I got that tip last night and tried it and I am now very happy with FSX!It has completely done away with the micro stutters and has eliminated almost all (read 99.999%) of the pauses! This is the single most dramatic tweak I have done! I know it has probably been posted before, but I never paid much attention to it! I am getting increased FPS also, from:KPDX approach; Flt 1 C-152 : Before = 10-14 with microstutters and pauses to 17 - 26 without stutters and pauses!System: ASUS A8N SLI Deluxe, AMD 64 4000+ (no oc'g), Geforce 7600 GT 356 meg,2 gig Crucial ram.LCD Monitor 1024 x 768 resolutionSettings: Dense scenery, normal autogen, 2/8 stratus clouds, 12% road traffic, no airport vehicles (that's a killer), no ships, or boats, 12% Commercial AI, 23% GA, 2x low water. Prior to this tweak KPDX and vicinity were virtually unflyable for me!Someone more techy than I should post the "how to" as a sticky as I am sure it will help most low end and mid end systems!

"Setting FSX Priority to HIGH"Hi Dave,How did you do that? The only way I know is through Windows Task Manger (CTRL-ALT-DEL), but that is only for the current session, and has to be done every time after FSX has started.Jozef K. http://homepages.onsnet.nu/~jkusters/signature.jpg

I wanna have a go at this too but need to know how. Go on Dave share please

this is old newsdidnt work for me.blah.

Yep. Tried this early on. I kill almost all my background tasks anyway, so FS gets most of the CPU attention so that is why I see no benefit.Bob

Here is copy of thread from SOH where it was suggested: I am having a problem trying to get this to stick so I don't have to do the cntrl-alt-del properties thing each time I start up FSX. But the results are fantastic for my system. I use FSAutostart and have cut all programs running in the background, but I think this must prioritize over some services - which I confess I do not know enough about to shut down arbitrarily on my own. This way, windows xp does it for me so I don't screw things up. More knowledgeable people certainly could know those unneeded services and do this, but I'm not one of them. Yes, it is old news, as I remember something about this a long time ago, but I never did it until last night and this morning. As they say, your mileage may vary. At least it does not involve stripping anything out of FSX or dumbing it down. Worth a try. All this is is setting the system priority to high. Ted;If you want FSX in that mode all the time when you start it...right click on your desktop shortcut. Select "Properties" and in the "Target" box replacethe C/Program files/Micr........./fsx.exe with the following;%comspec% /C "start /HIGH fsx.exe" EXACTLY as it is shown.Afterwards every time you launch from the shortcut it will automaticalyEdit: this works to make it permanent:Here's my best advice:Copy%comspec% /C "start /HIGH fsx.exe"EXACTLY AS SHOWN into the TARGET textbox of your FSX shortcut.Then, copy the complete path of the folder in which fsx.exe resides in the START IN textbox.So, in your case:TARGET: %comspec% /C "start /HIGH fsx.exe"START IN: E:FSX(this is my path to FSX yours will be different probably)HTH,Chrisstart with the "High" priority assigned.__________________RegardsDennyProfessional Tourist

I tried this-it screwed up tracker ir and I would suspect any outside program running with fsx...I would use if you only run fs exclusively....it did seem to add about 3 fsp on my rig.http://mywebpages.comcast.net/geofa/pages/rxp-pilot.jpg

Well, Geofa is right! If you are running Track IR you may not want to do this. It may interfer with other outside running programs, like maybe ASV? I have Track IR and the first time I tried this everything was okay with Track IR, But the last time I had problems, would not pan correctly really lagged. I don't know why it should work sometimes and not others. The performance is wonderful but I'm not sure I can Live without TIR - I don't think so! Darn, I thought I had it made! Well, it's easy enough to change back so no harm done. For those not running outside programs interfacing with FSX, it should be no problem.

Another option: If you are using Ken Salter's FS AutoStart, on the configuration screen it has a simple drop down menu where you can set FSX priority.Just save your settings, then FSX will always run in the specified priority when launched through FS Autostart.-Rick----------- My System -----------P4 @ 2.53 GHz / 1GB RAM / NVIDIA GeForce 6800XT, 256MB / Windows XP Home

I've tried this and it doesn't make much difference to framerates, maybe 1 or 2 at best. But it has the unfortunate side effect of making all keyboard and mouse actions very very sluggish.

Guys,try this instead...http://support.microsoft.com/kb/331796/

A side effect of this surely is that if you increase FSX's priority then you must reduce the relative priority of an other applications that are running. This wil be dependent on the particular combination of hardware and software so the results will vary - some may see a benefit: others may not.

>Guys,>>try this instead...>>http://support.microsoft.com/kb/331796/EXELLENT ADVICE THERE.Agree that the clean boot procedure is far more desireable than modifying the priority of one process. Why kludge the priority of MSFS over all the other annoying or troublesome background tasks when it's far more elegant and sensible to cull those tasks out to begin with, and any seperate yet co-dependant tasks (like your Track IR) still get what they need. Win-win scenario - ideally you end up at about the same place or better. The group I sim with has been doing this for a short while now with real, measurable gains for most people.

>>Guys,>>>>try this instead...>>>>http://support.microsoft.com/kb/331796/>>EXELLENT ADVICE THERE.>>Agree that the clean boot procedure is far more desireable>than modifying the priority of one process. Why kludge the>priority of MSFS over all the other annoying or troublesome>background tasks when it's far more elegant and sensible to>cull those tasks out to begin with, and any seperate yet>co-dependant tasks (like your Track IR) still get what they>need. Win-win scenario - ideally you end up at about the same>place or better. The group I sim with has been doing this for>a short while now with real, measurable gains for most people.>I dunno, before changing the priority I could take off from JFK and see 1 (One) building in New York City.After the change I see ALL the buildings AND the statue of liberty?I decided to fly over Boston again to see what I could see. I was amazed to see all the main buildings, Fenway Park, and a reasonable layout of Deer Island. I worked at Deer Island on construction for about 3 years, could even see the eggs/tanks (they called em eggs). This is the first time ever that I could see all kinds of buildings etc., around JFK.I saw, for the first time, ships in Boston harbor. I could see trailer Trucks from 4000 feet on the highways, closer to Boston or New York the move cars & trucks were to be seen.I didn't disable any other crap, virus etc.I'm not from Massouri, but seeing is believing.Got 10-12 FPS on my old machine w/744

>I dunno, before changing the priority I could take off from>JFK and see 1 (One) building in New York City.>After the change I see ALL the buildings AND the statue of>liberty?>I decided to fly over Boston again to see what I could see. I>was amazed to see all the main buildings, Fenway Park, and a>reasonable layout of Deer Island. I worked at Deer Island on>construction for about 3 years, could even see the eggs/tanks>(they called em eggs). This is the first time ever that I>could see all kinds of buildings etc., around JFK.>I saw, for the first time, ships in Boston harbor. I could see>trailer Trucks from 4000 feet on the highways, closer to>Boston or New York the move cars & trucks were to be seen.>I didn't disable any other crap, virus etc.>I'm not from Massouri, but seeing is believing.>>Got 10-12 FPS on my old machine w/744>That's good news. For giggles you still might want to try the "Clean Boot" method to see how it stacks up, tho.