FSX Really Flying Now! - How I Achieved It.

[=Hollywood= 0]

Chas, the statement about the inbuilt sim video is where I start to wonder about the validity of the claims, although they may be true...The video part of FS only records position, altitude, pitch and heading information, it does not create a video file like an AVI or WMV or MOV file...I suspect you have somehow done something in your system that has given your system more room to breathe in running FSX but I don't believe that there is a panacea here...

[Guest Chas]

Thank's Andreas,There is certainly something new here.I did not create this post to tell you that you need to stop anti-virus software and to shut down background services, neither am I stating the obvious. The point is, this program can run extreamly well on what is probably a mid-range machine with performance that the cynics in this forum say is impossible. We want to know where the big injection of viagra came from and how to ensure that we all can enjoy it. It appears after trolling through this forum, there are others who are enjoying significant performance gains after re-installing this simulator, why?You are not having a good experience with flight simulator, I would expect you to be a little negative. It would be more helpful if you could tell me if you saw an introductory video and DirectX install near the end of your installation.Thank's for your input, cheers!Chas.

[Guest Chas]

Hi,I stated that I could maybe use the inbuilt video feature of flight simulator to create a video to show you what can be achieved on a mid-range system. You have not read my post very well. There are no claims to be here, no superstition, no placebo's etc.I am also stating that I never saw an introductory video play during the first two installs of my simulator. You have the "wrong end of the stick" :-)Yours ayeChas

[Guest cwright]

Chas, I used the old UK & Wales VFR scenery for FS9 but I didn't like it, partly because of the low resolution. I'm now using the Horizon Simulations VFR scenery and it is stunning. Even at tree-top level the textures are still reasonably well defined, unlike the FS9 version.Horizon will be releasing a full autogen package in April. They have released an autogen demo that covers a large part of Snowdonia in north Wales. This autogen is stunning. Buildings and trees are placed on their real-world counterparts (when the autogen is released I shall be checking that the large tree in my garden has an autogen tree placed there!)Ironically I think that the higher resolution textures make autogen more important. When flying at a few hundred feet (as I often do) you can clearly see the outlines of buildings. Unfortunately they are completely flat, as if they had been flattened by a huge steamroller. It looks completely unnatural. By placing well-designed autogen buildings over these images it looks natural - and very impressive. Horizon claim their autogen objects are more frame-rate friendly than the default and I believe them. Even with huge numbers of trees stretching into the distance the frame rates are excellent - and it runs very smoothly, too.And speaking of birds, there are many animated objects included, including birds and animals. Several times now, when flying over Snowdonia, I spotted flights of geese in a vee formation. And eagles circling over mountain tops. They are perfectly animated and looked completely realistic - and beautiful. Only yesterday, after landing the Grumman Goose close to Conway Castle, I spotted a group of porpoises swimming in the water. The autogen demo also includes some beautifully modelled buildings such as the castle and some bridges.This combination of high resolution textures and high quality autogen has provided my best flight sim experience - by far. I would suggest to Microsoft a new autogen feature for the next version: the ability to set a maximum autogen altitude. When you exceed the altitude above the terrain, for example 1000 ft, then the autogen should fade out. At higher altitudes the textures provide all the objects with realism and autogen is not required.But when flying at a few hundred feet or on final approach, autogen provides a sense of realism that cannot be provided by flat textures.By the way, Horizon also have a free flyable demo (Snowdonia) but without autogen. It was released a few weeks ago. I think it is far superior to the Just Flight demo.Best regards, Chris

[Magic Man 2]

The inbuilt vide created will look good on any machine since it pre-renders and doesn't have to run real time.As for the other things, you did nothing other than tidy up your system, i.e. installed latest drivers, windows updates etc.Force starting windows services would have done nothing - if those services had stopped it is because they weren't needed. If they were or are needed at any time they start (as long as they are not disabled) - that is how they are meant to work. The installation wouldn't of required any services to be running that weren't already doing so.You tweaked your system - nothing more, no magical secret, just another 'performance discovery' masquerading as a PC tweak.I'm afraid a lot of the issue with PC installations is that many people have come to see a PC as another electrical component and take them for granted, like a DVD player or a games console and forget that because they not running a hardware OS that they can be can be configured in many ways, rightly and wrongly. PCs are so readily available pre-built these days that people think they can take them home and install everything they want without maintenance. Isn't the case I'm afraid.

[tf51d 284]

Repaired FSX installation with downloaded tool from Microsoft, (mentioned in my previous post, reference MICROSOFT KB928080).I think you may be on to something here! Others have stated they are seeing performance gains after applying the Microsoft fix you state above, except that was after a reinstall. How did you manage to do this on your system prior to your installation? Or was this also with a reinstall? I'm now getting good FPS too, I have a E6700 system though with 2GB and ATI X1950 Crossfire cards! How does your system compare with the performance I see. Check out the FSX vs FS2004 thread in the screenshot forum to see what I now see in FSX. As well as someone with a presumably more powerful system (a QX6700). There is quite a difference!

