Why do I get so much better FPS in say Hawaii versus New York City?Now before you answer here's the scenario. I take off and in a 10 degree climb, I see nothing but blue sky - no clould. I get 20 fps in my LD767 in NY and 30 FSP in Hawaii. Does the NY smog cause -10 fps? What's the drag in the NY area. FS9 was the same and I have no add-on scenery. Also daytime flying I get better fps ( +10 approx) vs night. Isn't there less to render at a pitch black sky with a few stars vs a blue sky with some clouds.

Because it renders the whole world, FSX is amazing, look at how far we've come since the 1980s, we don't even deserve SP2, 15 fps is the same as 60 fps, yada yada yada. Anyway, the actual reason is that FSX is... FSX. I'm guessing NYC has a lot of buildings, different textures, etc that FSX has to load even if you are't looking at the sky. So it still has to perform background work because eventually you'll look outside again and it has to be ready. Again, I'm guessing. It's a strange game to be sure. I just made a thread about how I get less FPS in the 737's 2D panel then in the VC, try and figure that one out.

I am no expert but I can think of three things here:1. Drawing polygons2. Caching the data required to build the scene 3. Vehicle movementNumber 1 - I should think this is has nothing to do with it. Geometry clipping should save the 3D engine from wanting to draw lots of stuff. Number 2 - Texture loading for a complex area not being looked at I think would have an effect but for me it is more to do with a possible stutter than FPS hit. You can get stuttering at 50FPS because the disk is going bananas. Number 3 - Vehicle movement (at least some) is always being updated even if your not looking, does one area have a lot more vehicles moving around than the other? On my machine I can have no AI planes flying in visible range and suffer a 8FPS perforance hit because of the stuff that is outside visible range.For my money I would think number 3 would be the answer with maybe some number 2s thrown in but that is a guess.Steven.

Traffic is one of the biggest killers of FPS. New York has ground, sea, and air traffic in spades. Think of all of the major airports within spitting distance of one another.Then, there's custom buildings. While Hawaii has some custom elements, New York has much more. Finally, there's autogen. Autogen quantity and autogen variety will slow down any system. Again, New York trumps Hawaii for this.Jeff ShylukAssistant Managing EditorSenior Staff ReviewerAVSIM

Thanks for the reply. I always knew if I was looking at busy scenery, I'll take a FSP hit, but I never knew even if I don't see the cars moving or building (because I am in a 15 deg. climb and ONLY see sky) the computer is still working hard.