If this has been asked/stated in the forum already - my apologies.I know already that clouds are a big FPS hit it FS9 and that it is a balance you have to find between textures and your system to find the 'sweet' spot.The question is why are the clouds such a drain on FPS?I would think the scenery, mesh, autogen would be a bigger drain then mere clouds in sky?Yes clouds can cover the whole sky in overcast conditions and yes cumulus clouds seem to be the most damaging to FPS but what is it about those textures that hurt FPS over 1024X1024 ground textures or buildings or mesh or anything else?I can be in the middle of a city center on the runway with buildings and autogen and detailed mesh around me and be getting high 20's to 30 fps but the second even a few cumulus clouds show up - bam I could be down to 10-15 fps.I speak not only for my system but I'm sure a lot of other peoples too but this thread is not about how big your system is - it's just a question to find out what is it about the clouds over anything else that is such a drain to the system?Thanks.Paul.

I am no computer "expert" but it seems rather obvious that more computer resources (mathmatical calculations) are required to create the cloud effect we see. And the more complex the cloud (3D as opposed to simple) the more resources are involved.

My understanding is that the FS9 3d clouds are implemented using sprites. Don't know what the performance implications of that are.scott s..

Was just wondering as even some of the 'replacement' cloud textures don't help terribly much.Some but not a lot. You'd think they'd be able to come up with a bitmap for clouds that mostly any system could handle.Well it looks like the hunt is still on or stick with what i have and try to find a balance between the bitmap and my system.Thanks.

In my opinion, for what it's worth, FS sees not much difference between clouds and AI traffic. They are both similar in that they are moving scenery. And in their toll on CPU resources.Whereas mesh, landclass, and ground textures are fixed in space, clouds and AI are dynamic. The processor must not only determine where they are, also where they are going.Just my 2% of a dollar.Joe

It's funny reading this thread as I was wondering the same thing myself the last few days. Here I have a system that is little over a year old with 1gig of ram on the video card and still FS9 clouds can cause a noticeable drop in performance. Things like this ring so loud as to what potentially could be problems or should I say how long it's going to take before a sim like FSX runs somewhat on the level FS9 runs today. I wrote about the memory limitation of a 32bit OS using 4gigs of ram. The OS only reports 3.25... Not to get side tracked but it is remarkable after all this time clouds still pose a performance issue on todays machines and we're six years out from when FS9 was first released. Makes you really think about that whole argument people put up that Flight Simulator was/is designed for future machines...

It's funny reading this thread as I was wondering the same thing myself the last few days. Here I have a system that is little over a year old with 1gig of ram on the video card and still FS9 clouds can cause a noticeable drop in performance. Things like this ring so loud as to what potentially could be problems or should I say how long it's going to take before a sim like FSX runs somewhat on the level FS9 runs today. I wrote about the memory limitation of a 32bit OS using 4gigs of ram. The OS only reports 3.25... Not to get side tracked but it is remarkable after all this time clouds still pose a performance issue on todays machines and we're six years out from when FS9 was first released. Makes you really think about that whole argument people put up that Flight Simulator was/is designed for future machines...

HelloOn todays hardware FSX runs a lot smoother than FS9, I know it is hard for some to let go of FS9 but today FSX is superior in every way.I am running both sims on this rather outdated C2Duo E6600 /8800 Ultra and FSX is just a smoother experience full stop.The OS matters not a bit, both sims never get near to using all the memory, and I only have 4 Gigs installed.There is no memory limitation, next time you run FS9 check how much Ram and Video memory you are actually using.If you manage to get the sim to use all your 3.25 gigs then there are other issues going on with your installation.This continual bashing of FSX , regarding poor performance vs FS9 is totally outdated A machine capable of running FSX well is now only a midrange rig.No wonder MS gave up on Flightsim when half of the user base turned their back on the product that they released.New sim = new hardware , This has always been the case and will be the same if Aerosoft build the next Sim.

This continual bashing of FSX , regarding poor performance vs FS9 is totally outdated A machine capable of running FSX well is now only a midrange rig.