[Guest Chas]

Hi Tom,Thanx, Tom I will do that.There is something going on here, I rekon Microsoft know about it too. Remember, if I can achieve what I have achieved on my modest system, then I believe a Microsoft patch will be forth coming in the future that will un-lock the performance of this simulator without us having to throw expensive up-grades at it, many more people will be able to enjoy it too.I applied the KB928080 patch then re-installed FSX after removing redundant registy values, some of which were almost certainly from the demo which I had installed and removed prior to my purchase of the full version. I was not aware that people were getting asignificant frame rate increase after applying the KB928080 patch, (Microsoft, I hope you are paying attention). There may be issues too related to having installed the demo which may have a negative impact.There are so many variables, it's difficult to know where to start. It's in the hand's of Ace's to sort it out.BRGDSChas

[LAdamson 240]

>The point is: when I set a slider more to the left, I>"cripple" FS somehow. This sums up with every slider that's>not fully set to the right stop. The question now is if I want>to play a crippled game or not. If not, current hardware>cannot provide the amount of power needed to run FSX, let>alone run it with complex add-ons. Period.>All we have is FS9 to compare with. All sliders to the right in FS9 can't compare to the clarity of the high resolution images that are possible in FSX; even when the FSX slider's aren't fully to the right.So in effect, and certainly what I notice, is that FS9 with all it's addons, is essentially crippled by your definition to start with. And it's a problem that will never, never heal.It's also the problem that I now see, everytime I fire up FS9 with all those sliders to the right and all those addons. It just looks inferior to the new FSX, it always will, and there is nothing that can be done about it.L.Adamson

[Guest Chas]

Chris,I had Horizon's VFR package. I took it back to the store. Horizon advertise wondeful night lighting textures included in the box. When I opened it, the cupboard was bare! The night lighting texture folders have a text note inside, that states that due to technical difficulties and problems with the night lighting, they withdrew the textures at the last moment before production run!Slapped wrists for Horizon, a slap on the hand for continuing to advertise the textures, giving the impression that they are included in the box. I may come back, if they can deliver the good's the actually work as stated "on the tin".Chas

[Guest Chas]

I know how the services work, I explained that. You missed the point, I ask if the services required during install can be successfuly called when required by the program. A valid and good point!I never claimed to have found a magic bullet tweak or anything like that. I am telling you that the programme will really rock on a mid-range machine and set out to detail what I was doing before I found the viagra which I probbably should have had in the fist place.BRGDSChas.

[Manny 1,293]

>>....everytime I fire up FS9 with all those sliders to the right and all those addons. It just looks inferior to the new FSX, it always will, and there is nothing that can be done about it..>>L.AdamsonThe only places I fly in FS9 are airports where I have addons. Flytampa, Aerosoft, Flight scenery, and multitude of Freeware sceneries, where each airport is unique that has unique runway textures and taxiway textures from Lukla, Frankfurt, to Portland to San Francisco, to Gatwick to Hongkong.No, they do not look inferior to default FSX. They are far far superior to FSX default airports. I do not know where you are comming from to make such a statement.I am waiting for these addons to work in FSX. Otherwise... Landing at 1 airport in FSX is like landing on any other airport around the world. With the exception of St. Maarteen and Las Vegas. ACES need to fix that runway and taxiway texture problems that these addons vendors are facing. And also the Patch. These two are absolute requirements.FSX would look amazing if and when these addons airports are done in FSX and when they perform reasonably well in terms of performance. FSX has potential.Manny

[LAdamson 240]

>>The only places I fly in FS9 are airports where I have>addons. Flytampa, Aerosoft, Flight scenery, and multitude of>Freeware sceneries, where each airport is unique that has>unique runway textures and taxiway textures from Lukla,>Frankfurt, to Portland to San Francisco, to Gatwick to>Hongkong.>>No, they do not look inferior to default FSX. They are far far>superior to FSX default airports. I do not know where you are>comming from to make such a statement.>And, at this point, yes these FS9 addons WILL look better, at least for the near future! It's the reason that I keep FS9 alive!But that's not my point. FSX uses a much higher resolution structure than FS9. Somewhere along the line, when addons of this type are produced for FSX, FS9 is going to have the look of an antique relic of the past. It already does, compared to a few MegaScenery type addons that are made with FSX's higher resolution textures in mind. There is simply no comparison, graphics wise.L.Adamson

[Manny 1,293]

Hopefully ACES would get that airport texture issue fixed so we can have these addons from vendors like FlyTampa for FSXhttp://www.flytampa.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1919http://www.flytampa.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1764http://www.flytampa.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1971Manny

[LAdamson 240]

>Hopefully ACES would get that airport texture issue fixed so>we can have these addons from vendors like FlyTampa for FSX>Yep,We want a round world, Aces gives us a round world, and then the flat airports don't fit anymore! :D

[Manny 1,293]

FSX airports are all flat.. even if the real world airports are sloped. Manny