Improving my system.

[KLMMD11 0]

Hi all

I need to improve my system over the coming weeks, mainly to improve FSX.

My specs are:

 

* Intel Q6600 Processor

* (2.4GHz, 1066MHz FSB, 8MB Cache)

* Genuine Windows Vista ® Home Premium

* 4GB Memory

* 1TB Hard Drive

* 512MB nVidia GeForce 9600GT

 

Can anyone recommend the best area to improve. My FPS levels are good in areas, and very bad in some, averaging around 7/9 FPS at LHR with settings tweaked and turned down, and I seem to regular get the 'out of memory error'.

 

Cheers

 

[Bilal2104 213]

i would say upgrade that q6600 to a intel i series and overclock the s**t out of it lol. but that as far as my knowledge goes on that partt.

[KLMMD11 0]

i would say upgrade that q6600 to a intel i series and overclock the s**t out of it lol. but that as far as my knowledge goes on that partt.

Haha cheers! I'll start looking into that!

[stans 706]

Over clock the cpu, that will be the least expensive way to improve performance. The closer you get to 4 GHz, the smoother FSX becomes.

[VeryBumpy 272]

You don't say what motherboard or memory type/speed. Regardless, you really need a bunch of new stuff. Get a new MB, cpu, video, memory and cooler.

[KLMMD11 0]

Excellent. Cheers for the help gents.

[fridbergj 4]

CPU: i7 Sandy Bridge or Ivy Bridge or wait for Haswell. Remember to buy the K version.

GPU: GTX 600 series.

RAM: minimum 8GB

HDD: I recommend buy SSD for FSX and HDD for Windows and other games.

OS: I use Windows 7 which is good. But you can go to Windows 8 if you want.

And here:http://www.jetlinesystems.com/performance.php this site is very good to decide what to buy by performance.

[KLMMD11 0]

CPU: i7 Sandy Bridge or Ivy Bridge or wait for Haswell. Remember to buy the K version.

GPU: GTX 600 series.

RAM: minimum 8GB

HDD: I recommend buy SSD for FSX and HDD for Windows and other games.

OS: I use Windows 7 which is good. But you can go to Windows 8 if you want.

And here:http://www.jetlinesystems.com/performance.php this site is very good to decide what to buy by performance.

Great. Thank you very much for that

[Adam T Lutley 12]

Hi all

I need to improve my system over the coming weeks, mainly to improve FSX.

My specs are:

 

* Intel Q6600 Processor

* (2.4GHz, 1066MHz FSB, 8MB Cache)

* Genuine Windows Vista ® Home Premium

* 4GB Memory

* 1TB Hard Drive

* 512MB nVidia GeForce 9600GT

 

Can anyone recommend the best area to improve. My FPS levels are good in areas, and very bad in some, averaging around 7/9 FPS at LHR with settings tweaked and turned down, and I seem to regular get the 'out of memory error'.

 

Cheers

 

 

My system specs are posted but here are some general thoughts. To get the performance you're looking for you'll probably need to look into a new system either built by yourself or custom built by a company such as cyberpower. Most off the shelf PC's are very limited in terms of what you can do. You probably wont be able to overclock the processor. You should be able to add more RAM to help the OOM errors and maybe a better graphics card but that's about it. Fsx is very CPU bound and it needs raw CPU clock speed and lots of it! Not sure how far you want to go but here are some ideas if considering a new computer

 

CPU: The fastest you can afford and then overclock it as high as you can . Intel is regarded to be superior to AMD for Fsx. Consider an I5 such as the 3570K or an I7 like the 2600/2700K or an Ivy bridge like the 3770K. Make sure you get the "K" version of whatever processor you choose. CPU clock speed is the BIGGEST single determining factor in Fsx performance.

 

Mobo: A Z77 board will accomadate any newer I5 or I7 processor and its also pci 3.0 ready so it will also take advantage of the latest NVIDIA 600 series graphics cards. I prefer ASUS but I hear Asrock is decent also. Try to get a mid range or higher Z77 board as the base ones won't have some added features you may want such as Wi Fi capability, memory timing features, etc

 

GPU NVIDIA is generally regarded to be the preferred Graphics card for Fsx. A 660ti or better should be fine. The 670 FTW is very close to the 680 in terms of performance at a $100 less. Fsx wont take advantage of SLI or "dual" single graphics cards like the 690 series NVIDIA so stay away from those.

 

RAM: anything more than 8Gb is overkill as Fsx in general wont make use of more than 4. Timings and speeds do matter for overclocking purposes so try to find something that is 1600 Mhz or faster with the lowest CAS latency you can find. The Corsair Vengeance or Dominator series are good cards.

 

Hard drives: SSD's are becoming cheaper by the day so I would go that route. I have 2 Samsung 840 series SSD's. One for the operating system and one dedicated for Fsx. Fsx should be installed on its own hard drive in its own folder created by you, not the default x86 path suggested by the installer.

 

Cooling: Anything but the stock CPU cooler such as the Cooler Master 212 EVO. For "average" overclocks, decent aftermarket air coolers are on par with budget closed loop water coolers like the Corsair H60, H80 etc.

 

PSU : for a single Graphics card setup, anything over 850 W is overkill. However, not all PSU's are created equal. A cheaper one might crash your system with sudden voltage drops and spikes. Corsair and Cooler Master are decent brands. Just make sure you get one with a 80 plus gold rating. Try to get a modular one as you'll only connect the cables you need and won't have unused cables cluttering the inside of the case.

[tf51d 284]

Hi all

I need to improve my system over the coming weeks, mainly to improve FSX.

My specs are:

 

* Intel Q6600 Processor

* (2.4GHz, 1066MHz FSB, 8MB Cache)

* Genuine Windows Vista ® Home Premium

* 4GB Memory

* 1TB Hard Drive

* 512MB nVidia GeForce 9600GT

 

Can anyone recommend the best area to improve. My FPS levels are good in areas, and very bad in some, averaging around 7/9 FPS at LHR with settings tweaked and turned down, and I seem to regular get the 'out of memory error'.

 

Cheers

 

You need to click off the High Res 3D cockpit is the FSX display aircraft settings. My frames almost doubled doing this. In areas that I get 10 to 11 fps with the NGX. I'm now getting 18-20FPS, and at a locked 30FPS (In NI with 1/2 VSYNC) at cruise altitude where I only got about 22-24 before. In theory deselecting this, you should lose some visual quality, but I don't detect any on my system. As you can see from my system description, it's not a new system like the I7 power houses people have now!! So I'm happy!!

[KLMMD11 0]

Thanks Tom. Will give that a whirl.