R. Martin, your problem is most certainly AI Smooth and NOT FSUIPC. FSUIPC is and has been running on millions of machines without issue. I have also AI smooth and have stopped using it. I can't point to it definitively as a "problem causer" but I've had fewer since not running it. Put your FSUIPC.dll back in, as it is not causing any of your problems, I'm 99.9999999% sure. If you experience problems with the FSUIPC.dll back in and set up, let us know...I doubt it will happen but FS9 has made me humble before! :(

R. Martin, your problem is most certainly AI Smooth and NOT FSUIPC. FSUIPC is and has been running on millions of machines without issue. I have also AI smooth and have stopped using it. I can't point to it definitively as a "problem causer" but I've had fewer since not running it. Put your FSUIPC.dll back in, as it is not causing any of your problems, I'm 99.9999999% sure. If you experience problems with the FSUIPC.dll back in and set up, let us know...I doubt it will happen but FS9 has made me humble before! :(

Hi thereI agree with you with 99.999 percent certainty. I have never had a problem with FSUIPC.I have been simming since late 2002.I have been using FSUIPC since early or mid 2003.? I always loved FSUIPC and as I said, I was only testing. What I forgot to mention, and I apologize, when I ran my computer, during testing with FSUIPC and NO AI Smooth, I had no problems in six hours of flight time with several take off and landings.The second I dropped in AI Smooth, it started to slew my computer until it locked up.This is my observation after hours, and I do mean hours, of testing.I am not bashing FSUIPC or AI Smooth.But, I am also 99.999 percent sure AI Smooth was the problem.I do want it made clear I have had no problem with FSUIPC in eight years of use, or since it came out, that I am aware of.

Thanks Victor,Perhaps I misunderstood what you meant by 'lockups'. By lockups I certainly understood your second case: dead PC, hard reboot being the only solution.I have never heard of duplicates texture though. I've ran fs9 since its release in 2003 on 3 different machine without looking for dupes and never had issues.What are you refering to as duplicates textures?About OOMs, they always happen near airports. The first OOMs were approaching aerosofts great hubs. I bought some uk2000 sceneries not later that last month and didnt have OOMs but most likely because in the meanwhile I had installed the 3gb switch.What's really of interest to me in what you write is the trick to allow fs9 on one CPU core only. I've had read few posts about it in the past but never paid more attention because by then I did run an old single core p4. That sounds like making sense to me.CTDs: the original CTDs were just what they mean: crash to desktop! FS closes without warning and without a single error message and you're on the desltop.I sometime had FS crashes, normal crash with some errror message and an entry in the eventlog, those crashes caused by duplicate AFCADs, 32bit texure without alpha channel etc...I can clearly see the graphic corruption on your screenshot, I dont have that particular problem. On the other hand I do have some problems with sounds too sometime.Anyhow, I will continue to investigate and try to keep track of what I'm doing and report when I get rid of the problem.And, Desertwinds, you're absolutely right, it IS frustrating. As you say, except those freeze, my new PC also FLIES :(

Arnaud, duplicate textures start occuring when we get heavy into addon scenery. I also did not have a problem with them until the last 2 years or so...I started adding scenery, if I could find it, for every airport I flew to for my VA. I started having problems, eventually, and read about duplicate textures when searching for answers. Here is my understanding of it: As we add scenery, especially those which use the Runway12 or EZscenery library textures, we end up with (as an example) a "Roof2.bmp" texture in more than one place. If we have added the libraries seperate from a scenery, then the "Roof2.bmp" is in our FS9/addon scenery/static objects/textures directory (in a normal install). OK...now we install a scenery for Bumfuq, Egypt and it contains both a "Scenery" and "Texture" folder...and in that Texture folder is a "Roof2.bmp". This is a duplicate...we already have the same texture in our Static Objects folder in Addon scenery. It get's even worse...some scenery makers include default scenery textures in their addon's "texture" folder, even though they are already installed in :"X:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Flight Simulator 9\Texture" folder...another duplication. My simple understanding of this, as told to me by MUCH smarter people, is that FS9 will "lose it's mind" when faced with finding a texture...and finding more than one. I can't explain WHY this is but I can certainly say that getting rid of duplicate texture BMP's has solved 95% of my FS9 weirdness. Take it or leave it, my friend...it is what it is for me. Now, if your willing to go along with me on this, and get rid of duplicate textures, the problem becomes...FINDING them. I am unaware of a freeware program which will easily find them and either rename those textures or delete them. I use FSManager and it's diagnostic tool...it finds all duplicate textures and renames them to "XXXXX.BMPfsm". I then search for all files of type ".BMPfsm", using Windows Search function, and delete them. No...I am NOT trying to sell FSManager...I wish I could find a way to do this, this easily, for free. If there is a freeware program out there which will handle dupe textures I really hope someone will jump in here with it. If nothing else, Arnaud, think of the disk space you will save by getting rid of unneeded repetitious textures? Textures are some of the largest files in FS9. I will completely understand if you choose to go a different path...I can only offer what has worked for me. And this removing of duplicate textures is only a first step, in my mind. I suggest it as an elimination of one possible problem, one which was the root of most of my problems, so we can eliminate it and move on to other possible solutions for you. Let us know, whatever you choose to do, how things go! :(

