A breath of fresh air!

[Hornit 3]

Ok, to be fair, this sim runs ok and I can display a lot of the goodies, even clouds just not a whole lot of them. Also I tried the 30.82's the 41.07, and 44.03, no discernable difference noted in any of them. 44.03 stays as it appears slightly more stable/smooth here. I use 2XFSAA now and 2X Aniso, running at 1280x1024(1024 and 1152 work slightly better but with some jaggies) The only thing I have a small problem with is the frame rate is all over the place. I can be flying along witha smooth, no very steady 29-30 (as long as Im not in dense scenery/AI) and it will do this hiccup thing and go down to 18-20 for about half a second. I only see this if I stare at the frame rate, but I can notice it fairly often while doing things close to the airport while hand flying. Its not a showstopper, but I truly dont believe its my system at this point. I think its the sim. If I set the frames up high at like unlimited say, then I see anywhere from the 20's right on up to the limits. My system WILL run good frames it just aint smooth. I also have noticed that it appears to me there is a different type of graphic engine, which is not real conducive to AA and there is a good bit more shimmer going on in similar situations. I have also noticed others with this complaint. It kind of reminds me of CFS2 and CFS3 in a lot of ways. I submit that most of this is happening to others if you pay attention carefully to the frame rate counter and not ooh and ahh so much at the graphics. For the record 2002 runs extremely smooth with TONS of add-ons etc here and frame rate locked around 30. I have ALL the good add-ons for it. I would like to know how to set up a dual boot with WIN XP here, I like 98 for a lot of things and would think trying XP is a good idea, but the thought of the backups is killing me!!!!! Any advice here would be appreciated! I have a 40 G hd with about 15G free and could find a lot more room at this point. Thanks.Hornit

[Guest daveg4otu]

JP---Have you tried letting Windows Update scan and update your system- If your DX9 is in need of the update it should do it for you.I never had any problem getting FS2004 onto WinME and it all runs just fine - just a little slower than the XP drive.For the record ,at the moment ME is still my primary OS and is on C drive,XP is on E drive ( the other half of the primary HDD-IDE 0) .The other(secondary HDD-- IDE 1) is split between Storage(D) and Backup(F).I keep a (fortnightly) updated compressed Drive Image backup of both C and E drives on F - in case my constant poking and tweaking cocks it all up irretrievably!(Been known to happen)I can be back up after a total disaster in no more than 30 minutes with everything just the way it was.Greg--No secrets.... this mobo(K7S5A) was a total pest when I first built the system a year ago ,very unstable,prone to lockups and freezes in FS2002- particularly in WinME.I found out that they are very sensitive to excess heat and low grade memory.A year later having spent a lot of time and not to much money adding lots of extra cooling to get the CPU temps down from the mid-high 50s to the low-mid 40s©under load, it's generally pretty stable in ME and very stable in XP.I've played around with the BIOS settings a lot and those that you see in my previous post seem to be the best compromise between speed and stability- haven't changed them in 6 months.Good flying allDave

[Guest Vulcho]

I have a GF4 4200 also. Except, I have the 64MB version. I get FPS in the mid to lower teens. My suggestion to anyone is to get a new vid card with more memory. The people with the 128MB cards are saying that they get fps in the 20's category. Their rigs are pretty much the same as mine except for the +/-2.0GHz processors. I have a 1500+XP with a decent mobo. Frames are 15 on average. Drivers don't seem to cut it for me. There is only so much that a card can do. And no matter how new the drivers are, I doubth that a GF2 can run FS2k4 at 20FPS. There have been a lot of new drivers since it's release, so a lot more frames have to be added with each one as nVidia claims. You get my point. (Don't take this too literaly please. :)) Drivers just provide a little more performance increase and more stability. They won't add 2FPS with every new release.So, for me, the next card I get, whenever that may be, I'll try to shoot for 256MB.Oh and Mark,"Love the autogen, clouds, trees, colours ... but WE HAVE TO BE ABLE TO FLY." Thank You!Alex.

[Guest Salbado]

Thank you for your post...I had FS2K4 in my hand and put it back...There is absolutely nothing wrong with my FS2K2 set-up...clouds, wxRE,Ulimate Traffic, Simflyers scenery, FSUIPC, CH Products, GoFlight stuff, Project Magenta, FDS, PA Airbus,FSNAv,etc,etc,...my very realistic home cockpit is now being flown every night with no glitches, no stutters, no BSOD, at 22 constant FPS with everything maxxed and absolutely no headaches...the only thing that I "worry" about now is real time weather and thunderstorms at my destinations.So, forgive my rant but, from what I have been reading on the posts for the last two weeks, both pros and cons, I don't think that FS2K4 is really worth the hassle...at all...rock on 2002! I think I'll wait until 2006...maybe.

