HDD to SSD - Disappointment

[cianpars 1,164]

The first time I cloned an SSD from a HD, I kept the HD as a backup and a few minutes later found that my PC was still reading from the HD.  Soon fixed that.

Loading times are definitely quicker from the SSD as expected, but overall sim performance was no different.

After a few years of using the SSD, I note that loading time performance is dropping again.

FYI, I have 2 SSDs, one containing FSX and the other containing all of my scenery.

Don't expect any real performance gain from an SSD though, but it does speed up loading which is great for FSX and also for booting Windows.

[Capt Speirs 52]

On 4/22/2017 at 10:58 PM, Dane Watson said:

I thought I would uninstall ver. 5 and load up ver 4.9.7.

Strange thing - ver. 4.9.7 supports my 850 EVO and also allows me to enable Rapid Mode, which I did. Then did my usual FSX load with no difference in load times.

So as Bert said earlier maybe my system is at it's peak. I don't get it because I just purchased this MSI GP62-6QF with NVidia GTX960M in December. Oh well it could be worse, I could be back with my five year old Dell system.

I just was hoping for a faster load so I could utilize some of the ORBX products, but they just bog my loads down too much.

I have FSX on an 840 Pro and I see a vast difference in load times. Here it is with and without "Rapid Mode". Note; Rapid Mode can only be enabled on one drive at a time.

 

Without Rapid Mode

 

 

With Rapid Mode

 

[Dane Watson 38]

2 hours ago, Capt Speirs said:

I have FSX on an 840 Pro and I see a vast difference in load times. Here it is with and without "Rapid Mode". Note; Rapid Mode can only be enabled on one drive at a time.

 

Without Rapid Mode

 

 

With Rapid Mode

 

GOOD NEWS - sort of.

Took my system to my tech guy this morning he checked it all out and really could not find anything wrong. Well I don't give up that easy. I got home and uninstalled Samsung Magician 4.9.7 (because Ver. 5 was not cooperating with my system). updated again to version 5 BUT this time it recognized my SSD and allowed me to turn on Rapid Mode, I then did a performance check and what a difference in results - see below.

However I still have not seen a significant increase in load my FSX-SE Saved Flight that I have been using as the test. I am getting a 15 second improvement - so I am partly happy but my quest continues...

Thanks to all for contributing valuable information that caused me to keep digging - HAPPY FLYING.

[Capt Speirs 52]

2 hours ago, Dane Watson said:

GOOD NEWS - sort of.

Took my system to my tech guy this morning he checked it all out and really could not find anything wrong. Well I don't give up that easy. I got home and uninstalled Samsung Magician 4.9.7 (because Ver. 5 was not cooperating with my system). updated again to version 5 BUT this time it recognized my SSD and allowed me to turn on Rapid Mode, I then did a performance check and what a difference in results - see below.

However I still have not seen a significant increase in load my FSX-SE Saved Flight that I have been using as the test. I am getting a 15 second improvement - so I am partly happy but my quest continues...

Thanks to all for contributing valuable information that caused me to keep digging - HAPPY FLYING.

Your "Rapid Mode" is turned on in your "C" drive, is that where your FSX is also installed. Remember, you can only have one drive with "Rapid Mode" turned on.

[Dave_YVR 968]

2 hours ago, Dane Watson said:

However I still have not seen a significant increase in load my FSX-SE Saved Flight that I have been using as the test. I am getting a 15 second improvement - so I am partly happy but my quest continues...

1

 The load times you are going to see the most gains from are the initial load times when launching the sim, not so much from pressing Fly Now.  

[Dane Watson 38]

2 hours ago, Capt Speirs said:

Your "Rapid Mode" is turned on in your "C" drive, is that where your FSX is also installed. Remember, you can only have one drive with "Rapid Mode" turned on.

