Helsinki and the 777

[Nixon 30]

Tonight I decided to fly the T7 from Barcelona to Helsinki. I have the Aerosoft Mega airport for each. I have made a special saved setting for the T7 which works fine for flying into UK2000 Heathrow and Fly Tampa Dubai and Athens. I arrived at dusk at Helsinki( not interned but I forgot that we had passed the equinox). On flying downwind past EFHK I heard the dreaded pinging sound which stopped once I was approx 5 miles past EFHK, turning onto final the pinging started again and then I ran out of memory.

 

I therefore make the following points

 

1. I have read the section in the introduction manual re VAS and OOM and understand what it says. Of course I was only able to read this once I had purchased the T7. If I had been able to read that before purchase I doubt that I would have bought this add on

 

2. PMDG state that the the T7 doesn't cause OOM. I accept that on it's own it does not but when used with other products the combined effect can result in an OOM crash. All the advice given seems to recommend compromising the settings of ever other add on but not the T7.  

 

3. This is the only add on plane where I have to have a special saved setting to fly. In fact as I own all of UK 2000's Xtreme airports, I have moved them to the top of the scenery library so that when using the T7 I can untick all of them except for the arrival / destination and alternate airport.

 

4.I understand that dusk may increase memory use and may have contributed to the OOM crash tonight.

 

5. I feel disinclined to fly longer routes such as Dubai to JFK (FSDT version) as am concerned that once I get near to JFK I will run out of memory and FSX will crash.

 

6. I have no wish to use the accelerated time function and am wondering if this function has an effect on memory usage. If so would it be possible in future to disable it

 

7. I don't know how much memory the liveries take but I would be more than happy to accept a lower quality to the liveries as I can't see them when flying or taxing but I can see the airport etc,

 

8. In my special T7 saved settings I have reduced all traffic(boats cars etc) to zero.

 

So in summary I have reduced all my settings considerably and therefore don't wish to reduce them further and if I had known before purchase that I would have to do that, then I doubt whether I would have bought the T7. As detailed advice on OOM and VAS is given in the Introduction I assume that PMDG were aware before RTM that this area would be a cause for concern. In my opinion this information should have been made available before purchase.

 

My enthusiasm for flying the T7 is tempered by the possible OOM.s and I now very much doubt that I will buy the proposed 747 v2. I would of course buy the 747 if it's memory usage is as the 737 NGX. If there are some compromises that I can on the visuals or by PMDG making some features optional I would be grateful and more likely not to regret making this purchase.

 

[hopskip 253]

REX Cloud textures at 409whatever size are silly. 

 

Level of Detail radius above 4 is silly, and doesn't help combating blurries inside the LOD area (can actually make it worse). If blurries are the problem try fiber_frame cfg entry instead.

 

I think I saw some thread where someone has completley removed the external model, so you can see everything in the cockpit, and when you go to external view you are flying an invisible nothing (with a shadow if you have those on). I'm gussing that saves some.

 

 

When I'm flying mid-pacific ocean, my VAS is under 2.0GB (a little above 1.9).

 

When I installed Aerosoft's Antarctica, they automatically bump up the LOD area. my VAS went up to 3.5 sitting on the ground at a default airport. Add Vatsim traffic and some weather... OOM.

 

Cut back your autogen, LOD, 512 textures on clouds is plenty. 

 

Remember as far as textures is concerned, the difference between 1024 and 2048 is't just double the size. (3 dimentions of texturing).

[ahuimanu 50]

Funny, I've started a few flights in and out of EFHK over the last month.  I agree that the 777 will cause OOMs.  What I lowered was my autogen.  I too use many Aerosoft/Flightbeam/FlyTampa/FSDreamTeam/ImagineSim/LatinVFR sceneries and find a complex scenery a requirement to fly into an airport now.  In any case, turning down autogen (normal or sparse) has made an impact for me.

[VLJ510 16]

I haven't had to disable any add-on airports to stop my OOM error that I got on my flight (KSFO-OMDB) the night the T7 released.  After that OOM error all I did was lower my autogen settings down one from max and set my texture max load from 4096 to 2048 and haven't have one OOM since.

 

Since then flights like LAX/DXB, DFW/DXB, YVR/HGK, and ORD/HGK have gone off without a hitch. I also tested my original flight SFO/DXB (polar) again that next night and no problems with OOM error on approach.

[Shermann 4]

I tried two flight on EFHK by Aerosoft and pinpong strted always! The only way i had to finish the flight was to untick the high res HD VC in the FSX option lower a bit the autogen. ANd i was able to finish the flight. Just need to remember to tick the option back to use some other plane like the Airbus extended as otherwise the ND is not shown.

[Nixon 30]

Thanks all above for your advice.

As I said I have done all that and one of my points is the fact that you have to buy the T7 before you find out about the compromises you have to make.

 

No doubt many people will be happy to do that and for the most part I am too. The point about removing the external model is interesting. As my interest is in flying on my computer and not messing about with the programming etc I would appreciate it if PMDG would be more proactive and make it easier to make such changes.

