Info please on PMDG 777 in P3Dv2 - Re: Memory

[downscc 1,327]

 

 

OK..I will try. I will uninstall P3D and reinstalled it. I hope I am wrong.

That's not the recommendation. The recommendation was to start your flights by loading a pre-saved flight.

 

 

 

AlwaysFullLoad=1

This is in the Introduction, which has been edited for the P3D release. Just because you have read the FSX Intro doesn't mean you get to skip all of this one.

 

 

 

Anyone managed to load the 777 in OMDB (Fly Tampa's Dubai)?

 

Yes, I've gone into and left OMDB several times.  Loading Fly Tampa OMDB starts at about 3.2 GB.

[greggerm 312]

I skipped the FSX version held out for the P3D version, and it's great to feel rewarded now that it's out. Just completed OMDB-KBOS ten minutes ago in the big bird as my first flight. No issues or problems whatsoever. In fact, in true flight simulation user fashion, I didn't open a single tutorial, manual, readme, or document. I don't monitor VAS usage or FPS numbers as I've never had a memory crash or horrible performance in all my time with FSX or P3D... if it feels right and the program keeps going, it's mission accomplished.

 

Mission accomplished.

 

-Greg

[Guest]

Some tips to avoiding out of memory in P3D:

 

1.  1024 textures

2.  Building AutoGen = Normal

3.  Disable products you aren't going to use (DLL.XML And EXE.XML)

4.  Disable scenery you aren't going to use

5.  Setup your Flight, save, exit, double click on your saved flight .fxml file to load P3D 

6.  Do not change Time/Season (see #5)

7.  Don't enable every single option in Orbx Vector (that will consume 300+ MB VAS) - I disable Secondary and Tertiary Roads (all options)

8.  Manage 3rd party airport settings (stay with 1024 textures, disable static items, etc.)

9.  Manager you AI traffic, even more important if you're using 3rd part product like TrafficX, UT2, etc. (this products will consume considerable VAS if you high traffic density)

 

In P3D V2.5 you can use (apparently this might be available for v2.4 also, unconfirmed?):

 

[TERRAIN]

UseGlobalTerrainView=True

 

This should help reduce VAS usage on view changes (VC to spot to aircraft etc.).  Vehicle selection OOM is fixed in v2.5 but I would still recommend doing #5 regardless.  I always use #5 and have done VERY VERY long flights in complex aircraft.

 

I haven't noticed Cloud Shadows or Terrain Shadows impacting VAS ... provided you have enough GPU VRAM ... so far those setting seem to just affect FPS performance not VAS.

 

None: 2.83 GB

Cloud Shadows: 2.82 GB

Terrain Shadows + Cloud Shadows 2.83 GB

 

Which is what I would expect as the GPU should be doing majority of the work when it comes to shadows.

 

P3D 64bit would alleviate this problem, but until 64bit P3D is available (and 3rd party are on board with 64bit) the above process works well.

 

Cheers, Rob.

[jgoggi 65]

I wonder what's the point of switching to P3D if, in order to avoid OOMs, you have to disable the features that make it better than FSX, such as cloud shadows...

[AimHawk 8]

Some tips to avoiding out of memory in P3D:

 

1.  1024 textures

2.  Building AutoGen = Normal

3.  Disable products you aren't going to use (DLL.XML And EXE.XML)

4.  Disable scenery you aren't going to use

5.  Setup your Flight, save, exit, double click on your saved flight .fxml file to load P3D 

6.  Do not change Time/Season (see #5)

7.  Don't enable every single option in Orbx Vector (that will consume 300+ MB VAS) - I disable Secondary and Tertiary Roads (all options)

8.  Manage 3rd party airport settings (stay with 1024 textures, disable static items, etc.)

9.  Manager you AI traffic, even more important if you're using 3rd part product like TrafficX, UT2, etc. (this products will consume considerable VAS if you high traffic density)

 

In P3D V2.5 you can use (apparently this might be available for v2.4 also, unconfirmed?):

 

[TERRAIN]

UseGlobalTerrainView=True

 

This should help reduce VAS usage on view changes (VC to spot to aircraft etc.).  Vehicle selection OOM is fixed in v2.5 but I would still recommend doing #5 regardless.  I always use #5 and have done VERY VERY long flights in complex aircraft.

 

I haven't noticed Cloud Shadows or Terrain Shadows impacting VAS ... provided you have enough GPU VRAM ... so far those setting seem to just affect FPS performance not VAS.

 

None: 2.83 GB

Cloud Shadows: 2.82 GB

Terrain Shadows + Cloud Shadows 2.83 GB

 

Which is what I would expect as the GPU should be doing majority of the work when it comes to shadows.

 

P3D 64bit would alleviate this problem, but until 64bit P3D is available (and 3rd party are on board with 64bit) the above process works well.

 

Cheers, Rob.

ive always wondered, why can i use 4096 texutres in fsx steam edition and get lower vas but cant use them without ooming in p3d?

