Easy to see why, since there's no performance requirements when the sim is running at 60fps or more, but a smoother sim IS required when the frames are low. I continue to recommend 4 LPs, guys, no need to rush out to get an 8 core CPU. Incidentally, in the next wave of HEDT CPUs there are 6, 8, and 10 core. The 6 core of those is able to run faster because it's making less heat.

Easy to see why, since there's no performance requirements when the sim is running at 60fps or more, but a smoother sim IS required when the frames are low.

Hi Steve,

 

I agree absolutely and it is certainly not my intention to undermine your helpful advice and guidance. However, my experience with the i7-5960X suggests that there is something about this CPU, other than the fact that it has more physical cores, which makes its behaviour different. Restricting P3D V3 to the use of 4 physical cores on the 5960X die with HT enabled just doesn't cut it on my rig. Perhaps it has something to do with the motherboard (Asus Rampage V Extreme) and the fact that the CPU can utilise up to 40 PCIe lanes. Admittedly these are just the idle speculations of a non-expert, but there must be an explanation. At this point I feel that I have come full circle and have determined that, on my rig at least, the best configuration which ensures best all-round smooth performance is simply to allow the 5960X to do its own thing without interference.

 

The highest CPU temp I have witnessed to date at base clock (3-3.5GHz turbo) under heavy load is now 37 degrees C using water-cooling.

 

As to not having experienced any OOMs, I'm presuming this is simply because the sim has not yet been loaded sufficiently for these to appear.

 

It's good to that the upcoming HEDT CPUs from Intel will be compatible with my current X99 MoBo's LGA 2011-v3 socket. Don't suppose I'll be in the market for a CPU upgrade for quite some time, if at all, but knowing there is some future proofing is further reassurance that the right decisions have been made

 

Regards,

Mike

Hi Mike, yes there is an explanation, but it's complicated and maybe a little beyond the scope of the technicality required in this discussion. In a nutshell P3D works in a slightly different way to FSX and FSX-SE. When we apply an AM to P3D we get all the processes that are spawned from the use of P3D able only to utilise those LPs. If those are heavy, they may interfere with the maximized jobs on the LPs allocated within the AM. So what I am saying is that it can appear that it is running better with the AM removed and no HT enabled. In your case the HT enabled situation is marginally better. In most cases the four allocated LPs are fine. Unless they alter the behaviour of P3D with 3.1, the best solution would be to initially provide the AM to organise the jobs, and allow expanded affinity to give subtasks access to the entire CPU.

What should my AM be for a 3770k with HT enabled on P3Dv3?

There's no perfect AM, but for the 4 core HT enabled, 8 LPs, I generally say start with 85=(01,01,01,01), which allocates one LP per core. So it's similar to running 4 core HT disabled and no AM, but with the benefit of HT in operation and keeps the major sim jobs to a core of their own. But we do get some addons recommend avoiding core zero since they will run there, in that case try 116=(01,11,01,00), which still allocates 4 jobs, but on three cores. Reason to put the two combined jobs on core 2 (LPs 4 and 5 on the third core) don't max out together to compete for throughput of that core while the sim gathers scenery data. Four physical cores is better than three but when other processes are at large there will have to be compromises of a sort.

Hey, 

 

short update from myside.

 

 I got the Windows 10 "November" Update on Friday and since there something strange happend. 

 

My Simulator is now running "perfectly" and also the VAS is now being released as expected.  I have HT on with the AM setting that Steve suggested ( 340) on my 5820K with 4,7 Ghz. 

 

Rob`s NVI settings are enabled ( 4x SGSS) 

 

Now i have rock solid locked 35 FPS even with MyTraffic 6 set to 50 % Traffic and 25 % GA, LOD set to Ultra, 2048 Textures and Ultra shadows.  

 

The "scenery sliders are set to : scenery complexity : very dense and the other two to dense.

