If you are using Active Camera on a powerfull system, you should lock the FPS between 20-25 fps. I found that with my fps set to unlimited or even at say 35-45 fps, there was a definate jerky-ness to panning around the virtual cockpits of my aircraft. After locking the fps to 25, this went away completely and the smooth panning is back allowing the full effects that Active Camera offers.As far as the texture loading issues, you can adjust the FS9 config file and set the TEXTURE_BANDWIDTH_MULT value higher. I have mine set at 140 and get very good results with my texture loading times. No flashing textures at all and no noticable loading of the textures during flight. But be carefull, if you set this value too high, then you will get micro-stutters.I use the Denver megascenery, but with my fps set to unlimited (as recomended) there were just too many problems with stutters. At 25 fps with my TEXTURE_BANDWIDTH_MULT set to 140 and my viedo card's antiallaising set to 4X, and my other terrain texture setting in the FS9 file set to 9.50000, I get very good looking scenery (no bluries and crisp). In fact, after installing the megascenery, I went back an re-tweaked my system, since the settings that the megascenery installer set actually decreased my FS9 performance.So it's 25 fps locked for my system!Happy Simming!Scott :-)ATP/CFII/DA20 Type Rated - Instructor Pilot - USAFA (KAFF), Colorado Springs, CO & at KCOSAOPA #00956593, since 1987Gamming System Specs: (Built this one myself)AMD Athlon-64 3000+ Gigabyte K8NS nForce3-250 Chipset 8x AGP Main Board 1GB DDR400 PC3200 Memory 160GB 7200 rpm Hard Drive 16x DVD-ROM Audigy 2ZS Gammer Sound Card5.1 Channel Surround Sound Speakers256MB GeForce-5700 8X AGP Video Dual 17" LCD & CRT monitorsCotytech Gaming CaseCH Products Yoke, Rudder Pedals, Throttle QuadrantSaitek Cyborg Gold Joystic for Helo's & Stick equipped aircraftWindows XP Pro SP2Home Network for using the Instructor StationFS9 Sliders maxed with other settings (except weather, kills the FPS) at their best quality positions.

Hi,I always fly at 25 FPS together with a bottle of Wiskhey.After 10 minutes my vision is also blurred, so 25 FPS will do just fine :-lol

>>>>Perception of smooth motion usually occurs for most people>at>>a frame rate of about 18FPS or more. Certainly there>should>>be no problem perceiving smooth motion with 24 FPS or 25 (>>European TV ) or 30 FPS ( NTSC 3.58 ) >>>>>>So what your'e sayng is that the screen refresh rate (usually>no less than 60Hz) resembels the 48Hz movie shutter (only>better)?>>Bdw, Do you know what NTSC means? European broadcast people>always refer to it as "Never Twice Same Color", but no one>told me the correct meaning ...>>EagleNTSC is the National Television Systems Committee which came up with the current color standard bearing it's name in 1953. Screen refresh rate has very little to do with frame rate in FS9. The screen refresh rate is set by your Graphics card resolution and frame rate settings. The Frame rate in FS9 that we all discuss, is the rate the each frame that FS9 is able to construct, is fed to the Graphics Card input. The higher the monitor frame rate, the easier it is on your eyes. That only applies to a CRT device, and is not applicable to DLP or LCD.

>Actually, jm2c is correct.In what way he is correct?He is correct that movie camera catches a slight blur but he is not correct in stating that this is necessary ingredient to perceive fluid motion. Disney's animation pictures (circa 1939) run at 24 fps with absolute fluidity and no blurr. The problem with something like FS9 is that its fps counter lies - and even though it tells you that you may be getting 24 fps you are NOT getting 24 fps in the sense of the world of cinema. If you analyzed every frame generated by FS9 you would see they are not coming uniformly 1/24 sec apart - you would find many frames spread out further apart than 1/24 fps. It tells you that on "average" you are getting 24 fps but this is not enough. Therefore even with the counter in FS9 showing 24 fps you see the famous 'microstutter'. Motion blur really has little to do with all this.Michael J.WinXP-Home SP2,AMD64 3500+,Abit AV8,Radeon X800Pro,36GB Raptor,1GB PC3200,Audigy 2

I'm not denying that the microstutter won't occur even at 24 fps, or even that the fps counter lies. However I disagree that Disney's animation pictures at 24fps look "completely fluid". I can see a big difference between 40 fps in FS2002, and a 24 fps Disney animated film. And even FS2004, during stretches between Microstutters, it looks smoother than any Disney animated film I've ever seen when it's above 30fps. Come to think of it, even Disney's best animation never showed motion to the degree ***in my perception*** that films of the same era, such as Wizard of Oz, did. We all perceive things differently, and I suspect if life were limited to 24fps, we'd find it difficult to navigate in the world or drive during rush hour where things happen in thousandths of a second.-John

"I always fly at 25 FPS together with a bottle of Wiskhey.After 10 minutes my vision is also blurred, so 25 FPS will do just fine"Great answer!

