Hi AllMy current visuals machine employs an ATI 5770HD card to provide front left, front and front right views on three monitors. I suffer from a massive fps drop whenever I introduce any more than a slight scatter of clouds into the mix. In clear skies I get 40+ FPS. Anymore than a very slight scattering of clouds and this drops to about 16FPS. To my knowledge I cant use and external FPS limiter as I'm using DX10 (massive fps increase over DX9 for me). On a single monitor I can max the weather and still have great performance. I expect a drop when using Eyefinity due to the increase in resolution.I have read that ATI cards don't tend to handle clouds that well so my question is; Could I switch to 2 x Nvidia cards in a SLI formation (to continue with 3 monitors on one machine) and not suffer such a severe FPS drop?Info on the whole setup can be found in my blog (below)RegardsAlexwww.al3x-foster.tumblr.com

Hi AllMy current visuals machine employs an ATI 5770HD card to provide front left, front and front right views on three monitors. I suffer from a massive fps drop whenever I introduce any more than a slight scatter of clouds into the mix. In clear skies I get 40+ FPS. Anymore than a very slight scattering of clouds and this drops to about 16FPS. To my knowledge I cant use and external FPS limiter as I'm using DX10 (massive fps increase over DX9 for me). On a single monitor I can max the weather and still have great performance. I expect a drop when using Eyefinity due to the increase in resolution.I have read that ATI cards don't tend to handle clouds that well so my question is; Could I switch to 2 x Nvidia cards in a SLI formation (to continue with 3 monitors on one machine) and not suffer such a severe FPS drop?Info on the whole setup can be found in my blog (below)RegardsAlexwww.al3x-foster.tumblr.com

Yes, SLI will let you use Nvidia surround, which is similar to Eyefinity. I used to use a ATI5770HD, but switched over to Nvidia because of the cloud performance as well.

I would reccomend using THIS.After that, use THIS to improve FPS. This is Shader Model 3 for FSX. This gives a very nice jump in FPS with ATI/AMD GPU's.

I too highly suggest you try a nvidia card. Systems do vary so only true way is to buy and try the card yourself. I'm getting much improved results with a slower nvidia card than my current (supposedly much faster) ATI. ATI is great for most of my other games but FSX it does not like at all.

I too thought of nvidea solution. Basically add two video cards in SLI for multi monitors (more than 2 monitors) But then I was told that SLI brings down the system (for FSX). That FSX works better in non SLI mode. So it solves the multi monitor issue...but the price isn FSX performance in SLI.Is this not True?Manny

I would reccomend using THIS.After that, use THIS to improve FPS. This is Shader Model 3 for FSX. This gives a very nice jump in FPS with ATI/AMD GPU's.

Thanks!I've already used the fsx.cfg tweak tool to great effect but so far as I understand, the Shader Model 3 only works in DX9? I'm using DX10 as FPS is better. Would switching back to DX9 and using Shader be better?

Would switching back to DX9 and using Shader be better?

You might as well try it.