Congratulations, it only took you $2200 to get there! I doubt the topic starter and most of these people have a PC to that caliber, or have the ability to dump $2200 on a new PC! No need to call people 'a really excited user' that prefer FS9 over FSX, we've all purchased it, found out how it runs on our systems, and based our choices off of that. You can't sit there and tell me that FS9 with maximum sliders won't look better than FSX with sliders at either default or whatever that same system can handle.

PLEASE show me where the OP said anything about price. PLEASE.PLEASE tell me where I said FS9 with a thousand dollars of addons wouldn't look better than a copy of FSX RTM.PLEASE tell me where I said FSX wouldn't take a good computer with a properly configured configuration file.You are coming up with things out of thin air!

I did answer the OP original question in my first reply right after yours, the answer to that specific question is no, but a qualified no, in terms of overall simming experience I personally enjoy FS9 more than FSX(and so do alot of the others who chimed in on this thread).Anyhoo I actually have a triple monitor setup with 3 22" monitors, and yes FSX looks great but the higher resolution is what killed my framerates. Now in FS9 I have frames consistenly above 30(how much above I don't know) with a widescreen 5040 x 1050 desktop.

PLEASE show me where the OP said anything about price. PLEASE.PLEASE tell me where I said FS9 with a thousand dollars of addons wouldn't look better than a copy of FSX RTM.PLEASE tell me where I said FSX wouldn't take a good computer with a properly configured configuration file.You are coming up with things out of thin air!

I don't need to find these things, you're forgetting to mention them on purpose, giving people the false hope that they can go out and get FSX, expect it to run the same and look better - while also replying to them rather harshly. I said nothing about addons for FS9, you must have come up with that on your own.

I don't need to find these things, you're forgetting to mention them on purpose, giving people the false hope that they can go out and get FSX, expect it to run the same and look better - while also replying to them rather harshly.

No, I answered the original poster's actual question. "So, I'm wondering if I should continue upgrading it so it's comparable to FSX. Do you think this is possible?"And so far only two people (I think) have actually answered his question! TWO. Guess what, both answers were "NO".Nowhere did he mention his computer specs, money, or anything that you guys are bringing up. NOWHERE. The OP needs to chime back in and respecify his question if he wants something else answered.

I said nothing about addons for FS9, you must have come up with that on your own.

Point taken, woops.

I'm not giving up entirely on FSX, but I am going to upgrade FS9. Based on the comments so far, it seems like Active Sky, Ultimate Terrain, FS Elemental, and Flight1 Ground Environment are programs I should consider. Any other suggestions?Dell XPSCore 2 Duo8800GT2GBThanks,Paul

Dell XPSCore 2 Duo8800GT2GBThanks,Paul

Yay, specs! FS9 would be better for you with your computer. (SHOCK, HORROR, I actually recommended FS9, like I said I would)Definitely get Active Sky. I think it is one of the best addons anyone could ever spend their money on.

No, I answered the original poster's actual question. "So, I'm wondering if I should continue upgrading it so it's comparable to FSX. Do you think this is possible?"And so far only two people (I think) have actually answered his question! TWO. Guess what, both answers were "NO".Nowhere did he mention his computer specs, money, or anything that you guys are bringing up. NOWHERE. The OP needs to chime back in and respecify his question if he wants something else answered.Point taken, woops.

I guess the answer to that question depends on what is meant by "comparable." You seem to assume that it means "looks as good as." I take it to mean "looks as good as can be expected given its a 6 year old piece of software." I mean lets be realistic here - nobody should expect FS9 to look as good as FSX running on a system like yours. But I'd suspect that the two sims would look much much closer visually on my $800 Dell. The fact is though, wehter or not it can be made to look as good as (and I should point out that looks aren't necessarily the only meaningful parameter here) FSX, FS9 can be made to look very very good in its own right...

Visual appeal is important, but more important to me is frame rate. I'm creating a lot of flight sim videos and frame-skipping is sure to ruin any visually stunning scenery, etc.Paul

I'd suggest Triple head 2 go, it really has enhanced my immersion factor. And if you Combine it with most of the addons mentioned in this thread, Fs9 will look pretty darn good!

Visual appeal is important, but more important to me is frame rate. I'm creating a lot of flight sim videos and frame-skipping is sure to ruin any visually stunning scenery, etc.Paul

Have you got a link to any of your vids, im always interested to see what fellow simmers have there fs looking like!Chris

Sorry, Chris. All of the videos I (we) create are work-related, so they're not published on YouTube or other media. I'm a project manager for the AOPA Air Safety Foundation. We've been using FSX in some of our free online courses to re-create accidents and runway incursions, but we're going to use it a lot more now and in the future. My recent (and failed) attempts to install DBS Walk and Follow and REX on FSX prompted me to post this thread. (Had no problems installing WAF on FS9.)If you're not familiar with ASF, check us out at www.asf.org.Thanks.Oh, and one more thing... most of the FS videos we create are compressed and viewed in a fairly small screen, so that's why I'd prefer smooth performance over perfected scenery...thus the thread.