 

10 Clouds layers in ASN and cloud draw distance to 90 , cloud coverage density set to MAX.

 

With the PMDG 777 starting in flytampa LOWW flying to flytampa corfu i could manage to land with 450 - 500 MB VAS left. 

 

Yesterday i did a flight from flytampa LOWW to flytampa dubai also 400 MB VAS left.  Before i had "usually" a CTD 100 meters before the runway at OMDB.

 

Very strange i cannot belive that windows was the problem for the oom`s, but i thought i tell it to you guys. 

 

 

brgds

Now running AM 1365 on my six core and all cores seem to be active and getting better fps, smoother runs and faster texture loading. 

I also have no longer problems with texture loading.

 

I fly the route from europe over irak to dubai verx often and i never have seen any citie night lightning on the ground at night outside europe. Now i see it.

 

But as i said i didn't change any settings.

Just to add ... I think someone asked about disabling cores via EFI/BIOS ... not sure about other CPUs but for my 5960X and 3960X I can disable any number of cores ... I can basically achieve the same as using AM via EFI/BIOS.  AM would be the easier option and not restrict other apps.

 

As far as what cores to disable for maximum OC, guess we'd have to know their physical layout and select the cores furthest apart from each other: 

 

 

The cores will produce the most heat so assume use the 4 corners, but how is each ID tag associated left to right then top to bottom ... or top to bottom then left to right?  Where is 0 and where is 7?

 

But I'd be surprised if one could get more than about 5.0-5.2 GHz ... but should be a lot more L3 cache (shared) hits with just 4 cores running.

 

Cheers, Rob.

Rob I think I read where you have HT off. With it off do you notice better fps or do  you notice smoother graphics?

 

I did a test with the Duke at O'Hare, clear day set at one of the gates. I got 24 fps so then I went into the bios and turned off HT and then loaded the saved scenario and got 24 fps. But I then taxied all around O'Hare and looking out the side window observed smoother graphics with much less stuttering. 

 

It seems I get no fps advantage but maybe smoother graphics but more testing is needed.

Been following this thread with great interest. I have a 4790k running at 4.5 GHz, liquid cooled. My biggest issue in P3D v3.0 has been OOM's. If I use an AffinityMask setting of 85, will I still get the VAS headroom benefit, or is that only theoretically with HT off. My system runs great, but the OOM's are irritating as heck!

Here's a background to HT enabled I posted earlier on AVSIM

 

No AM or AM=0:

4 core = 1111

4 core HT on = 11,11,11,11 (showing HT pairs between commas)

 

 

HT Enabled; AM 170 or AM 85:

4 core HT on = 10,10,10,10

4 core HT on = 01,01,01,01

 

With 170 or 85 we present the sim with the same processor layout as HT off no AM. The only difference is that with HT enabled there is the slight performance benefit during process switching. Anyone reporting worse performance in this scenario has something wrong.

 

If the exe addons do not start on core zero (rightmost 01) then allow to start the main sim thread on core zero (shown with an AM=85 on LP0, or AM=170 on LP1).

 

If exe addons start before the sim on core zero, and there's no way around that, then we might think about moving the first sim LP to core 1, or in other words LP2 or LP3. We could do that with 116=(01,11,01,00) or 184=(10,11,10,00), which still presents 4 LPs (logical processors), but only groups threads 1 and 2 (from 0 to 3) together on a core, which run on core 2 (of 0 to 3) on LP4 and LP 5. This setup allows the sim to maximise throughput of core 2.

 

dll addons start up within the affinity of the sim.

Thank you Steve. I'll give an AM setting of 85 a whirl then.

 

...so the short answer is that sticking to an AM that allows 4LPs will save unnecessary VAS use, and allow P3D or FSX to run most efficiently.

 

Thank you Steve. I'll give an AM setting of 85 a whirl then.

You're welcome!

I am most likely going back to switching HT  on in bios because with it off some programs are acting a bit strange. I get ctd's in a couple games that I never had before and P3D is not loading some programs that it loaded before.