As promised, I put together some screen shots of FSX from SFO/Bay Area (California US). I've included screen shots of both nVidia Control Panel 3D graphics settings and ALL the graphics setting in FSX.The flight screen shots are taken from various locations around SFO using both Fraps and the Shift-Z option to display frame rates. FRAPS displays a big yellow number -- this is the fps. I ran both so as to validate what FSX reports with what FRAPS reports. FRAPS is an intelligent program and will run exclusively on the 2nd CPU core as does very little to impact frame rates.You can find the screenshots/info at my web site:http://www.nocomsleft.com/Simulations.aspxAgain, my hardware:Intel X6800 @ 3.9Ghz (1500 FSB)nVidia 8800GTX 768MB video card (just one using 97.02 drivers)Asus P5W DH motherboardtwo 10K Raptor drives2GB Patriot PC8000 memoryDell 24" LCDMy system 3DMark05 score is 19253.I would like to see others post their results using the EXACT same settings as outline at my web site.Min 11 fps is not acceptable for me, I could live with min 20 fps but I've yet to discover how much I must turn down to reach that mark and still stay at 1920 x 1200.FSX for DX10 is not the solution, as I know DX10 will only open more doors of detail that will tax the video card even more (it's not the magical glove many of you seem to think it will be).Rob.

looks good- and nice setup -but why Autogen off ?I am running Autogen @ DENSE and still fine for min fps of 18 ish and average about 30.Mark.

Thanks very much for this info, very interesting, i'm sorry i'm too lazy to post my findings in such a well organised manner, but here goes anyway..I note you have no bloom and no autogen, these are big framerate killers, but i find autogen a must have so i have drastically reduced the numbers in fsx.cfg.I have a 4800x2 and 1900xt my 3dm05 score is about 10k and i would judge my frames to be about 20% less than yours which i would put down to cpu mostly.Your investigation just confirms that fsx is very crudely written and takes no advantage of modern graphics cards.The only thing is that i thought that the bad performance was due to ATI/FSX drivers but your results indicate it runs deeper than that. Looking at your system specs and framerates, its difficult to see a way forward, your pc is obviously performing very well as indicated by your 3dm05 score presumably you will score about 10k in 3dm06 which is at a very high level of performance.good luck, however i think you've just confirmed my decision not to bother upgrading.thanks again

>looks good- and nice setup -but why Autogen off ?>>I am running Autogen @ DENSE and still fine for min fps of 18>ish and average about 30.>>Mark.System specs? 3dm score, a statement like this is totally meaning less without data. When you say min 18 fps do you mean on the ground at the airport stand as in the min frame rate shot in the op.I can easily take a screenshot in london with very dense scenery and a framerate of 30, but it means nothing because a slight change of the view to a wider angle and i get single figures.The original post is the most reasoned set of data i've seen and hence the most believable. If someone can produce the same shots/settings and get 18 where he's getting 10 i would be amazed.BUT if someone does, fair enough, it just proves that fsx has a serious conflict on a significant number of systems.

>As promised, I put together some screen shots of FSX from>SFO/Bay Area (California US). I've included screen shots of>both nVidia Control Panel 3D graphics settings and ALL the>graphics setting in FSX.>>The flight screen shots are taken from various locations>around SFO using both Fraps and the Shift-Z option to display>frame rates. FRAPS displays a big yellow number -- this is>the fps. I ran both so as to validate what FSX reports with>what FRAPS reports. FRAPS is an intelligent program and will>run exclusively on the 2nd CPU core as does very little to>impact frame rates.>>You can find the screenshots/info at my web site:>http://www.nocomsleft.com/Simulations.aspx>>Again, my hardware:>Intel X6800 @ 3.9Ghz (1500 FSB)>nVidia 8800GTX 768MB video card (just one using 97.02>drivers)>Asus P5W DH motherboard>two 10K Raptor drives>2GB Patriot PC8000 memory>Dell 24" LCD>>My system 3DMark05 score is 19253.>>I would like to see others post their results using the EXACT>same settings as outline at my web site.>>Min 11 fps is not acceptable for me, I could live with min 20>fps but I've yet to discover how much I must turn down to>reach that mark and still stay at 1920 x 1200.>>FSX for DX10 is not the solution, as I know DX10 will only>open more doors of detail that will tax the video card even>more (it's not the magical glove many of you seem to think it>will be).>>Rob.>You know Rob, that's scary. This hardware you have will be high-end even in 6 months - year from now.I've got similar system to yours (running x2 4800, same graphics card and 1x Raptor, Dell 24" as well), and my frame rates are similar (10-15% less than yours).More, I can run it at work at dual dual core Opteron workstation with incredible optimized memory/gfx/IO and 4 gigs ram, and it still runs like a dog - 12-15 fps over the cities.I can say that without major overhaul (ie, really carefully written optimization patch, not DX10 whatever), there will be no hardware which is capable to run FSX at acceptable frame rate (ie. 30 FPS, not some 12..) in reasonable future.And no - Vista will not make FSX run 100% faster. Not even 10%.

