The clean install vs upgrade can ony work for so long. Anyone here that has ever allowed a registry cleaner to look at the Windows Registry and see how much junk is left over from uninstalled programs could vouch for this. Software dev's truly are incapable of leaving zero trace of uninstalled software, either intentionally, or maybe ulterior motives. That's my pretty solid experience. Pages and pages of orphaned reg entries, files and folders. Just a single obscure registry entry can potentially cause your PC to behave "badly".

 

To state again, it's not just P3D that has been updated. A huge Windows 10 update recently and then the previous upgrade from 7 to 10. If you have just been updating and upgrading all this time, you are fortunate if you have zero issues. Or you are maybe not phased with the odd PC crash or lock up.

 

Of course I am not suggesting everyone must format and reinstall the PC every time LM release a new update but after a while, when you start running into unexplained issues, this is going to be your best bet to not tearing your hair out. Don't fix what ain't broke for sure... but it sounds to me that it is broke for some folk here! You can spend frustrated weeks trying to fix it, or a couple days getting a pristine system rocking and rolling. :-)

Funny to read this after I just spent about 3 hours uninstalling P3D including all add-ons and other stuff related to P3D and then manually got rid of all traces both in the file system as well as in the registry where this second step probably took 85% of the time...

I really don't understand why P3D can't uninstall completely and why you have to delete stuff manually to make a clean reinstall?

That is unfortunately true for most software and not only P3D.

I really don't understand why P3D can't uninstall completely and why you have to delete stuff manually to make a clean reinstall?

 

P3D will not remove content is does NOT install ... i.e. 3rd party software that will create addition files/folders under P3D.  I'm assuming you uninstall 3rd party content first before uninstall P3D?  If 3rd party are leaving traces of their products under P3D folders then you'll need to contact the 3rd party vendor regarding their issue.

 

Cheers, Rob.

P3D will not remove content is does NOT install ... i.e. 3rd party software that will create addition files/folders under P3D.  I'm assuming you uninstall 3rd party content first before uninstall P3D?  If 3rd party are leaving traces on their products under P3D folders then you'll need to contact the 3rd party vendor regarding their issue.

 

Cheers, Rob.

 

I know - That goes without saying.

 

I was thinking of P3D only, and the need to delete certain folders after uninstalling it from the Windows Programs and Features app within the Control Panel. 

 

There might be a good reason for it - I'm no software engineer, but it's a minor annoyance.

......

 

Don't sit there... and tell me it's my settings either...        I run 1024 texture resolution, cloud textures at 1024,  Visibility is set to 90 miles max in ASN, There were 15 AI planes in the area at the time, I texture optimized the Aerosoft Nassau airport down to 1024 textures (which shaved off 850 megs in file size), I reduced the textures on my PMDG plane to 2k,  Autogen set to LOW for Trees and Buildings, LOD 4.5, Scenery Complexity Dense.  I turned off Dense Trees and 3D Grass in the Nassu Scenery manager...    I had 850megs of VAS on approach then WHAM it dropped to 228megs and then...  CRUNCH....

 

Come on....  really....  I can't take anything else OUT.   This was a short bloody hop from KFLL to MYNN... 40 minutes TOPS in the air... and below is the end results....  -_-   v3.4.9.. I officially hate you... and I can't go back to a previous version...  this is precisely the reason I gave up on this stuff a year ago...   I shouldn't have to do this much babying to get a simple 40 minute flight in... I shouldn't, period... end of story.   I am tired of the excuses and that it's MY fault because my SETTINGS are too high.  No they are not...   they are too low if you ask me!    What else can i possibly do to enjoy a flight that won't end in a nagging DING in my air or this mess below?   

 

 

Was this particular flight OK in P3D v3.3.5, Brian?

Was this particular flight OK in P3D v3.3.5, Brian?

 

I wasn't around for 3.3.5 unfortunately.  I stopped flying.. 10 months ago?  So I was.. 3.2 I believe.   I never had problems like this in 3.2 personally.   The performance of 3.4.9 is better, don't get me wrong.  I am able to run smoother and more consistently at 30 FPS with a lot of AI traffic on.   Now, let me a little fair to P3D for a moment.   Aerosoft's NASSU is a hog.   I don't understand how a small island airport can be that much of a hog but it is.    Even in the default F22 when I spawn in.. I watch the VAS go from 1.6gigs free to 1 gig free.   600 megs POOOOF for this little airport.    That is why I texture optimized it.  When the optimizer was done it had shaved off nearly 800 megs of Texture fat so I thought I had it licked then when I did my flight in the PMDG.   Nope...   even with shaving the textures down to size and turning settings low... SPLOSION!   It's just....  so irritating....    But... even still.. I could land at Nassu in 3.2 without crashing or even dinging.   I know Lockheed is aware of the VAS problem in this 3.4.9 version but.. I needed to rant a little.. XD      On a happy note.. when I fly with Photoreal scenery on in the states, I can fly 2-3 hours with 6 full states of photoreal scenery loaded, 100 AI aircraft at all times around me and land in most cases with 100-200 megs of VAS remaining.     So.. for now.. I guess I will just fly MegaSceneryEarth 2.0 exclusively.  I don't mind flying a table cloth.   I am not near the ground long enough to care about Autogen trees and buildings.

