Was you VISTA/W7 installation...totally complete?!?

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

Post EDIT: Was YOUR VISTA...., not 'you', lol! Thanks.---------------------------------------------------------------------------Hello all,Since I have my complete FS9 installation on my Pentium 4 system, and when needing to use that computer, I still find myself firing it up, I began to believe that when out of curiosity for FS9 performance on my i7-975 Dell 730x rig, and after having installed FS9 on my Vista Ultimate 64bit/i7-975 combo AND NOT BEING TOO IMPRESSED with the GRAPHICS (not the FPS---locked down to a constant 60 FPS!), I stopped using it.Ok, that being said...I wondered why on my XP Pro 32 bit/Pentium 4 3.4 GHz/Radeon 1950 Pro, the GRAPHICS looked MUCH BETTER?!?!?!?!?, and there was more A.I. action on the ground, at the terminals, and in the sky in flights around me...than had been on the SAME installation and use of all programs on my Dell 730x/i7-975/GTX 285 rig. I had a hunch...I still had my FS9 install on my 730x...but was not using it. I then went to my P4, taking my 1TB portable hard drive..and downloaded onto it, the ENTIRE FS9 folder. Coming back to my 730x, I copied the contents of the downloaded folder off of my portable drive into the 730x FS9 folder. Went for a coffee or three...lol.Came back to find it was done. I then fired up FS9 on my 730x...and was ASTOUNDED to see great graphics, tight display, everything at least 150 percent better in display, A.I up the ying-yang, all my Bird's Eye View textures showing off VERY NICELY on the GTX285'er. This is what I thought I should have seen on my initial install of FS9 and all my add-on programs when having installed DIRECTLY onto the 730x. I did not GET this current display, and performance from my add-ons when having done so.So.......this begs the question, (and yes..I did it all right and quite methodical....) does VISTA somehow NOT properly run the install engine on the FS9 install CD's? Yes..it installed...but did the textures PROPERLY install? Doesn't appear to. Also, in having installed my B.E.V's directly onto the Vista 64 run system, THEY certainly did not properly install, but the textures and display after having 'seemingly' done so, and rebooting, defragging, etc.With the performance and the GREAT GRAPHICS and stellar performance of my add-on's as a result of TRASNFERRING from an XP Pro 32 bit installation of FS9 by means of copying the WHOLE FS9 folder of that computer, then onto the 730x/Vista 64 bit, I will indeed now run both FS9 and FSX on the i7-975/GTX285 rig.For those that have installed and are running FS9 and their add-ons on a VISTA or W7 platform, just my recommendation that you TRY transferring the whole FS9 folder of your older XP(whatever) platform and OVERWRITE all files on your VISTA and/or W7 FS9 folder and check out if you also find a much more detailed and better performance of all associated add-on's! VISTA/W7 might not PROPERLY install programs that were created for usage under W98/XP, EVEN IF YOU CAN USE THE VISTA 'run as' mode. This is what I found out, and wanted to pass on my experience.FS9 running on a VISTA 64/i7-975/GTX285 platform AFTER HAVING BEEN PORTED OVER FROM AN XP PRO installation FS9 folder....SIMPLY ROCKS! There is an amazing difference...and you might want to check it out for yourself. In closing, you might JUST not have a full and complete install of FS9 on your VISTA/W7 system, where you thought...you had. It wasn't that in my case.Cheers!Mitch

[scott967 62]

Wouldn't it make more sense to do a file-by-file compare of the fs9 folders first to see if there are any file deltas, before doing a copy/overwrite? I like a utility named "Beyond Compare 2". I also have something called "ExamDiff". Then we would know if any files were different. Otherwise, there might be some difference at the file system level, though can't see how that would have the effect you describe except perhaps from file fragmentation, but I take it at face value that it is there.scott s..

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

Wouldn't it make more sense to do a file-by-file compare of the fs9 folders first to see if there are any file deltas, before doing a copy/overwrite? I like a utility named "Beyond Compare 2". I also have something called "ExamDiff". Then we would know if any files were different. Otherwise, there might be some difference at the file system level, though can't see how that would have the effect you describe except perhaps from file fragmentation, but I take it at face value that it is there.scott s..

Who knows, Scott? When having installed FS9 and add-ons via the 730x...and then running FS9, I was totally underwhelmed, to say the least! Then as you read, I ported over the entire XP Pro-driven FS9 folder install, overwrote on the 730x...and a totally different sim experience came off of it. It really now makes me wonder if there could be subtle file corruption upon installs with O.S.'s that were not the prime O.S. when a particular program was published. Something else to ponder, I guess,lol!Cheers!Mitch

[scott967 62]

I guess the engineer in me wants to know how this subtle file corruption could occur. If it occurs, my guess would be it would be related to either a) somehow the physical storage of the file is changed in such a way it makes a difference, or b ) (and this should obviously be related) somehow the file system understanding of the file makes a difference. Since part of the function of the file system is to keep track of the physical storage of a file and make it appear as a logical string of binary data to the OS and any program, it seems the most likely the place to look. After all, the file system has greatly grown in complexity since the days of FAT when the file system did little more than keep track of folder and filenames, and have a string of disk sector IDs representing the file layout on disk.scott s..