For anyone following this thread, I have the following update:In the light of no further input from GaryGb, and NickN's info about the upper value limit, I have not persued Gary's suggestions.I have however ascertained that using higher values of the LOD radius setting does not help in this circumstance. Using only the TBM400 setting, Leaving LOD radius at 4.5 and no other tweaks as a baseline, I found that increasing the LOD radius setting did not give any advantage in crispness. The TBM400 setting seems to ensure that textures are rendered at max res as far out as you need. Setting LOD radius higher in this circumstance just adds to the load times ( as you would expect ) to no discernable benefit.What I would like to establish now is wether the FFTF entry is of any use and if so what setting. And wether using the bufferpools entry and or the affinity mask entry has any good effect as well. While this would be good, I have to say, that just using only the TBM value at 400 seems to be all you need for great performance using photoscenery without autogen. With this and my set up as below, I am getting pretty good frame rates ( 30 - 60 ) depending on the aircraft I am flying, and supervast view switching and zooming. Plus of course lovely crisp in focus textures. I would like to know more about how FSX uses the different threads and loads textures when rendering photoscenery, but this information seems pretty difficult to uncover!! Nick, when you say that "photoscenery is not textures" can you explain? I notice that most photscenery files are .bgl files and that there are often seperate folders for texture files. In fact, many packages recently downloaded from Bluesky scenery do not have any texture files with them, just .bgl files. Does Photoscenery not really use textures much, and is that why it is able to take avantage of the higher TBM setting without bringing FSX to its knees? Anyway, I will keep on tweaking and report back.Cheers, Mark

For anyone following this thread, I have the following update:In the light of no further input from GaryGb, and NickN's info about the upper value limit, I have not persued Gary's suggestions.I have however ascertained that using higher values of the LOD radius setting does not help in this circumstance. Using only the TBM400 setting, Leaving LOD radius at 4.5 and no other tweaks as a baseline, I found that increasing the LOD radius setting did not give any advantage in crispness. The TBM400 setting seems to ensure that textures are rendered at max res as far out as you need. Setting LOD radius higher in this circumstance just adds to the load times ( as you would expect ) to no discernable benefit.What I would like to establish now is wether the FFTF entry is of any use and if so what setting. And wether using the bufferpools entry and or the affinity mask entry has any good effect as well. While this would be good, I have to say, that just using only the TBM value at 400 seems to be all you need for great performance using photoscenery without autogen. With this and my set up as below, I am getting pretty good frame rates ( 30 - 60 ) depending on the aircraft I am flying, and supervast view switching and zooming. Plus of course lovely crisp in focus textures. I would like to know more about how FSX uses the different threads and loads textures when rendering photoscenery, but this information seems pretty difficult to uncover!! Nick, when you say that "photoscenery is not textures" can you explain? I notice that most photscenery files are .bgl files and that there are often seperate folders for texture files. In fact, many packages recently downloaded from Bluesky scenery do not have any texture files with them, just .bgl files. Does Photoscenery not really use textures much, and is that why it is able to take avantage of the higher TBM setting without bringing FSX to its knees? Anyway, I will keep on tweaking and report back.Cheers, Mark

So after reading all of this most which I do not understand what is the concensus? I have my TBM set at 70 and max load set at 4096 anything else recommended to change or try up or down? THanks

Hi Hardwater, are you using photoscenery and not using autogen? This is most important, as all of the discussion relates purely to that and NOT the normal sceneries and textures within FSX.

