One Tweak to Rule Them All - How to set Affinity Mask Correctly

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

For those who don't have (i5) or use HyperThreading, best performance seems to be to turn all 4 cores on.  (AM=15)

 

"seems to be".... ^_^

 

"Seems to me":  AM=14   (1110)  for a non-HT quad.

[toby23 138]

Toby, your 'mini-tutorial' was so well done that I have exercised my magic power and "promoted" your OP to an actual tutorial:

http://forum.avsim.net/tutorials/article/100-one-tweak-to-rule-them-all-how-to-set-affinity-mask-correctly/

 

Unfortunately, our tutorial module will not allow me to change the name of the "submitter", so if you'd like to re-edit your post and then submit it to the Tutorial system yourself, I can then remove the one that I just submitted. I have given you full credit and cited this thread in the "Description" text, which is the best I can do for now.

 

That's good to hear Bill, thanks for waving your magic wand.

I can't edit the post (I think these words must be invisible) but you've put my name on there, so it's all good.

[EC-120 0]

Naming it wrong may lead to a misunderstanding if you talk with a pro. Make it perfect, this doesn't cost more.

That was all I've intended, thanks for your understanding.

 

It's the possibility that it can lead to misunderstandings.

If for example, one is talking abut activities at core one but is indeed looking at the first core, what is core zero, his or her discussion partner is maybe looking at the core named one, what is the second core.

 

Sorry for my interruption, just wanted to mention this :rolleyes:

[deetee 164]

"seems to be".... ^_^

 

"Seems to me": AM=14 (1110) for a non-HT quad.

Hi Bert, the concensus with P3D v2 seems to be all 4 cores on for best results (anti-blurries etc), rather than leaving the 1st core alone.

It certainly does the trick for me! :)

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

Whatever works for you!

 

Kind of surprised that the P3D authors would have gone for 1110..

 

Luckily, it is easy to try both and choose  :rolleyes:

[SteveW 1,792]

To be even more pedantic: The "CPU" can be split into multiple "Cores". With HT technology cores are split into "Logical Processors", Cores and Logical Processors are numbered from zero up as shown when we hover over their mini graphs in Task Manager Performance page. :smile:

[toby23 138]

I wondered when you'd come along :P

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

Great Post, will certainly look into this...

 

Thank you!

[SteveW 1,792]

Hehe, yeah, sorry about that! :biggrin:

 

Kind of surprised that the P3D authors would have gone for 1110..

Hey Bert, are you saying three cores are recommended by LM? Do we know how many cores are optimum with P3D?

Steve

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

Nicely explained and orderly presented but to be honest - nothing new.

Spirit

I think the 'intent' was not to publish at the frontier, but to let as many readers access to this information and 'how to'. :)  I think he did an excellent job!!!!

[toby23 138]

I think the 'intent' was not to publish at the frontier, but to let as many readers access to this information and 'how to'. :)  I think he did an excellent job!!!!

 

You're not wrong ^_^

Do yourself a favour though Sesquashtoo, delete your Prepar3d.cfg file and let the sim build a new one for you before you start with this guide.

I know how you love to tweak :P but if you're lucky, the correct Affinity Mask and Adaptive Sync might be all you need.

Don't forget to make a backup of your .cfg file first so that you can copy any relevant simobject entries across to the new one.

[Richard Sennett 2,499]

"the correct Affinity Mask and Adaptive Sync might be all you need"

 

This is all I did as I am very happy with my NI settings

[SteveW 1,792]

To HT or not HT? Well with any core, sooner or later it will begin to process a second thread. When this happens the situation of the first thread is saved away to make room for the second thread, it's a bit of a fuss. Would be better to have two cores. With HT on, the chip emulates two cores using one core and a bit more, that is a lot less than two complete cores. It's making the switch to the second thread more efficient. This leads to more work done by the chip, and a little more heat in some cases, but not much. The overclockers like to disable HT so that purely a higher frequency can be used to reach higher temperatures, foregoing the advantage of HT since there's not much other thread activity.

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

Hey Bert, are you saying three cores are recommended by LM? Do we know how many cores are optimum with P3D?

Steve

 

Steve,  I'm not sure we "know" anything..

 

Some folks believe that more cores (virtual or otherwise) are better,

some believe that too many cooks in the kitchen does not equate to

smoother performance..  take your pick!

[toby23 138]

And the best bit of all of this is Steve, I have a 4770k that refuses to overclock (no tips please, I know how it works), so I run it at stock speeds with HT on and turbo boost and I get better performance than I did in FSX with a 2660k overclocked to 4.6ghz with HT off...

I cannot get the same performance in P3D with HT off, using affinity mask to force all cores, which is why I have HT on.