Hi All

 

I am starting on a project to dramatically improve my FSX experience and will do it in two parts, any help on either would be really appreciated.

 

The first stage is a new main computer, the specs I am thinking of are:

 

Intel I7-4790K 4.00GHz

Asus Z97-A  motherboard

500Gb Sansung 840 Evo SSD

16Mb Kingston HyperX fury  - Black Edition

MSI GTX970 Twin Frozr 4GB

 

I am also thinking of a "be quiet Pure Rock BK009 CPU Cooler", Is this good enough for this spec of processor?

 

Will this do the job?  Is it overkill? Is there anywhere I can save a pound or two?

 

The second part of my project is to use my old computer networked to my new one to run weather and the likes, the specs on that one are in brief:

 

2.33 GHz Intel Core2 Quad

Gagabyte G31m-S2L

GeForce GT640

4Gb Memory

 

Does anyone have any experience of networking a second machine to run the add-ons?

 

What is the best way to configure the machines?

 

Which applications should I put on each machine?

 

Thanks in advance for any help or even reading this far

Is this an FSX only PC? I'd recommend getting another 1TB internal data drive, just for media and stuff like that. 500GB is a little less than ideal for a computer meant to be your "everything computer". 

Even better, buy a little SSD to run the OS off, then buy an SSD for FSX, and then have a separate data drive with which you can have your movies/music/whatever.

 

 

Even better, buy a little SSD to run the OS off, then buy an SSD for FSX, and then have a separate data drive with which you can have your movies/music/whatever.

 

Yes. This has been a great configuration for me.

Sorry it will have a 1Tb data drive I just did not bother mentioning it as it will just be for data.  I also do a little work with graphics so it will be used for that as well.

I would get a better CPU cooler. The Cooler Master Seidon 120 is a decent one and will fit into most ATX cases. I'm using one on mine and it keeps the processor happy.

Important Question: Are you planning on overclocking?

I had not planned on it certainly not at the moment.  This chip will apparently step itself up to 4.4GHz if needed with no input from me, so I don't see any real point.  What do you think?

I had not planned on it certainly not at the moment.  This chip will apparently step itself up to 4.4GHz if needed with no input from me, so I don't see any real point.  What do you think?

Not sure how it's going to do that. Clock speed fed to the CPU is sort of a BOIS function and that's dependent on the BOIS in the motherboard. Of course, Intel could have done lots of stuff I'm not familiar with.

The only part of that machine that could be considered overkill is the amount of RAM.

 

If you're stitching big panoramas or working with heavy PSDs then great, otherwise do you need it?

 

Personally I think it's a bit of a mismatch building a 4790k, 970 GTX and 8gb of RAM, even if you don't need 8gb now.

 

RAM is only going up in price and this machine could last many years depending on the future of FSX/P3D.

Yes the 4790k will turbo to 4.4ghz but only on one core.

 

If all four cores are active, the max frequency is 4.2ghz.

 

If you can keep your temps down below 75c after a decent FSX session, overclock your system to whatever you can get for less than 1.3v vcore.

 

FSX will always benefit from extra Mhz and by the way, if you enable your XMP profile to make the RAM run at its rated speed, you're already overclocking and will be glad you're not on the stock cooler.

You sussed me McGraw I do also work with PSD's as well as AI and sometimes huge InDesign files.  In truth that is what the machine is for (as far as the wife is concerned), if it just happens to be well suited to FSX as well....... What a coincidence :wink: 

As long as you are working with filters that make use of your gpu then you are completely covered as far as he other half goes

 

 

Not sure how it's going to do that.

 

That's how Intel chips work, my i52500k sits at 1.6Ghz while doing stuff like web browsing ect then steps up to 4.6Ghz which is what I have set my OC to when I fire up P3D or FSX.

Thank you all for your replies to my first question.  Does anyone have any ideas for the second part?

I tried running weather at one point on a second machine. It's typically through SimConnect. I experienced networking issues between WinXP and Win Vista (at the time). SimConnect seems to be quirky when installing on a secondary PC in my little experience.

 

If your primary PC is fairly recent you'll be fine with running everything on that PC. It's not even worth it to run another PC for FSX apps.

 

After I tried the above I ended up going with another secondary PC but not running separate apps - I used Synergy+ and operate one set of mouse/keyboard with two pc's and two monitors. That old PC has since died and I just use two monitors with my i5 2500K system - the second one runs Chrome / skyvector / NACO terminal charts / NOAA weather web pages.