Bad news on the latest tests I'm afraid but the results do show that the stutters have nothing to do with overloading the card with high sliders, overclocking or tweaks of any kind. Vsync is more of an issue here than i originally thought.

Dave, this is a just a quick reply, I'm sorry but on the way out, nothing wrong with the ram, most everything looks ok, the only thing that I see in the cfg that looks odd to me may be just nothing but the ProcSpeed=7398PerfBucket=7 is listed twice (these only get read for the initial FSX auto setup, the first time you start the game, so kinda useless), and reading this quick I dont know that I have spotted everything, Please delete the cfg and let it rebuild just to be safe and try again.Question, did you clone the drive from its original install or was this fresh with the 580 in there? If not a fresh install what is the history behind all graphic cards that were on this motherboard? What MotherBoard and Bios do you have and what chipset drivers have been installed?You might want to try running the DXdiagnostics, If I remeber its in the sys32folder, but its been a while since I've searched for it on Win7, but its where ever you find DirestX installed, run the tool and see what it reports.Hang in there...

Dave, this is a just a quick reply,

Hi Freebird, i re-created the cfg and it now shows ProcSpeed=7460 and only one entry for PerfBucket=7.This install of the OS and FSX is only a day or so old, no other graphics cards have been used other than the 580. No clone from the previous OS messing about with the 470. In previous installs of the OS (only 2) the 470 was the only other card tested.The motherboard is the Asus Rampage III Extreme, bios version now in use is 1102, previous version with same results was 1005 but i havent tested the one prior to that. Thought about trying it though.Chipset drivers were downloaded from Asus - Intel_Chipset_V9111023_XpVistaWin7 along with several other USB, LAN, Sound etc. Its worth mentioning that a flight was tested without these drivers when i ran the quick test on the Raptor with same results.dxdiag found no problems under all tabs in both 32 and 64 tests.been playing around in BIOS turning some things off and on like turbo, speed step, audio etc, nothing helping as yet.hanging in there :-) will do so until i get to troubleshoot with some new hardware, thinking of getting different hardware with my upgrade just so i can run some comparisons, dont mind getting different memory and motherboard but i need to stick with the 980x though for work.If i still have stutters testing with a different motherbaord (probably EVGA X58) and different RAM and video card and the combinations i can mix up then i will be taking up a new interest, maybe stamp collecting or something easy :-) But seriously, this whole thing has been about me trying to build my dad something i know he would love so i appreciate the help yourself and others have suggested.My father is 78 and spends his days flying on FS9 with pretty ordinary graphics, i havent even shown him what FSX can look like with some of these amazing addons. I often wonder how many other 78 year olds have a pc like this, the cabling i did on the Corsair 600t case is a piece of art, looks amazing, its a very well thought out case.The frame rates i am getting with all the addons installed, rex, ftx, enb, pmdg in built up areas with autogen on dense are 18-30 which i think is great, im very happy with those numbers, its just a matter of smoothnes which has proven to be an issue at the lowest levels.I'm always thinking of something else to check, luckily i dont give up very easily.:-)

using any of the asus software, o/cing or temp monitoring? shut those all down, antivirus i think we covered it before, it sounds like something is polling.Try mscfg and temp remove from startup anything and everything you can...something really odd here - ARGH!

Bojotes tool suggested a hybrid pool setup but bufferpools=0 is the only way to go with a 580GTX IMO.jja

Well, I could not resist...I just pulled the trigger on a 580 GTX! Here we go again. Kind regards,

Bojotes tool suggested a hybrid pool setup but bufferpools=0 is the only way to go with a 580GTX IMO.jja