 

I also note that on the issue tracking thread it says that OOM issues are not issues. My take on that comment is that to overcome OOM issues you have to make changes to your settings and reduce the quality of your other purchases. Now if that is made clear before purchase then I would have no complaint but that was not the case.

 

Therefore I feel that in PMDG's view the OOM is not caused by the T7 (even though I suspect it's memory usage is greater than any other add on aircraft) and therefore the solution is down to the customer. As am a member of the generation where when I was young computers were so massive they had to have there own air-conditioned building I am less able or willing to delve deeply into my computer internal workings. Up until the T7 I have had no problems with setting up and running FSX but now to run this plane I have to make so many compromises it effects my overall experience.

 

 

[Jazz 1,046]

I think your point is a valid one Nixon. 

[Nixon 30]

Thanks Jazz

Maybe that's because am also from Cardiff!

[MichaelMoe 1]

Try DX10 and steves DX10 Fixer. 

 

Michael Moe

[Don t moderate me this way 882]

I'm puzzled by the fact that your specific flight resulted in an OOM. Does this OOM reproduce with every attempt?

 

Furthermore, PMDG statements in the intro doc reflect brand new findings, discussed here on AVSIM in recent months. The manual basically sums this discussion up and offers heaps of suggestions to manage VAS usage in FSX. If you ask for release of this information prior to purchase, well, the AVSIM forums are at your fingertips ...

 

VAS usage/OOM is not T7-specific at all: I can OOM almost any plane in places like

- New York

- London

- Brisbane

- Cairns

- Melbourne

provided, I installed the relevant addons and increase settings and texture sizes sufficiently.

 

The VAS contribution of the T7 is about 0.8 GB with an overall VAS limit of 4.0 GB. That's slightly more than the VAS contribution of the NGX which, to my knowledge, never triggered discussions like this.

 

The most important question is why you OOM-ed on a flight like the one you did:

 

Can you tell us something about

- LOD Radius?

- texture sizes?

- autogen settings?

- operating system (32 bit or 64 bit)?

[Shermann 4]

I'm puzzled by the fact that your specific flight resulted in an OOM. Does this OOM reproduce with every attempt?

 

Furthermore, PMDG statements in the intro doc reflect brand new findings, discussed here on AVSIM in recent months. The manual basically sums this discussion up and offers heaps of suggestions to manage VAS usage in FSX. If you ask for release of this information prior to purchase, well, the AVSIM forums are at your fingertips ...

 

VAS usage/OOM is not T7-specific at all: I can OOM almost any plane in places like

- New York

- London

- Brisbane

- Cairns

- Melbourne

provided, I installed the relevant addons and increase settings and texture sizes sufficiently.

 

The VAS contribution of the T7 is about 0.8 GB with an overall VAS limit of 4.0 GB. That's slightly more than the VAS contribution of the NGX which, to my knowledge, never triggered discussions like this.

 

The most important question is why you OOM-ed on a flight like the one you did:

 

Can you tell us something about

- LOD Radius?

- texture sizes?

- autogen settings?

- operating system (32 bit or 64 bit)?

Hi ! For example in my case i had only twice the PINPONPANG that warn me i am having the OOM. Once After a flight of 7 hours to KJFK and other two times in the same fight to EFHK, a flight that lasted 2.5 hours. IN my case The LOD is set to 4.5 txture size is 2048 for the clouds autogene is dense andthe operating system is windows 7 64..

[Don t moderate me this way 882]

KJFK can be really tough:

 

- KJFK, KLGA and KEWR addons available

- heaps of AI traffic generated in a confined airspace

- Aerosoft Manhattan or DD New York scenery available

 

Try 1.024 (or even 512!) for the clouds (halving the texture size means only one quarter of texture VAS usage) and autogen at 'normal'. Both AI traffic sliders in the 15-20% range. For the DD New York scenery there are 'VAS patches' available from the developer. The initial N.Y. release was basically unflyable.

 

Should help a lot with the VAS but should not look significantly worse.

[Shermann 4]

I will give a try but in USA all is default for me. I have no Add on scenery installed. and traffic is 15-20%. Unluckly we spend lots of money and ithe more time pass by the more the quality of add on is high the more we have to reduce the quality of the SIM. While some add on require some high spec setting to be enjoyed. Unluckely in life all is a comrpomises. What i cant understand is same flight same weather same traffic same setting from the same route LIPE EFHK. With The 737NGX all ok, with the maddog all ok, with level d all ok, with MD11 all ok and with my beloved 777 two flights two warnings..

[Jazz 1,046]

Thanks Jazz

Maybe that's because am also from Cardiff!

 

Well what do you know.

 

I am actually from Newport honestly.

 

You still live there?

[Panman 4]

The first 2 times that I flew the 777 (KMEM-OMDB, and EGLL-KJFK), I suffered from OOM's.  Since then, all that I have done, is tell activesky to use 1024 textures instead of HD textures - now no more OOM's.  I refuse to disable any scenery.  Since then I have flown EGLL-OMDB, OMDB-VRMM, VRMM-PHNL (that flight was 15 hours long!!) all of them using high quality sceneries with no OOM's.

 

Aaron

-oOo-