DX10 cloud performance

[Hageneezz 3]

Good evening all,

 

I recently made the jump from DX9 to DX10, i am planning to buy Steve`s DX10 fixer but for now i am using his freeware version which i downloaded from the AVSIM file library.

 

I am very happy with the overall smoothness of the sim, much smoother than it is with DX9.

 

The only thing i do`nt like so far is performance with overcast skies. I always fly from the VC and i use Opus FSX as weather engine..

I have tried a number of cloud sets, from REX soft clouds to the freeware Aimee Leclercq Oscar clouds, in even tried his 128x128 sized clouds but performance was still bad. If i go into the weather tab in FSX itself i notice that there are multiple cloud layers, if there only is one layer there is no performance drop, but with multiple layers there is. 

 

Is this a common problem within FSX and DX10 mode? Are there special DX10 optimized clouds that are available i could try?

 

PC Specs:

 

Windows 7 64 bit

Intel Core i5 @ 3,4

8mb Ram

Nvidia 750 GT 2mb ram

 

Thanks in advance!

[Jim Young 2,356]

 

 

Is this a common problem within FSX and DX10 mode? Are there special DX10 optimized clouds that are available i could try?

 

DX10 is a technology developed by Microsoft.  In order to use it, you must have a DX10 compatible GPU and the application you are running must be programmed to use the technology.  There are no special clouds or textures involved.  The Microsoft FSX Aces Team developed FSX and were in a rush to get FSX programmed to use DX10.  They were trying to get it released with Acceleration but Microsoft honchos wanted Acceleration released immediately so they were able to do some programming for DX10 but not completely.  When they released Acceleration, they included called DX10 "DX10 Preview" as the product had not been fully completed.  There were many anomalies but along came SteveP and he fixed the anomalies.  We at AVSIM are happy he is a member here and fixed DX10 (we are also happy he has his official support forum here too).  Now, the simulators like P3D and X-Plane are moving up to DX12.  With DX12, you might see rain drops and snow piling up on the windshields.  Things within the sim will become more realistic.  Look at P3D already with moving clouds and cloud shadows on the ground.  Tiny things like that will make it possible to make your immersion into flight simulation more realistic and more fun.  Here's a video which shows some of the capabilities of DX12 (but remember, the developer has to program the features into the application) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHmjA1sVP9M

 

So there are no special clouds.  DX9 textures from FS9 and before that will not work properly in DX10 mode but there is a program at Flight One that changes the textures on the fly (not permanently but during a flight session).  FSX textures were upgraded to the .dds format when it was first released.  I liked DX10 Preview mainly because you had, for the first time, shadows created by the sun in the VC's. The water also moved and you can see white caps and nasty waves if you are flying over water in nasty weather.  If you want special clouds, I recommend checking out REX or AS16 for FSX.  You can get some nice looking skies, water, and clouds and REX will even render your thunder and lightning better than the defaults.

 

I highly recommend you purchase Steve's DX10 Fixer.  It doesn't cost that much and it has a lot of nice eye-candy included. 

 

Hope you continue to enjoy DX10 Preview with FSX. 

[magnetite 38]

Cloud performance relies heavily on your GPU. Yours is kind of on the low side. 

[yidahoo 365]

 

 

P3D and X-Plane are moving up to DX12

 

Just a slight correction there, X-Plane does not use DX it uses OpenGL as this is compatible with Windows, Linux and MacOS whilst DX is Windows only

[Jim Young 2,356]

Thanks Jason.

[Hageneezz 3]

Thanks all for answering  :smile:

Guess i`ll buy the fixer, and (not this year anyway) a new GPU..

[Slayer 190]

The fixer has an option to turn off AA for clouds. Much better FPS with that setting IMO.

[Hageneezz 3]

The fixer has an option to turn off AA for clouds. Much better FPS with that setting IMO.

 

I am now using the latest DX10 Fixer version. I have turned off AA for clouds but still am getting not so good performance. 

Under DX9 performance is better, but i would rather not switch back, as DX10 is so much prettier..

Are there other options to get performance up?

 

Thanks

[ieydis 51]

When you say your performance is "not so good", what does this really mean and in what context?  Understand that there are numerous factors that affect FSX performance such as:

 

What are your FSX cfg settings?

What are your nVidia inspector settings?

How many cloud layers are displayed simultaneously?

Is the performance bad only when cloudy?

 

As someone mentioned above, your system is on the mid-low end so you already start with a major handicap.  I have a higher-end system but clouds still cause major performance degradation.  Not much can be done with the limits of the FSX engine (10 year old program).

 

Ilya 

[Hageneezz 3]

When you say your performance is "not so good", what does this really mean and in what context?  Understand that there are numerous factors that affect FSX performance such as:

 

What are your FSX cfg settings?

What are your nVidia inspector settings?

How many cloud layers are displayed simultaneously?

Is the performance bad only when cloudy?

 

As someone mentioned above, your system is on the mid-low end so you already start with a major handicap.  I have a higher-end system but clouds still cause major performance degradation.  Not much can be done with the limits of the FSX engine (10 year old program).

 

Ilya 

Good evening Ilya,

with not so good performance i mean fps jumping up and down from 20 to 31 (locked at 31)

I use DX10 and know performance cloud-wise is worse than DX9. but i`d rather not switch back..

 

I am using the REX Soft Clouds, but am looking for other clouds that may give better performance

 

Do you know if performance is better on FSX-SE? (i`m still playing the boxed version)

[ieydis 51]

My friend, 20-31 is not bad if considering a cloudy situation.  Again, so much depends on what else is running (type of scenery for instance, i.e. Orbx) and your config settings.  Have you read the DX10 Fixer guide?  This helped me quite a bit with the setup.

 

http://www.nzfsim.org/index.php?dsp=dload&fname=DX10_HowTo.pdf

 

Ilya