I agree. Big mistake to upgrade now. Especially with a Dell anything. I too am seeing better results even with this old machine. Maybe the OP just needs to tweak things a bit.DougP4 3.2E @ 3.680 (1.385 vCore - 230 FSB)Asus P4C800-E Deluxe (BIOS 1019)2 x 512MB Corsair TWINX CXM3700 (3-4-4-8)1.5 TB of WD HDDHercules 9800 Pro (128MB @ 410/360)A-Open 1648 AAP RipperPlextor 708A WriterEnermax 431W PSUInwin Case

Agreed here, as well. This is why I put off a major upgrade and instead opted to do a minor upgrade to a GeForce 6800GS (AGP) and added a gig more ram for a fraction of the cost. Not quite the time to go to PCI-E just yet.

> I agree. Big mistake to upgrade now. Especially with a>Dell anything. I too am seeing better results even with this>old machine. Maybe the OP just needs to tweak things a bit.>>Doug>That's my point exactly...the OP has autogen turned completely OFF, and is averaging 30 fps in the demo. If I turn autogen OFF, I too can average 30 fps, but I "only" have a 3700+ and 7800GT vid card. The original poster's core 2 duo rig should really be besting mine...you'd think anyway. RhettAMD 3700+ powered by Gerbil wheel + gerbil, eVGA 7800GT 256, ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 gigs Corsair TWINX, blah blah, etc. etc.

>>375W PSU?!!!! Oh, holy ******* christ...>>>>Forget about 800DDR2. As soon as you can afford $150-200,>you>>should go and buy new PSU that has at least has 500W. All>new>>fancy videocards (especially ATI) require AT LEAST 400-450W.>>>>That's why I hate ready-to-use Dell and HP boxes. I'm>>currently building new PC by myself and as a first step, I>>purchased new PSU~780W ($178). Don't try to save on it or>>you'll lost the entire box eventually. >>>>Or get an Antec TruePower 550W for 85 bucks on New EggOr maybe none of them because Dell uses a proprietary case that doesn't fit PSUs

Yes indeed people should stay away from Dell at least for gameing. In addition to the above their BIOS is limited. Allways go with "standard" everything never with something that is "customized" at the factory I.E. Dell. At least they have great monitors! Dan Martin Team Flight Ontario

From an upgrade perpective yes, but do you think Dell would be silly enough "only" to include a 375W PSU if it didn't have enough juice to power a fully optioned Dimension 9200, plus a bit of headroom? Core 2 Duo uses heaps less power than it's power-hungry P4 predecessor and the 7900 video card uses less juice than the 7800GTX. It will all be good for the OP (til upgrade time, but that's a known Dell "feature").Gary

hi jcmissionary you mentioned you upgraded your ram and GPU i want to do exactly that, get another gig and a 6800GPU can you tell me if you saw any increase in performance, i fly the PMDG 737 and wondering if youve seen any improvements in your upgrade? thanks

>From an upgrade perpective yes, but do you think Dell would>be silly enough "only" to include a 375W PSU if it didn't have>enough juice to power a fully optioned Dimension 9200, plus a>bit of headroom? No problems yet, but If there are its getting sent back :-)Nels

Nels,Update your sig - It's an E6700 ! ;)

And I get 25 fps (20 over the dense autogen forests of St Kitts and Nevis) with autogen on very dense with AMD Athlon 3700+ and BFG 7900GTX 512mb running 3840 x 1024 Matrox Triplehead To Go across 3 19 inch monitors. I am running very little traffic however 10% or so and have a few stutters sometimes when the autogen objects load. I love flying the demo slow and low over the treetops, which is why I run high autogen. when I wan't to fly higher I go to FS9 since I have less blurries when flying faster aircraft like airliners. I will have to wait and see what the final product offers. I don't think I will be ditching FS9 anytime soon but running both sims side by side as I have too many addons that I wan't to keep on using and compatibility has been hit and miss,(or wait and pay, see PMDG) at least with the demo.Regards, Carlos

Hi,One big advantage of buying a Dell is that all the XPS machines that I have had (several) have run FS perfectly - no unexplained crashes or CTD's (2002 through FSX). While there are crashes due to certain addons, these have been documented on many other machines as well. I have never had a problem with "goes to the splash screen and then crashes", unless I remove the plane in my default start up flight (a documented crash source).Many times I will ask a forum poster what kind of machine they have when they have unexplained FS crashing, and either they built the machine themselves or they had it built for them locally. I'm not saying that those machines can't be reliable nor that no Dell's crash FS (I have heard of a few), but my personal experience has been very good. It gives me great peace of mind to know that my machine has been tested for stability above pure performance - that is what is most important to me.Hope this helps,--Tom GibsonCal Classic Propliner Page: http://www.calclassic.comFreeflight Design Shop: http://www.freeflightdesign.comDrop by! ___x_x_(")_x_x___

>Nels,>>Update your sig - It's an E6700 ! ;)Thanks! :-)

Hi Tom,Thats basically why I've bought another one. Last DELL served me well for FS2002, I skipped FS2004 (was living abroad) and am now exited about FSX with my new Dimension 9200 Core 2 Duo.

My Dell 9200 came yesterday. C2D e6700, 7900gs, 2megs.After de-crapifying (its a Dell!) it underwent the FSX test. With everything on full, including autogen, traffic, clouds, AI, draw distances etc it managed an steady 25fps with the 25 locked. It occasionally drops down to 15 for a second but it'll do me. I'll probably have to back things up a bit for the full version with add-ons, but its way better than I was used to.I'd have waited for Vista and dx10 happily but my old PC was on its way out. FWIW I was pleasantly surprised by the level of customer service from Dell, and a decent Employee Purchase Program discount was wot swung it.

Amazing!, that's a laptop, right? My AMD 64 x2 4200+, 7800GT, 2GB RAM is having performance issues with FSX Beta.