It's an eye opener for sure.FSX has alot more eye candy but the smoothness is a painful price to pay for it. I am getting some quite good FPS now after tweaking but it's the stutters I now have to deal with. My question on AI Traffic might yet be the least of my worries. I'll get there, this thing will not beat me!!RobEngland

>Guys, how does Traffic2005 affect your performance vs. the>default AI in FSX?Traffic 2005 and Traffic PlusPaks in FSX in my system are better then default traffic!FSX default traffic is a terrible frame rate killer!4800 X22 GB RAM4 Raid 0 disksGainward Bliss 7800GS+ 512MB AGP

AI Traffic impact is largely a matter the number of polygons.The default aircraft have much better use of LOD to minimize FPS impact than almost any AI aircraft.However, their initial polygon counts are three to four times higher than those of good AI aircraft - throwing away their advantage on a plane by plane basis.But - 20 default aircraft as AI will have less of an impact than 100 of the best AI aircraft - because of fewer total polygons to be drawn and textured.At the same numbers of aircraft - models designed as AI aircraft will beat the default aircraft significantly.The one area where AI aircraft have a disadvantage is if the flightplans use more aircraft than there is parking available - this includes the entire active AI zone - which is up to 108 miles in radius from your aircraft in FS2004. Appears to be the same in FSX.This doesn't really result in an FPS drop, just stutters.To many AI aircraft without parking - even 60 miles away - does hurt your performance. FSX has much better default parking and many, many more default spaces than FS2004. I'm only seeing this as a big impact/issue in FSX in the major cities with multiple airports.

Thanks Reggie you have answered my next question before I posted it!!My next question was going to be AI aircraft v default with respect to FPS. I am not necessarily looking for more traffic in FSX just more accurate (with regards liveries) and hopefully a little boost in performance to boot.RobEngland