And to throw another spanner in the works it doesn't work well with multiple screens e.g. a main VC monitor and a CDU or moving map GPS on another monitor, it results in lower frame rates than in DX9 mode in the same situation and I get a constant flashing mouse pointer, along with the loading icon appearing on the mouse pointer all the time too. It's a shame because in single monitor mode it works bloody fantastic, but I can't live without my CDU2 or GPS5 from VRInsight.

DX10 is for better shadows and glare

your GPU is as fast, or faster than the cpu.

Little offtopic and perhaps nitpicking, but this statement is plainly wrong or at least wrongly put. Modern GPU is incredibly fast processor, but only in calculations with high data parallelism. In other words, GPU is a SIMD type processor suitable of computing same instruction on multiple data points at the same time (like calculating same algorithm in all the CUDA-cores or Stream-processors in modern GPUs for different data). Because of this feature or requirement, GPUs suit well for not just multimedia and graphics work, but also for many scientific calculations (Folding is one example). Also, many of today's most powerful supercomputers and clusters consist of hundreds or thousands of GPU-processors.

 

On the other hand, CPU is wholly a different beast. It is a general purpose processor designed to run complicated OS, programs and after all of that, it has to control all your hardware through system bus. That's why CPU is far more complicated processor compared to GPUs, even though latter are far bigger if you look their transistor counts or die size. Because of complicated architecture, high end CPUs also cost more than best GPUs even with their board and fast memory. There are also some "hybrid" processors, like IBM/Toshiba Cell-family, which includes one relatively weak general purpose processor to handle OS and rest of the computer and finally it instructs bunch of vector processing units, which actually make up pretty much all of the computational power of the unit.

 

So, as said this is like comparing apples to oranges. If you could run your Windows on your GPU it would do extremely poorly, although it wipes the floor with CPUs when you look at their peak performance figures with SIMD calculations. Of course modern CPUs have SIMD instructions also, because they are required to handle multimedia, but the design of processor is still very different.

DX10 cards and above. The mod is to sort out a couple of glitches that show multiple textures competing causing flashing runway junctions with taxiways and missing taxi direction arrows.

 

So with an ATI 5850 which supports DirectX 11, and running only one monitor, I should see improvements?

FSX DX10 mode is provided to look better than DX9

 

 

Hi Paul,

 

I also get occasional blue logos in gauges when changing views. What RT value would you suggest as a starting point and also what increment should I use please?

 

thanks

 

The standard rejectthreshold values to begin testing with are below.

 

Start at the smallest and work your way up until no more blue squares. Keep in mind you could have any number in between these as well, so consider them a guide for adjustments:

 

96Kb = 98304

128Kb = 131072

256Kb = 262144

512Kb = 524288

 

Just as different PC's will find a sweet value, that value will most likely vary between DX9 and DX10 use as well on the same PC.

A few points, not meant grumpily although it may possibly come over that way! Nor is it meant to criticise any other posters, I am just thinking about what someone reading this thread might find it useful to know at this point.

 

All the fixes I have posted do is address some of the most annoying graphical glitches that the fsx dx10 implementation has and which have caused people to quickly abandon it. They don't in themselves speed up fsx, change how textures appear or effect antialiasing. Therefore if you were disappointed in v2 then please don't expect a different experience in v3. All v3 adds is the softer vc shadowing plus a fix for some car headlights that someone asked me to look at, and some improvements to the installer.

 

If anyone is considering whether to try this then I would suggest you might do no better than to read and follow kelB's approach a few posts above.

 

All you have to do is try selecting dx10, ignore the flashing runways for a minute and go for a test flight. Do double check first that the in game antialiasing option is checked along with anisotropic filtering, these seem sometimes to toggle off when changing mode, also some people may have had aa forced in ccc or nvi and so not have previously needed the option ticked in game for dx9.

 

If you see any advantage then you may want to consider exploring dx10 further and dowload and install my patches. I am not aware of anyone suggesting that they make dx10 worse in any way and they certainly do not affect dx9 (although do check when switching back that it hasn't toggled the filtering mode).

 

If you don't see any benefit then continue to enjoy dx9. I only ever really wanted to stop the pesky runways flashing, I have never made any inflated claims of miracle fsx performance cures! Clearly some people do see benefits but it isn't everyone.

 

If you do decide to experiment further then take a copy at least of your dx9 optimised fsx.cfg and write down or save your ccc or nvi settings before you alter them. You might later decide to go back to dx9 and get annoyed trying to recall what they were!

