Hello there.

 

I am currently running FSX Steam Edition for flying on VATSIM. I use a number of addons like PMDG, Majestic and Aerosoft Aircraft, and many addon sceneries from Aerosoft, FlyTampa, T2G, etc.

 

Here are my current specs:

AMD FX 6300 3.5GHz

Gigabyte Motherboard (AM3+ Socket)

Stock CPU cooling

AMD Radeon R7 240 2GB

8GB DDR3 RAM

Windows 10 x64

 

I have to run FSX on very low settings which makes textures, sceneries and terrain look rather horrible. I can tweak it to the point of maybe getting 20fps in well optimized or less dense scenery, but once you start adding in more dense scenery and air traffic, frame rate can drop as low as 8fps (which I am kind of getting used to flying with...)

 

I would like to upgrade either my GPU or CPU, depending on which is more likely to be the bottleneck, so I can run FSX with textures that are actually readable! I'm on a budget of around £300, and would like to move away from AMD, but replacing the CPU with an Intel would obviously require a new motherboard too, which would mean I'd have to go for a lower-end CPU.

 

If you could point me in the right direction, even suggest a specific processor or card!

Thanks for the advice.

Calum

If you want to go the cheap route, get a better GPU. Such as the GTX 970. Should be a nice upgrade without breaking your wallet.

 

AMD's GPUs don't work well with FSX.

 

Anisotropic filtering should help provide clearer looking textures, if you haven't turned it on already in the options.

Whilst you'll be able to run at higher resolutions and with better anti-aliasing, the GTX 970 won't do much to improve your frame rates - I upgraded to 970 about 6 months ago and saw just a few FPS extra. You may find that your current CPU will bottleneck a modern GPU anyway leaving you with an expensive upgrade which does little or nothing to your system. The only real solution to better performance in FSX is a fast CPU (preferably 4GHz or faster). If you're on a really tight budget, t may be worth looking at the Intel G3258 (http://techreport.com/review/26735/overclocking-intel-pentium-g3258-anniversary-edition-processor) which overclocks very well with a good cooler and gives you a good CPU upgrade path.

It's well proven, FSX much prefers Intel and nVidia, neither of which you currently have.

 

You are also trying to run several addons making things even more demanding.

 

You don't mention what resolution you fly at but it should be 1080p or less I would hope.

 

CPU is very much king so I would recommend a new MB\CPU and a cheaper nVidia card similar to so.....

http://www.newegg.com/global/uk/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117372

http://www.newegg.com/global/uk/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157512

http://www.newegg.com/global/uk/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127784

I upgraded from a GTX750 to a GTX 970 and I seen very little increase in frames as well.  I seen a huge improvement in P3D though.