Like you said it must be system specific. I can run a 530/430 combo with the FLT or JL avionics and I dont thing I see an ounce of loss.

You guys got it all wrong. THE #1 frame rate killer in FS 9 is............ FS 9!delete FS9 from your harddrive and, presto, no more framerate problems!ricardo

Good one ricardo. Along your line of thinking, what's the #1 misery in life? :)Jason

Resolution--check performance at 1280x1024... Then go down to 1024x768, then down to 800x600. Resolution can impact performance quite a bit, depending on hardware.-John

The effects of some setting changes will be highly dependent on what hardware you have. If you have a great CPU and a 3 year old video card, stuff that affects the videocard directly may have a big affect. Likewise, if you have a great video card but an old CPU, then settings that are more CPU intensive may have a bigger affect.Color depth can make a noticable difference. 16-bit is easier on the system then 32-bit and for the most part you may not notice the difference. (Unless you fly an F-14B with the same afterburner effect, which gets badly dithered in 16-bit.)On my system changing Water Effects from low to high can give me a 10 FPS drop with a lot of water on the screen! I may have an Intel 3.4Ghz CPU, but I've got an old (soon to be retired) GeForce FX5200 PCI video card. Oh, and I've got a 3rd party water texture.Onboard sound cards have often been said to be big FPS hitters, but that is likely very hardware dependent.For me, the biggest thing that affects my FPS is the airplane I'm flying, because I usually fly in spot view. Some 2D panels and VCs can really drop my FPS too."Let me help you out. You're cleared to taxi any way you can to any runway you see."

Maximum water effects. With Water set to High, no matter where I am on the planet, if I look anywhere other than nearly straight up or down, my framerates slow to a crawl....setting Water on the middle setting restores my fps...

"For me, the biggest thing that affects my FPS is the airplane I'm flying, because I usually fly in spot view. Some 2D panels and VCs can really drop my FPS too."Good point... There's some excellent low poly aircraft released for AI but visually pleasing which yield great results in spot view for me. As far as 2-d panels are concerned, sometimes if I need high fidelity for a landing, I will hide the 2-d panel and that will almost always optimize fps.-John

2 wordssim flyers

SHIFT - Z - ZJimCYWG

CorrectionSim KillersMarkFX-55ATI X850XTABIT Fatal1tyCorsair XMS Pro 2GWD Raptor RAID-0Koolance

CLOUDS, CLOUDS AND MORE CLOUDS, which bites as I only fly in real weather. After nearly giving up on FS because of this very fact, I now enjoy it very much thanks to a new rig, Active Sky 6 and Chris's great texture enhancments.Regards, MichaelKDFWhttp://www.calvirair.com/mcpics/mcdcvabanner.jpgCalVirAir International

I thnk you have the answer Michael! "thanks to a new rig" :-hahThe comps/cards available now can make your FS experience truly heavenly!I am totally happy with my rig and still have the option to upgrade to a 256mb 7800 GTX if I feel I need more frames. :)

regardsEd

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v640/edetroit100/holy.gifAMD Athlon 64 3500+, 1024Mb PC3200 DDR, 300Gb HD 128Mb DDR Nvidia 6600GT PCI Express, Audigy 2 ZSCH Products Yoke, Pedals and Throttle Quadrant

LOL, well to be honest Ed, I got AS6 before building this rig and did notice a big improvement. The new rig was actually to take advantage of BF2 and my 3DSMax, POSER, and Bryce work, but found the added benefit of great FS performance as well!Running an ATI 256mb 850XTPE and you are right, it is a whole new experience from my old 9800 pro.Regards, MichaelKDFWhttp://www.calvirair.com/mcpics/mcdcvabanner.jpgCalVirAir International

The issues with clouds being a real FPS-killer is, I believe, largley a hardware problem; I was, up until this past weekend using a Geforce 6600GT and couldn't have heavy clouds without watching FPS drop almost by half! i too use FE (DXT, small textures)- stormy weather was awful..!!I changed video card to a Sapphire Radeon X800GT (256mb DDR3) and now with the same settings, those clouds don't have ANY impact on my system...!!A year or so ago, this forum had a couple of threads comparing different cards for FS9 and it was shown that ATI cards do not use AA on cloud textures (something to do with not using AA on Alpha Chanels), whereas Nvideia Geforce cards do...With my old Geforce card, I could only use 4x AA/4x Anisotrpic filtering; with the Radeon, I'm using 6x AA, and 8x Aniso (with ATI HQ filtering). Resolution has been, and still is, 1280x960.I use PAI traffic set at 75%. Admittedly, busy airports will drag the FPS down, and to mind, traffic IS the biggest FPS killer. I've tried a few of the alternatives but regardless, still find traffic to do the most damage; it's not just the graphical issue with traffic - the CPU has a lot more work to do when it's dealing with all the movements of those extra aircraft!Anyway, for those having trouble with 3d clouds, a change of video hardware may well solve your problems...it did for me :)

Depends on Your computer. I get anywhere from 15 to 40 fps running 2560 by 1024 dual monitor in span mode. Clouds are the biggest killer on my setup, then detailed scenery, then detailed aircraft in VC. Ive noticed the frame rate lock helps a lot especially with complex aircraft. Usually I lock at 20 but use unlimited for my photoscenery areas.