[ZKOKQ 984]

I wonder what's the point of switching to P3D if, in order to avoid OOMs, you have to disable the features that make it better than FSX, such as cloud shadows...

Yes, thinking the same. Quote from this thread "I just used low settings like no cloud shadows, low autogen... "

lol

But reading Rob's post, cloud shadows etc don't impact VAS.

[JalioHC 3]

Sorry for my little understanding but just to be sure, you guys are running the Professional Licence of P3D?

[rjack1282 316]

There is a thread in the FSX forum regarding ASN and PMDG products.  Several people claimed to have resolved their VAS issues by reinstalling ASN after installing or updating their 777.  I haven't had a chance to get in depth with this yet; however, I did fly the first tutorial flight immediately after purchasing the 777.  The tutorial flight uses the Clear Skies weather theme so I didn't open ASN.  I had 1.8 GB of free VAS sitting on the runway after loading the tutorial flight.  The flight went fine and I had over 1 GB of free VAS after landing.  

 

I then attempted two flights from KDFW to KLAX with ASN already opened upon opening P3D.  Sitting at the gate in default KDFW I had 1.0 GB of free VAS each time I loaded the plane with all other settings the same at the tutorial flight.  That VAS got me about 100 miles out of KDFW before an OOM each time.  I then loaded up at KTPA to try a short flight to KMIA and had 1.2 GB of VAS sitting at the gate in default KTPA (ASN running again).  I couldn't make it to default KMIA.  Again, no other settings had be changed from the tutorial flight and I have flown numerous legs with these settings in both the Aerosoft Airbuses and the iFly 737NG in and out of payware airports using ASN.

 

Again, I haven't been able to test much but after reading that thread and then seeing the above with modest settings, I am starting to believe there is an issue with ASN and the 777.  Maybe people can report whether or not they are using ASN and whether or not they installed it before or after the 777.  I will do some more testing this week and report back.

[AirCanada235 103]

So i have made the jump to P3d over the weekend with mixed results.  I have a fairly decent machine to run FSX and P3D on but yet I find the results from P3d less that optimal.  I have dual quad core Xeon 3.2Ghz processors, 32 GB ram, wicked hard drives and a 3GB AMD 7900 video card.  Sitting in FSDT CYVR in the 777 VC, I get 12 FPS, exterior view looking at the terminal I am pulling about 28 FPS.  I have tried a myriad of different combinations to increase my frame rates to no avail.  Any suggestions would be welcome  My VAS usage doesn't seem to be the issue - more around frame rates.  

 

Any thoughts?

[Michael Moe 495]

Some tips to avoiding out of memory in P3D:

 

1.  1024 textures

2.  Building AutoGen = Normal

3.  Disable products you aren't going to use (DLL.XML And EXE.XML)

4.  Disable scenery you aren't going to use

5.  Setup your Flight, save, exit, double click on your saved flight .fxml file to load P3D 

6.  Do not change Time/Season (see #5)

7.  Don't enable every single option in Orbx Vector (that will consume 300+ MB VAS) - I disable Secondary and Tertiary Roads (all options)

8.  Manage 3rd party airport settings (stay with 1024 textures, disable static items, etc.)

9.  Manager you AI traffic, even more important if you're using 3rd part product like TrafficX, UT2, etc. (this products will consume considerable VAS if you high traffic density)

 

In P3D V2.5 you can use (apparently this might be available for v2.4 also, unconfirmed?):

 

[TERRAIN]

UseGlobalTerrainView=True

 

This should help reduce VAS usage on view changes (VC to spot to aircraft etc.).  Vehicle selection OOM is fixed in v2.5 but I would still recommend doing #5 regardless.  I always use #5 and have done VERY VERY long flights in complex aircraft.

 

I haven't noticed Cloud Shadows or Terrain Shadows impacting VAS ... provided you have enough GPU VRAM ... so far those setting seem to just affect FPS performance not VAS.

 

None: 2.83 GB

Cloud Shadows: 2.82 GB

Terrain Shadows + Cloud Shadows 2.83 GB

 

Which is what I would expect as the GPU should be doing majority of the work when it comes to shadows.

 

P3D 64bit would alleviate this problem, but until 64bit P3D is available (and 3rd party are on board with 64bit) the above process works well.

 

Cheers, Rob.

 

Hi Rob

 

Thanks for sharing,

 

I am not sure i do see any reduce in VAS . Maybe 50mb or so during the saved flight.Nothing on the other matters (tweaking the cfg with new finds)

 

Everytime i load a saved situation in P3D it says the.pln file is corrupted but i just moves on. Doubleclicking the saved situation file gives you the menu inside P3D right ? At least it does on my system.

 

Thanks

Michael

[Guest]

 

 

4096 texutres in fsx steam edition and get lower vas but cant use them without ooming in p3d?