No, I answered the original poster's actual question. "So, I'm wondering if I should continue upgrading it so it's comparable to FSX. Do you think this is possible?"And so far only two people (I think) have actually answered his question! TWO. Guess what, both answers were "NO".Nowhere did he mention his computer specs, money, or anything that you guys are bringing up. NOWHERE. The OP needs to chime back in and respecify his question if he wants something else answered.Point taken, woops.

Fair enough

My system was about 2200 dollars new, with everything down to the the monitor, gaming mouse, keyboard, power strip, and ethernet cable. Specs are Q9550 @ 3.4 (1600 FSB), 8 GB DDR2 1066, ASUS Rampage Formula X48 mobo, EVGA GTX280 stock speeds, X-Fi titanium fatal1ty sound card, 2 WD Caviar black 640 GB hard drives, 1 160 GB WD hard drive for storage and backup, Corsair 750TX power supply, antec 900 case, and Xigmatek S1283 CPU cooler. Monitor is a Samsung T220 at 1680 x 1050 x 32. OS is Vista Ultimate 64 bit SP2 and occasionally a flavor of linux. Also in the mix is a pair of hundred dollar speakers and Track IR4 with track clip.I should make a note, prices have come down quite a bit since I built my computer. You could build an i7 tower for under a thousand dollars if you do it right! NOWHERE did I say FSX was cheap.As for "quality" addons. I consider all the ultimate terrain series, all the orbx regions, REX, GEX usa/canada, FSgenesis USA mesh, and freeware mesh for the rest of the world to be "quality". Most of the time I am running Active Sky X and more recently, Ultimate Traffic 2 when not on multiplayer (75% commercial, 25% GA). I own most native FSX addon aircraft, including all the big sims (except ariane...).Most of my graphics settings are maxed out. The ones that aren't are completely off- like the in-game bloom, self shadowing (which looks stupid due to no AA), lens flare (which I think looks stupid too), and all default traffic (boats, planes, cars- not important to me, this is a flying sim). I use the bloom DLL that was released a few months ago. I have 8xQ AA and 8X AF enabled in nhancer. If I set either of those higher, I notice no visual difference. I guess it is worth mentioning I use Direct X 9. The cfg tweaks I use are what nickn suggests in his popular guide, except for the autogen trees value, which I manually set lower. I value my building count much more than the horribly out of proportion trees in MSFS. I don't have any exact values because I'm on my little EEE right now.As for traffic, I'm not going to argue there. I don't fly often with traffic as I spend about 95% of my time on multiplayer. When I do use traffic, it is with Ultimate Traffic 2. Depending on the plane I am in, WITH UT2 ENABLED, my FPS fluctuates between 25 and my locked value of 36. However, in multiplayer, even with 5 other planes in close proximity (and on my screen), my FPS stays pegged at 36.I don't believe that you have better immersion than me, but maybe different immersion. The only thing you have better is more traffic, which I don't care about anyways because I'm always on multiplayer. If you spend ALL your time taxiing at an addon version of KJFK with 100% traffic, your experience might be marginally better than mine. But as soon as you takeoff, everything changes.Speak for yourself. 36 FPS solid in downtown San Francisco isn't crap. Not by a long shot. Some of you guys are bragging you have FS9 locked at 30...IMHO, THAT is crap.Please, show me or explain to me how 36 FPS (silky smooth with FSX, absolutely ZERO stutters) in some pretty respected addons in one of the larger metropolitan areas on Earth is crap. If you'd like, we can compare screenshots of the SFO bay area... ;) Please, enlighten me.Now I fully realize about 90% of you guys who read this will completely ignore what I say and just stick to your OPINIONS about FSX's performance (see a really excited user). Wait, probably more like 98% of you. Maybe that last 2% will see the light, or at least read what I said.

"a really excited user"?! Dude, please refer back to nearly every post you've ever made. Let's not attack those and their opinions without first perfecting ourselves. :( That being said, William, I only wish I had that rig of yours! :( I kinda answered the original question, I'll make it more clear. NO, but damn close, less expensive, and much smoother! :(

After trying FSX and liking a few things and hating others, I decided to try to add the things I liked to FS9. Here's what I did:1. Freeware Recorder module. Allows you to save preset views of the interior and exterior of aircraft. Works like a charm and much easier to manipulate.2. Already had Ultimate Terrain and Flight Environment3. Freeware 76m worldwide mesh4. Carenado 172 to replace default5. Already had Active CameraA couple of things I haven't been able to do and probably won't are multiple visibility layers and a really nice CRJ (have Wilco). I have Ground Environment but was never really disappointed with the default. To me FSX only looks good maxed out. Otherwise I find it not as enjoyable as FS9. So I have FS9.8 and am very happy.Cheers

OK, I didn't see enough comments about the killer FS9 screen shot that I posted. Well, I think it's killer at least. So I'm thinking it's because we are limited in the size of the files we can post. I went ahead and posted a slightly higher resolution file to rapid share.My belief is that after seeing this screenshot, all FSX users will abandon their pride and come flocking back to FS9! It's a nice shot at 1920x1200 and it's about 1mb in case you want to see it. I think it dispels the idea that FS9 is not of the same quality as FSX...but that's one reporters opinion :)http://rapidshare.com/files/259284752/LFOY..._Large.zip.htmlMarkOh, if the link goes dead then let me know...I don't have an account with rapid share and didn't really want them to have my email address. That means the first 10 people will get to see it :)