>However I disagree>that Disney's animation pictures at 24fps look "completely>fluid". John, they do look **completely fluid** and I am super sensitive to a slightest stutter. I bet if you collected a group of 'average' viewers they would not find anything wrong with fuidity in those movies. You may disagree for the sake of disagreeing but I have quite a collection of Disney's old classics, watch them frequently and if FS9 could match this fluidity I would be in simulation heaven.Michael J.WinXP-Home SP2,AMD64 3500+,Abit AV8,Radeon X800Pro,36GB Raptor,1GB PC3200,Audigy 2

"You may disagree for the sake of disagreeing but...."I think here we have the pot calling the kettle black. What the heck is happening to these forums that you can't make a single comment or observation in a thread without someone trying to take a hit at motives or someone's ability to make a sound comment? I won't discuss the subject further--how's that? -John

I'm sure that you'll get many different opinions on this one... for what it is worth, I'm happily flying with a 30 fps lock.For me, the most critical time of flight is the landing, so that is where I try to optimize the sim.I do not perceive any smoother motion in final approach above 30 fps and I like to have the steadiness of not having my fps jumping up and down quite as much.

Great tip!I'm gonna check that tonight. Anyone know if you can substitute vodka for the whiskey?Cheers and TGIF, :-beerchug

<>No, Michael, that is incorrect...at least prior to 1980 when a new technology for creating motion fluidity in "stop action" photography and animation called "Gomotion."Motion blur is fundamental, along with "persistence of vision" in creating the illusion of motion. Without motion blur, the sequence appears SLIGHTLY less fluid than with motion blur. But in stop motion cinematography, which is how animation is accomplished, the object being animated is technically not moving when each frame of film is exposed. The animator is moving the object in between the shooting of frames. Therefore, the animated object has no motion and therefore, no motion blur. Motion blur is necessary because it helps to smooth apparent movement. That is why in many older films that use stop-motion animation, the animated objects appear to move with a slight "jerky" motion. I think what is happening to you and most others who like to watch pre-1980 animated films, (me included) is that you see what you EXPECT to see which is far less fluidity than with standard motion photography. And since you are seeing what you expect to see, it is fine with you.As for motion picture film NOT running at 24 fps through a projector but rather at 48 fps as some people think, that is not correct either...although it is NEARLY correct.In fact, film exposed at 24 fps is also projected at 24 fps BUT there is a "gate" in all projectors where each frame of film STOPS for 1/24 second so that it can be projected onto a screen. Most modern pro projectors now employ a "double shutter" technology wherein the light hits the paused frame of film TWICE so what the eye perceives is 48 fps but what you are ACTUALLY seeing is two identical images (i.e. the image produced by ONE frame)48 times per second while the film strip itself passes the gate at 24 fps.From a fluidity and fliker-reducing standpoint that is a better deal than straight 24 fps projection like you used to get with you 8mm home movies but is NOT as good as actually shooting AND projecting at 48 fps. If that were done, a typical motion picture whould require a film strip nearly FOUR MILES in length.And actually, maximum FLUIDITY is achieved at 24 pfs which is exactly why that rate has been universally adopted by filmmakers for so many decades. The issue realy is FLICKER and not fluidity and it is true that flicker happens to be noticed by and bothers some people more than others.As for video, as has often been pointed out, there is absolutely ZERO similarity between the way VIDEO and film motion is portrayed. There is an entirely different set of physics involved and trying to compare fps in the film and video worlds would be like trying to say that aerodynamics above and below the sound barrier are the same. But, they are NOT. Ask Chuck Yeager.Finally, since each human eye is different..even the two eyes in the same head are different, the rule about sim settings has to be that there are no rules. Only INDIVIDUAL, PERSONAL EXPERIMENTATION with locking or not locking frame rates and what fps is optimal will provide an answer that is right for that particular person.Therefore, given the infinite varation in the physical properties of individual human eyes, the only person who MUST BE WRONG is the one who suggests that any GIVEN settings/techniques are correct and all others are incorrect.Regards,Jim

>Great tip!>>I'm gonna check that tonight. Anyone know if you can>substitute vodka for the whiskey?>>Cheers and TGIF, :-beerchugYou know the best substitution is a good wine red ofcourse and funny enough after a while there the sim flies beautiful.Who care about the frame rates...Stelios

Hi Stelios,One thing which is the most basic in locked versus unlimited frame-rate settings is this:** If you LOCK framerates at a level which your video card cannot always maintain, especially in photo-realistic scenery environments (like airports), then FS will REDUCE the quality of the picture (e.g. less detailed textures will load) to MAINTAIN the frame-rate which you asked for when you locked it. In other words, if you set 24FPS and you have seen, from experience, that your current system can easily go and STAY at 14FPS when you are taxiing at photo-realistic airports, then you'll get close to 24fps but your textures will most likely not load or the lower res/quality ones will load with possible effects on reduction of your anti-aliasing and AAF settings as well as FS2004 tries to maintain the frame rate (performance) you asked for - but at the expense of picture quality. At least this is my understanding of how locking FPS works in FS so please anyone correct me if I'm wrong.Hope this helps.John

>Actually, jm2c is correct.>>A movie camera catches *everything* that happens while the>shutter is open which is why if you pause a movie at a>particular frame, one with lots of motion, you'll see motion>blur.>>A computer image is rendered perfectly sharp and displayed>until the next image is ready in the backbuffer, at which>point the buffers are swapped and the new image is displayed>with absolutely no interpolation between the two.>>I, and I'd imagine, most human beings, can see the difference>in computer animation up to about 70 FPS, and I can also make>out the difference between 85Hz and 100 Hz in CRT's.Not true again. What you are seeing on one frome of film is the crispness loss because the image being exposed on the film is blurry. You woul get a similar effect by shaking the camera while you shoot some film. As for 85hz and 100 hz etc , and people being able to see it . , pure rubbish.