A "How-To-go-DX10" doc

[Paul J 349]

It's a rats nest, isn't it! - especially when some start and then stop.

 

%windir%\system32\services.msc <--- this is where to get the list of running services from, Jim - not msconfig,

and then review them against any one of a number of lists found on the weeeb.

 

http://www.blackviper.com/service-configurations/black-vipers-windows-7-service-pack-1-service-configurations/

 

http://www.computingunleashed.com/speed-up-windows-7-ultimate-guide-to.html

 

http://superuser.com/questions/196633/what-windows-7-services-can-safely-be-stopped-without-degrading-experience

 

:Thinking: Hmmmm Darn.. More work.. tweak, tweak, tweak and more tweak. :lol:

[SQUAWKIDENT 3]

:Thinking: Hmmmm Darn.. More work.. tweak, tweak, tweak and more tweak. :lol:

 

Exactly what I'm spending this coming weekend doing! I'm actually rather enjoying trying to optimize everything now I've got the basic DX10 tweaking done. The dreaded "texture bandwidth multi" thing is next. But at least now I can fly around the Orbx scenery with everything (nearly) cranked to max and still get it locked at 30fps for most of the flight. Woot!

 

Thanks again for all the help and advice from you, Steve and others on this forum.

 

Adam

[SirStiggie 63]

I've been doing a bunch of tweaking over the past 2 days and I've gotten my system running pretty well with DX10 Preview. Currently, I'm running without AA activated as I've been unable to get the stuttering problem resolved so more work is needed on that. I also had an issue with REX Essentials when I'm in my Orbx PNW scenery. I tweaked REX a little bit by changed my 3D Cloud Resolution from 4096X4096 HD to 2048X2048 HD and my FPS issue went away.

 

I'll work on the AA settings this weekend and see if I can make any progress.

[Paul J 349]

Hahaha! Did the same, Chris! I always start low and then work upward until it messes up, then I try a few things, dropping back when nothing else works. I've been working with the AS2012 clouds for a week or so, but I think that the REX Ess are better - even the older REX2 and OD - even at 1024x1024 resolution.

 

Keep in touch.

 

pj

[MarkW 1,491]

Paul, thanks for taking the time to put this document together.

 

I was kind of blown away by the suggestion to have TEXTURE_BANWIDTH_MULTI=120 (72-120) in increments of 3. I thought that 40 was gospel !! I wonder if you could enlighten me as to what increasing this value will do in DX10.

 

btw, just tried 72 and was very smooth, no pauses that I had before and seemed like less Autogen popping.

 

 

thanks,

[Paul J 349]

Hi Mark:

Ha-HAAAAAaaaah! A convert!! And smooooth! Yes, it is. It needs to be tied to the BufferPool, and to Wter + 4, 5 or 6.

 

I went to 102, today, having spent the whole day going from 40 to 157, and everything in between. Naah 40 was gospel for one very hard-nosed person who now espouses 120 as the maximum - which is my current limit. I've used 120 for a looooong time. It begins to matter when one begins to push the graphics department a little harder than it's used to! My goal is simply drive anywhere around Jon Patch's (and Holger Sandmann) Vancouver+, any altitude, with the Carenado 172. Any current single, two or four seater cruising aircraft - most everything maxed - and hold 29.9 - 30. Doing so (on my beast as it was previously configured (DX9 or 10)) would always pull frames down into the low twenties and teens, so a couple of days ago I began to push it. Well this evening and one entirely new fsx.cfg - it's done. 40 is actually not bad, but it limits the more capable gpu. It's a multiplier, and was that size from the FSX get-go. It's too small for the average "modern" card. You have a 560Ti - you can probably run 80-odd. (Actually - with a 4.8gig proc - your card is a bottleneck, isn't it.)

Anyway - I've posted some shots, the Inspector settings and this fsx.cfg on the DropBox.

 

https://www.dropbox....nh2d/lUsnzREZt1

 

I'm glad you have yours sorted out - It's very rewarding. You're going to share the details and secrets, of course? Hmmm?

 

 

:biggrin:

[Dirk98 354]

Paul, I've noticed your LOD_RADIUS is only 4.5. Isn't it too little, or at your wide resolution you can't go higher?

 

Thanks for sharing again!

Dirk.

 

PS: Btw do you think the 3840x1024x32 resolution can affect the selection of TEXTURE_BANDWIDTH_MULT=102 value? I have the same videocard but but I'm running it 'flat' at 1920x1200, so I'm curious if I should settle on 102 or go higher?

(you spent your whole day on finding it out anyway, thanks!) :lol:

 

And no bloom? I thought one of the main reasons to go DX10 was the Bloom=1

 

Dirk.

[Jason Howell 1]

Dirk98, ive used this document and Pauls advice to great effect, so much so that i dont refresh this thread every 5 minutes to see what has changed. Im pretty much happy with fsx now that im in DX10 and have it tweaked. My most recent postings have been in the screenshot forum and not in a tweaking forum. Which means im flying instead of dissecting a cfg file. My LOD radius is set at 6.5 and that seems to be the sweet spot for it. I prob could go higher, but im not fixing whats not broke.

 

And bloom...i run bloom great in DX10, it has no effect on frame rate. But today im gonna shut it off to see if things are more realistic looking in the sim. Some things about bloom i love, such as the VASI lights and the runway lights at night, but i dont like how it makes airplanes "glow." Maybe with it off, ill even gain even more headway into keeping that fps counter pegged at 30.

[Paul J 349]

Gotta set the resolution to whatever the native resolution is of your monitor, Dirk.

