Why putting FSX on its own HDD?

[ArjenVdv 190]

Hi,Currently the only bottleneck of my pc is my HDD, which is a WD Caviar Green 1TB 5400 RPM. I'm planning to buy two SSD's. a Crucial M4 64GB for my OS, and a Crucial M4 128 GB for FSX. Is this a good choice?I was also wondering, will I see a performance increase when I put FSX on it's own drive? In terms of framerate?

[Superpilotv2 2]

The frames won´t be affected by using an SSD. It´ll load a lot faster but I think you won´t really find a difference in frames. It´ll reduce the texture loading time and the blurries (and maybe the shutters) but no real impact on the frames.I think the big advantage for FSX on its own disk or at least partitition is that you can gefragment it a lot easier than it would be without. The OS tends to fragment very fast and so this would prevent the whole disk from getting perferctly defargmented and this massivle affects the FPS. The more fragemented the data is, the longer it takes to load the data in FS and so the FPS will go down.

[ArjenVdv 190]

The frames won´t be affected by using an SSD. It´ll load a lot faster but I think you won´t really find a difference in frames. It´ll reduce the texture loading time and the blurries (and maybe the shutters) but no real impact on the frames.I think the big advantage for FSX on its own disk or at least partitition is that you can gefragment it a lot easier than it would be without. The OS tends to fragment very fast and so this would prevent the whole disk from getting perferctly defargmented and this massivle affects the FPS. The more fragemented the data is, the longer it takes to load the data in FS and so the FPS will go down.

So if I understand correctly, FSX will get better FPS when you put it on a seperate HDD/SSD, instead of on the OS HDD/SSD, because the OS drive is very fragmented, BUT framerate between SSD vs HDD is around the same except for stutters. Is this correct? At the moment I have FSX on the same drive as my OS (because I only have 1 drive), so putting in on a seperate drive will give me better FPS correct?

[Superpilotv2 2]

So if I understand correctly, FSX will get better FPS when you put it on a seperate HDD/SSD, instead of on the OS HDD/SSD, because the OS drive is very fragmented, BUT framerate between SSD vs HDD is around the same except for stutters. Is this correct? At the moment I have FSX on the same drive as my OS (because I only have 1 drive), so putting in on a seperate drive will give me better FPS correct?

Over all it should. And I also have FSX and the OS on the same HDD but I ahve two partititions, one smaller one for the OS (which is very fragmented) and a larger one for all the rest (basicly FS9/FSX and some other stuff) and this has zero defragmentation.Yes, it´ll speed up the FPS cause the reading head hasn´t to move arround that much on the disk to collect all the data.

[adamant365 28]

I have a 128GB Crucial SSD and I love it. Like Steffen says, it doesn't increase my FPS that I know of, but Windows and FSX both load with lightning speed. I have my OS and FSX on the same disk. As far as having FSX on it's own drive, I don't think that is really all that necessary if you are running both on SSDs. Since there is no read head moving around and the data throughput is so amazingly fast, it's not a huge deal to have the OS and FSX on the same disk. But you will want to have FSX on the root of whichever drive you install it on. For example, if by default it wants to install to C:/Program Files (x86)/Microsoft Games/, you will want to change it in the istaller just install to C:/.Your setup will be nice...having two SSD's that is. I don't have space issues using just the one, but I only have FSX and the OS on the SSD. I have other slower HDDs for other programs.Oh, and you will NOT want to try to defrag the SSDs. By their nature, they don't get fragmented. I don't know if it would cause harm, but it's totally unnecessary anyway.

[ArjenVdv 190]

So, if I understand correctly... If you have two HDD's, you should put FSX on a seperate HDD so that will increase framerate and performance because that seperate HDD is not that fragmented. BUT, if you have two SSD's, it's not necessary to put FSX on a seperate SSD, because SSD's don't get fragmented, so you will not notice any framerate/performance increase. Is this all correct?

Edited January 23, 2012 by arjenfsx

[adamant365 28]

So, if I understand correctly... If you have two HDD's, you should put FSX on a seperate HDD so that will increase framerate and performance because that seperate HDD is not that fragmented. BUT, if you have two SSD's, it's not necessary to put FSX on a seperate SSD, because SSD's don't get fragmented, so you will not notice any framerate/performance increase. Is this all correct?

To the best of my knowledge, that is correct thinking. Personally, I prefer to have one big SSD for FSX and the OS as opposed to two SSD's with one drive for the OS and one for FSX. The reasoning there is that two drives means twice the possibility one will fail. Either way you slice it, if you lose one of your drives, you're not flying for a bit. However, one big drive means you lose FSX and your OS if you have one and it fails. Probably the best idea would be to have two big SSD's (at least 128GB) in RAID 1 configuration. That of course if you have the cash...

[CapnOz 104]

- intersting topic. Im thinking about this because my Velicraptor( 150GB) is just about full. Mostly FSX stuff. 9GB of itunes music thats crowding me out.Could some one post how to have FSX on a seperate drive with W7?

[adamant365 28]

- intersting topic. Im thinking about this because my Velicraptor( 150GB) is just about full. Mostly FSX stuff. 9GB of itunes music thats crowding me out.Could some one post how to have FSX on a seperate drive with W7?

