I have ASA plus Hi Fi Sim's graphics program which generates the cloud textures. The program delivers solid visuals and does a reasonably good job with the annoying haze layer in FSX. My problem is that any kind of rough weather brings my system to its knees. I have a 920 i7 overclocked to 3.66 ghz, a Radeon 4800 HD card with about a gig of video memory, and 3 gigs of good system memory (running xp). My question - REX looks amazing, but how is it performance-wise? Can anyone comment on the performance hit who has used each? Thanks!Colin

Launch REX, create your weather theme and install it. Close REX. Launch ASA. Launch FSX . Instant happiness. "My problem is that any kind of rough weather brings my system to its knees."This combination, Colin, will not hit your frames to the degree that ASA/ASG did. While the REX interface is much more confusing than that of ASA, you can select the water resolution as well as the cirrus and the 3d cloud resolution: 512 x 512, 1024 x 1024, 2048 x 2048 and 4096 x 4096 - and this is a feature which (the older)ASA/ASG doesn't have. REX will give you much better performance, while giving you back much more realistic clouds and water at the same time.I always thought that HiFiSim clouds - although better than anything else - were not as realistic as I have seen when r/w flying, but the configuration, the interface, the reliability, the haze control - the weather engine itself - plus the phenomenal and consistent service and support - is fantastic! For many newer flyers, REX will do all they want, but a great number of us already own all of the HiFiSim products, and won't dump ASA any time soon. I expect REX will continue in their efforts to improve the product,but so will HiFiSim, and somewhere down the road folks may have the opportunity to make the choice of one or the other, just as we do with many aircraft.Competition is good, Donkey!

Hey Colin,Poor performance in heavy weather is primarily a result of your GPU not being able to handle the cumulous clouds. In ASA you can force 100% stratus clouds, which should give you a lot better performance in heavy weather. Of course, the weather won't look as heavy without lots of cumulous clouds, but in my opinion it still looks great with stratus, and the performance is a lot better.Regards,JusJ

I have REX updated to v2, have set the cloudresolutions at the second highest level. I have no drops in performance except in thunderstorms, with fps being 3-4 lower than normal. I have fps limited to 20, normally running at that rate.In REX v1, the fps drop was slightly more: 20 fps clear skies, 19 cloudy, 14 in thunderstorms.Since in Rex v2 the weathergenerator is running much more smoothly and is more correct than in v1, I now use it exclusively for weather performance and graphics.My rig: E8200 @ 2.67GHz, 2GB RAM, nVidia 8800GT 512MB, XFire music audio.

I have both. I have used ASX and ASA, and I really like ASA. I seem to get the impression if you are really into "weather" and want to tweak it with a high degree of specificity, than ASA is the way to go. I've compared to real-life weather and it seems to deliver the weather pretty accurately for the most part and loads real time weather quite well. But lately, I've been using the REX2.0 weather engine, and must say it is much much improved over the REX 1.0. It also seems to deliver believable weather and great textures with ability to apply certain textures for specific weather. I also seem to get a a nice 'hazy' condition when it is appropriate as well. One interesting thing, and maybe Tim can chime in on this, is when we had the SoCal fires (I live closeby) REX added a major haze to the area, perhaps picking up the real time weather conditions and trying to apply them to the current conditions. I was blown away by that (perhaps it was a coincidence.) REX weather seems to be of a 'set it and forget it' type, with many different options such as using the weather engine along with the weather avoidance menu. It also is well done and adds an interesting new dimension to the situation. The only downside I can see to REX weather, is when it loads in real-time weather (set at intervals of your choice) I get a bit of screen shuddering until the download is complete.To sum up, I use both for different situations. When I want to get down and dirty with all the weather specifics I use ASA, the rest of the time I use REX.

To the OP - it's apples & oranges again, based upon your description of the problem.It's not which is better - ASA or REX it's which is better on frames - ASA/XG or ASA/REX? In that case, I'd say ASA/REX gives less performance hit than ASA/XG.Vic

To the OP - it's apples & oranges again, based upon your description of the problem.It's not which is better - ASA or REX it's which is better on frames - ASA/XG or ASA/REX? In that case, I'd say ASA/REX gives less performance hit than ASA/XG.Vic

thanks all - appreciate your comments.

I have ASA plus Hi Fi Sim's graphics program which generates the cloud textures. The program delivers solid visuals and does a reasonably good job with the annoying haze layer in FSX. My problem is that any kind of rough weather brings my system to its knees. I have a 920 i7 overclocked to 3.66 ghz, a Radeon 4800 HD card with about a gig of video memory, and 3 gigs of good system memory (running xp). My question - REX looks amazing, but how is it performance-wise? Can anyone comment on the performance hit who has used each? Thanks!Colin

Colin with your ATI card go into your CCC panel go to your AA settings set that to box for filter 4x for samples make sure you have AA unchecked in FSX that should help with rough weather and get your frame rates back.