Sorry Guy's I must of came across a little crankie:-wink2 Sorry Rob it was not you. I just must of miss understood what you were saying. About keeping your FSX looking the fullest no matter what and improving the FPS.The only thing I can add is your sytem is great but even with that system you will have to cut down on the Eye candie. FSX is just not going to run in its full glory for another year or 2. Good luck with your system you should be able to good something good going.

Thomas, I can see we are worlds apart on our views of FSX - probably best to leave it at that.Regardless, I've been pretty clear about my goals -- getting FSX to look as good as FS9 at the same frame rate. As you can see from my posts and screenshots, it would appear to me that I'm going to have to further reduce graphics detail (beyond what I already have) to get FSX to run at the same FS9 frame rates -- keeping in mind that FS9 is fully maxed on all details settings with hi-res scenery add-ons, airports, and Traffic 2005.I agree, I do have a frustration that A LOT of very inaccurate information is being tossed around and some of it from the Aces dev team. Have you seen any profiling data from the Aces dev team? Has anyone outside of the dev team? Was FSX even profiled? When releasing any software, it's pretty important to understand the boundaries even if you create software that can't be fully utilized until 3+ years from now.Sure I can turn off lens flare and shadows, but ask yourself, is this progress?On a technology side, the shader should be able to it all in two pass max, ATI claim their new DX10 card can do it all single pass. But again, if the code ain't there to utilize it, doesn't really matter does it?Rob.

No problem, sorry that my message came across that way and didn't mean to cause any issues.My goal is to get FSX to look as good as FS9 at the same frame rates. So far I'm not having much luck. But you're correct FSX does have the potential to be better than FS9 -- maybe in a year or two or three it will.But deep down, I still can't help but think there is something fundamentally wrong with the Aces dev team code -- FSX shouldn't be this slow.Rob.

I understand what you're saying Thomas. Not really a matter of happiness -- the programmer in me knows there is something not right in FSX. I can appreciate the Aces dev team aimed high, but what we currently have in FSX appears to me to be rushed out the door in time for Xmas. Several magazines (PC Gamer) are NOT giving FSX stella reviews (not even editors choice) and the reviewer's comments reflect what most know -- "it was released a year too soon".If Microsoft really do want to move into the world of multi-million dollar flight simulations then they REALLY need to brush up on their CPU specific threaded coding and use of GPU technology currently available.Rob.

>My goal is to get FSX to look as good as FS9 at the same frame>rates. That's easy: Lower your LOD radius to "Small". Lower the Mesh resolution to 76m. Lower the Texture resolution to 5m. Lower your Water effects to 1.x. Lower your scenery complexity to sparse. Turn off Aircraft self-shadowing. Turn off Ground scenery shadows. Turn off Road vehicles. Turn off Ships and Ferries. Turn off leisure boats. Turn off Aiport vehicles.That will put you much closer to FS9 as far as performance is concerned. Not to mention look & feel.You seem to think that maximum sliders in FSX are synonymous with max sliders in FS9...but it has been said many times tat this is not the case. In many cases, the "Sparse" setting in FSX give more detail than the "Extremely Dense" setting in FS9. Autogen is a perfect example.If you want FS9 performance, then you're going to have to accept FS9 quality as well.Nick