Hey, thanks for the explanation Vic.There is only one thing that bugs me with the duplicates textures theory: as any PC programm, it is my understanding that FS deals more with pathes than file names. Otherwise, how the hell could AI work properly? Must of us have gigabytes of textures for our AI aircrafts, meaning thousands of 'duplicated' texture, yet it works very well. Because, FS looks for a texture with a path to it, not simply a filename. I fear that if you remove some of what you think are duplicate textures for some of your sceneries, you will end in finding some sceneries with textures missing here and there on the display.I will all let you know how it turns out for me, I made some hard testing (at heavy sceneries with tons of AI and chasing views) and so far no freezes, only thing i did was lower the texture_bandwidth-multi and lowered the audio acceleration setting in dxdiag.oh, and I for one totally trust FSUIPC too. Never used AI smooth.Will keep you guys posted :(

Arnaud, the way it was explained to me is that FS9 handles aircraft textures differently from scenery textures. Aircraft textures must exist in the aircraft's folder (whether AI or flyable), and this explains why you can have a "Fuse1.BMP" in many, many places...FS9 will only call the texture from that aircraft's folder when you load an aircraft. Scenery textures can be in one of 4 places...the addon scenery's own Texture folder (F:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Flight Simulator 9\Addon Scenery\FlyTampa-Seattle\texture, as an example), an FS9 Addon scenery/XXX/Texture folder, (as in my F:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Flight Simulator 9\Addon Scenery\Static Objects Library\texture, which contains all my Runway12 and EZscenery stuff, and can be used by any scenery), the Addon Scenery Texture folder (F:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Flight Simulator 9\Addon Scenery\texture) or the FS9 main Texture folder (F:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Flight Simulator 9\Texture). FS9 will look for the needed texture in those places. I wish I could find the post which was a reply to me and gave the order that FS9 will use to look for a scenery texture...but I believe it's in the order above? This is, I believe, why you can have 15 different "Fuse1.BMP" aircraft texture files...it will only look in the aircraft folder, but only 1 scenery texture..."Roof2.BMP", as an example. Now, I cannot explain why FS9 would have a problem with more than one scenery texture...you would think it would find the BMP it needed, in any of the 4 directories, and just use the first one it found. That is not how it works for me, however. If I have 2 "roof2.bmp"'s anywhere in the 4 locations I mentioned...lockup when I get near ANY scenery which calls for that texture. I can't explain this behavior and I'm no expert...I am only relaying the info that was either given to me or found by me, over the years. The way it was explained is that FS9 goes into a "loop" when more than one scenery texture is found...and wears out your memory in no time trying to decide which of them to use? I'm not going to say this info is correct...only that duplicate scenery textures, and removing them, has solved most of my lockups. Obviously FSManager thought they might be a problem because it's Texture troubleshooting tool specifically looks for dupes and renames them to "XXXX.BMPfsm", an unuseable file type? Again, I'm not selling FSM in any way...it's just the tool I have. If someone knows of freeware which will find duplicate textures in FS9 Scenery I hope they will post the info here. Like I said earlier, Arnaud, FS9 and different systems are notorious for acting differently. I can only relate what I've done and what has worked for me...and deleting duplicate textures has solved most of my lockup issues. Will it work for you or have any effect on your FS9...I don't know that. My current thought, for my FS'ing, is to wipe everything out, install a 64 bit OS (XP or Windows7), slam at least 8gb of RAM at it and install FS9 on a RAID0 array of 2 100+gb HDD's. That should take care of the 32 bit memory limitations and any HDD access bottlenecks (stutters). And, no, I still won't go to FSX if that plan works out :(