This VAS issue is the main reason why I am reluctant to upgrade from v3.3.5.

Welcome to the oom's club bro, i posted screenshots as well , gone back to v.3.3.5, now i can enjoy with all my tons off ad-ons, v3.4 no go at this stage

Brian,

 

I was almost moved reading the last two posts of yours. Both because I feel for you but also because I'm in the EXACT same situation myself. What you describe could be my own words down to every little detail with the only exception being the airports in my example would have been FlyTampa Copenhagen and Orbx Stockholm-Arlanda. Two airports I've been flying more times than I can remember without any issues and using the same settings and add-ons I've been using for years without any issues.

 

Sorry if I repeat myself since I no longer even can't remember in what thread and forum I already wrote what regarding my late VAS issues but in short what happened is I upgraded from 3.3 to 3.4 and I did all modules and not only the client.

 

When rather quickly noticing something wasn't right with the VAS I thought maybe a clean and full install still is the way to go. Of course LOTS of extra work since that means reinstalling all my add-ons but I do prefer that over having VAS issues.

 

So I completely wiped my current installation of P3D including all my add-ons and I even manually got rid of all leftovers both in the registry as well as in the file system. I then did the clean and full install and I even left out a couple of add-ons I know has a bad reputation when it comes to VAS such as Orbx FTX Global Vector. Still though the exact same problem...flying from Copenhagen to Stockholm I kept finding myself on the ILS with about 200 MB VAS left where I started in Copenhagen with about 1.2 GB.

 

After this and realizing all my time and effort so far was wasted I decided to restore my complete image backup of my system and what it looked like before upgrading to 3.4 but what do you know...I still found myself having the same problems!? At this point I got really worried because I had literally gone back in time to a state where I didn't have any issues but here I was still having the same problems.

 

I couldn't believe what I was seeing and I still can't understand how this can be possible. The only explanation I can find is I always do my flying in real time at least for the date and what did happen while doing the upgrade to 3.4 and messing around with the issues is it turned from summer to fall. So maybe just maybe those fall textures are much harder on VAS vs summer textures.

 

At this point I was close to giving up but a friend of mine using the same add-ons and pretty much the same settings BUT version 3.2 of P3D had no issues at all and landed with about 700-800 MB VAS left in the same situation where I had 100-200 MB VAS left. He also gave me a link to a blog where someone was talking about the VAS issues in different versions of P3D and how version 3.2 clearly was the best performing one from a VAS perspective.

 

This made me think twice and I thought I would get in touch with LM letting them know about my situation and kindly ask them for the 3.2 installation media since I no longer had it on my disk. I got a quick response where I was told that version wasn't available for download and I should instead search for a solution to my issue in their support forum which was frequently monitored by their technical team...yeah right...

 

I then came to think of one thing. Maybe if I was in real luck the installation media for P3Dv3.2 could still be found in the package cache found under the ProgramData folder in Windows. To my big joy I did find the scenery part but unfortunately not the content, client and main setup parts.

 

This was yesterday and last thing I tried was to do a full and clean reinstall of 3.3 rather than 3.4 or reverting to old backups but when I was about to activate P3D after the installation I was told I had no more activations left.

 

I again contacted LM and kindly asked them to reactivate my license. I also explained my situation and the reason for all deactivations/activations lately desperately trying to address my VAS issues. This was Friday evening CET and it's now Saturday almost lunch CET and still no answer from LM...

 

For the first time in what must be nearly 20 years in this hobby I'm seriously considering to abandon this hobby and find a new one. I already got rid of the yoke, throttle quadrant and pedals and put them into my shed and was pleasantly surprised how much space I suddenly got on my desk :smile:

 

So...maybe it's time to start installing GTA or something where I will be able to enjoy myself rather than spending all my time troubleshooting stupid issues...

Could this be an addon problem?

 

I know the developer of the Norwegian Airports freeware package has compiled his scenery in accordance with the changes made in P3D, so his airports are no longer fully FSX compatible. The benefits in terms of fps has been noticable though. 

 

I'm just thinking that airports that are compiled with "old" FSX code might cause problems, while pure P3D airports might be better and potentially have fewer issues. Maybe we're getting close to the point where backwards compatibility will be broken. 

I was going to do the same 3.2 was way better on vast but ditch not have the relevant hotbox to install active sky hope you can repost this in lm forums .the more complaints the better

I have bluecreen i a flight with 737 or 777 from pmdg. And another time I got a blackscreen and whitescreen. It's not bad overclockinng that cuase the issue. On defualt speed, no differance.