Well, I would posit that, if you really do want to use this software, I think a better approach would be to start with a setup equal to FS9, and to increase it from there. What were your results when you set the system up so it is EQUal to FS9?That would be something like LOD medium or low, Mesh res 76 m (or 38 m with freely available mesh), texture res at 5 m, water at 1.x medium, scenery complexity normal, Autogen density sparse or normal, lens flare and shadows on (do you have those settings on in FS9? I've never used shadows, too much of a performance hit), traffic at 20%, no cars or boats and airport vehicles off. That should be better than a maxed out FS9 setup.Now increase that a little bit to something better. What is your performance at LOD high, Mesh res 19 m, texture res 2 m, water at 1.x high, scenery complexity high, Autogen normal, lens flare and shadows on, traffic at 20%, cars and boats at 10%, airport vehicles high? Since you are a big rig driver, maybe cars and boats still off. This is way better than FS9. Do you disagree?ACES has clearly stated that there will be a patch minimally with some fixes to errors that people catalog at [email protected] (spouting here won't necessarily get anything done by them), and DX10 compatibility. Telling ACES that "something isn't right" doesn't help them figure out what to fix. They will ignore anyone telling them that the software has awful performance with sliders all the way to the right. They know that. Adam has told me that he and others attempted to implement better threading, but it didn't meet their expectations at decision point, so they rolled back to something stable. But one of his top goals at this point is getting better threading into the patch.And yes, they do have an understanding of the boundaries.There are sound marketing reasons for releasing the product now instead of a year from now. If you don't like it, go back to FS9. That's not a cut, it's just a statement. If you do want to use it, and it will take work to get what you want, I'd suggest more realistic expectations. Let's work together to provide good quantification of our goals and produce results that will help ACES and the community use FSX.What you've done is a good first step. But you've only quantified what is very well known by everyone. I'd love to hear your results, however, if you followed the testing plan I outlined above. I can't do it for your needs, I don't have access to hardware as fast as yours. For instance, I've never been able to run with any traffic on. Smooth flying was more important to me. But I will quantify using the same procedure on my own hardware.Thomas[a href=http://www.flyingscool.com] http://www.flyingscool.com/images/Signature.jpg [/a]I like using VC's :-)N15802 KASH '73 Piper Cherokee Challenger 180

Did you see this before?http://forums.simflight.com/viewtopic.php?t=57384It is from ACES ... give it a read

Is there anything in particular that you would like me to glean from this letter? I've had many discussions with several of the ACES team members and am working pretty much full time on understanding FSX and how it runs and what hardware is available and what it can do. I didn't really find anything new in his letter, but it is a good synopsis of the information it contains.Or did you mean to show this to Rob?Thanks for the link, though, I have never conversed with Phil before, nor was I aware of his joining the ACES team, so it's always good to get another contact.Thomas[a href=http://www.flyingscool.com] http://www.flyingscool.com/images/Signature.jpg [/a]I like using VC's :-)N15802 KASH '73 Piper Cherokee Challenger 180

The bottom line is the game (and I specifically call it a game now) is not usable on todays hardware, is not likely to be much better on tomorrows hardware, and will not likely be saved by some patch that is the magic bullet.I run a AMD FX60 / 2G ram / ATI 1900XT / RAID0 system. I can not fly an ILS approach at all due to the sim rate which to me makes FSX rather pointless and converts it from Simulator to Game catagory.It will take a quadrupling of hardware to bring this into usable land ... Based on tech speed changes over the last 5 years, that means we are talking 2009 at a minimum before out hardware catches up with the software. That is 1 year AFTER FS 11 is released so ...Lame Duck. Hopefully the 3rd party devs can weather the storm and hold out until 2008's release because they are not going to be doing much business this time around.

Tomas,I thought it (ACES info) explained the "why" behind and backing up what you mentioned.It gave some technical reasons why FX needs to be "sliders left" for awhile. Possible tweeks, hardware upgrades, and a patch in the near future.

