it still has lots of potential to grow, not age.

I'm not talking about 3rd party addons.The FSX "core platform" is based on 2006 tech and will never be updated and will continue to age. The X-Plane (and new Aerosoft sim) "core platform" can take full advantage of 2010 tech.

I'm not talking about 3rd party addons.The FSX "core platform" is based on 2006 tech and will never be updated and will continue to age. The X-Plane (and new Aerosoft sim) "core platform" can take full advantage of 2010 tech.

That is true-though the present xplane seems to me more like 2002 technology. I hope they skip a few years and we see something more up to date in 2010, including add ins.

That is true-though the present xplane seems to me more like 2002 technology. I hope they skip a few years and we see something more up to date in 2010, including add ins.

Why is X-Plane 2002 tech? It has better multi-core support than FSX and utilizes GPU shaders/normal maps just like FSX. X-Plane is already a more powerful development platform for aircraft than FSX. See BSupniks blog over at http://xplanescenery.blogspot.com/Additionally see the upcoming CRJ200 videos.

Why is X-Plane 2002 tech? It has better multi-core support than FSX and utilizes GPU shaders/normal maps just like FSX. X-Plane is already a more powerful development platform for aircraft than FSX. See BSupniks blog over at http://xplanescenery.blogspot.com/Additionally see the upcoming CRJ200 videos."I just judge by what I see and what features it has. I get better performance on fsx if I tone it down (quite a bit) to similar settings as xplane-and xplane's looks for the most part (terrain, autogen, clouds, aircraft and vc's) look like a cross between fs2000-and fs2002. Which brings the subject back to the op's initial post and what I would challenge anyone to do. Set up the two sims to display the same-then measure the performance-I'll bet the performance is better on fsx.Again, I like xplane-especially for its once in the air handling, systems failures, and a few other things. But in my opinion it is several years behind even what fsx has now. I'd like to see it catch up and surpass-I am rooting for that

Which brings the subject back to the op's initial post and what I would challenge anyone to do. Set up the two sims to display the same-then measure the performance-I'll bet the performance is better on fsx.

I always run FSX on minimal settings, no autogen, no ai, water 1x, low clouds etc. On my Q6600/8800GT/4GB Xplane is faster/more fluid.edit: but yes, FSX and XPlane both have their good/bad points.

ah forget it...what else do we expect to see in an XP forum.... *sigh*

ah forget it...what else do we expect to see in an XP forum.... *sigh*

So you agree then? That the core FSX platform is based on 2006 tech and is never going to be updated to take advantage of new hardware capabilities. All 3rd party add-ons are constrained by the core platform, this include things like complexity of aircraft models, support for hardware lights, weather depiction, cloud/cockpit shadows, water simulation (waves), autogen tile size etc.FSX is still a good core platform, I'm just saying it is never going to improve.

ah forget it...what else do we expect to see in an XP forum.... *sigh*

In truth I think this is one of the more moderate X-plane forums around, probably because it's part of a larger more broadly focussed site. And EVERYONE knows both sims are not without their problems. But one thing was made apparent to me, recently, that is that we are all being binary in our thinking. I don't understand why people don't use BOTH sims, why does it have to be one or the other. Why join a "camp" at all, both sims are around 30 bucks now, why not put them both on your pc and use them accordingly. Now I realize this is part of human nature, I mean how many FS9 vs FS10 debates are there, but as the great Gil Grissom said "A person is smart, but people are stupid." So with that I am going to break away from the group-think and try to get the best out of both of them going forwards.I am building a pc for my 12 year old cousin(who is totally naive about simming, but interested in learning), I am going to install and optimize Xplane and FSX just to see which one he favors and why.

In truth I think this is one of the more moderate X-plane forums around, probably because it's part of a larger more broadly focussed site. And EVERYONE knows both sims are not without their problems. But one thing was made apparent to me, recently, that is that we are all being binary in our thinking. I don't understand why people don't use BOTH sims, why does it have to be one or the other. Why join a "camp" at all, both sims are around 30 bucks now, why not put them both on your pc and use them accordingly. Now I realize this is part of human nature, I mean how many FS9 vs FS10 debates are there, but as the great Gil Grissom said "A person is smart, but people are stupid." So with that I am going to break away from the group-think and try to get the best out of both of them going forwards.I am building a pc for my 12 year old cousin(who is totally naive about simming, but interested in learning), I am going to install and optimize Xplane and FSX just to see which one he favors and why.

