Oh ye of little faith!

[Guest daveg4otu]

In view of the many reported troubles with FS9,I thought that just for fun,I'd see how,or if,it would run on something a bit slower than my normal system.I have an system made of spare parts which my granddaughters use to play "toddlers" games on. It has a MS 663AS Ultra motherboard,and AMD 700mhz CPU and 256mb of SDRAM.The only good thing going for it is that it has a reasonably modern graphics card ( ATI Radeon R900/128mb- by no means the best but far from the worst.).OS is WinXP home.The hardest thing about getting FS9 running on the system was the long wait while it loaded the software via an ancient 6x CDROM.However it eventually got it all in with no hangups ,plodded thru the decompression of files etc. All this took about 30+ minutes-by now I was not to optimistic about how it would perform.When I ran FS9 I set the screen to 1024x768,all scenery sliders to halfway and fps locked at 24,3D Clouds were set to 30% ,Cloud coverage density medium.Using the default flight (C172 at SeaTac- daylight fair weather) with VC the worst FPS was 11-12 whilst taxying and take off.After that once in the air just flying around the general SEaTAC area the FPS averaged anywhere from 13 to 18- occasionally reaching 20 if there was very little of the "city scenery" in view.Switching to the no-instrument Cockpit view ,gave 18-24(locked) fps virtually all the time whilst airborne droping to about 14 on the runway.The old machine I used was literally put together from junk I had laying around ,bought at car boot sales/flea markets over the past couple of years- the only newish thing being the Radeon card( I think- excluding that card ,the rest of the pieces cost no more than

[John_Cillis 2,406]

Good post Dave...I've been posting similar results for a while now on a system that's only marginally faster. By leaving AI off and Autogen low in the Seatac scenario, I can usually hit 25 fps with most other sliders maxed as soon as I turn away from downtown or one of the airports. But as I've noted in other threads, airports are giving me trouble, and I've had longer time to experiment with the sim, as being on the beta I had gold a bit before the rest of the pack.For the longest time I thought I was having airport issues due to use of 3-d clouds. But even without them, in clear skies, "2nd Tier" airports like SLC (2nd Tier in terms of detail), cause performance to drop once I'm in range. If I lock my fps lower, then it's not a problem--but lower means lack of smoothness--and my eye doesn't consider 15 fps smooth after two years of 25 fps in FS2002. I'm not saying that to knock FS2004--it's a better sim than most give it credit for. But I don't think it's as much of a "pilot's" sim in terms of the fluidity and FDE fidelity pilots demand when in the pattern. I noted in another thread that it's become my exclusive domain for Ultralight and bush flying. For that type of flight, I can crank up autogen and enjoy 20-25 fps in the air with a light deck of clouds.-John

[Guest daveg4otu]

OK JohnWell ,I didn't really expect much at all on that old system so I guess I was pleasantly surprised.I really think that every system ,every user and every set of flight circumstances give differing results - so hard to get any kind of benchmark)I think someone else posted to that effect).Still,it's a lot of fun.Dave

[John_Cillis 2,406]

I've felt the same way getting FS2002 to perform as well as it has, as well as FS2004. But some of it I consider dumb luck. If I had chosen a Radeon, or a newer GEF 5 FX, I suspect I'd be cursing and swearing a bit. Still, I enjoy posting thick FS2004 cloud shots and 20fps while my peers are doing the same on much faster systems. A few slider adjustments, and you can have fun with some of the positive and sometimes "against all logic" results. And that's really what this hobby is all about!-John

[vgbaron 3,627]

>I really think that every system ,every user and every set of>flight circumstances give differing results -Dave - You are so right! I feel sorry for those that are having troubles but I'm getting really tired of the heavy duty MS bashing that is going on. There seem to be many systems that run it with no problem ( I'm one of the lucky ones ) and there are others that are a nightmare.There is NO WAY that any software developer, MS or not, can design a product to cover every possible system hardware/driver/software scenario. Add to that the extreme complexity of what FS is trying to do and the max loads it puts on the system and you have a recipe for some disgruntled consumers.However, as you have demonstrated, YMMV and it's worth a try. If you get a good install, it's well worth the effort.Just MHO,Vic