 

Re TBM - not the whole day! Somehow the day before I lost the fps at Vancouver, and I ended up creating a new cfg, so the 102 was part of that. The major issue was controlling the enormous amount of graphic spiking and "artifacting", so it's wind everything back 'till it stops, then start cranking it back up. 3840 x 1024 is a lot of pixels to paint. This link will show you the endless circling that consumed so much time. (Inspector and cfg are in there, too) Flying in and over those skyscrapers brought the fps down to 12 - 20, and that told me something was wrong, but I couldn't find out what. I made a new config, and then started adding parameters back in. Once I had the 30 frames doing that, I went to low-level flying up the streets, and then back into the city at, maybe 800 feet. Looong day.

 

"Should I settle on 102 or go higher?" This is something which is going to depend on a number of other parameters - the major one is setting what you want to see. Starting with a clean config, but with the known add-in parameters (HIGHMEMFIX, BP=0, Fiber_Frame_Time_Fraction), and modest graphics settings - I add my desired frame rate (30), weather, location and traffic. I want "20" cars: I want "20" AI at airports: I want "20" GA at the smaller airfields, with default MS "Fair Weather" in downtown Vancouver+. Those are my "must-haves".

Now - what does FSX give me? Are the frame rates too low? Are they good? Is it stuttering? Is it taking a "gulp" every five seconds? Is it flashing, spiking, artifacting? Those are the drivers for the tests. First I get the AA and AF sorted, as that is fixed with Inspector, and I know the settings. Then I wind up most of the settings then fly the racecourse again, and again, and again, and again, adjusting until I get a solid 29.9 - 30 in and around those buildings and then the same again at ground level on the traffic'd roads leading south toward the airport.

 

At 1920 x 1200 (great screen size!) you should have no trouble in getting higher number everywhere. I have to run BP=1 because of the artifacting: I thought (a week ago) that a higher TBM prevented artifacting, but yesterday I found it's the reverse - at 120 I have artifacting, and a slightly lower frame rate. You should be able to go well above that. You could also try (instead of moving the TBM upward - move the TextureMaxLoad from its default of 6 - up to 12. It was one of those settings found by Bojote, and is a similar multiplier that determines how much pressure to put on the card. I have both in the cfg and have played with both, but I think they do the same thing. If it "artifacts", you turn it down a hair - same with the TBM - or allow a slightly larger bufferpool and then play with the reject threshold, with a flight test in between.

 

Bloom? At this moment I don't think it adds a lot to the sim, Dirk, but I've not 'tested' it at all. I did have it on for most of last week, but haven't turned it on since. I may do, just as a quick test. It's certainly not the frame hog that it was - in fact I found it barely noticeable!

I think it will be fine in the "easier" areas of the world. The sim is almost, or getting close to the point of perfection with Steve's mod, but there are a number of tweaks (for me) that still need more work. It's so much work, and it progresses so slowly.

To end this diatribe on a positive note - I am constantly amazed at the strength of FSX in this new form. I've watched those fps in the posted pics go from a stuttering, slideshow with poor settings to a smooth, fast, flying experience with settings waaaay above anything DX9 could hold, with moderate GA, AI, road: with moderate weather, in a dense addon location with graphics settings that astonish me!

 

Stevejp - thanks again!

[Paul J 349]

A quick addon note: I just finished a flight from Stark's Twin Oaks, in and around the PDX area - with Bloom on - no difference in frame rate whatsoever.

[William J.S.S 173]

Trying this now. Using Orbx KSEA and PMDG NGX as my constants. Should be a good enough stress test you think? I mean, if I can get it working good with those two, any other area in the world shouldn't be a problem. For me I always got at least +10 FPS at FlyTampa Tampa than I did KSEA in Orbx. That's was always crazy to me.

 

 

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[Dirk98 354]

Trying this now. Using Orbx KSEA and PMDG NGX as my constants. Should be a good enough stress test you think? I mean, if I can get it working good with those two, any other area in the world shouldn't be a problem. For me I always got at least +10 FPS at FlyTampa Tampa than I did KSEA in Orbx. That's was always crazy to me.

 

 

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What's your CPU/ VIDEOCARD?

 

Dirk.

[Dirk98 354]

Paul, thanks for the explanation of your local research; TBM=120 and LOD_RADIUS=6.5 do work very nice at my resolution on a single screen. I can't get back to LOD_RADIUS=4.5 once I saw the difference at 6.5, no way. Bloom didn't affect FPS either in DX10. Do you think DX10 is good for photo scenery, or its main strength is in normal FSX terrain?

 

Dirk.

 

Dirk98, ive used this document and Pauls advice to great effect, so much so that i dont refresh this thread every 5 minutes to see what has changed...

 

Jason, I hear you. However I've found a huge lot of useful and interesting information refreshing this and another DX10 thread quite a few times every day for the last how many weeks(?).

 

Dirk.

[William J.S.S 173]

@Dirk

 

I7-2600k @4.8 currently

EVGA 560ti 2GB

 

 

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[Paul J 349]

Never tried PhotoScenery, Dirk:

 

DX10 has a number of strong points over DX9.

 

1). It is quite stable. I have heard quite a few stories of "no more OOM's, CTD's," etc.,

2). It responds to the addition of heavier loads by holding the same frames. Once it's "set up" - once you have "the sweet spot" you can add more weather, traffic and complexity than you think. I am still astounded, as doing to DX9 what I've done yesterday and today - it would have CTD'd or just become a slide show.

3). Allows Bloom.

 

https://www.dropbox....l6ev/QERLLkHdSW

 

https://www.dropbox....nh2d/lUsnzREZt1

 

I completed the flight from Stark's Twin Oaks - Goheen - Walter Sutton's, Auburn, KSEA this morning, started in "Fair Weather", and switched to "Building Storms". Did not drop below 29.9. Pics later - have to jpg them first .. are on their way. At Goheen some of the parked aircraft have black rectangles under them; Needs AddonConverter, I suppose!