 

The possible benefits of dx10 are some graphical lighting affects such as bloom (but if you have enb series working reliably you may have that in dx9 already) possibly better water reflections, cockpit shadows and possibly for some setups framerate and or smoothness improvement ( or not!)

 

The downsides, are issues with nav lights and effects which can be largely dealt with albeit by spending money..., 3rd party airports and aircraft that have issues, some vsync issues , antialiasing is harder to set up and possible other issues. However it's always just one tick box to switch go back to dx9 and you did keep that old fsx.cfg file didn't you?

 

My belief from running tests is that the main Impact of dx10 is that the 3d rendering process on the gpu runs much faster. However that doesn't necessarily translate into an fps improvement for everyone. If you have set your sliders in a way that exceeds what your CPU can handle, e.g high ai at a big airport with other large airports close by then your system might be CPU limited, with a mostly idle gpu. In this case speeding up the gpu won't help the overloaded CPU and you won't see any benefit. It's also feasible that there are airports that work particularly badly with dx10 and it's also possible that I am wrong in my belief!

 

For antialiasing the key facts to understand are that you cannot force it in nvi or ccc, you have to set the in game option and also that you cannot go beyond 4x aa in dx10 without setting MultiSamplesPerPixel in fsx.cfg. I have an ati card and if you look on my blog you can follow the comparative tests I did for dx9 and dx10 aa. My conclusion for ati was that I could (with some effort) get exactly the same aa in dx10 - that doesn't mean that the same is true for nvi but I suspect that it is until someone proves me wrong. No one else has confirmed that MultiSamplesPerPixel does anything, but than I cannot tell the difference myself without zooming in to look at individual pixels.

 

I have no solution to offer for vsync, i have the framerate locked at 30 and I don't get bad tearing unless I pan very fast. some people report that vsync works with nvi whereas others disagree.

"your GPU is as fast, or faster than the cpu."

Little offtopic and perhaps nitpicking, but this statement is plainly wrong or at least wrongly put.

 

Sorry you mis-interpret it, Grunt: it may be wrongly put for you. By "fast" or "faster" I mean the rate at which the GPU can absorb data from the proc, balanced against the speed at which the proc can push new data. A "slow" proc - then BP=0: a "fast" proc with an older ("slower") GPU, then BP has to equal 1, with an appropriately-sized RT, and that needs a few hours work to get that in balance.

If you're running a 4.8gig proc with a 580, you can set your BufferePools equal to "0", as the 580 can absorb - can process - the datastream as fast it comes from the proc. No flashing, no stutters.

 

http://stevesfsxanal...ry/bufferpools/

 

Whether to use BufferPools = 0 or BuffferPools = 1, with a reject threshold is dependent on a lot of things. Steve has outlined the process by which FSX moves data from the proc through the GPU and onto the monitor, when and why it uses static or dynamic buffers; how a Reject Threshold affects the type of pool used, and what the difference is when we use a Pool which consists of purely static buffers, as when BP="0".

 

Steve's explanation is an excellent read, but requires more than a layman's grasp of this technology, and for me to do it in a way which is simple enough for myself and others to understand in a forum environment is barely possible. Steve's superb analysis is not what (for eg) RobMyPro (above) wants to hear. He needs concept, testing methodology, pointers - help.

I'm trying to help people here - some/many/most of whom are not power users, like you obviously are, Grunt, and my work within the IT industry, and my hobby experience since 1982, has given me the knowledge to be able to make a statement simple enough, and explain it better later. (if it's not worded as some folks might understand). Does this sound better? :wink:

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Edit: In post #330 I said the LSH Maddog was not compatible:::: If one uses (shameless plug) "AddonConverter" from FlightSimTools.com - it will become compatible! Big Bonus! The reason I was so long (a year) in not moving to FSX was Dreamfleet's B727 - FS9 only... This time with DX10 it was the Maddog. Son of a Gun. "Addon Converter" Is tops! :lol:

Hi FsxHd

 

I have an ati card too. I would recommend that you read through my blog entries on ati antialiasing and dx10. i would try setting MultiSamplesPerPixel=8 in fsx.cfg and then enhance in ccc (not override which doesn't work with dx10) plus sent the ssaa slider as you desire.

 

Steve

 

Reporting back after testing some AA settings with an ATI 6700 series card and CCC...