Yes, my SSD is my C drive and everything is in it. My HDD is my D drive and it is a completely empty 1TB drive

[Capt Speirs 52]

48 minutes ago, Dane Watson said:

Yes, my SSD is my C drive and everything is in it. My HDD is my D drive and it is a completely empty 1TB drive

the only thing I can think of that maybe slowing things down to where the SSD doesn't matter is other programs related to FSX that is also loading and may be waiting for certain circumstances to transpire prior to loading. EZCA v 2.0 is very slow starting as is in my case. Where I see a massive improvement is when the the initial terrain loads.

[Dane Watson 38]

2 hours ago, Capt Speirs said:

othe only thing I can think of that maybe slowing things down to where the SSD doesn't matter is other programs related to FSX that is also loading and may be waiting for certain circumstances to transpire prior to loading. EZCA v 2.0 is very slow starting as is in my case. Where I see a massive improvement is when the the initial terrain loads.

I don't use EZCA but I do use ChasePlane, I already did that test and ChasePlane has no affect whatsoever in my load time.

What I did notice is when I un-check Addon Scenery in my FSX Scenery Library I pickup 45 seconds on the load.

I have the same issue with "Loading Terrain Data... it hangs at the 6% mark for 1 minute 10 seconds, I have read that this is a problem for many others as well.

I have turned off ORBX Pacific Northwest (PNW) because that adds an extra 1 minute 30 seconds to the load

[Jim Young 2,356]

6 hours ago, Dane Watson said:

I have turned off ORBX Pacific Northwest (PNW) because that adds an extra 1 minute 30 seconds to the load

I found similar results after uninstalling Orbx KSAN/SoCal/NoCal in P3D.  As I documented several years ago when MegaSceneryX was released, I tried to load 40 US photoscenery States.  My aircraft was black at the setup page and it took over 20 minutes to load and, when it finally loaded, I had less than 10fps.  So, any photoscenery (and I think Orbx scenery has a lot of photoscenery in it), it will slow down the loading times and your fps/vas will suffer too. 

7 hours ago, Dane Watson said:

have the same issue with "Loading Terrain Data... it hangs at the 6% mark for 1 minute 10 seconds, I have read that this is a problem for many others as well.

In the AVSIM CTD Guide, page 17, I provide instructions on how to set up Process Monitor so that it only shows what is loading in FSX/P3D.  You can use the Process Monitor to see exactly what is loading at startup to the setup screen and then during the loading process.  Of course, I think you have a pretty good idea already but it is always interesting to see.  I remember doing a flight between Chicago and St Louis once and saw all kinds of things in California and the Pacific Northwest being loaded.  Why?  Turned out it was Autogen and stuff Orbx placed in Scenery/World/Scenery.  Since then Orbx has done a pretty good job removing stuff from the Scenery/World/Scenery as everything in this folder is loaded whether you are using it in your flight plan or not.

Best regards,

Jim

[Gregg_Seipp 565]

38 minutes ago, Jim Young said:

I remember doing a flight between Chicago and St Louis once and saw all kinds of things in California and the Pacific Northwest being loaded.  Why?  Turned out it was Autogen and stuff Orbx placed in Scenery/World/Scenery.  Since then Orbx has done a pretty good job removing stuff from the Scenery/World/Scenery as everything in this folder is loaded whether you are using it in your flight plan or not.

Holy cow.  I didn't know about that.  Glad they fixed it.  I, too, have disabled most of my regions.  On my system it typically costs about 5 fps to run them which takes away smoothness.  Instead of fighting with it, I just turned it off and went flying.

[Capt Speirs 52]

11 hours ago, Dane Watson said:

I don't use EZCA but I do use ChasePlane, I already did that test and ChasePlane has no affect whatsoever in my load time.

What I did notice is when I un-check Addon Scenery in my FSX Scenery Library I pickup 45 seconds on the load.

I have the same issue with "Loading Terrain Data... it hangs at the 6% mark for 1 minute 10 seconds, I have read that this is a problem for many others as well.

I have turned off ORBX Pacific Northwest (PNW) because that adds an extra 1 minute 30 seconds to the load

Something is really not right here unless you have a tremendous amount of scenery to load.

 

My load times from start to splash screen is 33 seconds.

Load time for Terrain Data is 27 seconds. when it hit the 6% second mark it hesitated for less than a second.

