there are a few hubs like the default KDFW that hammer me on FPS even with no traffic.

If you are using UTX, there is an issue regarding selection of waves on lakes that affects frame rates during approaches to KDFW. The following is from the UTX support forum at SimForums.com:When you have something like a coastline defined in the terrain.cfg, you can specify as one parameter that it can have an effect (waves) associated with it. If you want large waves then you have the lineEffect=wavecontrollerif you want small waves i.e. for inland lakes, you useEffect=lakewavecontrollerNow when you use the UTX Setup Tool to set the wave effect to none, it was changing the parameter to readEffect=As I discovered, it is having this entry with nothing after the Effect= which causes the FSX scenery engine to choke and badly impact framerates.The workaround is therefore to make sure you have one of the two wave controller effects listed (which is the quick test I did with you), or, if you have no wave effect then remove the Effect= line completely.

If you are using UTX, there is an issue regarding selection of waves on lakes that affects frame rates during approaches to KDFW. The following is from the UTX support forum at SimForums.com:When you have something like a coastline defined in the terrain.cfg, you can specify as one parameter that it can have an effect (waves) associated with it. If you want large waves then you have the lineEffect=wavecontrollerif you want small waves i.e. for inland lakes, you useEffect=lakewavecontrollerNow when you use the UTX Setup Tool to set the wave effect to none, it was changing the parameter to readEffect=As I discovered, it is having this entry with nothing after the Effect= which causes the FSX scenery engine to choke and badly impact framerates.The workaround is therefore to make sure you have one of the two wave controller effects listed (which is the quick test I did with you), or, if you have no wave effect then remove the Effect= line completely.

I think you're referring to UT_USA, Art - Ultimate Terrain, not UT2 - Ultimate Traffic. I sometimes wonder when they're going to run out of these fancy names... :(

Regarding the UT2 post SP1 limitation of a/c spawning only at 20 minutes before departure and disappearing after 20 minutes parked, I have stumbled upon a workaround that will bypass that. If you replace the ut2 schedule of an airline with a Powerpack schedule imported from WOAI or Alpha India, the UT2 engine will ignore the 20 minute rule! I don't know why it happens, but it works :( I have tested the scenario on my system for British Airways at EGLL, and US Airways at KPHL. With the default UT2 traffic for those two airlines at those two hubs, traffic was noticeably sparse at all hours, and especially at night. However, if I turn off those airlines in UT2's "weekly official" database, and instead enable the databases I imported into UT2 with their new PowerPack (which allows you to import user created flightplans into the UT2 engine so that they follow ut2's real world routings) I noticed the traffic was more like the old bgl scenario with full traffic at all gates and no 20 minute rule! I love UT2 and also obsess over the accuracy of repaints and model quality (I even go so far to d/l new models to replace ut2 models because they tend to use one engine type per a/c, i.e. all ut2 airbus narrow bodies have cfm engines, so for my favorite airlines I will replace with IAE models if I can find them) I welcome the ease that UT2 allows the power user to modify their database to suit their tastes. But I was none too pleased to learn of the 20 minute rule; tradeoff or not, it's just not acceptable when everything else about the product is about realism and flexibility to adjust the engine to tailor to a user's FPS desires. Since the developers went to the effort to give the user the ability to choose how many AI to spawn and the ability to zap conflicting traffic on approach, I was disappointed that they could not offer a simple slider to at least let a user decide to either allow all traffic to spawn (if the user has high end hardware and can accept the fps hit) or limit spawning to their imposed 20 minute rule or whatever the user decides is appropriate. They say they did this to improve FPS and to remove traffic sitting at gates for days on end and I respect that decision. I just think that it would have been nice to have a slider giving the user control over this aspect of the program. Its not unusual to see cargo traffic sitting on the ramps at international airports for at least a day, I would have preferred a limit of 24 hours instead of 20 minutes before departure! And of course international flights are not going to turnaround at gates in 20 minutes or less. So, if you want WOAI like traffic at your airports but like UT2's real world routes for such traffic, I highly suggest finding WOAI or the more current Alpha India Group fps, hunt down repaints (or even use the built in UT2 paints) and utilize the PowerPack tool for your favorite airlines. I have Powerpack UT2 traffic for all the US majors and some of the bigger international carriers, and I am very pleased with the results. I understand that we are simulating flight and should not be focusing on virtual plane spotting, but realistic traffic density plays a large role in the immersion factor of airport operations. This also gives you something else to tweak when you are not actually flying :( Thanks!