I agree! Never could understand why one sim has to win over another. Much of it comes down to how we use a sim-which is very different for everyone.My interest in this thread is two things you hear as mantra's about xplane: superior performance and superior flight models. I'll say again-if you set up fsx just like xplane you will probably find fsx runs better..at least that is my experience on two different rigs. What the future holds who knows? I hope Mathew is right!

I give Ping Pong the AVSIM award for one of the best posts I've seen in a long time.

All 3rd party add-ons are constrained by the core platform, this include things like complexity of aircraft models, support for hardware lights, weather depiction, cloud/cockpit shadows, water simulation (waves), autogen tile size etc.FSX is still a good core platform, I'm just saying it is never going to improve.

"Brilliant" 3rd party designer/programmers have developed work arounds to the core engine for years.............with much success. This has been well known around the Microsoft Flight Sim community. In fact, a lot of these vendors were always invited by Microsoft for beta testing of new versions. At least they'd get an idea of what changes they were in for. But never the less, the core product isn't an unyielding block of reinforced concrete.L.Adamson

Interesting that so many major serious companies are choosing esp for their platform with it being so "stuck"...

I actually heard some rumors going around that before ACES was canned, they got ESP to support SLI and was running much better than FSX. I also heard rumors that these things were going to be transfered in to FS11.

Set your visibility to 20 miles which is xplane's maximum

It's 25 (statute) miles actually. Which is still way to low anywhere near mountains, and is one of the biggest drawbacks of X-Plane's scenery system, in my opinion.

Then go to your settings menu-set your level of detail to the lowest since you won't be seeing more than 20 miles

The lowest LOD radius is much less then 20 miles in FSX, and X-Plane doesn't have any similar resolution-degrading mechanism.

your texture resolution to a simlar one to xplane(low resolution)

X-Plane supports arbitrarily high terrain texture resolutions. I don't have a number for the default scenery (it probably varies anyway because of the free-form terrain mesh), but I think it isn't considerably lower than FSX's, if at all. And besides, The Blurries are completely unknown to X-Plane.

autogen to a setting which matches your xplane

Which would mean off the scale to the right. Yes, at higher object density settings, X-Plane has way more autogen¹ then FSX. Plus, X-Plane's 'autogen' trees have next to no impact on performance (at least on my system).

Set your water to an equiv. setting you have in xplane.

X-Plane uses water shaders, too. But they somehow manage to be less of a performance hog while still looking better then FSX's most of the time.But you have a fair point nonetheless, which can also be illustrated the other way round: Set all of X-Plane's rendering options to the maximum, as so many users seem to think is absolutely necessary in FSX, and watch it crawl. But X-Plane is still usually smoother than FSX, in my humble opinion, because the latter often suffers from micro stutters and/or excessive frame rate volatility.Judith-----¹ X-Plane's scenery developer likes to call it 'algogen' instead, because X-Plane actually doesn't have any autogen at all, in the sense of scenery objects the sim creates on the fly. What looks like autogen in X-Plane is just ordinary, pre-compiled static scenery.