Yes, I've read that link before and discussed with Phil. It is a pretty disappointing read with little hope for FSX performance improvements.Unfortunately I'm well beyond some of their suggests which are pretty basic -- getting better memory performance takes A LOT more than adjusting latency, and getting stable memory performance is even more of a challenge.Comparing game consoles to a PC is not relevant as consoles run at 1280 x 768 -- even the most basic PC's covered that resolution challenge a long time ago. I know it's new for the XBOX360 crowd, but for us PC folks, consoles are very limited.Anyway, key point in that link... "Once you are on the glide path it is a very risky decision to change the architecture underneath the product. For better or worse, we decided to not do that and ship the product."This is really where the problem lies.What I'm demonstrating is that FSX looks pretty aweful when trying to obtain the same frame rates as FS9. So their decision is clearly a bad one that they don't plan to address with a re-write, so they hope DX10 and as yet undetermine future hardware to help -- yeah, Ok that sounds great!??With detail adjustments, FSX should be able to at least look as good as a 3 year old product FS9 at the same frame rates -- it doesn't, not even close. It's a standard Microsoft approach, release it now, maybe fix it later (they do that with most of their products). I don't like that approach, it's not good for the customer and it doesn't provide "fun" either. It is narrow minded and infinitely limiting approach to software development, but that is the Microsoft way and that way has stalled the companies growth -- but this is an entirely different topic now.I'll get some screen shots up of FSX running at the same frame rates as FS9 -- but I did warn you, it does look aweful!Seeing as the Aces Team do visit this place, I'll continue posting my results in the hope they might listen. If they don't maybe others can use my information to help them make the decision to buy or not buy FSX or use a wait and see approach.Rob.

>Is there anything in particular that you would like me to>glean from this letter? >>I've had many discussions with several of the ACES team>members and am working pretty much full time on understanding>FSX and how it runs and what hardware is available and what it>can do. I didn't really find anything new in his letter, but>it is a good synopsis of the information it contains.>>>Thomas>Well if you're in contact with the ACES team but didnt know they had a new team leader, its a pretty one way relationship.I'm afraid you and your ilk are part of the problem, you will defend this shoddy piece of blattant moneymaking disregard for the customer until you die. You and your attitude is why we are stuck with such a badly programmed game.Its time to move over and let people who know what they are talking about have a say, you never know you might learn something, but what ever you do please stop grovelling to your self proclaimed chums at th 'ACES Team' they have just done what they were told to a time scale its the management decisions on the way that have resulted in this debacle, hence the new team leader.

Why are you here?I happen to like what I do and I do get a sense of gratification out of using MSFS and I see it as a useful tool, as do my customers. I'm sorry you don't.You and your ilk? What, do you think I was implying I was somebody special or something? I'm me, they are Microsoft. I have my work to do, they have theirs. All I meant was to thank the person for his effort to point out something I had not read, and to ask him why he wanted me to read it. Name a better program I should be using and I'll check it out.I would say that Phil joined the team in the last month or so. I've been pretty busy attending to my own personal business during that time, and haven't been paying much attention to the goings on in Seattle.Do you think Microsoft should just develop a program and give it to us free? The whole point of the business is to make money. I'm sorry you have a problem with that.Personally, the reason I chimed into this thread, was that Rob's got a nice setup, seems to be knowledgeable about using the software, and I'm very interested in seeing his results with other sets of settings. And I hope in the process, he might find a setup that meets his needs.Thanks for your wonderful attitude and your ability to make friends, influence people, and solve problems. I'm sure it will take you far.Thomas[a href=http://www.flyingscool.com] http://www.flyingscool.com/images/Signature.jpg [/a]I like using VC's :-)N15802 KASH '73 Piper Cherokee Challenger 180

look, lets get real, ACES took 3 years to produce this ia there a dx9 magic patch - NO, Is there a DX10 magic patch - NORob You ARE RUNNING FSX NOW on hardware that 99% of people will be lucky to have in three years time (if the chip speed ever gets that high)It appears there have been some disasterous decisions made to meet the market date.I hope i'm wrong but there does not appear to be much hope, The bloom effect - I love this, it looks great but can never be used as it uses CPU if it was programmed correctly, on your system, it would have no effect on framerate, its as if it was chucked in purely to create nice screen shots. The same goes for the level 2 high water, this should have virtually no effect on FPS but it must use CPU so it kills framerate, what a complete joke.

Go at it. I'll be the first in line when you finish coding your product.Thomas[a href=http://www.flyingscool.com] http://www.flyingscool.com/images/Signature.jpg [/a]I like using VC's :-)N15802 KASH '73 Piper Cherokee Challenger 180