With a default FSX and away from large airports I would guardedly agree. However install a complex airport such as EGLL, KJFK or KORD and an Ai package and I can easily bring my system to a crawl - i.e. less than 10fps. I don't call that 'running FSX well'. :( How many enthusiasts (us!) run a default FSX? Not many I bet. My current setup (see below) runs FS9 superbly and approaching FSDreamTeam's JFK in Concorde with Ai set at 100% still gives me frame rates in the mid-high 20s. That's as low as it ever goes. and usually it stays locked at 50fps. :( Taxiing around SimWings EGLL, FS9 takes it all in its stride. Flying has never been better. In 3-4 years when hardware has caught up with FSX to the same level as my 18-month-old system has with FS9 is the time when I may switch over.

Ray it's best not to go back and fourth on this issue. I'm just glade to see the vibrant freeware market for FS9 hasn't dissipated...

Hello,

Not to get side tracked but it is remarkable after all this time clouds still pose a performance issue on todays machines and we're six years out from when FS9 was first released. Makes you really think about that whole argument people put up that Flight Simulator was/is designed for future machines...

The machines are not allways the solution for the game run better.All is coming from the game engine and how the graphics are supported ... (DirectX ..etc..)Take two games very old (1998 era) like European Air War and Falcon4 from Microprose.Those games are still moded actually by two nerds group who have the right to use the code (they have legal code acces)What happen ?With all the mods and modifications those games are able to put the most high end computer on the knees :( (can run in certain conditions like a slideshow on powerfull PC)The problem is the game engine ... not able to exploit the new possibilities of the actual PC's.Regards.Gus.

Hello,The machines are not allways the solution for the game run better.All is coming from the game engine and how the graphics are supported ... (DirectX ..etc..)Take two games very old (1998 era) like European Air War and Falcon4 from Microprose.Those games are still moded actually by two nerds group who have the right to use the code (they have legal code acces)What happen ?With all the mods and modifications those games are able to put the most high end computer on the knees :( (can run in certain conditions like a slideshow on powerfull PC)The problem is the game engine ... not able to exploit the new possibilities of the actual PC's.Regards.Gus.

On the clouds, my guess is that the textures are mapped not on an object as autogen textures are but using the alpha channel with a cloud mask. Also transparency and clipping effects with other objects come into the picture.

Heres a nice link about clouds in fs9, fs2004.http://www.ofb.net/~niniane/clouds and http://interactive.usc.edu/members/jchen/a...ves/001479.html1 IntroductionClouds are an important aspect of many computer games, particularlyflight simulators. Our system extends texture splatting on particlesto model a dozen cloud types (e.g. stratus, cumulus congestus,cumulonimbus), an improvement over previous systems whichmodeled only one type of cumulus. We also achieve a 100x speedupfor scenes with dense cloud coverage.We created a new shading model which uses artist-driven controlsto approximate lighting. We also introduce a way to do cloudformation and dissipation with texture splatted particles.2 Cloud Modeling and RenderingWe extend the texture splatting on particles developed by [Harrisand Lastra 2001] to create a dozen visually different cloud types,such as nimbostratus, cumulonimbus, and altocumulus. We do thisby ”mixing-and-matching” 16 distinctive textures on the particles.We use foggy textures for stratus, textures with high-contrast shadingdetails for cumulus and cumulonimbus, and flat-bottomed texturesto produce the bottoms of cumulus clouds. We created a toolfor artists to control the cloud shape and automatically place particleswithin a 3-dimensional volume. As a computer game witha pool of artists, this utilizes our resources more effectively thancreating an entirely automated algorithm. Figures 1, 2, and 3 showexamples of our cloud types.Figure 1: Cumulus congestus at sunset.We achieve a 100x speed-up over [Harris and Lastra 2001], andare able to render overcast skies packed with clouds, a limitation oftheir system. Our technique is used in Microsoft Flight Simulator:A Century of Flight, which requires aggressive performance evenon low-end PCs. We render a dense set of clouds in 10 millisecondson a 733 MHz machine, which would have required over 1 secondfor Harris [2001]. To achieve the speedup, we use a ring of 8 impostors,an application of the technique introduced by [schaufler1995]. We render numerous distant clouds into a single impostor,That is just a part of the pdf below its a good read its by Niniane Wanghttp://www.ofb.net/~niniane/clouds/CloudsI...NinianeWang.pdf