He has alreay tried, but no go.As far as BP=0 its certainly not the Only way to go, Proabaly depends on your system, what add-ons you use and how you fly. fast and low and BP=0=blurrie ground, especially if you like things like LOD at 6.5 and above especially if a lot of AG and complex mesh, but if the screen res is less than 1920x1200 there is less visual difference so you might as well use stock LOD.I've been searching for the set it and forget it type settings that enables handling tons of AG and sharp IQ in all scenarios. So far a Poolsize=20000000 is working very good with FSX limitted frames=30 and a -0.125 LOD in the NV-drivers with a 8.5 LOD in FSX with 8SQxAA and TSSAA + GSSAA and 16xAF and it is superb in the 7cm photoreral data sets as well as just about anywhere else, but the LOD has to be lowered to 6.5 in places like ORBX PNW with AG set to Dense (no AG lines in cfg).What are your settings?

He has alreay tried, but no go.As far as BP=0 its certainly not the Only way to go, Proabaly depends on your system, what add-ons you use and how you fly. fast and low and BP=0=blurrie ground, especially if you like things like LOD at 6.5 and above especially if a lot of AG and complex mesh, but if the screen res is less than 1920x1200 there is less visual difference so you might as well use stock LOD.I've been searching for the set it and forget it type settings that enables handling tons of AG and sharp IQ in all scenarios. So far a Poolsize=20000000 is working very good with FSX limitted frames=30 and a -0.125 LOD in the NV-drivers with a 8.5 LOD in FSX with 8SQxAA and TSSAA + GSSAA and 16xAF and it is superb in the 7cm photoreral data sets as well as just about anywhere else, but the LOD has to be lowered to 6.5 in places like ORBX PNW with AG set to Dense (no AG lines in cfg).What are your settings?

My setup seems to run best with FSX FPS Limit = 30, LOD-6.5, 1080p resolution, Most all of Bojotes tweaks and Max Cloud Draw distance.  Yes I want it all and am getting it with the 580GTX.  Cheersjja

Well, I could not resist...I just pulled the trigger on a 580 GTX! Here we go again. Kind regards,

Stephen,I can't wait to see your side by side comparison with the gtx 480.Thanks in advance.

Stephen,I can't wait to see your side by side comparison with the gtx 480.Thanks in advance.

Hi DJ,Good to see you again my friend as it seems you are a wee bit less active on the forums these days. I intend to test the 580 GTX against the same benchmarks already established by my 275 GTX, 470 GTX and 480 GTX. So, we will be able to have an overview of what has been accomplished (or not) by the 4 different video card technologies, insofar as their direct effect on FSX.GTX 275 vs 470 GTX vs 480 GTX However, this time the validity of new direct comparisons between the video card generations will be a little bit more difficult to establish, as the apples to apples results will be encumbered by this computer having been recently upgraded with solid state hard drives in Raid 0 configuration. Even still, the updated tests will show the advantage (or not) of solid state drives with newer video cards verses mechanical drives with older cards.Over the next couple of days in preparation for the new 480 GTX vs 580 GTX series of tests I will begin comprehensive benchmark tests and FSX in-flight screenshots showing new performance statistics with the 480 GTX. After installation and run-up of the 580 GTX, I will repeat the same tests under the exact same controlled circumstances. Each video card will be tested in both default, and in their maximum stable overclock configurations, allowing us to have some (hopefully) accurate calculated information for FSX applications.Someday I may even forget about all this data collection and organization and just enjoy the flying experience, ah, perhaps, but not in the next few days or so, that's for sure! This is too much fun. :Nerd: Kind regards,

Bojotes tool suggested a hybrid pool setup but bufferpools=0 is the only way to go with a 580GTX IMO.jja

I agree. AffinityMask=14 and Bufferpools=0 with sliders backed off one notch gives perfect performance w/the GTX580. No need for anything else here.

