UHD Mesh/w2xplane - out of memory during load up

[captain420 3,099]

I currently have 16GB of system RAM and an GTX 680 FTW (4GB) for my GPU. On alpilot's site it states that I need 16GB or more to be able to use the new UHD meshes. But I'm getting out of memory errors and the sim exits. I have the extended dsf option enabled and also have w2xplane regions in my scenery ini file for america, europe, australia, asia, and so forth.

 

I thought it was possible that running UHD mesh with w2xplane addons would result in this error because too much is being loaded into memory. So I went into the scenery ini file to disable all those w2xplane entries, reloaded up the sim, and I am still getting out of memory errors.

 

Has anyone with 16GB of system ram and a similar graphics card like mine been able to get UHD mesh to load up without any errors? I'm wondering if has to do with something else in my setup.

 

I'm thinking about upgrading my memory to 32GB to see if that will fix the issue. But I'm hesitant to spend money on that if it's not going to do me any good. I thought X-Plane uses the memory from the GPU for everything, not the CPU.

[tonywob 4,769]

I have a similar setup and less video RAM (2GB) and have never had an OOM. I can run UHD Mesh and World2Plane with less video RAM than you (In Norway anyway). But I don't use extended DSFs which is almost asking for trouble with these sceneries.

 

If you mainly fly GA and low-level then you don't need the extended option, and won't even notice it's not enabled. If you fly jets and above 18,000ft, UHD and W2XP scenery won't give you a major improvement over the default scenery (All the fine details they give won't be visible but are still loaded into memory). My advice is either switch extended DSFs off, or if you really want them, downgrade your scenery to the standard HD Mesh.

[captain420 3,099]

tonywob, thanks let me try that then. I will turn off the extended dsf feature off and see if I can load up UHD Mesh with w2xplane.

 

Makes sense though. I have just placed my order for more RAM... do you think going from 16GB to 32GB will benefit X-Plane in anyway?

[tonywob 4,769]

Yes definitely. I notice I often approach my limit, so you will see a difference, and RAM is so cheap these days that it can't hurt, your system will be able to keep more scenery in memory so you should be able to push it more

[alpilotx 505]

As Tony told you ... disabling the use of extended DSF is the easiest and quickest way to lower your RAM pressure (of course, at the cost, that you loos details in the distance ... but which is less of an issue if you fly low-and-slow). The other - and long term - solution is to go with 32 GB of RAM. Especially as its quite likely, that with future developments the RAM demand might rise further ....

 

(and thats why I recommend 32 GB of RAM on my UHD page :wink: )