17 hours ago, betelgeuse said:

I ran RealBench for 3 hours = stress test passed. I ran Aida64 Extreme Trial version for 7 hours without any problems. Temps were as steady as a rock, between 74-78C.

I

 

You mentioned FSX a while ago. Have you tried installing FSX and checking to see if you get the same issues. In order to see if it's isolated to just P3D? What about other games, do they run fine, no crashing or stutters? What about P3D add-ons? Is there an add-on that's possibly conflicting? Only way to tell is to uninstall them all, reinstall the sim, and then install one at a time and test.

See post Above Tues 9.06 - I was running FSX at the time. There's a screenie of HWMon readout. I wasn't able to interpret it too well!

If you check my OP - I had to delete P3D because the PC just couldn't run it.  FSX is my main simulator.  I don't run other games on this PC - apart from FSX and its many addons, I use a separate HDD as a Music library backup on a network. 

From time to time, out of the blue, perhaps when I am not doing anything on the PC but it is 'on', there will be a screen dump. It doesn't happen often. Afterwards, the machine does an un-commanded and lengthy checkdisk routine, and never finds anything wrong!

The other thing which I still wonder about is the mobo, and why I cannot get into the BIOS. That is not normal.

 

2 hours ago, martin-w said:

There are countless variables at play, thus potential for conflicts. Different software running in the background for example. Bios versions. Driver versions. Windows updates. As for the sim, we all have different add-on's installed, different sim settings. Monitor resolution's, refresh rates and on and on.

Exactly. And since the sim software is just one small part of the whole thing, I still think it's more likely to be a problem elsewhere in the system than something specific to the sim.

25 minutes ago, vortex681 said:

Exactly. And since the sim software is just one small part of the whole thing, I still think it's more likely to be a problem elsewhere in the system than something specific to the sim.

 

The sim is one small part of the whole thing, but it appears its just that one small part that is demonstrating issues. Don't think he has issues with  anything else, or at least he hasn't said so. Stress tests aren't an issue. 

This is why I have asked him to confirm that all other software runs okay.

As I said... I could well be wrong. 

 

Edited January 24, 20197 yr by martin-w

1 minute ago, martin-w said:

The sim is one small part of the whole thing, but it appears its just that one small part that is demonstrating issues. Don't think he has issues with  anything else, or at least he hasn't said so.

But sims tend to be much more sensitive to system problems. It's like saying that a piece of software which pushes the CPU/system really hard so that it runs out of capacity is down to a problem with the software - in that case it's a system limitation which is causing the problem and the software is just highlighting it.

14 minutes ago, vortex681 said:

But sims tend to be much more sensitive to system problems. 

 

More sensitive than several exhaustive stress tests? 

So far, apart from a random glitch in one stress test, his system is doing fine. If we say that the sim has highlighted an issue that no other software can find, then I think it's more logical to proceed on the basis that its the sim and perhaps other software conflicting. I have asked him if he can install FSX and test that, might be interesting, and would test your "sims are more sensitive" hypothesis. . 

In my opinion, if no other software is demonstrating issues, then what I have always done in the past, is reinstall the software and test each add-on one at a time. Has worked for me in the past. 

But again, we are just speculating, I'd hate to be definitive, so many factors could be responsible. 

Edited January 24, 20197 yr by martin-w

28 minutes ago, martin-w said:

I have asked him if he can install FSX and test that, might be interesting,

I did!  See above posts and screenie Tues 9.06 pm! 

I'm grateful for all the help and advice.  I made a decision. 

I am not happy with this motherboard - I would like to be able to access the BIOS to o/c, and for maintenance, changing boot order etc.

So, I will try to find a secondhand Socket 1155 board and go from there.  I plan to install FSX-SE on a separate HDD (1TB) and see how it goes. If I like it as much as others, then it might become my main sim, but I will always have FSX if I want to visit old haunts. 

 

Edited January 24, 20197 yr by betelgeuse

6 hours ago, betelgeuse said:

See post Above Tues 9.06 - I was running FSX at the time. There's a screenie of HWMon readout. I wasn't able to interpret it too well!

If you check my OP - I had to delete P3D because the PC just couldn't run it.  FSX is my main simulator.  I don't run other games on this PC - apart from FSX and its many addons, I use a separate HDD as a Music library backup on a network. 

From time to time, out of the blue, perhaps when I am not doing anything on the PC but it is 'on', there will be a screen dump. It doesn't happen often. Afterwards, the machine does an un-commanded and lengthy checkdisk routine, and never finds anything wrong!

The other thing which I still wonder about is the mobo, and why I cannot get into the BIOS. That is not normal.

 

 

Oh right, fair enough.

Re BIOS, I linked you to others with the same issue. Seems common with your board. Might be worth opting for a different model to avoid a possible repeat of the same issue. 

What sort of settings in FSX were you using? Any frame rate limiter? I cant give too much advice re the sim as I haven't done any simming for  along time now, not up to speed. 

Edited January 24, 20197 yr by martin-w

I run the limiter at 30fps. Human eye can't see faster than 27fps I am told.  I never max'd out any sliders except the Global Terrain one, can't remember exact title.  Clouds complex but 50 nm max if I remember right. I tried not to overload the system. 

I placed a bid for an ASRock Z77 Extreme4 as suggested by airernie.  Hopefully, with a new cooling fan and maybe a GPU upgrade, I'll get flying with fewer hiccups in FSX-SE.

Edited January 24, 20197 yr by betelgeuse

Quote

I never max'd out any sliders except the Global Terrain one, can't remember exact title.

 

Then it would make sense to not max out the terrain settings, if you haven't tried that already. 🙂 If stutters are reduced or vanish, you have the answer. If not, still useful to know. 

 

According to Professor Thomas Busey, 60 Hz is better than 30 Hz and once you get to 200 frames per second, it's akin to real life. 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 25, 20197 yr by martin-w

Just to complete the circle, I bought a Z77 AsusRock Extreme6 and managed to install the i7-3770K without damaging anything. Next, I replaced the water cooler with a Noctua NH-D15S air cooler, replaced an old case fan, and bought a pair of new memory sticks.

I overclocked the CPU to 4.5GHz and tested. Temperatures stayed around a peak of 70C after 2 hours. In my view this is overkill - the chip never runs at 100% for more than a few seconds.

Next, I reinstalled a suitable Nvidia graphics driver.

Using the latest version of Nvidia Inspector, I used Nick's settings to set up the graphics and to tweak the fsx.cfg settings.

FSX now runs like a dream. Better than it ever did before. 😄

Thanks to martin-w and all who offered advice. 

On 2/16/2019 at 8:53 AM, betelgeuse said:

 Next, I replaced the water cooler with a Noctua NH-D15S air cooler,

 

Welcome to the D15S club! 🙂

Noctua have a new version in development, so looks like they will be shaving even more of the temps.

Meanwhile, seems to me AIO's haven't really improved much lately. Although I did see that there's a new AIO on the way that has pressure sensors. And if it detects a leak it automatically shuts off the pump.