Frustration with 777 memory issues

[machie 1]

Hi everybody,

 

Okay so here’s the deal, I’m going to post this question in a number of different forums because I have become so frustrated with the problem that I want to get a broad range of feedback from different sources and different people who may know something about this issue. What is the issue? Well the issue is the memory problems that I have encountered since the installation of the new PMDG 777 aircraft. I have had memory issues in the past with the 737 and GX but for the most part with a little tweaking and memory fix tweaks that I have found on various forums I have been able to manage pretty well. The new 777 is a totally different Cat!

 

I’ve been working on my Sim for a long time to get it ready for the issue of the 777 into the most part my Sim seems to be running very very well. However, once I installed the 777 I began have memory issues all over the place even when I wasn’t flying that particular aircraft. The main issue was liveried textures not installing correctly by this I mean that the aircraft would be missing parts when it was flying for instance the engine might be missing scowling or part of the fuselage might be missing or when I was sitting in the cockpit there might be areas of the firewall missing so that you can see straight out into open space I am by no means a computer expert----I’m just a pilot who likes to also fly flight simulators in his spare time.

 

I have a good computer with a very fast processor and 12 GB of memory--- the only thing I really skimped on when I built this computer (which by the way I built solely for the purpose of flight swimming) was the total amount of memory. I bought $1000 processor and the best video card I can get at the time which still seems to be high-end acceptable if not the very best on the market. I did not add huge huge amounts of memory to to the fact that I was led to believe from what I could glean from the various flights emporiums that I read that the flight simulator program itself is only able to access a limited amount of memory. My computer guru, when asked about this problem said,(although he is by no means a flight simulator aficionado) that he felt that memory was a big deal because of all the scenery that needed to be crunched)--- so I don’t know if 12 GB of memory is way low or average or way high --- the documentation that accompanies the programs that I run certainly don’t request more than this amount of memory. I have many nice third-party add-on programs which I run with my flight Sim program such as mega scenery 2.0 and Orbix scenery, and professional flight planner ask and radar contact and Rex and all the cool PMDG aircraft.

 

So here it is once again----if I’m flying aircraft other than the 777 then I will usually, but not always have some sort of texture issues on the aircraft itself--- I Sagan this is not always the issue lifelong flights from San Francisco to Chicago in the 737 NGX and experienced absolutely no trouble at all. However, when I load up the 777 I will run out of memory before I can program FMC in the control data unit.

 

I will certainly appreciate any thoughts, ideas, possible fixes, absolutely guaranteed fixes--- general thoughts on the amount of memory that a flight Sim pilot should maintain on board his rig--- and of course will warmly receive any commiserations from other flight simulator pilots about the general state of memory issues in relationship to flying the new PMDG Boeing 777.

 

Thanks for reading this long post and I look forward to getting any and all information that the flight Sim community might be able to provide. I’m going to post this on the PMDG forum, on the Avsim FSX general form, I’m going to post it on my flying Tigers virtual airline forum where there are some really savvy long time flight simmers. So if anybody wants to follow this thread to see if there are solutions to the memory issues that I am experiencing these are the places that you might find flight Sim community responses.

 

Cheers

 

Dorn Cranert

 

[3-2-1-Now 126]

Well for a start your "computer guru" isn't that hot, otherwise he wouild have been able to advise that 32-bit applications on a 64-bit OS can access up to 4 Gb of memory, and not a byte more. My machine "only" has 8 Gb because I knew that I would never use more than 8 Gb doing anything (the aforementioned limitation included). As far as 64-bit apps go - I'm not an artist so I won't be needing 20 Gb of RAM for Photoshop. Flight sim is as much memory as I will ever use in a single application.

 

That aside:

 

However, when I load up the 777 I will run out of memory before I can program FMC in the control data unit.

 

Need much more information at this point. Are you running every add-on known at the location you loaded the 777?

 

Forget all the other snake-oil tweaks out there - did you add the critical HIGHMEMFIX=1 to a vanilla fsx.cfg file?

 

Do you have the latest FSUIPC installed? Even if you don't register it, installing it can help improve the stability of FSX as it will patch a certain class of CTD and prevent it taking out the whole simulator. Note that FSX is buggy and has serious memory leaks in its own right. Loading up an add-on like the 777 will make the problems with FSX apparent much sooner.

 

Major problem areas:

 

* AutoGen (buggy/memory leaks leading to CTD/OOME)

* AI (traffic leaks memory)

 

If you disable these, not only will the sim run much quicker/smoother, but it will practicially eliminate CTD/OOME on even long flights. FSX was never written to run for 3 months straight, but knowing its problems you can avoid them and run the sim continuously for days, which is adequate (important if you're going to fly that 18 hour long-haul in the 777).

