I love my new graphics card and new speaker system :D

[ArjenVdv 190]

Hi,My system was pretty much on top of the notch, except for my graphics card (and my HDD which I'm also gonna upgrade "soon"). After having decided for weeks that I was gonna buy the GTX 580, I made a last minute change after reading a post from Ryan saying that anything from the GTX 560TI to the GTX 580 will perform pretty much equally in FSX. So, I decided that I was gonna buy a cheaper graphics card. I found the GTX 560TI a little too "low-end" (maybe not for FSX but for other games). The GTX 570 was pretty much out of stock in the Netherlands. Until I found this graphics card. Something kinda in between the GTX 580 and GTX 560TI. The NVIDIA GTX 560TI-448 1280 MB, which is not a regular GTX 560TI, which has 384 shader units and 1024 MB of VRAM, but this one has 448 shader units and 1280 MB of VRAM. Before I had this new graphics card, I was already pretty happy with my performance. I could achieve at least 20 fps in most cases. But yeah, extra performance is always welcome. So I bought the EVGA GTX 560TI-448 Classified (with their custom DS cooler). It cost me 285 euros, and because I saved some money, I could spend it on some other stuff. Well, today I received this new graphics card, installed it in my PC, with no problems. Installed the drivers and ran FSX. Unbelievable how big the performance difference was! While initally I was getting around 20 fps at Aerosoft EHAM with my old GT 320, I now got 35 (!) fps at Aerosoft EHAM with bad weather! incredible! In the air and at most other airports I could easily achive around 40-45 and sometimes even 50 fps! Some stutters every now and then still remain though, but I think that's because of my bad and old WD Caviar Green 1TB which only runs at 5400 RPM. And some people are saying that a graphics card barely makes a difference? Well, for me, it's the difference between day and night! From 20 to 35 fps under the same circumstances! So, if you're thinking about buying a new graphics card, and want to run other games also, then buy either the GTX 560TI-448, or the GTX 570 (these two are actually very similar, but the GTX 560TI-448 is not available in some countries). A few minor problems though: with the mouse cursor displayed, I get around 25% less performance, is anyone else noticing this too?Also for some reason, at Aerosoft EHAM, when getting around 3 miles out of the airport, all airport buildings suddenly turned white, I don't know why this happens... Btw, this only happens at Aerosoft EHAM (as far as I know), the rest is all working PERFECTLY!Well, as I said, because of buying a slightly cheaper GPU, I now could spend my money on some other stuff. I always had a very cheap set of two Trust speakers, only worth 10 euros, lol, never really liked them. Then I saw the Creative T6160 5.1 Speaker set, it costs only 55 euros, and read some good reviews, and I thought, why not? So I bought this set and also received it today. I put the subwoofer right under my desk, installed 3 on my desk, and the other two in the back of my room (around 1.5 meters behind me). When I started to play FSX, it was one of the amazing things I have ever heard! I new the soundpack of the 737NGX was very good, but THIS good? OMG, I could litterely hear every little sound, when putting in 40% N1, my desk even started vibrating a little, lol, gave me goosebumps! Beautiful soundset the NGX has! And also, the speakers were automaticly configured so that the engine sounds came out of the back speakers, and the cockpit sounds come of the 3 front speakers.