It's 25 (statute) miles actually. Which is still way to low anywhere near mountains, and is one of the biggest drawbacks of X-Plane's scenery system, in my opinion.The lowest LOD radius is much less then 20 miles in FSX, and X-Plane doesn't have any similar resolution-degrading mechanism.X-Plane supports arbitrarily high terrain texture resolutions. I don't have a number for the default scenery (it probably varies anyway because of the free-form terrain mesh), but I think it isn't considerably lower than FSX's, if at all. And besides, The Blurries are completely unknown to X-Plane.Which would mean off the scale to the right. Yes, at higher object density settings, X-Plane has way more autogen¹ then FSX. Plus, X-Plane's 'autogen' trees have next to no impact on performance (at least on my system).X-Plane uses water shaders, too. But they somehow manage to be less of a performance hog while still looking better then FSX's most of the time.But you have a fair point nonetheless, which can also be illustrated the other way round: Set all of X-Plane's rendering options to the maximum, as so many users seem to think is absolutely necessary in FSX, and watch it crawl. But X-Plane is still usually smoother than FSX, in my humble opinion, because the latter often suffers from micro stutters and/or excessive frame rate volatility.Judith-----¹ X-Plane's scenery developer likes to call it 'algogen' instead, because X-Plane actually doesn't have any autogen at all, in the sense of scenery objects the sim creates on the fly. What looks like autogen in X-Plane is just ordinary, pre-compiled static scenery.

Judith-I have my xplane settings pretty much on default-and I get the message that it is reducing visibility to less due to rendering settings being too high in almost every situation. If I set things higher than the defaults like autogen-not only do I the message and fog but a crash. This is of course to maintain 20 fps.I have almost all my fsx settings to the right-and run with no problem 30-50 fps normal.As far as... "The lowest LOD radius is much less then 20 miles in FSX, and X-Plane doesn't have any similar resolution-degrading mechanism." Since you can't see further in xplane than 25 miles by your count-of course xplane wouldn't need such a degrading mechanism-it is built in by limiting the visibility! Both these situations happened on my old dual core, and now on my present i7 920. I get no blurries in fsx-but the default terrain in xplane sure looks blurry and ragged in compare-especially at lower levels that I fly at. The textures of xplane may support high res-but what is displayed is certainly blocky and lower res than fsx's defaults-more like what the older versions of fs displayed. Photoscenery likewise in compare.I agree the water looks better in xplane, likewise the trees and general coloring of the sim. Performance wise though-I have to give it to fsx...and I still maintain if you set the sims up in as similar fashion as you can, fsx will outperform xplane and give you many more features.

Judith-I have my xplane settings pretty much on default-and I get the message that it is reducing visibility to less due to rendering settings being too high in almost every situation. If I set things higher than the defaults like autogen-not only do I the message and fog but a crash. This is of course to maintain 20 fps.I have almost all my fsx settings to the right-and run with no problem 30-50 fps normal.As far as... "The lowest LOD radius is much less then 20 miles in FSX, and X-Plane doesn't have any similar resolution-degrading mechanism." Since you can't see further in xplane than 25 miles by your count-of course xplane wouldn't need such a degrading mechanism-it is built in by limiting the visibility! Both these situations happened on my old dual core, and now on my present i7 920. I get no blurries in fsx-but the default terrain in xplane sure looks blurry and ragged in compare-especially at lower levels that I fly at. The textures of xplane may support high res-but what is displayed is certainly blocky and lower res than fsx's defaults-more like what the older versions of fs displayed. Photoscenery likewise in compare.I agree the water looks better in xplane, likewise the trees and general coloring of the sim. Performance wise though-I have to give it to fsx...and I still maintain if you set the sims up in as similar fashion as you can, fsx will outperform xplane and give you many more features.

Geofa, you should not be seeing any messages about reducing rendering options with the processor you have. I assume you use a decent Nvidia card? I run the highest res textures, complete water level, and mid-level selections for the rest of the options and I am between 40-60 fps. Maybe try to tone down the objects and roads a bit? X-Plane renders far more autogen than FSX does, so lower settings will provide more bang for your buck. Cranking sliders to the limit are not the best true comparison within each sim. I prefer a balance of what runs well while still looking good, and I can get that in X-Plane without cranking things up. Perhaps your issues are driver-related or something. As I have said before, I own both sims and fluidity is not even a close contest on my Q9550/GTX260. X-Plane easily wins without blurries, hiccups, and no frame drop around downloaded/installed scenery. Plus, there are some wonderful addons that should be out in the next couple months that might encourage you to split time with your simulators!I sure hope this does not present me as an X-Plane a really excited user or anything. I am new to the sim, honestly. I'm still way more comfortable with the MSFS series, but I am learning to really love X-Plane.Thanks,Scott