Hi Mark:Thanks for your feedback to the extent you were willing to test thus far regarding FSX.Cfg parameter impact on photoreal scenery performance. :( Indeed it can be a good idea to design a test scenario using certain variables, especially if one of the variables (TBM) is hypothetically regarded and used (ex: a value of "400") as a "fixed" variable reasonably unlikely to result in a change of results when other variables interact.I will be interested to see what your further testing reveals, and I am certainly OK with pursuing testing some of my hypotheses on hardware such as you have through another venue, if you presently prefer to focus on a different test scenario than that I had suggested (which although speculative, was based on extrapolation of initial results from other testing scenarios on different hardware platforms). B) BTW: The FSX SDK BGL file format for photoreal imagery now contains the processed aerial photo tiles along with geographic placement and other instructions in a specially compressed and encoded (encrypted?) form as a quad matrix, so one may only see a larger BGL in the add-on package \Scenery folder, and some associated *.AGN (autogen annotations) in the add-on package \Texture folder.In the FS9 SDK BGL file format for photoreal imagery tiles will be seen as a smaller BGL file containing geographic placement and other instructions in the add-on package \Scenery folder.*.BMP files in the add-on package \Texture folder are processed aerial photos as 256 x 256 pixel "bitmaps" (dare I say Textures?) in LOD13/QMID 15 quad tiles.I believe both FS9 and FSX photoreal imagery are properly referred to as a form of "Custom Land Class", and the numeric file name prefix strings used for FS9 " *.BMP " and " *.AGN " files, as well as the file name for FSX " *an.AGN " files, specifies the unique single location in the FS world that those photoreal tiles can be placed.Be aware that some of the sceneries you have mentioned by Gottfried Razek ( aka BlueSky sceneries) may actually be in FS9 format... but still displayable and desirable to use in FSX (he does really nice work!) B) I applaud your willingness to seek out new possibilities through experimentation and testing in an effort to gain new insights which might help us all to maximize enjoyment of our FS experience. :( Many of the innovations that have made computers, software and FS itself possible (with scenery add-ons that work around commonly assumed limitations) were only achieved by "thinking outside the box".I shall look forward to seeing what further insights your testing may bring to us all in the FS community. :( Best Regards,GaryGB

FS9 photoscenery used LOD13 textures in DXT1 + alpha format with mipmaps. In FSX, it doesn't appear mipmaps are used. Instead when the bgl is created using the resample tool the range of LOD to include is set as an input parameter. It appears that the terrain engine requests a given LOD value within the LOD radius, and if not available in the photoscenery bgl the landclass texture tile is used. FSX also has the ability to blendmask the photoscenery together with the landclass texture, you so potentially have that processing to do as well.scott s..

Hi Gary, thanks for the information regarding the files and formats. I would be perhaps a little more willing to indulge your suggestions if you would just explain a little more. You sound like you know what you are talking about, yet suggest things that other very knowledgeable people think are completely pointless. I am all for a bit of experimentation, as you say, thinking outside the box is what leads to interesting discoveries. But all the same , a little more candour would be appreciated. Again, why are you suggesting thesse things to me? can you not test them yourself? And what are your hypotheses based on? Feel free to continue this discussion by pm if you wish.....Tonioght I am going to try out "Rise of Flight" !!!!cheers, Mark

FS9 photoscenery used LOD13 textures in DXT1 + alpha format with mipmaps. In FSX, it doesn't appear mipmaps are used. Instead when the bgl is created using the resample tool the range of LOD to include is set as an input parameter. It appears that the terrain engine requests a given LOD value within the LOD radius, and if not available in the photoscenery bgl the landclass texture tile is used. FSX also has the ability to blendmask the photoscenery together with the landclass texture, you so potentially have that processing to do as well.scott s..

Hi Scott, again, thx for your input. Unfortunately, a lot of it went over my head. How does what you say relate to my enquiries? Can you break it down a bit more so a simple soul like me can understand? Sorry but I have little experience of the inner workings of the file structure and metholody of FSX terrain and scenery. Although , willing to learn. However, that reply is pitched a level or so above my current understanding of how this all works!!If no mipmaps are used, why use the "MipBias=6" hook in the .cfg file ?What determines the Lod value requested by the engine? The LOD radius setting? And What is the difference between landclass scenery and photoscenery and how do they work together?Do varying methods of production of photoscenery produce scenery with differing characteristics performance wise and how can you tell them apart if this is so?cheers, Mark

It's my understanding that 'FIBER_FRAME_TIME_FRACTION' has no effect on FSX. I tried 0.10 to 0.99 and and there is no noticable change ... for my hardware anyway.W7 xx64, i7 965, 6GB memory and a GTX295

It's my understanding that 'FIBER_FRAME_TIME_FRACTION' has no effect on FSX. I tried 0.10 to 0.99 and and there is no noticable change ... for my hardware anyway.W7 xx64, i7 965, 6GB memory and a GTX295

Tried flying north out of KSEA at 2000 feet with FFTF=0.99 and 0.03First case, nice sharp texture tiles in front of the airplane.Second, blurry tiles... So, at least on my system, there is a difference.WinXP32, Q6600, 4 GB memory, and a 9600GT.

It's my understanding that 'FIBER_FRAME_TIME_FRACTION' has no effect on FSX. I tried 0.10 to 0.99 and and there is no noticable change ... for my hardware anyway.W7 xx64, i7 965, 6GB memory and a GTX295

I am guessing but it may be because you have such a fast system. I can say for a fact that this cfg entry is valid.RegardsBob