FS9 Performance Technical Questions

[tomcatpilot1 0]

I'm trying to run FS2004 at max or near-max settings with great FPS on a new computer in 2014... is that too much to ask for?

From BestBuy, we bought an Asus Q310.  It ran flightsim great on max settings except for the fact that there was some random keyboard glitch, rendering it unusable. Four of the keys wouldn't type what they were supposed to, both in and out of the game.  This was not there before I installed the sim.  I exchanged it for another computer of the same model, dismissing it as a random glitch, but low and behold, once I installed FS, it happened again. BB ppl think its a thing on that particular batch of computers where that Asus keyboard driver couldn't coexist with the FS drivers.  Needless to say, that computer was returned as well, and I decided to move on to a different make and model.

Enter the Lenovo U430.  I thought I had finally solved everything when I learned that the Lenovo does not experience the keyboard glitch..but it does keeps crashing with FS, namely when i try to adjust the settings to max. In fact, it crashes when i adjust them as so and i dont even fly yet and am just on the home screen main menu. Like as its trying to adjust for them i suppose.  

In order for me to run the game, I need to lower the settings and it's still a bit choppy as a pan around outside.  When I got the Asus, I was thoroughly impressed with its ability to run FS.  When I ran it on the Lenovo, I found myself saying "eh...it's bearable."  It's by no means awful, but for 2014 technology on a 2003 game, I expected flawless performance.

Also, the Lenovo requires that I run FS in compatibility mode for XP service pack 3, which the Asus did not.  I assume this causes a disruption in speed.. but why would one Windows 8.1 machine require compatibility mode while the other did not?

Additionally, the Lenovo has a 25gb "D" drive which is a soft drive which BB people said would be so much quicker and greatly increase performance on games but I'm not really noticing any performance difference and the above problems persist there too.

Does anyone have ANY ideas about this? How does performance differ to cause this? We all thought the Lenovo would be far superior to the Asus because of the increased memory (see below) and the soft drive but that's not the case.

Lenovo has 8GB RAM; Asus had 6 (4+2, 4 onboard). CPU on Lenovo is 4th gen i5 @ 1.6ghz. I think but am not certain that the Asus was comparable as far as CPU.

Does anyone out there have a laptop that can run FS2004 (with lots of AI and airport addons and aircraft addons) on max settings with great FPS without breaking the bank?  I find it hard to believe that computers like this are hard to come by given the age of the game and how much technology has expanded...

Thanks very much for your attention and your tips/pointers/advice/etc.  I really appreciate it all!

Nick

[HoratioWondersocks 4]

Concerning keyboards.

I am not sure about W7 W8 but I do know XP can have different keyboard settings for different countries.

I have been caught out myself by this IE somewhere in your settings there should be options for U.S. or U.K . (as an example.Other countries may be available)keyboard setups which you can alter to suit your preference.Your original P.C. choice may not have necessarily been faulty.

Anyways some thoughts .Others may help.

 

Cheers Socks.

Edited April 5, 2014 by HoratioWondersocks

[Luis Hernandez 565]

What GPU has each laptop?

[rpjkw11 0]

My laptop has an i7 4700MQ, 8 GB of G.Skil RAM, and a GTX 770M. Not only does FS9 run maxed out, so does FSX, though with lower fraps but equally smooth performance using Win7 64 bit.

[mebull 27]

Thanks very much for your attention and your tips/pointers/advice/etc. I really appreciate it all!

 

You state that one PC had / has 8Gb of RAM and the other had 6Gb. FS9 would not have been able to make use of either unless the FS9 executable had been made "large address aware", which would allow FS9 to put more than 2Gb into use. Unless you were lucky to find someone at BB who was a avid flight simulator fan I would take their advice with a grain of salt. It is not just about throwing hardware at the simulator. Each component, CPU, RAM, Video processor and driver plus FS9 or FSX need to work with each other as a whole and in the most streamlined way possible. This is true whether you are talking laptop PC or tower PC.

 

There are also secondary issues galore. One example would be what processes are running in the background that may be robbing the CPU and RAM of computing resources. That would be like programs that run services that are constantly or frequently looking for updates or a antivirus that is checking every file being processed. Another example would be programs that load a bit of software at start up that sits and runs in the background just so that that program loads a little faster if and when you decide to use it.

 

It is not likely to pick up a store purchased PC of any type or brand, take it out of the box and expect FS9 / FSX to run flawlessly unless you have done a fair amount of research ahead of time and ordered the PC with the specs that are required. That said, I do not mean that a off the shelf PC will not do, only that it takes some effort and some time to get the result you desire.

 

As for the keyboard issue, I would go with Socks on that one, as FS9 uses the standard key coding used by the OS.

 

"Also, the Lenovo requires that I run FS in compatibility mode for XP service pack 3, which the Asus did not.  I assume this causes a disruption in speed.. but why would one Windows 8.1 machine require compatibility mode while the other did not?"

 

That a very interesting question. I can't help there - no experience with W8. You might wish to take a look at the "FS9 on Windows 8.1" topic.

 

I hope this helps at least a little.

 

Regards,

Mel

[sascha 314]

I got my FS9 to run adequately with Nvidia settings tweaks, FS Copilot forcing 2 core use and the latest Nvidia drivers available. Hardware changes never brought the performance boost I expected, it was only software that helped. I guess modern computersis way beyond the scope of FS9 architecture to benefit from unless it is aided by external programs.