard drive. That would form a nice place for an unfragmented swap file.Dispite the Operating system's recomendations to allow the swap file to change size automaticly, on many systems fragmentation of the swap file can be avoided by setting the minimum and maximum swap file sizes to the same value. That reportedly creates a permenent swap file that will not become fragmented as it expands and contracts.If you are setting up a new hard drive, you can create a partition which will have little activity other than swap file. The more active a partition is, the more fragmented it will tend to be. The exception to that fragmentation with activity would be a partition with a single active file, like the swap file, on it.Crew member at FlightAdventures.com

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Thanks for safe mode tip for defragging, I will try it next time.That was 2.5 GBs of hard drive space that was freed up at the push of a button. I never made the connection before about the recycling bin, the swap file and my computer performance. The scenery is running so much smoother now I don't believe it, even at 10-12 fps. Before I emptied the Recycle Bin, on initial start up of the Beaver, cycling through the views and full throttle take-off the engine sound popped and crackled as the graphics accelerated. I even resorted to turning down the sound acceleration and volume. The Beaver engine sound is now cured. I went into the FS2002 cfg and turned up the sound quality to =4. The slider is all the way up now in FS sound page. I loaded David Copley's FS2002 P-38H and then coupled it into my surround sound via the VCR and went flying. I don't need that vibrating chair but I can't find the cat now!Daryll

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