Can we now have an "intelligent" criticism of FS2004.

[Guest]

Hi Chris - a question for you regarding the framerates you mentioned... i'm on a p4 2ghz machine, and I'm only getting in the region of 6fps as well; admittedly this is with a geforce 2 Ti 64mb but I was still expecting something slightly better - in FS2002 I never got below 12-15 fps (and higher in less scenery dense areas) with all sliders maxed (and with your wonderful cloud textures!) I've experimented with reducing various options in FS2004, none seem to make a large difference, although it would appear that, as expected, it is the clouds that cause me the highest fps hits. But even reducing density and 3d clouds to under 50%, as well as draw dsitance etc, it makes very little difference. I have also been having issues with AA (it does not work at all from within FS, only when selected in the tweaker) and 4x gives me massive hits (latest drivers from nvidia installed)... question is, is this because of my card, or should i still be expecting better fps?Having said all that - and to get back on topic - despite my fps woes, I am still enjoying this new sim enourmously. The atmospherics are fantastic, and crusing over the Luberon and Rhone Delta in the Cub last night around sunset was breathtaking; I had set clear skies but as the evening progressed, cumulus started building, growing into CBs, over the vastly improved European textures... and frankly, I can deal with some missing bridges when the sky is now suddenly so much more important to the sim-pilotthanks allrk

[Guest White Hawk]

It needs a patch, majorly, more than any FS has needed one to date, I keep seeing bugs left right and center, example-1: Go to Las Vegas at night and watch for the fireworks, and have some clouds around, the fireworks will be hidden by clouds that are miles and miles behind them.I haven't got the newest vid cards that people are having problems with, but even with a Geforce 3 I get issues, video driver you say? I say rubbish, 99 percent of other games seem to be just fine, but when it comes to FS, well, it's special isn't it. :-(2: When hitting Alt to bring up the menu, I click on one but decide to move to a different tab and the first one stays shown instead of disappearing as it should and had done in previous versions, small but still a bug.3: When going into Windowed mode and then going back, not sure if I have to minimize the FS window or not, but randomly it seems when I want to go back to FS and put it back into full screen it will just have a black screen and the cursor will jump between itself and the hourglass very fast and just keep on doing that all the time, I can bring up the menu, and stuff and the sound is there, but anything thats 3D in sim stuff is just blank black and never comes back.I have tried two different vid drivers just for peeps to know, but I will say it again, I don't believe this is driver issues for a moment, and I find it kind of funny that MS would say wait for a particular driver from Nvidia when in the process of making this FS over the last nearly two years there have been many driver versions released.There are many other bugs that are nothing to do with driver issues that I can't remember right now, but here is the killer one for me.4: I don't have a issue with the 3D clouds personally, but the killer on fps is the 2D panel, I haven't a clue why, other than MS messed up some how but 2D panel's run so slow it's terrible to use them, about 9-11fps in the less complex panels, and about 6-8 in the more complex panels like the 747, I can only imagine what it will be like with a very complex third party panel like a DF737 or PIC767 type one. But the thing is, if I change to the VC I get about 20-25 in the same situation and same zoom factor, whats up with that? Previous FS versions never did that, FS2002 never did that to me.I would not be surprised if there are more bugs in this version of FS than there is in both FS2000 and FS2002 combined, so does it need a patch? Sure it does, there is no doubt, and if they don't produce one this time, well, that will be disgusting behavior when most others don't have such a loyal following and seem to be up to the job of releasing them for they're games and sims.

[Guest Skedflyer]

A very good friend of mine showed me this...This is a very big problem...http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...&topic_id=12256

[Guest Ron Freimuth]