 

I added the MultiSamplesPerPixel=8 line under the graphics section of the fsx.cfg and then went to CCC. As stated in your blog post, I set the AA mode to "Enhance application settings." I left everything else as CCC default except for the AA mode slider. I moved it to super-sample AA and pressed apply. Upon loading up FSX and then a flight. Unfortunately I found my AA settings to be the same as they looked before. I used the VC of the RA Lancair Legacy as a control test and nothing looked different. The bottom switches' text is unreadable due to AA, as well as some of the gauges. The RXP GNS 530 is completely unreadable in the VC as well unless I zoom in or pop up the 2D. Am I doing something wrong? I'd like to continue trying to get the ATI AA to work in DX10 FSX before falling back to DX9. Thanks!

 

Here is a picture of my settings for reference:

Almost ready to celebrate. I updated the shaders to V3.0, messed around with bufferpools and reject threshold to get rid of the flashing, but that did not quite work. Ended up reducing the water from 2.x high down to 1x high and eventually worked back up to 2x Med. No flashing. Just for fun went back to bufferpools=0 and like magic it all works. Whew!

Yahoo! Good for you, Mark! You are hereby official a member of the DX10 Flying Club.

 

If anyone's interested - AddonConverter has fixed my other FS9 port-overs, too. Just spent 1/2 hour flying around the PNW.

These all work:

Carenado 182Q; R.Piper Chipmunk; F1 172R & Maddog; Will try the Dornier and the MAAM B25 tomorrow.

Am I doing something wrong? I'd like to continue trying to get the ATI AA to work in DX10 FSX before falling back to DX9.

 

I have only heard bad things about Enhancing Application Settings for FSX. It just doesn't work well with that switch. Don't own an ATI card but the concept is the same with Nvidia cards too. Make double sure your AA and AF is turned on in FSX. I had mine running great yesterday. Turned it on today and the screens were horrible. Did some checking of the FSX settings and found that they had reverted to the FSX default.

 

Best regards,

Jim

Yep..Application only, along with the "MultiSamplesPerPixel=8 line" and Anisotropic=1 and AntiAlias=1 selected with FSX.

 

Strange for it to turn itself off, Jim...

 

MarkW is having fun! You need some success in this game. I used to get so disheartened when the 8800GTX was King. It seemed everybody else had one, but me.

My gosh, Jim! I just finished a 'Perfect Flight' - OrbX PNW in the 172, from Diamond Point -> KORS -> Anacortes, and then into Skagit. Fair to cloudy, early evening AS2012 + AccuFeel. The secret - your AA and AF Inspector settings. I'll post mine tomorrow, as the vsync is a little different, but man! - I cannot believe the difference! The water is just fantastic!, it's better than REX Sparkling was, with land Complxty & AG as high as I can get them, Bloom on - and 29-30 frames all the way - no dips.

I have to go now, but I have (I hope) lots of pics, and will post later. Jim - this is THEE best! Sometime tomorrow DX9 will be officially dead on my PC. It is SO much better!

 

@Jason: You are right! This is the way to go - application controlled. I have a slight different setting to Jim's, but I think that's the right course to take.

 

Hi Paul,

I changed my settings to your settings today and they are great! Much better than mine. Although I had excellent graphics when I tested yesterday, for some reason they were horrible when I tried my favorite flight from Portland to Seattle in FTX/Orbx scenery. The Portland airport looked like FS95. I later found out that my FSX AA and AF settings were set to default (no AA and trilinear only). Don't know how that happened. But I downloaded your NI and the screen shots of your FSX settings and I am amazed at the quality of graphics. I recently deleted my Bufferpool settings and may put them back in but recall reading somewhere (believe in NickN's guide) that the settings don't work for everyone and it is a good tweak for older computers. But my FPS around Seattle fell to somewhere between 11 and 14 but I still had excellent graphics. I did have the PMDG737NGX loaded and real weather as well as the FTX PNW scenery so that may have been the frame killer. I know Seattle is famous for low frames. In any case, thanks for the settings.

 

Best regards,

Jim

 

<br />when the 8800GTX was King<br />

 

That's the video card I was trying to remember when I wrote somewhere that the 9800GTX came out about the time FSX was released. It was the 8800GTX and I had it and actually got it when I heard FSX was on the horizon for release. It definitely was a great card. But now... the 580GTX! Grrrrrr.

 

Best regards,

Jim

Didn't I include the price sheet with them, Jim?

 

Listen - glad your happy. I got my old RAF Chippy flying - first time in DX10 - wouldn't have believed it. At Diamond Point - gosh it all looks so sharp. I'm still oggling the crispness and color. Radio Shack were still selling the Trash-80 when this thing first flew! Same with the Maddog - I cut back a bit on the Complexity, AG and traffic, but it works a treat out of Seattle. Took some screenies, and will post them tomorrow.

 

"the settings don't work for everyone and it is a good tweak for older computers" Crock.