System Upgrade: Here is what PMDG Advised

[bakaman 28]

Hi everyone,I would like to share with you my system upgrade experience. Actually i was running FSX on my imac 27 2.8Ghz but i was getting poor performances especially when flying on most of the addon sceneries: i encountered a lot stuttering, graphic corruption or crash to desktop just because the machine wasn't powerful enough and the graphic card was just not appropriate (ATI 4870). So for those who who want to buy an imac to run FSX using bootcamp, i did it myself and i have 3 words for you: JUST FORGET IT !!! Being very frustrated i decided to submit a ticket at PMDG and Ryan was kind enough to help me get the best components on the market to build my own system. I got exactly what he advised to to buy. Check this out: Corsair 600T tower caseAsus P8P67 deluxe B3 MotherboardIntel i5 2500k cpuA70 and H70 Corsair cooling systemCorsair veangence 2*4Go Ram 1600Mhz 1.5V CL8Western Digital Caviar Black 2*2TBEvga GTX 580 superclockedCorsair AX series 850WPlextor L890SA DVD Writer http://www.youtube.c...di?feature=mhum So if you guys want to know about the performance and so on, i won't be able to give you those kind of informations as the system is not ready yet. But if you want to have some details about how much it cost, or about fsx on the imac etc.... feel free to post or contact me i'll be very delighted to help you.

[ryanbatc 12,812]

Looks good, if you want to save a little cash but still have an excellent card, go with the GTX 570. Regarding the cooler - you pick one - the A70 (air-based) or H70 (water based). I'd actually get the H60 (I own it) because it's newer.

[RossThomson 1]

Just so you don't get your posts deleted, put your full name in your postNice system!

[bakaman 28]

Thanks guys,I'll probably post tomorrow if i get my cooler. Each time i'll get a component of my new system i'll post here and upload a video. That's the first time for me to build a system and i'm very excited about it . Once i'll get my system up and running i'll also upload some videos for you guys so you can see the result of such an upgrade.Kaman BA

[Tabs 2,790]

Just to be clear here for others who are building... I didn't actually recommend that Kaman get a GTX580 and I specifically recommended against a factory overclocked one... I think it's overkill for an FSX-only machine and OCing the video card does basically nothing for FSX - you can usually reach higher speeds than the factory OCed ones using just the normal version and OCing yourself. I would have put the extra money toward an SSD for the OS and FSX.

[antic81 57]

Hi guys,That does look good...although I have been out of simming and the pc gaming world for a while now...since my last cpu burnt out...and that was an old home build 3.2 gig P4!So I have been eyeing out a new system for FSX amongst other things and have found this:System Specification- Case: Antec 1200 V3 Case with White LED case fans.- Power Supply: Corsair AX 850 Gold Rated PSU- CPU: Intel Core i7 2600K 3.40GHz Sandybridge overclocked to 4.60GHz- Motherboard: Asus P8P67 PRO Intel P67 (Socket 1155) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard ** B3 REVISION **- Cooler: Corsair H70 CPU Cooler- RAM: 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 Dual Channel Kit (16GB Upgrade Available)- Hard Drive: OCZ Vertex 2E 60GB and Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB 6GB/s SATA-II 32MB Cache- Graphics Card: Dual Nvidia GeForce GTX 580 1536MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Cards in Sli- Sound: Realtek 7.1 Channel Sound (On-Board)- Optical Drive: Samsung SH-B123L/RSBP 12x BD-ROM / 16x DVD Writer Drive - Black- Operating System: Windows 7 home premium 64 bit.Also decided to go for a 24" LED screen and a Saitek X52 Pro stick as I have always used them in the past and found them to be great sticks - the X52 does also have some great reviews.Its actually a build made by a local UK company that I used when I built my last machine all those years ago - I wont mention the name as it is a commercial enterprise and I suspect that is against the rules here - but they specialise overclocked gear.What I always wonder is whats the difference between an i5 2600 and an i7 2600? or perhaps there is no such thing- you must forgive me as I have been out of the game for a long while now.All that gear is sitting in a basket on their site and yet I have to wait for our business to kick off mid month before I can hit the buy button!Then of course there's all the bits for FSX to get...FSGlobal sceneryUltimate TrafficActive skyREX All the PMDG Aircraft as I couldnt run them on my old system so had to stick with the old FS9 versions.Not sure if there is a good sound pack for the AI - used to have an awesome one for FS9 - cant remember what it was called...Im sure theres more...Being single certainly has its advantages...haha!

[Tabs 2,790]

Anthony,Do you play games other than FS? The dual video cards are a total waste if not.