>A very good friend of mine showed me this...>>This is a very big problem...>>http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...&topic_id=12256 It now appears AC imported into FS9 WILL NOT fly the same as in the version of FS they were designed for. One can check that thread to see the problem. I checked the DF C310 I installed in FS9 and found I'd set wing_incidence and wing_twist during the design so they exactly canceled as far as flight pitch and induced drag go. So, the DF C310 accidently worked out OK in FS9 as far as that matter goes. However, most AC installed in FS9 will have changes in performance. While many users won't see any difference, AC with carefully adjusted pitch and drag will very likely be less accurate in FS9. Only those that were accidently set as I set the DF C310 are likely to be indentical as far as pitch and induced drag go when installed in FS9. This can probably be ameliorated, but one has to edit the AIR file and know what he is doing. ...... I just checked several commercial and other AC installed in FS2K2. It appears the end result for the AC I looked at would be small when installed in FS9. A change in flight pitch of 1/2 degree. But, also a change in induced drag that will be measurable. Thought, the end effect may help, rather than hurt, many AC. ;) MS regressed many flight dynamics details in FS9 back to the FS2K level. They had messed up the autopilot and other things in FS2K2. This regression will improve many things. They did not fix all the Flight Dynamics bugs introduced in FS2K2, MS probably wasn't even aware of them. ;) However, I suspect other serious problems such as mentioned in the thread above will surface. MS makes changes without telling anyone. And, some of them are buggy. And, I don't expect any MS 'FD SDK' to be of much value. The previous Flight Dynamics SDK's are almost useless and I ended up explaining aircraft.cfg settings in a file I prepaired for others. Ron

[OHN 1]

Fireworks and bridges, come on, soon we will hear people screaming for patches because a tree is placed a little to much to the left.If something major comes up that will ruin your flightsim experience then im sure we will see a patch, but at this time i have not seen or heard of anything that will do that.OHN

[John_Cillis 2,406]

Brent...I picked up an OEM 4200/TI for $89 at Shentech several weeks ago. It's running fine on my system, which has an old BX MB (AGP 2X). There's some bargains to be had with the 4200, which supports FS2004 very well. Using the 30.82 drivers shipped with the card, I've escaped the issues vs. black screens, panels, menus, etc....A side effect of my upgrade, is that FS2002 looks outstanding. I still fly FS2002 often, as it's an easier platform for me to tinker with aircraft design and landclass (which absorb 90 pct. of my simming time these days).I am flying FS2004 exclusively for my Microlight collection. Outside of the big cities, with moderate weather, I am getting a very fluid 20-25 fps... It's incredibly realistic for me, IMHO.Considering the nature of the thread, if I were going to list a an issue that merits discussion, the chief one would be FDE related--it seems like some common parameters (like incidence and twist) are now ignored. In spite of this, most of my favorite aircraft handle the same way as they did in FS2002. I haven't had to tweak any of my favorites, whereas the transition from FS2000 to FS2002 saw me having to tweak almost every aircraft in my collection.As far as the bridges issuw is concerned, so much of my flying is done in open country vs. around the major cities, I haven't been bothered by it much. I can understand how those who visit the cities more often would have a concern. OTH, when I fly around the detailed cities in FS2004, more "city specific" buildings have been added vs. the generic ones. Phoenix (my home city) serves as a good example, but there's many more throughout the sim.I know the dreaded "P" word raises emotions. Some seem to feel it means a product is bad. But even great products get patched. Will we see one for FS2004? Depends on how we discuss the issues. If they are discussed with respect for the work the Microsoft team has done, then we may see one. But many of the issues around FS2002 turned into Microsoft bashing. Since I had the chance to participate in this beta, it gave me a chance to see that we're working with a team of people, who could have as easily worked for a small company vs. the large one they work within. So "Microsoft" in this context is a small team of enthusiasts, who often receive mixed signals from the community as far as what we want. I hope we show them the respect they deserve, and recognize the talent they have.

[Guest White Hawk]

You haven't been reading much then as there are a number of major bugs people have been talking about, drivers aside, I call the one I mentioned about 2D panel fps and the one about blank screen after minimizing both very very major that most surely muck up my flightsim experience.And even if there wasn't major issues, almost every other software/games developer deals with the smaller issues just fine.Mmmmm, I thought sim's were about realism, I guess I'm in the minority.

[Guest otter55]

i may be in the minority (but i doubt it)i have my fps lock on 20 and it never varies over 1i run most everything maxed or near maxed outthis sim is totally fluid on my system regardless where i flyi have tried 3 cards (ti 4600, gf 5200, gf 5600) all functioned perfectly with default drivers that came with them. ti 4600 tops them all in overall performance on my system using the same drivers i used when running fs2002.the weather/clouds/ai traffic/autogen seem to have much less load on my system than fs2002.my sons old system , p4 1.5, 768 mgs ram, new gf 5200 running the good clouds and decent settings on the rest is locked on 15 and stays near there except at major airports where it drops to 9-10. but it is still very flyable even then.as for the need for a patch, different things bother different people. i have zero need for a patch and had no need for patching fs2002 either. but, i may not fly the same planes, areas that others do so i dont encounter the problems that some others do.imho this is the finest flight sim ever developed for the public.it's not perfect, but its a large step in that direction.hope all you with performance issues get them worked outdon