Have you tried placing the following lines in your fsx.cfg under the [DISPLAY] section?ForceFullScreenVSync=1ForceWindowedVSync=1

Well, I could not resist...I just pulled the trigger on a 580 GTX! Here we go again. Kind regards,

Stephen,If you really want to test these GPUs side by side, suggest revising what settings the testing is done under so that fsx is actually using the GPU in a way that is loaded towards the GPU a bit more than your previous test.frankly there isn’t much GPUs do for FSX even when they're being utilized correctly, there is a little bit of shader work (more if you turn water up, shadows, effects and Bloom), but mostly in raw terms the bandwidth, ROPS and core clock, so it requires a decent screen resolution combined with a good amount of filtering to test what these cards offer, otherwise there is no real test of the GPU going on, and once smooth flight is established, what have you got to show for it? Any upgrades beyond that would be some what useless, kind of like getting a new Hemi equiped Ram with cylinder de-activation...Hey I got me a Hemi, but I never load it or drive beyond using 4 cylinders, when I tested it against my 4cyl Honda Pilot, so I saw little differrence - Useless. Ahhh, the sweet smell of new hardware! Look forward to your results.Cheers!

Stephen,If you really want to test these GPUs side by side, suggest revising what settings the testing is done under so that fsx is actually using the GPU in a way that is loaded towards the GPU a bit more than your previous test.frankly there isn’t much GPUs do for FSX even when they're being utilized correctly, there is a little bit of shader work (more if you turn water up, shadows, effects and Bloom), but mostly in raw terms the bandwidth, ROPS and core clock, so it requires a decent screen resolution combined with a good amount of filtering to test what these cards offer, otherwise there is no real test of the GPU going on, and once smooth flight is established, what have you got to show for it? Any upgrades beyond that would be some what useless, kind of like getting a new Hemi equiped Ram with cylinder de-activation...Hey I got me a Hemi, but I never load it or drive beyond using 4 cylinders, when I tested it against my 4cyl Honda Pilot, so I saw little differrence - Useless. Ahhh, the sweet smell of new hardware! Look forward to your results.Cheers!

Good advice Freebird. I will certainly try to make the tests and comparisons meaningful.Kind regards,

Good advice Freebird. I will certainly try to make the tests and comparisons meaningful.Kind regards,

I also want to extend a thanks for all of your testing Stephen.  On the other hand I don't know if test data alone can give a true indication of how much the 580 has transformed FSX on my system but your results should be interesting none the less.Anyway, I'm sure that you will enjoy yours.Thanksjja

Hi folks back again after a few more days of tests.nothing I did would remove the stutters with everything turned completely down, vsync on and locked between 20-30fps but i have had a success of sorts. One thing i noticed was that different frame locks produced different stutter patterns.In the end an internal frame lock of 40-45 with vsync on and raising Texture Bandwidth Mult to 60 has almost perfect flight.I am now able to fly with all settings maxed out with very smooth results, don't ask me why my frame lock needs to be 15fps higher than everyone else to get rid of the stutters but it seems to work.The only issue is this works with no addons just fine, once i add the heavy stuff from previous tests i know my frame rates will drop between 20-30 so it will be back to the drawing board to find the right frame lock and TBM. What i can do though is use ORBX's FSX-GO utility to load different settings into the CFG for different flights depending on whether i am flying over FTX scenery or not.QUESTION: does anyone know if the relationship between vsync, frame lock and TBM is upset by using a different monitor with the same refresh rate but a different response time? I am testing my fathers system on my Apple Display but the final setup will be with his Dell 24". I'm thinking of taking the system to a friends work where he has a Dell 24" and testing there to be 100% sure.Thanks again all for your support, I have learnt a great deal the past couple of weeks, i will keep you posted with the next results once i fire up all the eye candy.cheersDavePS: also another quick question, does anyone else get crazy jerking in instant replay using LOCKED spot? its unbearable even though my flight is smooth. Only work around i have found that is the FS Recorder Module which is dead smooth but not quite as convenient. It will do, i was just wondering if anyone else has found this also. Advanatge of FS Recorder is you have the replay saved in data format, not video, to play again in FSX at anytime. Downside is if you didnt start a record you cant use it to instant replay as with default FSX replay.