Graphical stutters. Sorry in advance for the long post.I posted this in the hardware forum but I guess not as many people look there so I'm posting this here.I recently started having less tolerance for those graphical micro-stutters that happen in 2D cockpit view that affect outside textures when in turns on the ground and in the air.I contacted Microsoft support, via chat. They've been trying to be very helpful but nothing they suggested has worked, including running FS9 with Minimum everything. It is now being sent to their support escalation team that are getting in touch with me today sometime but I honestly am not holding my breath for a magic solution.I think I have narrowed it down to a culprit, maybe, but I wanted to hear from you guys who have experienced this.First, I have an old system:P4 2.2GHz1G RAM64 GF4 Ti4200SB LiveRest is standard stuff.I have formatted my HDD and a fresh install of XP with SP2, all the patches, and a clean install of FS9 with the 9.1 update. No add-ons what-so-ever.Tweaked XP to the max, and my system is running great. I am getting very high FPS, well above 40 in all cases.The thing of interest I noticed is that when I press the W key to get rid of the main instrument panel leaving only outside textures and the minimized basic instruments, those stutters are COMPLETELY GONE! In turns, climbs, weather etc...Nothing. Just perfect. As soon as I press the W key again to put back the normal 2D cockpit view and they all come back.One of the Microsoft support guys thinks that the gauges are somehow placing a huge burden on the graphics card causing the stutters. But I said that the minimized gauges are still 'gauges' so that doesn't completely answer that.So here I am trying to find a solution for this age old problem with FS9 and ofcourse my hardware but I would really like to hear from the tweakers and experienced users as to what might help.I appreciate all the input.

Hmm. What you describe is unusual. Most of the problems I have come across are related to FS add-ons (textures, etc) or perhaps the system being infested with spyware or other accumulated rubbish. But with a re-formatted disk, new install of XP and a clean install of FS9.1, you still get stutters with 2D panels. Bizzare! This suggests it's nothing within FS, but more likely a hardware or driver issue.Admittedly, a GF4200 Ti 64 is no great shakes these days (I had a GF4200 Ti 128 until a few months ago), but if you are getting 40 fps with your current quality settings, then it seems to be coping really well. Perhaps it is the graphics card drivers? The newest drivers are not necessarily the best for your card, as they were produced principally to support newer cards like the 6xxx series. Have you looked at that possibility (perhaps via guru3d.com)? Another potential issue is PCI latency, although this seems to be more commonly a problem with newer systems. But have you considered it? Cheers,N.

Hi,Thanks for the reply. Yes, it certainly is strange getting great FPS but with stutters when the full instrument panel is present.I did go back to NVidia drivers version 52.16 which date back to sometime in 2003. You are absolutely correct in that those drivers actually gave me much better performance than the new ones.And I do have a PCI latency config program running and I have tried everything set to 32 and settings giving the video card a longer hold on the PCI bus, but to be perfectly honest, I haven't seen any impact.I am hoping someone will come forward with something to do with gauges, but I think I'm now officially reaching :-hmmm Thanks again for the reply.