[OHN 1]

I dont have any probs with 2dpanel fps and blank screen after minimizing, havent heard any betatesters talk about it either, but im sure it can be solved by tweaking your system or updating drivers.OHN

[Guest BrianC]

I tried 200 on my old GeForce 2 Pro 64MB. It works extremely well! The inconsistency in smoothness I had with the setting at 40 is gone. It was sort of like regular "soft stutters" at a rate of 2-3 per second. Now it's nice and smooth and I get very infrequent texture loading. Nice.

http://brianc.vip.warped.com/kpwk_sig.gif

[JerryG 1]

Chris -I think you're correct. I have a 4x AGP MOBO. I upgraded to justa GeForce FX 5200 128MB AGP (which is 8x). I realize I'm notgetting the full AGP throughput capability of this new card,but it does run better (and crisper) than my previous GeForce 4MX64MB.JerryG

[Guest]

...and I'm having a fair bit of performance grief with mine, not getting above 6 - 8 fps anywhere when AA is on, under any conditions (with reduced settings on the usual fps killers) on my p4 2ghz machine as mentioned in my other post. Also having a lot of problems with AA - not the menu blackouts some are reporting, but it is not enabled even when selected in the sim. It will work when selected externally in the tweaker, but really doesn't seem to be doing a great job even at 4x (still a heck of a lot of 'shimmering') and absolutely killing fps down to slide-show proportions... latest nvidia drivers helped a bit but... am I missing anything? What's your setup?thanksrk

[Guest ssurjap]

Actually, the one question that I have is where does it say that MS wasn't using WHQL certified drivers when they programmed/tested FS9?Maybe they were using the video card that was available at the time and the driver was WHQL certified?

[TonyB 1]

1. Well, I can't complain about the "serious" video issues because I don't think I am having any. All seems to be well with my Geoforce 3 TI500 with 30.82 drivers.2. I'm not complaining aobut frame rates either. It seems to run pretty good on my 1.4 mhz machine. I do have to turn down detail in heavy urban areas, but that is to be expected considering how much more has been added to the scenery and augogen over FS2002. You mentioned you friend's 1.6 mhz machine being challenged. That is not exactly top of the line anymore. Remember when FS2002 came out? That was the day of GTS2 cards and 1 mhz machines. For what its worth, I am getting 10-15 in the clouds, with 100% 3-D. That said, I bet we are not comparing apples to apples when it comes to settings, location and so on.3. The missing bridges are unfortunate. However, are they show stoppers? I don't think so, but I respect those that say they are. Granted some of these may be a step back, but look at all the steps forward. MS is afterall, modeling the entire world. Remember all the flashing or disappearing taxiways in FS2002? KMSP was a good example of this. Though MS did not patch it, and I would say they weren't show stoppers, some folks in community did step up and release some fixes. 4. I can't argue with you on autogen being in some odd places, such as on a runway. I have seen an example of this myself. That said, I don't consider it a show stopper.5. No problems here with the copy protection. It installed just fine for me. I did install a No-CD crack, but that was after using FS2004 first for a day or two to make sure is was stable before I changed the exe. It sounds like the MS support folks are working hard and even sending out new discs to folks with install problems. I respect you postion on the patch, but disagree with it based on my experience.

[Chris Willis 8]

wathomas777,"NON-WHQL DRIVERS,WHQL what's is the difference ? Did you know how program are created ? If great popular game like half life not released yet, will not have the AA, at least fs2004 still have it, see the links below.The Antialasinghttp://www.xbitlabs.com/news/video/display...0718155730.htmlSee this sposthttp://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...id=131467&page="I just don't buy a 2 GHZ or greater machine as having to dip into single digits. And if you are going to offer an easy "2D" alternative, at least offer them the same quality as you had in the previous game.""With your 600 mhz system you will SUFFER ALOT, the low end is a 1.4 ghz if not higher, I am wondering what's have change, remember at fs2002 release, the higher system was 1.2 ghz gforce2 64 mb, impossible to the sim at full, there is no difference here. I don`t have this problem with mine, Why ? You should know the sim is for two years, expect a product based on teo years system market. ThanksChris Willis[link:fsw.simflight.com/FSWMenuFsSim.html]Clouds And Addons For MsFs