Framerates drop after a while

[Hoang 108]

Some of you might know I've had terrible experiences with FPS,frames issues. Mainly was caused by my hardware. So I got a better graphic card and yup it sure cure a lot of problems that I was struggling. But..just a little I notice lately. If I load my fs right into an airport, I can get very high FPS(say..40 at KMDW),even if park it there. But if I fly from somewhere else into it, when approaching I can see some framerates drop and when landing into it, it really drops lower than I expected (I only get ~15-25FPS). Can anyone help me finding the cause? I'm thinking if it drops from 40 to only 15-25. If at KJFK I can only get ~20-25FPS, what will it be when it drops? .. could be 10..could be lower /Little bit off topic. I'm running E5300@4Ghz. Will E8400@4Ghz or maybe 4.2Ghz increase the performance? I hope someone here is using E8400. And will 6 or 8GB ram make any difference comparing to 4GB ram?

[learn-by-flying 37]

It is possible that there are background tasks running after the computer sits for a while, windows could be confused and starts de-fragmenting (not normal as it normally is set up to run at 3 a.m. I think), running a virus scan, doing random idle processes. Tom

[Hoang 108]

Thanks. I've done some test lately and found that if I stay in Fs for a while (I think about 15-30 minutes or more) then the FPS will drop,drop and drop. I accidentally found the cause (might not the only) is because of the sound. If I mute sound in FS (press Q) then my FPS will go up like before. The difference is significant. With sound on, by viewing around PMDG 747 VC I can only get 10-15FPS. But without sound, it can go up to 35-40FPS and never drop bellow. This is very very weird. How can sound affect that much on FPS? The same with other aircrafts such as iFly 737 Update: I'm currently enroute KSFO-VHHH on PMDG 747. When at gate at KSFO, my VC has FPS more than 25. After preflight and going through checklist (~30minutes) it dropped to only about 15-20. From cruising to now on it's only around 5FPS. Unbelieveable. All of that are when sound is on, if I turn it off,always above 35FPS.

[Hoang 108]

I save my flight. Restart Fs9 and the framerates is ok again. I will try to see how long will it last.

[learn-by-flying 37]

Have you tried to update your sound card drivers?

[Hoang 108]

Yes,already to the latest version. And I also uninstalled nVidia HD but still no luck! Banging my head to fix this all day Currently flying without sound. Very weird and quite boring but my frames are great I'm asking this too at another hardware forums to ask whether if I'm having bottleneck or not.

[Hoang 108]

I've tested again with long haul flight. After ~5 hours across the ocean, my FS is now struggling around 1-2 FPS. Unbelieveable. (sound on) With sound off,it jumps up to around 20. If I restart my FS,continue my flight then it will max at 30. Ah,by the way, I'm connecting my Z5500 to the mainboard through the digital port.

[Raindance 25]

@Sk1nNy -- Sorry if it's a silly question, but do you have a separate dedicated sound card or are you using onboard (motherboard) sound, which steals CPU cycles? Having said that, even with onboard sound, that slow degradation of performance seems strange. You'd expect onboard sound to have a constant effect on performance from the outset. Did you check what other processes are running in Task Manager when this happens?

[Hoang 108]

@Sk1nNy -- Sorry if it's a silly question, but do you have a separate dedicated sound card or are you using onboard (motherboard) sound, which steals CPU cycles? Having said that, even with onboard sound, that slow degradation of performance seems strange. You'd expect onboard sound to have a constant effect on performance from the outset. Did you check what other processes are running in Task Manager when this happens?

I'm using onboard sound with digital port. Well when normal turning FS sound on and off does have difference in frames but only 2-3 FPS,not this much Yes I always open task manager when flying, so I can monitor the processes in the background. There aren't any suspicious yet. My fs9.exe runs around 1-1,2GB of memory. The more longer I stay in FS, the more FPS "it" eats the game. What the hell is this Could it be because of bottleneck? My CPU is kinda..old and slow comparing to the graphic card /The newest driver (280.26) from nVidia has numerous problems so I'm currently using 275.33. An older version.

[Swoop 0]

This may sound very basic, (so forgive me if it does), but are you monitoring temperatures? It almost sounds like something is heating up and by the time you go back into the sim, it has cooled itself off enough to continue. Also, (and I may be reaching here), but do you think that the condition happens if the system starts using more then one memory module? I wonder if you swapped memory modules around if the behavior goes away.Another system parameter you could monitor would be processes with a large number of open handles which continues to grow...the dreaded memory leak!Mark

[Hoang 108]

This may sound very basic, (so forgive me if it does), but are you monitoring temperatures? It almost sounds like something is heating up and by the time you go back into the sim, it has cooled itself off enough to continue. Also, (and I may be reaching here), but do you think that the condition happens if the system starts using more then one memory module? I wonder if you swapped memory modules around if the behavior goes away. Another system parameter you could monitor would be processes with a large number of open handles which continues to grow...the dreaded memory leak! Mark

Thanks for pointing that out :( I always check my system temperature and I'm very sure it is nice. CPU ~50-60*C ,2 HDD are at ~40*C, GPU around 40-50*C,mainboard ~40*C. I'm also in caution about the OOM or memory leak but it isn't happening. I ran the 4GB patch and edited fs9.exe. Anyway, I've just done the last thing that I can think of...rename the fs9.cfg and run Fs so I can get a brand new one. And now..after almost 1 hour 30 minutes..no framerates leak. Very weird but I can see smile coming out of my face. Currently enroute EDDF-KSFO. Will report back soon the result!

[mmann 72]

A common cause for this problem is people refusing to use the FS9.1 patch or not installing the patch correctly.

[Hoang 108]

A common cause for this problem is people refusing to use the FS9.1 patch or not installing the patch correctly.

I always install 9.1 patch right after installing Fs9 so it shouldn't be it :( Thanks all for your help. The problem I believe is cured. I don't know what exactly the cause because I've done some works including remove the run compatibility with window XP SP3 and delete fs9.cfg.

[philip66 0]

this is an aged topic...but it's just to say that I encountered the same problem. A drop of frame rates after a while that could be canceled by desactivating the sound in FS9.

 

I thought to buy a sound card but in fact the solution :" remove the run compatibility with window XP SP3 and delete fs9.cfg." works for me too.

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