[Ponk 51]

i5 2500k No HT and default clock is 3.3Ghz 6mb L3 cachei7 2600k With HT and default clock is 3.4Ghz 8mb L3 cacheBoth overclock and perform the same in FSX at least.nothing else.....

[bakaman 28]

Ryan is totally right, he advised for a 570 but i don't know what will happen with MS Flight (maybe that the new sim will take advantage of a better graphic card). And just for infos, i got both the 570 and the 580 (the 2nd one was offered) but i dont know yet what i'll put in the case. given that i heard some of you reinstalled their whole system after a graphic card upgrade. So i really need to make up my mind on this. And sorry for the confusion Ryan!

[antic81 57]

Anthony,Do you play games other than FS? The dual video cards are a total waste if not.

Hi Ryan,Well to be honest I will have some other stuff on there - even I cant justify buying it only for FSX and also I want it to last a few years - I'll also probably go with the 16 GB of RAM again not only for FSX ( as I am aware that FSX will not use more than 4GB?)Its also a case of longevity.A quick question if I may - what are the thoughts on Solid State Drives - worth it for FSX - does it make a vast difference? They seem to be pretty steep in price!Bloody technology!Cheers - for the differences on the i5 vs i7's chaps!

[dazz 69]

Ryan is totally right, he advised for a 570 but i don't know what will happen with MS Flight (maybe that the new sim will take advantage of a better graphic card). And just for infos, i got both the 570 and the 580 (the 2nd one was offered) but i dont know yet what i'll put in the case. given that i heard some of you reinstalled their whole system after a graphic card upgrade. So i really need to make up my mind on this. And sorry for the confusion Ryan!

there's no need to reinstall anything just to upgrade the GPU only the drivers

[Tabs 2,790]

Hi Ryan,Well to be honest I will have some other stuff on there - even I cant justify buying it only for FSX and also I want it to last a few years - I'll also probably go with the 16 GB of RAM again not only for FSX ( as I am aware that FSX will not use more than 4GB?)Its also a case of longevity.A quick question if I may - what are the thoughts on Solid State Drives - worth it for FSX - does it make a vast difference? They seem to be pretty steep in price!Bloody technology!Cheers - for the differences on the i5 vs i7's chaps!

A single GTX580 can already run basically any game out there completely maxed up to around 2560x1600 (a single 30" monitor). I've had no trouble running anything at all on my GTX570 at 1920x1200 (single 24" monitor). Unless you are trying to run Crysis or Metro 2033 across three 30" monitors or something crazy like that, I just don't see the need for dual GPUs right now - it's a huge expense, a huge power draw etc.I would scrap the 2nd GTX580 and get a large SSD for Windows 7 and FSX. The SSD will not improve your framerate but it drastically improves the overall responsiveness of the OS and the loadtimes in FSX. Look at the 240GB OCZ Vertex 3 or Intel 510 series drives, those are currently the best ones.

there's no need to reinstall anything just to upgrade the GPU only the drivers

Wasn't true in my case - my 570 was all screwed up until I reformatted after I switched to it from my old 260. Can't explain it but it was a gigantic difference - I almost sent the 570 back, tried the reformat as a last ditch attempt and it was like night and day. Had done driver sweeper and all of that too...

[bakaman 28]

Thanks for the confirmation Ryan !Kaman BA

[antic81 57]

Also just noticed this line here:Hard Drive: OCZ Vertex 2E 60GB and Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB 6GB/s SATA-II 32MB CacheWhich is a copy and paste (obviously) from the site so could someone in the know explain if this is two separate drives and if so what the point is?Cheers!And apologies for the hi-jacking of the thread!

[antic81 57]

A single GTX580 can already run basically any game out there completely maxed up to around 2560x1600 (a single 30" monitor). I've had no trouble running anything at all on my GTX570 at 1920x1200 (single 24" monitor). Unless you are trying to run Crysis or Metro 2033 across three 30" monitors or something crazy like that, I just don't see the need for dual GPUs right now - it's a huge expense, a huge power draw etc.I would scrap the 2nd GTX580 and get a large SSD for Windows 7 and FSX. The SSD will not improve your framerate but it drastically improves the overall responsiveness of the OS and the loadtimes in FSX. Look at the 240GB OCZ Vertex 3 or Intel 510 series drives, those are currently the best ones.Wasn't true in my case - my 570 was all screwed up until I reformatted after I switched to it from my old 260. Can't explain it but it was a gigantic difference - I almost sent the 570 back, tried the reformat as a last ditch attempt and it was like night and day. Had done driver sweeper and all of that too...

Hi Ryan,Well thanks mate - I may make a little change to the specs afterall then!Good to have some impartial advice - the overall cost saving is about £380 - so that certainly is a significant amount! Ill stick with the RAM as the difference is only 60 odd quid and it will be usefull to have in the future.