These settings force FS X to use a specific number of cores. You've got AffinityMask set to '3', which means FS X will use both cores of you Dual core system, which is what you see indeed. Setting it to '2' is a bit daft because this means you've disabled core 1... why should you? The same goes for setting '1' on a dual core system: why disable one of the cores?Aces only gaves us this option because some mutlicore cpu's aren't recognized for some sort of reason. So if you see a core isn't being used at all you can force FS X to use it with this setting. This setting is not meant to disable cores, which is meaningless and not too wise.

>These settings force FS X to use a specific number of cores.>You've got AffinityMask set to '3', which means FS X will use>both cores of you Dual core system, which is what you see>indeed. Setting it to '2' is a bit daft because this means>you've disabled core 1... why should you? The same goes for>setting '1' on a dual core system: why disable one of the>cores?>>Aces only gaves us this option because some mutlicore cpu's>aren't recognized for some sort of reason. So if you see a>core isn't being used at all you can force FS X to use it with>this setting. This setting is not meant to disable cores,>which is meaningless and not too wise.I'm not saying it's a good thing to do, and I agree it's probably not too wise to change this, but it's not meaningless. Meaningless would mean that setting it does nothing, good or bad. While in fact it does, it forces FSX to schedule the threads only on core 2, which of course would have a negative impact on performance in a dual or quad core system.

>I wouldn't say setting AffinityMask to 2 is meaningless, it>just means FSX will use core 2, Setting 1 will use core 1>only.OK Tom, or are you President "the meaning of 'IS'" Clinton? ;)It is "sensless," "pointless," "fruitless" then, which in the final anaysis makes it pretty much "meaningless" :-wave Aside from the mult-core usage though, the AffinityMask=1 setting is very useful for single core machines with hyper-threading.For whatever reason, the detection algorithim ACES coded doesn't always recognize single core, HT enabled processors, and will cheerfully try to spawn seperate threads on the virtual cpu1, which extensive beta testing demonstrated doesn't work well at all...

After reading Phils Blog at:- http://blogs.msdn.com/ptaylor/default.aspxI got most of the benefits of SP1 on my rig by removing every single trace of my previous FSX installation and verified that, by using 'jv16 PowerTools' which can be found here http://www.macecraft.com/home/ Then defragged the separate HDD that FSX was to be re-installed on (it likes its own HDD). Fired up my rig, disconnected it from the Internet, shut down my Anti-virus, Windows Defender and my UPS monitoring application and proceeded with the fresh install. After re-installing FSX, I then defragged it before installing SP1.FSX and my system 'Page/Swap Files are now installed in separate partitions on a different HDD from the main Win XP Pro O/S HDD, which has no 'Page/Swap Files' on it at all. WINDOWS seems to be much more crisp and nippy when the 'Page/Swap Files' are on a separate HDD, for further mind expanding Win XP stuff that got my rig in to 'Tip-Top' form for FSX, I downloaded the PDF from this brilliant young man at:- http://www.tweakguides.com/To conclude, may I say; Very well done to Phil Taylor and his brilliant team at ACES, this patch is not the be-all and end-all, but it certainly has made my FSX fly like a bird!!! Well done guys.

>Stuart,>I share your pain but I really don't think it's a problem with>FSX or SP1. It could be your OS configurations, your computer>system, or perhaps your video card settings coupled with your>FSX.cfg settings causing your problem. I have some blurries>myself but I know it is caused by the fact I must keep the>level of detail radius setting at "Medium" in my FSX.cfg.>Setting it higher will surely cause an out of memory (OOM)>crash (I only have 4 gigs of RAM; maybe I need more?). The>little time I had with the level of detail radius setting at>"High" gave me a chance to see excellent textures (crisp and>clear) and little or no blurries in my very high-end system>(the Dell XPS710H2C which was recently certified by Microsoft>for FSX). I don't think there's a magic bullet that will>totally eliminate blurries (blurries also exist in many other>computer games). Maybe when the video card makers get their>acts together this will change as I think the technology is>clearly here. Unfortunately your system, by your own>admission, is not the latest tech and you will not be able to>get the maximum benefits of FSX until you upgrade. However, I>have read many other threads on AVSIM and other FS sites of>flight simmers having very nice graphics and system>performance with systems lower than yours. Since you stated>FSX performed better prior to installing SP1, you might>consider uninstalling the patch but I think the overall>benefits of keeping SP1 outweighs this decision. I have two>8800 GTX video cards in SLI configuration and use the video>card and FSX.cfg settings recommended by NVIDIA techs and>receive good graphics 98% of the time>(http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_fsx_techtips.html). They>even have recommended settings for your 7600! I also have no>suggested "tweaks" installed that I have seen in Aces blogs or>on AVSIM as I worry they could only make matters worse. I>would just like to get rid of the OOM crashes so I can enjoy>FSX even more. Hope you can find a fix for your problems soon>and apologize in advance for any remarks I made which may have>offended you. I'm just offering my comments and suggestions>in hopes you can once again be a satisfied flight simmer.>>Best regards,>Jim Setting the 'level of detail radius' to maximum (full right) will not cause an out of memory. I've run it full right with SP1 and before SP1 and never had an out of memory. It is likely some other peculiarity in the settings/video card/memory/ which is causing this for yourself.

For a single core with HTFor FS9?For FSX?Is it best to set the CMOS bios = no HT to force one processor?I am not sure if it accomplishes the same thing here ... as in I am not a programmer...Or should HT = on in the bios and we do Affinity mask = ?for FS9 and FSX?