 

A lot of the problems with FSX are due to sloppy programming. 99% of the tweaks to fsx.cfg are snake oil. HIGHMEMFIX is the only one that actually modifies FSX behavior, and causes it to run different code that fixes problems with the way it addresses video memory. All the other tweaks are going to lead to disaster in some way. I tried them all for fun, and they either made the sim more unstable or degraded performance.

 

Much of the eye-candy can't be seen from 30000 ft or mid-Pacific, so you're best off without them anyway. You want to fly, right, not look at a Scenery Simulator? :rolleyes:  Sure, the eye-candy is nice, but not worth the instability.

 

You might also be interested in this. http://forum.avsim.net/topic/420832-scenery-and-landclass-files-memory-leak-fix/

 

Best regards,

Robin.

[Lawyer+Pilot 126]

Forget all the other snake-oil tweaks out there - did you add the critical HIGHMEMFIX=1 to a vanilla fsx.cfg file?

 

 

HIGHMEMFIX is critical but is probably the least of the OP's issue.

 

To the OP: Follow one of the setup guides available (Word Not Allowed's or NickN's) to the letter. And I mean TO THE LETTER. If you can, start with a fresh FSX install, and, at the bare minimum, a clean FSX.cfg. When you have a stable setup, memory issues can be addressed through adjustment of your sliders. The tweak you want to be particularly careful of, however, is LOD. A lot of people are cranking this up to 6.5. That's a 44% increase over default and is a common culprit in OOM issues.

[3-2-1-Now 126]

To the OP: Follow one of the setup guides available (Word Not Allowed's or NickN's) to the letter. And I mean TO THE LETTER. If you can, start with a fresh FSX install, and, at the bare minimum, a clean FSX.cfg. When you have a stable setup, memory issues can be addressed through adjustment of your sliders. The tweak you want to be particularly careful of, however, is LOD. A lot of people are cranking this up to 6.5. That's a 44% increase over default and is a common culprit in OOM issues.

 

These are exactly the tweaks I was talking about. They are snake oil.

 

Best regards,

Robin.

[MMartinov 48]

 

 

These are exactly the tweaks I was talking about. They are snake oil.

 

I agree with Robin. Neither guides I've followed "to the letter" gave me the expected results. I end up having severe OOMs, bad graphic/frame rate issues or other undesirables. Now I have more like a blend from various sources and it took me quite a while to compile it. The reason - there is no FSX dedicated PC alike and even the small hardware differences matter when applying the above mentioned tweak guides. What works for me doesn't necessarily mean will work for you and opposite...

[Lawyer+Pilot 126]

Hi everybody,

 

’m going to post this question in a number of different forums because I have become so frustrated with the problem that I want to get a broad range of feedback from different sources and different people who may know something about this issue.

By the way, that was a bad idea and probably has a lot to do with the relative lack of responses. There's no way of knowing what other people have already said without looking at your multiple threads.

[machie 1]

You are right I should have posted to only one forum---But--- and it is a big but---I have posted this question in a less verbose manner during the past week and have had no responses---I did read the introducton part of the manual---and it is really informative---but once again--the developers clearly state that they provide no information for win 8 users since the os was so badly recieved by the public--so no joy for the win 8 users here---I will need to go back to win 7 or wait for 8.1 which is not looking so bright at present.

 

 

My sim is running alright without the 777---so I think I will just do an uninstall for the time being

[Tabs 2,790]

I wrote a large section in the introduction manual about this problem and its causes - have you read it?

[Don t moderate me this way 882]

I wrote a large section in the introduction manual about this problem and its causes - have you read it?

 

 

Ryan, can you confirm, as users reported here on AVSIM, that the additional VAS usage of the T7 (as compared to the NGX) is rather in the 400 MB's than in the 150 - 200 MB's?

 

And if the T7 actually eats up another 10% of the VAS limit (10% of the VAS limit over the NGX VAS usage), are there any plans for a "performance switch" as provided by PMDG for the NGX?

 

Thanks!!

[machie 1]

Hi Ryan

 

I just read the introduction in the Manual--it was great---so PMDG like in it's scope---I was really excited about getting to the bottom of my issues untill I read the part about no information for win 8 users due to the lack of interest in the OS by the public---I do not like my win 8 but dont know if I can go back to win 7 without screwing up my FSX (and add-ons)

[tf51d 284]

One of the biggest areas you can do to recover Virtual Address Space, is to manage your start up DLL's in the dll.xml file by setting ManualLoad to True. FSX will then ask you if you need to load the dll at startup, say no to all but the ones you are using for your flight. Set it to False for any DLL you use on every flight. This is a sample of how much can be recovered. This is a shot at Friday's harbor with the default C172 First one is with all startup DLL's not active, the second is with them  loaded.  The numbers on the window title is how much VAS FSUIPC is reporting available. (In KB's) That's a difference of about 229.1MB's that is being wasted. That is significant when using such a detailed oriented addon like the 777, or the NGX

 

All DLL's not loaded

 

 

All  loaded

 

 

Tom Cain