Though today I've been debating whether to bite the bullet and just get a new $800-1000 gaming PC. I'm kind of due for an upgrade. If I did that, I could enjoy P3D with sliders to the far right plus addons, and that would be amazing.

In all honesty, you're going to have to spend quite a bit more than that just to run with all the sliders set more than half way to the right. There's a BIG difference between setting all the sliders to the far right in P3D and in FSX. And some P3D addons can really drop your FPS.

Thanks bslenter for asking the question I had wanted to ask.  I already suspected that P3D is too much for my system.

 

So.  I will stick to my plan of when I upgrade to a better and more fancy custom build, P3D will be just another part of the budget.

Thanks bslenter for asking the question I had wanted to ask.  I already suspected that P3D is too much for my system.

 

So.  I will stick to my plan of when I upgrade to a better and more fancy custom build, P3D will be just another part of the budget.

Except for the video card, your system blows mine out of the water.  (but I don't expect much of mine)

 

It would be an interesting experiment, when you buy the components for your custom build, if you and bslenter were to install the new video cards and P3D on your existing systems.   Or mix it up (new cpu/old gpu) and post before and after results for a saved flight.  Since we lack P3D benchmarks it would help everyone to know where the most bang for the buck is on hardware upgrades.

Except for the video card, your system blows mine out of the water.  (but I don't expect much of mine)

 

It would be an interesting experiment, when you buy the components for your custom build, if you and bslenter were to install the new video cards and P3D on your existing systems.   Or mix it up (new cpu/old gpu) and post before and after results for a saved flight.  Since we lack P3D benchmarks it would help everyone to know where the most bang for the buck is on hardware upgrades.

 

HA!  I had thought about doing just that!  I was (am) thinking about simply upgrading my video card.  THAT said however I am a rather close follower of Nick Needham's philosophy as my plan for this rig back in 2011 came out of his advice then.  I have had awesome performance.  I learned how to overclock over at Tom's Hardware.

 

In a nutshell Nick says that it's best to keep like vintage hardware with like vintage hardware.  A new GPU may not work nearly as well as a new GPU married to a new CPU.  That's the jist of it.  So I'd hate to go plop down 500 bucks for marginal improvements via a new GPU, when a total new build would be a lot more proper.  IF I understand what Nick is saying.

 

When I do upgrade I will run that test just for fun.  Sure would be interesting to say the least.

Well I bit the bullet and purchased P3D on my existing system. After an hour or so of experimentation, I'm actually very pleased with the performance of the sim on my existing hardware. Even with many of the sliders more than half way to the right and fairly dense autogen, I'm seeing 15 fps. Now that may sound pretty choppy, but for a flight sim it's actually not bad (after all, this is not a twitch action game). If I pull the sliders back a bit, I can get 20 fps even over San Francisco. 

 

Maybe my expectations were managed by previously running FSX with PDMG 737 on this same box, but I'm reasonably happy. I still want a hardware upgrade, but it isn't urgent.

 

Now, the frame rate in P3D 2.1 is still not as consistent as I like (periodic drops in fps particularly upon touchdown) but I think that's a software optimization issue and reading the changelog for the upcoming 2.2 update sounds like they are addressing many of these issues, and also making fixes that will allow me to move sliders farther right without a penalty. 

 

Now the question is, do I really go nuts and add the ORBX NorCal package? How much will that drop my FPS?

 

 

Now that may sound pretty choppy, but for a flight sim it's actually not bad

 

Wow, Im getting 50fps what is that considered? I didnt know that 15 was not bad. But your happy that's all that counts.   BTW that not right your only getting 15fps with default everything. It should be higher regardless of settings. You start adding things you may get in trouble.

Wow, Im getting 50fps what is that considered? I didnt know that 15 was not bad. But your happy that's all that counts.   BTW that not right your only getting 15fps with default everything. It should be higher regardless of settings. You start adding things you may get in trouble.

To clarify, I'm down to 15 fps with all sliders at least to mid way, resolution at 1440x1050 (my monitor's native res), water at Ultra, AA at 2x, Autogen to Dense, texture resolution at medium, etc. I was above 20 fps when I first launched at default settings.

 

I'll readily admit that, if I had a few hours flying on your system, I'd have a hard time living with 15-20 fps. But in my case, I've been flying MS Flight Sim for a lot of years, and never had a system that kept up with the demands of the software. Each time MS released a new version, you had to have a $3000 box to run it at max. I never did. So 20 fps in Flight Sim is pretty normal for me.

 

Honestly, this fps range feels smoother on P3D than it ever did in FSX. It's obvious I'm experiencing modernized code. And Lockheed is not done optimizing. But yeah, if I get sucked into a lot of simming again, I'm probably going to get a new box and do it right. I'd sure like to experience 50 fps with sliders at max.