 

How do you know you are actually loading 4096 textures?  I'm not aware of any textures in FSX:SE that are actually above a 1024 texture size (same as FSX).  Setting 4096 textures is simply an allocation, if you don't have actual 4096 textures to load, FSX:SE platform will load whatever texture size is there.

 

But you can check this for yourself -- the SDK provides an ImageTool or if you have the correct plugin's you can use Photoshop to check the textures size you are actually using in FSX:SE ... but I'm not sure FSX:SE provides a complete set of SDK tools?

 

Cheers, Rob.

[Bjørn Helge 2]

How do you know you are actually loading 4096 textures?  I'm not aware of any textures in FSX:SE that are actually above a 1024 texture size (same as FSX).  Setting 4096 textures is simply an allocation, if you don't have actual 4096 textures to load, FSX:SE platform will load whatever texture size is there.

 

But you can check this for yourself -- the SDK provides an ImageTool or if you have the correct plugin's you can use Photoshop to check the textures size you are actually using in FSX:SE ... but I'm not sure FSX:SE provides a complete set of SDK tools?

 

Cheers, Rob.

Also getting 4096 textures in FSX you need to add this manually to FSX.CFG (don't know if this is the same for SE edition), anyways, in FSX if you change an setting inside FSX settings the textures will revert to the default maximum 1024, this might be the same for SE edition.

[downscc 1,327]

The P3D forum gurus (given with respect) recommended 1024b texture instead of 2048… although 2048 worked well for me in FSX I am willing to try most anything.
 
Test flight is a DAL B77L KATL-KLAX using  ImagineSim KATL and FSDT KLAX. I kept everything as close to similar as practical given the amount of effort I was willing to expend.  The results reveal that some improvement in VAS usage is possible but the change is not significant with the degree of certainty of the test (maybe +/- 5% if I’m smokin’ the good stuff), in plain words the difference was zilch.  Of course I am assuming the FSDT uses 4096 textures for the buildings and 2048 in general.

 
I used Process Explorer for VAS used value and FSUIPC logger for VAS remaining.  Values for PE are in Kb x 10[sup]6[/sup] and FSUIPC is bytes x 1x10[sup]9[/sup]:
                                   2048 TML                              1024 TML
Event                    Used        Rem                       Used     Rem
Load Flight              2.60        1.60                        2.57        1.62
TOC                      2.76        1.43                        2.83        1.37  After this point I used external view once which adds about 0.10
INK                      2.98        1.21                        3.09        1.10  About 2+10 ET
TOD                      3.22        0.99                        3.24        0.95
SEAVU                    3.45        0.74                        3.37        0.82  IAF
LIMMA                    3.84        0.36                        3.71        0.49  FAF
LDG Full Stop            3.89        0.30                        3.73        0.47

 
The increase in VAS remaining was about 0.17 GB (not converting bytes to K or G here), which is less than 5% so it’s within my margin of error.
 
I’m going back to 2048.
 
I will try UseGlobalTerrainView=True in [TERRAIN] section for another marginal step improvement.
 
I am now forcing a new habit of saving before TOD and reloading flight.  This saves up to 1.4 GB of VAS, which is significant.

[rjack1282 316]

OK, I tested KTPA to KMIA again.  I started ASN after loading in P3D and did not have a VAS leak.  I also followed the advice of others and turned off autogen and voila...only used 300 MB of VAS in severe thunderstorms (live ASN weather).  Note that my earlier problem could have been the autogen but I don't have the time or patience to eliminate possibilities one at a time.  Didn't notice the autogen as I was focused on dodging these cells.  WOW this plane is awesome!  Great performance in the thunderstorms too using 4x SGSS via NI.  Longer flights may require reducing other settings but I really don't want to look out of the cockpit anyway.  I just hit the V key and cropped out the FS2Crew panel so this pic may not be of the best quality.

 

[Guest]

Just to clarify what I commented on earlier ... the setting 1024, 2048, 4096 simply caps the Mipmap level for the texture resources.  The actual texture sizes in the texture files being used to display terrain, airports, aircraft, etc. are still loaded, however the resources created from loading the texture file (DDS) will be created based on mipmap level setting (i.e. 1024, 2048, 4096).  

 

FSDT uses 4096 ground textures some building textures and other textures  (see KLAX_4096_SF01.DDS ...) ... you can use the SDK ImageTool and take a look at them ... not all FSDT KLAX textures are 4096, but many are.  I don't believe FSDT KLAX provides a control panel to adjust/set texture sizes ... the Virtuali add-on manager is working with the global texture setting not airport specific.

 

Anyway, simple test, save your flight (fxml) from KLAX, now disable KLAX in the scenery library, exit P3D, load P3D do a 360 pan in VC, the goto spot view and do a 360 PAN (slowly) so that all textures are loaded ... note memory usage.  Now enable KLAX, exit P3D, load P3D, do a 360 pan in VC, do a 360 pan in spot view note memory usage ... calc the difference between the two values and this will be pretty close to how much "additional" VAS FSDT KLAX is using.

 

Cheers, Rob.