So after not finding data if fast nvidia on my type of system(older Core 2 Duo) would help or not, I was forced to test it my self.Default system:ATI 69708 Gig OCZRaid 0 with 2 x HITACHI Deskstar 7K1000.C(0F10383) 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/sGigabyte EP35C-DS3R v2.1E8500 at oc of 4.0GHzVista64nvidia test system:same but with nvidia GTX560Ti insteadBottom line: Frame rate with 560 was slightly less 1-2fps BUT it did not hitch or stutter at all compared to ATI. Like 90% less stuttering. Also noticed FSAA can not simply be forced with Control Panel like ATI can.I'm keeping my ATI card as the stuttering is not that huge an issue to me.Few pics with frame rates:nvidiaATII know this should probably be in hardware but thought it was important info for more people to see.

Try it with some real nasty thunderstorms!The ATI that is...

Drivers make a difference. Older Nvidia drivers for FSX often work better. Also, I think nvidiainspector can force FSAA (on newer drivers at least). You might still have some experimenting to do.

So true, I remember the good ol´ 182.50 driver on a 9600 GT, ah those were the days..! :Just Kidding:

With a few scenery addons, I was less than happy with FSX performance. Few nights of tweaking and trying things prompted me to put back in the GTX560Ti that I haven't returned yet.HUGE difference. Yes, in many vanilla FSX areas my frame rate is a tad slower BUT the consistency and non-stuttering of this nvidia card is night and day better than my ATI.Plus, in the HD scenery areas, frame rate is at minimum 5fps faster and usually about 10fps faster. And again, the stuttering is much less, especially when mouse looking around.

Hi VeryBumpy,Yes for whatever reason, FSX seems to really like Nvidia cards better - at least that seems to be the perception of many here.You may already be aware of this, to really get the most out of that Nvidia card, have a read here - this was done by NickN, long considered a guru of seting up Nvidia cards for FSX. I run for the most part with his settings, and get very good performance, and hardly any stuttering to speak of. A lot of his settings are done using the Nvidia Inspector app, and yes you can force AA to overide the settings in FSX using this method. In addition, Inspecter now has an external frame rate limiter, I set it to 30 fps while leaving it unlimited within FSX, seems to give me the best results so far.http://www.simforums.com/forums/fsx-and-nhancer-settings-for-new-drivers-updated_topic36586.htmlAlso in regards to the stuttering, are you familiar with and have you tried using the bufferpools=0 tweak? Some cards with 1gb or more of ram can handle that, it basically pushes the graphics straight to the video card bypassing any buffering. That tweak really helped my performance, especially around the airports - and I am running a GTX 460 SSC video card with 1gb of ram.Have fun!

Suggest using nvidia inspector and set AF=16X, AA=8XS.

This is what I get ATI vs nvidia in HD scenery.ATInvidia

Hello everybody,This thread should be in the Hardware Forums. Since it seems to be primarily about video cards and drivers, I will move it there but leave a link to it from here. Please discuss hardware issues in the Hardware Forum. Thank you.Kind regards,

Give ATI some clouds, and Nvidia is going to be eating it away. A very well known fact. New cards might be different, but I am yet to hear anything about that!

I've got the clouds set to max within Settings in those screens.Need to do more testing tonight in rain and such.

Suggest using nvidia inspector and set AF=16X, AA=8XS.

Being a NV noob, what advantage is using nvidia inspector over just checking the AntiAliasing/Ansioscopic box in game along with forcing 16xAF in CP?

Give ATI some clouds, and Nvidia is going to be eating it away. A very well known fact. New cards might be different, but I am yet to hear anything about that!

I'm confused by your statement. 'Eating it away' meaning nvidia will be much better or worse in clouds? I flew up into some clouds with the gtx560 last night and there was definitely a large frame rate drop 20-->12.Adding to my ATI vs nvidia experience, I was tired last night so didn't do any serious number testing but instead just loaded different missions and areas with some fsx.cfg changes and flew around.Again, there is zero doubt that nvidia is nearly stutter free compared to ATI. Even at low frame rates, panning around is steady and smooth on nvidia. Panning with ATI, even if the frame rate is +10 over nvidia, is nauseating cause the view massively skips frames and jumps around so much.Also, frame rates in wilderness landscape(minimal water and roads and no cities), nvidia has much faster frame rate, +10fps.However, in cities and heavy water areas, it seems reversed; ATI is about +10fps. Major downtown areas like the FSXmark11 are equally slow on both cards albeit stutters less on nv. Overclocking the nv card does not seem to have much if any affect at all to improve frame rates.As it stands now, I'm preferring the slower but consistent frame rates of nv.

Nvidia is better in general. You can't quite compare the frames, since you are comparing two different kinds of cards.But if you load the same cloud situation in both cards, lets say 3 layers of overcast cumulus clouds, I am sure nvidia is going to achieve more with the same level of quality - please take into consideration that most users do want nicely antialiased aircraft and non-shimmering trees.Sent from my iPhone using Forum Runner

Being a NV noob, what advantage is using nvidia inspector over just checking the AntiAliasing/Ansioscopic box in game along with forcing 16xAF in CP?

nvidia Inspector gives you access to additional AA options that you cannot access via the CP, like 8XS and 8XSQ both of whichare favorites among the FSX fans.

The key element IMHO not mentioned here is that FSX is not coded to properly leverage the GPU in any case.With my GTX 470 FSX uses at most 40%.Compare that to the new Falcon BMS mod, a recoded 10 year old sim, it uses 90% GPU.