[Cloud9 0]

I also notice some stutter in FS9 - can't see a pattern yet since it happens randomly on my system - but we got to realize that we are using a 1st generation weather engine that is integrated to a 3D-engine that, I think, was introduced in FS2000. Microsoft has not updated their 3D engine for FS in a few years.By default I run all games/simulations at 1200x1600/32bit res, so that is one reason why I sometimes get 10 fps. Normally at this res I get 20-25 fps in FS2004. All sliders are MAXed except autogen and weather clouds. I do not have any 3rd party add-on in FS2004.My FS2002 is on an older P4 system, so I really can't compare the two.I wonder what is causing these stutters? I don't see my frame rate drop below 18 fps when FS stutters for about 1 sec. Still, I think FS2004 is a step forward in the right direction. I'm hoping that in FS2006, MS will introduce a new, highly optimized 3D engine that takes full advantage of video hardware support of vertex and pixel shaders, shadow volumes, 128-bit floating point precision, advanced specular lighting and reflection, advanced particle physics engine, etc, etc. Even if it means that all 3rd party add-ons (scenery and planes) will not work, I'll still consider buying FS2006. Cloud9

[Guest]

I remember reading that MSCOF is supposed to be written for DX9 - and since 9.0b has a "debug" cpl it may be causing problems. DX diagnostics says the debug cpl WILL run slower. If you have 9.0b) MS2k2 may not be affected. I have my suspicions about this.Dave

[B777ER 2,486]

What version of DX9 does FS2004 ship with?

[Guest LarryJ_KMSO]

JPI'd be keenly interested in the performance of FS2004 on your new alienware computer if you are willing to share!ThanksLarry JonesFlorence, MT

[Wilson 2]

Hornit:I agree somewhat with your post. Especially after reading a post here about copying the texture files from FS9 over the texture files in FS2k2 (but back up your FS2k2 folder so that you can copy the runway textures back).I am now flying FS2k2 with FS9 clouds and great textures, with framerates in the upper twenties, with a broken down 1.2 G Athlon! Plus, I can fly my Flight1 421 as it was intended to be flown. I have full use of MyTraffic, with no untextured aircraft. FlightMax works great, etc. etc.It was a heck of a lot to pay for a texture upgrade, but I am not complaining. One of these days, they will get FS9 and the add-ons upgraded and I will make the permanent switch.But for right now, it is FS2k2 with the, er, uh, FS9 upgrades.Wilson

[Hornit 3]

Ok, Im gonna go do a search but run that by me again???? You can put the 2004 textures into 2k2?? Whoa! Clouds and terrain....please elaborate, ok im goin searchin now!!!Hornit

[John F 2,420]

Jim,It was my post. You could search under John F or look for the post "FS2002/FS2004 hybrid: best of both worlds!" It's a few pages further down.John

[Wilson 2]

John,Sorry, I was too lazy to go look up your posting and give you the proper credit.Thanks for the great tip. It really works and enhances FS2k2.Wilson

[Cruachan 705]

Hi Hornet,This is just a shot in the dark as I, along with everyone else have been experimenting like mad and, if many changes are applied at once, you tend to wonder which was effective ..LOL ;)You might try disabling 'Fast Writes' in your graphic drivers. This tip appeared somewhere else (sorry, I forget where) but the writer assured the reader that we wouldn't notice any difference in performance of the drivers by so doing. It's easily done in the ATI Control Panel, but I've forgotten whether there is an option for the nVidia drivers. Perhaps someone else can help here.Anyway I disabled 'Fast Writes' and while the sim was smooth before I have the distinct impression that it is now somewhat smoother during turns, even in a faster a/c like the Lear Jet. No harm in trying, you can always put it back. Best not to have FS2k4 running until the change is made.Good luck!MikeP4 2.4GHz (400FSB), 512MB PC2100 DDR Crucial, ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB (Catalyst 3.5), Gigabyte GA-8IRXP MoBo, Ultra-Quiet PSU 400W, WinXP Home (SP1), DirectX 9.0b3DMark 2001SE : 123753Dmark 2003: 5311

[Guest Steve K]

Maybe I'm just one of the lucky ones but my system doesn't come close to yours and FS9 is doing well on mine. I've got an AMD Athlon XP@1.8,GF2MX400 64mb video card,512 mb ddr, running WinXP. I've got all the sliders set to "at least" the midway position, I'm averaging in the high 20's to mid 30's FPS. Anti-Aliasing takes a huge hit and I leave it off. Granted, I could run AA in FS2K but I only had framerates in the teens most of the time...about the same as I've seen in FS9. I can live with a few minor jagged edges. It seems like a small price to pay for the added fluidity I've gained over FS2K.I've read so many terrible reviews so far on FS9 that I was hesitant to buy it. Now that I've had a chance to compare it to FS2K I'm glad I chose to buy it.

[Guest guyjr]

>Hornit,> I concur. After all the tweeks I've done including Chris'>new cloud textures, I'm finally getting frames in the 20s with>the exception of those 1-2 second pauses that seem to occur>whenever I am turning (taxiing and flying). I'm at the pointHehehe... this is _exactly_ the problem everybody was complaining about during the FS2000 days... seems the trend of every other sim is worth getting is holding true... all too true...