Greetings all,

Like many I am super pumped for the Aug release of MS Flight Sim 2020. 

I am running an older i7 2600k (quad core @ 3.4ghz), 8gb ram, gtx 1060 ti with 1 x ssd for OS and 4 x ssd in raid stripe for game data.  I am wondering if doubling the ram to 16gb and adding another 1060 gtx ti in sli will improve overall system performance?  What do folks think?  

I really dont want to buy a new sys right now as Intel PCIe v4 is set to be released in the near future.   While I understand AMD may have pci4, I however am an Intel die hard.

Looking for some thoughts and opinions on above as I would love to experience this sim in all of it's glory.

Thanks to all  

I think it's time for you to buy a new pc. If you look at the recommended specs, you are falling behind.  

HI Fogboundturtle

Overall I do agree it most likely time for an upgrade, but as stated not with current gen HW as I dont think its all that much faster than what I have.

Also, I have reason to believe that this simulator will mostly utilize gpu, ram, IO throughput and internet download speeds.  All of which I (or will) have.  Im just wondering what my expected improvements will be.    I betcha the CPU wont be doing too much.    So even with a more modern system I dont think its going to provide that many more frames per second.  Certainly not worth $2000 worth of difference.

Thanks for the feedback anyway.

I think both your CPU/GPU will be a bottleneck for you. I wish you the best of luck

Hi gunif,

despite what others say, actually you have a decent system that falls basically in the recommended requirements for MSFS (except for RAM amount): your 2600k is about equivalent to a Ryzen 1500X, and your 1060 gtx is about equivalent to a 970 gtx / rx 590.

As you said, your optimal upgrade right now would be going to 16GB RAM.

On the other hand, adding another 1060 gtx would probably be a stupid thing to do, I think SLI is hardly optimal in terms of price/effectiveness, and I don't know if MSFS will support it.

Your best course of action would be to wait for release, then read performance reports, what the bottleneck is at different settings/resolutions, etc. Then you could decide if it's worth to upgrade your GPU (selling the old one) and of course increasing RAM to 16GB.

 

SLI is pretty much dead nowadays, very few games support it without issues if at all, so it is unlikely the new simulator will. For now, I would stay with what you have, test the simulator and then try to decide what would be best to upgrade to. Your GPU meets the recommended requirements, your CPU and RAM do not but slightly exceed the minimum. You are right that the simulator will be more GPU-bound though.

Also I would really recommend not completely writing off AMD. Zen 3 is coming out within the next few months, while Rocket Lake is Q1 2021 at the earliest, if you're looking to upgrade as soon as possible. Both are coming with some nice performance boosts over their predecessors, but with Intel you'll also have to put up with much higher power consumption and heat output. What we know for sure if that they are porting a newer architecture (probably Sunny Cove) to their 14nm node, but whether it can be ported without cutting any corners remains to be seen.

Thanks for the feedback Chaotic and Murmur.   You guys have great points.   Basically buy the premium and see how it runs.  In the end too hard to predict performance .

Although I did have an athlon  years ago I find intel is just a more stable and predictable outcome despite its increase in power and heat over amd.   I've had my rig for years and I'm  amazed that it can still run newer games like Jedi fallen order at a decent frame rate.

Kind Regards 

@gunif I have a similar rig to you, I went to 16 GB ram when P3Dv4 came out and by the sounds of it MFS is going to need it! SLI is a waste of time, as others have said not much supports it now and it was never that great when it was supported.

See how you get on with your 1060, if it's not up to scratch grab a 1080 second hand if you want to try and eek another year out your system, or just put up with it and keep the money for your new system.

Edited July 15, 20205 yr by ckyliu

11 hours ago, gunif said:

Although I did have an athlon  years ago I find intel is just a more stable and predictable outcome despite its increase in power and heat over amd.   I've had my rig for years and I'm  amazed that it can still run newer games like Jedi fallen order at a decent frame rate.

The stability comes mostly from the very small amount of changes in architecture between each Intel generation, and the acceptable performance is due to game developers being severely limited by current consoles' CPUs (though if you had a Core i5 you'd be struggling with today's games, the 8 threads help a lot). Zen and Zen 2 had a few issues at first, but right now the latter is a very stable platform (especially with motherboard manufacturers doing a better job at rolling out BIOS updates recently), and with all the Skylake vulnerabilities that keep getting discovered, Intel's platforms haven't been too predictable as well. All brands (CPUs, GPUs, motherboards and so on) have had their fair share of successes and failures over time, sometimes unpredictably, so it is always best to do some research and then select the product that works best for you, no matter the brand. We don't know if Zen 3 or Rocket Lake will win the end (depending on type of usage of course), but what's for sure is that the former will be out sooner.

17 hours ago, gunif said:

I betcha the CPU wont be doing too much.

It does and to future proof yourself, especially considering that the addon market for the sim may become quite prominent, you'd want to invest in a fairly powerful CPU. 

Source: Self (Alpha tester)

I super appreciate all of the feedback and clarification concerning SLI.   I think I will put some money into RAM given that this system is <grunt/shrug> eight years old?!?   haha

Excellent points on stability of intel vs amd cpu/gpu vs nvidia.   They all have had issues and that certainly needs to be acknowledged.   I find this debate similar to Toyota vs Honda. 

I will still put my money with intel/nvidia with pci e v4 with ddr 5.   I tend to try and buy top stuff so that my ROI is fantastic.  Looks like the goodies slated for next year are going to provide some astounding performance boosts over current gen.  PCIe v4 + DDR5 + nvidia 3000 series 🙂

Thanks again everyone.

 

 

The 1060 doesn't support SLI, as in it doesn't have the SLI port. SLI has been dead for 10 years? At least that was the last time I used it and it only helped with a few games (Crysis NOT being one of them) 😏

I upgraded from a 1060 to a 1070ti about 6 months ago. We will see how it runs FS2020.. 

Edited July 15, 20205 yr by reignman40

That 2600 has served you well but it is probably time for an upgrade. Modern CPU’s will run circles around it especially in newer titles. You should be able to pick some more ram fairly cheap especially on the used market but the best advice anyone here could give is to put money beyond the ram upgrade towards a new system all around. 

Went from SLI 980s to a single 2080 last year but I'm eyeing up the 3xxx series for...reasons. Was so glad to throw SLI in the trash. Always just stick with a single powerful card. As @reignman40 said, 1060 doesn't even support SLI in the first place.

29 minutes ago, reignman40 said:

Crysis NOT being one of them

Coincidentally, Crysis suffered from the same limitation FSX did. Both were designed around fast single core systems that never materialized. This is one of the big fixes/changes in the upcoming Crysis Remastered.

As for SLI/Crossfire, they were never great solutions in the first place. Well, other than they were good for selling more cards for Nvidia and AMD.