Heh, Victor, so you're planning on going to a 64 OS then. I hope it will solve your issues. I understand about the textures, I didnt know, as you say if FSmanager looks for duplicate texture then there must be a good reason. I simply never heard about it.Now, about the freezes...oookay... I am on small vacation so I could spend some time on FS (well, all the afternoon actually :( ). So far, no more freeze nor lockups nor stutters. I dont hold my breath, but I am confident, and I am confident because after the three changes I made I have the clear impression that the sim is even smoother than it had never been.Been punching the sim in the face during hours, in the most heavy scneeries (including the latest Mega Amsterdam) with the most heavy PMDGs, full AI, weather etc...Switching views, panning 360 degrees like hell etc...the 3 changes I made are: - I loweredd the TBM steps by steps, ended at 200 with framerate locked at 29.- I deactivated the WinXP screen saver I had totally forgot about.- I lowered the dxdiag audio acceleration, one step.I suspect the last one to be the winner, so far.

Sweet, Arnaud! I hope your success continues! Let's continue to update our progress here?I think my first step will be to switch, as I said earlier, to the Esata controller for the FS9 HDD...just to see if it helps with stutters. Damn, I forgot all about Audio Acceleration...I did hear before that it might need to be reduced.

Hey Vic and all,Since my last posts I've been doing a lots of flights, always using heavy sceneries, heavy traffic, heavy weather and heavy aircrafts (PMDGs), and so far I did not have a single freeze.I am near to believe I had it sorted then. Would be interesting to know what other people who also had freezes get now. That could be a relief for all of us miserable frozen simmers.

I would like to pose my own success story. For me, it turned out to be a driver issue. The current nVidia driver, v196.21 turned out to be the culprit. I saw many fellow simmers using v182.50, so I tracked down that driver and installed it (I did use Driver Sweeper, as recommended). Since installing this older driver, things have been purring along without a hiccup. I filed a flight plan from Monterey, CA to Palm Springs, CA then to Las Vegas, NV and ending in San Diego, CA and let the autopilot handle the flying while I helped my SO organize the garage at our new place. Smooth sailing!I tried this driver with Crisis to make sure my card still ran newer games (not that I really care, just curious) as well as favorite legacy sim, GPL. I'm happy to report that my problem appears to be solved. So if you haven't tried driver v182.50 yet and you're having the type of problems described in this thread, give it a whirl!Now I can start having fun! :(

I also can report that my freezes have stopped...but I can't report what actually fixed it? Duplicate textures, leaving the FS9 CPU affinity alone, removal of all UK2000 scenery, removal of the 3gb "switch"? No idea but it is purring along rather nicely these days.

Awesome, that's THREE less frustrated fs9 pilots in this world. Good on us! :(

I still have uk2000 sceneries installed, Vic. I assume you can write those off your potential culprit list.I havent messed at all with duplicates textures.Myself, I lowered the audio DX acceleration one step, and lowered the TBM to 200.I flew a world tour two weeks ago: CDG-FRA-AMS-ORD-JFK-PDX-SFO-HNL-HKG(both new and old)-DXB-CDG without any problems, using only Aersoft's, FT and FSDT sceneries with PMDG 744 and MD11, full traffic and weather. I also suspected the nv drivers at some point, but I was obviously wrong as I havent changed the drivers, I use 190.45 and nHancer 2.5.7I'm glad we're all sorted :(

Well, yes...I'm flying along nicely...BUT...I can be a bit "anal" when it comes to FS? WTH fixed it, exactly, in my case?? This is the question I'll be asking myself for the next few months :( . Yes, I'll enjoy the freeze-free flights...but a little voice in the back of my mind will always ask "Wth did I do that FIXED it???" S-I-G-H! "Mommas, don't let your babies grow up to be flight simmers..."