If I turn AutoGen ON, my fps will take a major hit -- as in single digit around 6 fps. IMHO, AutoGen just doesn't look realistic, trees on top of textured trees, buildings just stick out, no blending at all with scenery textures.Rob.

Tried to provide as much information as possible, not the end all be all, but is a starting point for anyone that wants to compare or just can't believe a high end system is still slow with FSX.Like I said, I would love to see other folks results using the exact same settings and location so I could see what fps they're getting and determine if it's me or FSX.It is good to see a lot more folks running at 1920 x 1200 also, I suspected as much since monitors capable of doing 1920 x 1200 have been drastically reduced in price over the past year or so.Again, it would be nice to see profiling results from the FSX dev team -- they must have profiling results because they default the graphics setting based on hardware specs of the user's PC -- in order to do so I would assume they've done a lot of profiling work to come up with these defaults -- at least that's my assumption.But as you can see I hit a low of 10 fps and this isn't even 1/2 of Microsoft's new "target" frame rate of 20 fps.As you can see, I already have some big fps killers already turned OFF or down. Now, I will start turning more and more settings down to see what it takes to hit 20 fps in the same scenario.I also need to post screenshots of FS9 over the same scenario.Rob.

Rob,I noticed you selected Anti Alias on the video card and then also selected it in MSFS setup. Is it ok to have both on at the same time?I thought I read to turn it off in MSFS if the video card AA was enabled.Could you set me straight on this.Thanks,

As far as I know (and I do have friends that work in core area's of Intel) there is no CPU coming online that will run at higher clock speeds -- the trend is for more cores on a single chip with slightly lower clocks speeds. Since FSX is very primative about 2nd core usage (let alone 3rd or 4th core) I don't see CPU technology within the next 2 years doing much at all to help FSX.The new DX10 cards have helped a little, but still far from the 20 fps target (Microsoft's new low standard). Maybe we should be looking at technology 5 years down the road?Rob.

I think this comes from the days of FS9.0 -- there WAS (no more) a problem with FS9 AA setting and the Video Driver settings that caused some issues. This was fixed in FS9.1 and also addressed in the video drivers.FSX doesn't have this problem, the best settings I was able to come up with was having the Video Driver "Enhance the application settings" for AA and then turn AA on within FSX. This seems to produce the best image quality and permits the use of AF. This setting basically leaves it to FSX to set the AA sampling and then it will enchance that setting from there.Rob.

Rob,Thanks for the answer on this.I checked my video card driver (ATI Catalyst latest version) a week ago and it has a checkbox to Let AA be controlled by your application.I did not check the box and assumed it should therefore be now turned off in MSFSX if I wanted the ATI card to do it all.This video card (setup) stuff can get a little confusing at times.

Thats pretty disappointing. But, these guys http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html...GVudGh1c2lhc3Q=got good FPS In FSX with the G80. Their settings are quite a bit lower, however. And I think you're right, DX10 won't do anything. Nor will Vista. Thats all Microsoft's hype. Our only hope is that ACES finds some bug that has been magically killing FPS in the game and patches it, but thats pretty doubtful.

Guys it's real simple DX10 software + hardware will increase the pciture quality on Vista with the FSX patch for DX10 in place...But Vista requires more resources and DX10 bandwith will be filled up with better pictures...My guess is we see the same FPS as we do now ;-)The current version is only DX9 so testing with DX10 isn't very usefull untill vista is out with the DX10 upgrade for FSX....Have fun ;-)Andr

Something is wrong some where Rob. Try using some free AI and remove the original AI BGL from FSX put it in safe place.http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/161095.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/161096.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/161098.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/161099.jpgThis is the same airport you used and you computer is far above my computer specs.Amd 3800ATI X1800xl1.5gb ram.

I've added some screenshots of FS9 from my same PC, including the the graphics settings using the same location.http://www.nocomsleft.com/SimulationsFS9.aspxAs you can see, 40 fps in FS9 compared to 11 fps in FSX. And to be honest, I think my FS9 looks better than FSX. FS9 never drops below 40 fps at anytime during flight (got it locked at 40 so I'm sure it would go higher).Make your own conclusions -- I do prefer the water in FSX, but it ain't worth 30 fps.Rob.