It's pretty simple really. At the point in the installer where it asks the location to install FSX, (probably something like C:Program Files (X86)Microsoft Games) simply change the drive letter to the drive you want to install it on. At the same time, remove all the folder structure so that you simply have the root of the drive in the "Install Directory" field so it looks like D:That's all it takes. As far as I know there are no restrictions on where you install FSX as long as the registry entries all match up, which they should if you are using the installer. I have two drives and every time I install new software on my PC, I have to remember to change the drive letter from C to D in order to not take up precious space on my SSD. Since I installed the OS and FSX on the SSD, those are the only things I want on the SSD. I would have had the SSD be FSX only, but I also wanted my OS on the SSD because it's so darned fast to boot.About the iTunes...why not stick those on an external drive? Or pick up a cheap internal HDD and migrate them over. Just ideas....

[ArjenVdv 190]

It's pretty simple really. At the point in the installer where it asks the location to install FSX, (probably something like C:Program Files (X86)Microsoft Games) simply change the drive letter to the drive you want to install it on. At the same time, remove all the folder structure so that you simply have the root of the drive in the "Install Directory" field so it looks like D:That's all it takes. As far as I know there are no restrictions on where you install FSX as long as the registry entries all match up, which they should if you are using the installer. I have two drives and every time I install new software on my PC, I have to remember to change the drive letter from C to D in order to not take up precious space on my SSD. Since I installed the OS and FSX on the SSD, those are the only things I want on the SSD. I would have had the SSD be FSX only, but I also wanted my OS on the SSD because it's so darned fast to boot.About the iTunes...why not stick those on an external drive? Or pick up a cheap internal HDD and migrate them over. Just ideas....

Hey never thought of this. I was initially planning to install FSX in D:/FSX when I get my SSD. So I can just install it directly in D? (Or whatever letter my SSD is...). So that means when I open my D:/ that immediatly all my FSX files appear? Does it really matter if I install it in D:/FSX or directly in D:/? In terms of performacne?

[adamant365 28]

Hey never thought of this. I was initially planning to install FSX in D:/FSX when I get my SSD. So I can just install it directly in D? (Or whatever letter my SSD is...). So that means when I open my D:/ that immediatly all my FSX files appear? Does it really matter if I install it in D:/FSX or directly in D:/? In terms of performacne?

I don't think it's possible to have the root of the drive be the FSX directory. The installer is merely asking what folder to put the FSX folder in. I don't know if it would be even wise to try having your root drive the FSX folder. If you merely tell the installer to install in D:, it will create the FSX folder in the D drive. As far as performance, I think having a D:FSX folder is the optimum situation.Bottom line, I don't think you can have your Addon Scenery, Autogen, Categories, etc folders right on the root. There has to be at least an FSX folder.

[Turbine777 13]

If one were to put FSX on an SSD, the location it was on that SSD wouldn't really matter. However, if one wanted the best performance and load times, seek times, etc, from a mechanical drive then you could get that from Ultimate Defrag 3's options in putting on the very outside of the platter. I made a video of how to a little while ago explaining how

.

[CapnOz 104]

It's pretty simple really. At the point in the installer where it asks the location to install FSX, (probably something like C:Program Files (X86)Microsoft Games) simply change the drive letter to the drive you want to install it on. At the same time, remove all the folder structure so that you simply have the root of the drive in the "Install Directory" field so it looks like D:That's all it takes. As far as I know there are no restrictions on where you install FSX as long as the registry entries all match up, which they should if you are using the installer. I have two drives and every time I install new software on my PC, I have to remember to change the drive letter from C to D in order to not take up precious space on my SSD. Since I installed the OS and FSX on the SSD, those are the only things I want on the SSD. I would have had the SSD be FSX only, but I also wanted my OS on the SSD because it's so darned fast to boot.About the iTunes...why not stick those on an external drive? Or pick up a cheap internal HDD and migrate them over. Just ideas....

thanks adam. I have been wanting to move itunes over to a ext drive, saving it for a rainy day i suppose.

[GundamWZero 8]

Another reason to move FSX on a SSD (or HDD) is because of the Operating System itself. If you do major work on your computer, or Windows crash and will not recover, you may have to re-install Windows. If FSX is on that Windows drive, the it will be erased through a re-format. Moving FSX to another drive will save all your aircrafts, configurations, add-on scenery. When you re-install Windows, FSX is unaffected.... well you may have to re-activate Windows.

[iam 0]

As you fly in FSX, keep in mind that your OS and a bunch of background processes are running in the background and require constant i/o from your HD.It doesn't matter if you have the OS and FSX on separate partitions, as long as they are on the same HD, it WILL have an impact on FSX. We're talking thousands of i/o per minutes only for the OS and background services.The best solution is to have both the OS and FSX on separate physical drives. That way, the same HD doesn't have to share its reading/writing cycles between the OS/background services/bunch of other apps in the background and FSX.Using a SSD will NOT, repeat NOT, increase your FPS. It will (should) make FSX smoother and prevent blurries by increasing textures read speed, but will NOT increase the amount of FPS you're currently getting. It is still a huge advantage though as the less variation in FPS you get, the more smooth FSX will feel. Keep in mind that getting +70fps highs only to see the FPS drop to 26 then up to 50 then down to 20 then up...down...up...down... will not look better than having a constant non-variating 20fps.I personally have FSX on a dedicated/standalone WD caviar black SATA3 (6gb/s) drive with 64mb cache, couldn't afford SSD and personally thought the technology wasn't quite there yet.... Anyways, it used to be on the same physical drive as my W7 Ultimate OS. Moving FSX to its own drive made a huge difference. It did decrease load time (previous drive was a SATA2) and greatly helped in eliminating stutters/blurries and I can now keep an almost nono-variating FPS, which makes the whole experience a lot better!But remember, you will not notice an increase in FPS!Cheers!

Edited January 31, 2012 by iam