I have no Photoreal scenery or ORBX. 

[Dane Watson 38]

4 hours ago, Jim Young said:

I found similar results after uninstalling Orbx KSAN/SoCal/NoCal in P3D.  As I documented several years ago when MegaSceneryX was released, I tried to load 40 US photoscenery States.  My aircraft was black at the setup page and it took over 20 minutes to load and, when it finally loaded, I had less than 10fps.  So, any photoscenery (and I think Orbx scenery has a lot of photoscenery in it), it will slow down the loading times and your fps/vas will suffer too. 

In the AVSIM CTD Guide, page 17, I provide instructions on how to set up Process Monitor so that it only shows what is loading in FSX/P3D.  You can use the Process Monitor to see exactly what is loading at startup to the setup screen and then during the loading process.  Of course, I think you have a pretty good idea already but it is always interesting to see.  I remember doing a flight between Chicago and St Louis once and saw all kinds of things in California and the Pacific Northwest being loaded.  Why?  Turned out it was Autogen and stuff Orbx placed in Scenery/World/Scenery.  Since then Orbx has done a pretty good job removing stuff from the Scenery/World/Scenery as everything in this folder is loaded whether you are using it in your flight plan or not.

Best regards,

Jim

Thanks Jim, I have appreciated all your input and comments - we all need to keep learning.

I am not aware of the AVSIM CTD Guide that you mention, I need to try to find that and read it over. I would like to figure out and apply that Process Monitor to speak of.

I found some very interesting things last night with load times and how it relates to the scenery in your Scenery Library. My next investigation will involve Scenery as well as Traffic Settings in the FSX Customize window.

My home base airport is in the Vancouver, BC area in the Pacific North West - CZBB Boundary Bay. I use several of Don Grovestine's sceneries for this area - they have been really professionlly produced and do not affect load times or FPS - his sceneries are on the AVSIM Library.

I had installed a scenery file called Seaplane Bases from AVSIM Library - I have now turned it off as it caused a 1 minute delay in loading.

I also like to fly in the Caribbean and surprisingly my payware scenery of Jamaica from Latin VFR does not cause any issue in loading or FPS. But the fabulous St. Maarten, St. Barths, Saba all payware from Fly Tampa  cause a 1 minute 10 second delay in loading - I don't want to turn it off as I use it and it is a really excellent scenery file. I have contacted them to see if anyting can be done to improve loading times. Once loaded there is no issue with FPS.

What would be nice for other simmers would be if there was a compilation of scenery listings that related to how they affect load times and/or FPS

As simmers we all want to have that particular airport or scenery but most times do not consider the affect on our system. Developers should be more conscious of these affects from their products - especially ORBX, I am really shocked at the huge impact it has on performance.

[Dane Watson 38]

6 minutes ago, Capt Speirs said:

Something is really not right here unless you have a tremendous amount of scenery to load.

 

My load times from start to splash screen is 33 seconds.

Load time for Terrain Data is 27 seconds. when it hit the 6% second mark it hesitated for less than a second.

I have no Photoreal scenery or ORBX. 

I agree with your findings - when I turn off ORBX and the other Photoreal scenry files the load does not even stop at the 6% Loading Terrain portion and my saved flight loads in 35 seconds.

[Capt Speirs 52]

Just now, Dane Watson said:

I agree with your findings - when I turn off ORBX and the other Photoreal scenry files the load does not even stop at the 6% Loading Terrain portion and my saved flight loads in 35 seconds.

And there you have it. That is precisely why I don't use ORBX and Photoreal. Being a "Tube" flyer, scenery is only important to me at the airports. Waiting for an "Install and Play" 64 bit Flight sim for "Low and Slow" flying.

[Dane Watson 38]

18 minutes ago, Capt Speirs said:

And there you have it. That is precisely why I don't use ORBX and Photoreal. Being a "Tube" flyer, scenery is only important to me at the airports. Waiting for an "Install and Play" 64 bit Flight sim for "Low and Slow" flying.

TOTALLY AGREE - happy flying