Windows 7 Beta Test Flight

[Guest swanrunner]

:( Well after pulling my hair out trying every option,suggestion, and tweaks out there to try and and get the MD11 to run properly without black screens and FSX freezing and crashing I was just about ready to park it in the hanger. I am running a second hard drive dedicated to flight simulation. I am not sure how many times I have deleted and reformatted the drive trying both Windows XP64 and Vista 64 and still no cure all. Today I decided to take the plunge and wiped the drive to install Win7 beta. Well after finishing and reloading all programs including my XGraphics and ASA I took off on the first test flight for about an hour and a half. Now I'm not ready to say I have found the magic bullet or that maybe MS finally got it right but that test flight was flawless. The frame rates are amazing as well as both the sound and graphics seem to be improved over Vista. I did numerous alt button to menu and back to VC as well as many view change cycles during the flight. This would have almost for certain caused a black screen,freeze up,app hang or crash under Vista. I am still not going to say problem solved as I will need to take some longer flights to be certain. Also as a side note I am running ASA in Sim connect 1 mode with the beta update patch and I get nice smooth wind changes with turbulence and thermal effects enabled. I will report back after some more tests over the weekend. Hopefully Windows 7 will bridge the gap to make FSX workable since FS11 is going to be a long way off. John

[Richard McDonald Woods 168]

John,Very interested in your experiences with Windows 7 to date.Although I don't expect to migrate from Vista until Win 7 release, I shall look forward to your testing reports eagerly.All the best,Regards, Richard

[pscharff 56]

Your report sounds really good.Did you run the test flight in DX9 or DX10-preview mode?Patric

[Guest diajohn2]

'I did the unthinkable. I upgraded my Vista SP1 installation to Windows 7(32). I mean everything not an empty disk. FSX with the PMDG MD11 works as well and maybe better than the Vista. It seems a bit smoother and I increased my Ultimate Traffic to 50%. It appears that the future for Windows is bright with Windows 7 using FSX. FSX is an excellent platform if you have decent hardware. My last upgrade was over six months ago and happy reigns. Now if I could learn how to handle the MD11 throttles a bit more effectively.ASUS 775 Motherboard with a slightly overclocked Q6600, 4 Gig of memory, an ATI 3870 video card and Creative XFi sound card.

[DaveKay 0]

Well I installed Windows 7 x64 and my first impressions is that it appears 'much' more stable and responsive than Vista (excluding security issues which I have not looked into yet). As far as graphic related problems using the 747x, I installed the latest Nvidia 'Vista' X64 drivers that work much better for me as opposed to the dedicated windows 7 preview drivers. To my surprise, I did not even have to switch to compatibility mode to do this and the splash screen also stated 'installing Windows 7 x64 drivers too!?...strange. I don't seem to have the issues that I experienced using Vista as far as 'blackout' screens and the other common graphic related problems I got before. However, you do need to be a bit conscious when installing some driver software for example CloneCD which nearly rendered my system inoperative, but managed to overcome this by removing the registry entries...not a pleasant task.. (something to do with windows 7 using different permissions I think) I'm still having issues with the Kneeboard in FSX showing black/blank entries maybe something to do with explorer v8....not sure about his... maybe changes the to html/xml css or whatever the format of the Kneeboard utilizes not being present etc.. at this time, but I can live without that! Oh and DX10/11 is still a bit flaky in FSX, but after all, the DX10 functionality in FSX was never finished, sorry I meant to say ''Preview'' LOL. The PMDG developers must be having a hard time working around all the short falls of FSX , but we'll carry on blaming you for every single problem!...sorry no offence PMDG, but it's just easier for us this way! In fact, the only issue I'm really having at the moment is what to do when the free license expires in August.. hope Microsoft somehow push this out before this date because in my opinion, I feel FSX runs a heck of a lot more stable and responsive than in Vista and XP.. Regards...Dave Kay.