That a VERY interesting find AJ.Since getting SP1 installed I have yet to download and install the Power Pack. I guess I have figured that since I was pretty happy with the way UT2 was working I didn't feel the need to install the Power Pack or take a chance messing up all the repaints I have assigned.That being said, importing WOAI flight plan bgl's to avoid the 20 minute rule is very interesting. Personally during the day I dont ming it so much because I have plenty of traffic at major hubs and it avoids over crowding and FPS concerns, however it would be cool to use for those flights that occure in the late night hours where traffic is sparse.Following your post I am going to have to head over to the UT2 forums and learn more about Power Pack and how to install/use it. I guess as long as I back up my data bases I shouldn't have to worry to much about something going wrong with all the current assignments.Thanks for sharing that info with us.

I think you're referring to UT_USA, Art - Ultimate Terrain, not UT2 - Ultimate Traffic. I sometimes wonder when they're going to run out of these fancy names... :(

Yes, I am referring to Ultimate Terrain X. It didn't occur to me that it would be confusing until you mentioned it. The UTX-USA mention was in response to the cmpbellsjc post early in the thread.

The Powerpack intimidated me at first, but it really is a piece of cake once you get the hang of it. I now have 30 or so airlines assigned by Powerpack, which represent the airlines I see the most in FSX. At first I thought I was only going to use it to import airlines that were not included in UT2 like some cargo or charter operations. Then I chose to import some Alpha India group flight plans because 1.) they were more current because they were either Winter or Summer 2010 schedules, 2.)some flights in the flightplans are so detailed that they use specific liveries or equipment that can't be easily duplicated in the UT2 schedule (i.e. Oneworld 747 liveries for specific British Airways flights, new A380 routes for Lufthansa and Air France) For that reason alone I found it worth the time to decompile the ttools files to import into PowerPack. When I discovered that the Powerpack UT2 schedules bypass the new 20 minute rule I was excited, and it is further justification for putting the effort into using the tool to further tweak an Airline's representation in FSX. Please note that it can take some time to assemble all the pieces needed for a successful import. You will have to find the flight plan from AVSIM, extract the relevant ttools text files, and then import the ttools schedule into PowerPack. You can use the ut2 paints, but you may want to be picky like I am and use better paints or models to more accurately reflect the choice of jet engines the real world airlines use but that are absent in UT2 for the planes that have variable engine options (747, 767, airbus a320/319/321, etc). However, the Power Pack is very intuitive and the developers have really thought of everything in regards to making sure the external ttools flight plan can be integrated into the "UT2 world". There is plenty of error checking and hand holding during the entire process to ensure things go smoothly!You could of course just disable the airline in UT2 and use an external BGL airline schedule, but I do prefer the real world routes the UT2 AI fly. I have the old school BGL files for GA biz jet, military, and the more obscure airlines that I seldom see in FSX anyways, for instance importing the WOAI GA Bizjets into PowerPack is just not feasible because there are hundreds of paints to assign and each paint has to get its own assignment in the Powerpack GUI. For the AI obsessed, its one more thing to make you spend more time tweaking than flying, but I'm having fun! There may be a slight FPS hit because there are more planes, or if you chose non UT2 sp1 models, but it sure beats empty looking airports!

I'm quite happy with the old version of Ultimate Traffic myself. It puts aeroplanes at gates that are reasonably correct for the region, taxies them to the runways, and flies them around. I honestly couldn't care less if they are in three year-old liveries, or flying five year-old schedules, because I'm not enough of a plane-spotter to be concerned about it and probably wouldn't even know if they were anyway.Nor am I particularly bothered how many polygons they are made up from either, since I don't bother to count how many fan blades there are on the engine of something that is forty yards away from me when I taxi past it. The only parameter I even bothered to adjust, was preventing those naff Flight 1 liveries and the default FS airlines from displaying.Al

Thanks for the additional info A.J. Sounds like I might have to give it a go. I will probably just continue to run the WOAI cargo stuff the way it is in BGL form, but I may start with a few airlines an see how it works out. I have to admit to being somewhat particular with AI, but not so much to the point where I need them to have special paints for certain flights or a/c with certain engines. Those type of things dont matter too much to me, especially since I dont know the airlines well enough to know which paint scheme goes to which flight or which engine variation matches in real life. I am mainly concerned about the right airlines being at the correct airport at the right time.Thanks again.

Yes, I am referring to Ultimate Terrain X. It didn't occur to me that it would be confusing until you mentioned it. The UTX-USA mention was in response to the cmpbellsjc post early in the thread.

Art, thanks for your post. I had cleared up the wave thing a while back on their forum. Turned out that I had disabled the wave effects and was causing the problem you mentioned. Even so, KDFW still gives me some trouble compared to other airports like KJFK and KLAX. Hopefully the new version of FSDS's KDFW will give be a boost over the default version.