I am wishfully hoping the system my son is passing on to me will be able to run P3Dv4.5 and PMDG 737NGu without being a slideshow.  Anyone with first hand knowledge, your input will be greatly appreciated.

Note:  I have been doing a lot of reading and don't know 100% for certain, so I am inquiring herein.

I have P3Dv3 & v4.3 on my old desktop that has a corrupt C drive.  My flightsim installs are on a separate 1tb hard drive with 4 partitioned drives assigned.  I don't know how much in the my documents p3d subfolders of the c drive will be salvageable, so I anticipate complete reinstalls of all (a multitude!) of my collected addons (a/c & scenery).

Here are the specs for the desktop my son is giving me a soon as his new gaming system arrives:

Intel i5-4690k 3.5gHz OC to 4.4gHz
18 gb (2x8) DDR3 @ 2400mHz
Gigabyte r9 290 factory oc to 1040mHz w/ 4gb vram (AMD Radion R9 290)
1 tb HDD
256gb SSD

My old system is just a little weaker than this one and has a GTX 760 ti 4gb vram video card that ran PMDG 737 & 777 series very well with active sky and Pro-ATCx or PF3 running together.  

Will I be able to continue using the older versions of the PMDG 737 series a/c, I don't see where they are available to reinstall/reactivate?  If not, will this newer pc handle the 737NGu a/c?  I believe the weak area is only having 4gb vram on the graphics card.

Is this just wishful thinking on my part or is there a chance I can return to flying the virtual  skies with a beloved PMDG 737?

Thanks & kindest regards,

Glenn (beechcaptain)

I think it'll work...not sure what your previous "just a little weaker" system was.  Sounds like you'll have to run it with approximately the same limitations as the old system, given that both video cards have 4GB of VRAM.

I wouldn't get rid of that 760Ti until you have a chance to try the sim with the R9 290 and make sure there are no issues with P3D--AA in particular.

I looked on my PMDG account and the older PMDG NGX is still listed for download on my "account" page.  You'll want to re-download the latest version from your account there, as well as the latest version of P3D, which is v4.5 HF3.  I've never heard anything to suggest that people can't activate the original version of the P3D NGX.

 

I used to run P3Dv4 with an i5 4690k @ 4.3Ghz/16GB DDR3-1600 RAM/2 GB GeForce GTX 770 powered system. It did a pretty good job of it at reasonably high detail settings, although the weather was always set to clear and calm. I used the original PMDG 737NGX with this setup, and it worked very well with decent framerates @ 1024 texture resolution on a 1920x1080 monitor.

Edited July 23, 20223 yr by Christopher Low

2 hours ago, Bob Scott said:

I wouldn't get rid of that 760Ti until you have a chance to try the sim with the R9 290 and make sure there are no issues with P3D--AA in particular.

I looked on my PMDG account and the older PMDG NGX is still listed for download on my "account" page.  You'll want to re-download the latest version from your account there, as well as the latest version of P3D, which is v4.5 HF3.  I've never heard anything to suggest that people can't activate the original version of the P3D NGX.

 

Yep, I was planning on keeping the 760Ti, just in case. Oops, I just took a closer look and it is a 750Ti.  Little less horsepower but still decent.

Sure enough, my account also has the d/l link for the older PMDG NGX base and 736&7 versions.  Thanks for that tip, Bob.

 

1 hour ago, Christopher Low said:

I used to run P3Dv4 with an i5 4690k @ 4.3Ghz/16GB DDR3-1600 RAM/2 GB GeForce GTX 770 powered system. It did a pretty good job of it at reasonably high detail settings, although the weather was always set to clear and calm. I used the original PMDG 737NGX with this setup, and it worked very well with decent framerates @ 1024 texture resolution on a 1920x1080 monitor.

Christopher, your old system specs are almost identical to the hand-me-down I'm getting soon.  Makes things look much brighter for my flightsimming future.

My current pc specs:

AMD A10-6700 3.70 GHz
16GB PC3-16000 DDR3 memory
GeForce GTX 750 Ti 4GB GDDR5 
2 x 1tb HDD
500 watt power supply

My soon to be received hand-me-down:

Intel i5-4690k 3.5gHz OC to 4.4gHz
16 gb (2x8) DDR3 @ 2400mHz
Gigabyte r9 290 factory oc to 1040mHz w/ 4gb vram (AMD Radeon R9 290)
1 tb HDD
256gb SSD
750 watt power supply

They appear to be very similar with a slight advantage going to the i5 being oc to 4.4gHz.  It also has a better power supply & is in a larger tower with better ventilation 4 fans where my old one is a smaller tower with one original and one added cooling fans.  

The painful part will be installing all of the addons (lots of airports, scenery & mesh plus Active Sky, Pro-ATC/X & PF3).  I think I will install the following and test first:  P3Dv4.5, PMDG 737NGX, Mesh, FlyTampa KBOS, FSUIPC, Active Sky & Pro-ATC/X and see what happens.  Hopefully the fps will stay at or above 24.  If so, I'll be happy.

One last question (for now at least), is it advisable to install P3Dv4.5 & PMDG NGX a/c on the SSD and scenery/airports on HDD?

 I will try the i5 system as-is, then if not satisfied with the graphics, replace the R9 290 with the GTX 750Ti.  

I very much appreciate your input!

Kindest regards,

Glenn (beechcaptain)

 

2 hours ago, beechcaptain said:

 I will try the i5 system as-is, then if not satisfied with the graphics, replace the R9 290 with the GTX 750Ti.  

I very much appreciate your input!

Kindest regards,

Glenn (beechcaptain)

I think you’re going to be in for a  very pleasant surprise.

The R9 290 is a much more capable card than the 750ti.

Good luck.

23 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

I think you’re going to be in for a  very pleasant surprise.

@beechcaptain

I agree ....... 1024 textures is the trick, no HDR terrain but mid slider on most others using AS weather is my setup for pmdg's except a 1TB sata SSD (would be a plus for you)

8 minutes ago, vadriver said:

@beechcaptain

I agree ....... 1024 textures is the trick, no HDR terrain but mid slider on most others using AS weather is my setup for pmdg's except a 1TB sata SSD (would be a plus for you)

1TB sata SSD is a great idea, thanks! 

What motherboard?

I'm currently running P3Dv3.4.22.19868 with a slew of add-ons. Runs just fine. See sig for my full PC specs.

Edited August 16, 20223 yr by udidwht

The processor is a little older but I think you're probably going to be video card limited. If you can find a newer gen video card - the prices have come down a lot - you might get better results. 1080Ti, 2060 or 2070, you'll get some results for sure.

Should do fine with v4 and light use of addons, 1024 textures, etc.