Ladies and gentlemen, ;-) I have just purchased myself the FS X flight simulator from MS. I have a 4 years old IBM Thinkpad R 40 Laptop with 768 MB DDRRAM (?), SP II, XP, installation made on an external hard disc connected via 1.0 USB port (yes it works basically and the speed is okay :-o!!!)I made my first flight yesterday (fyi: I am a real pilot, ATPL, and I do prepare myself for a German Contact Air simulator screening on an FNPT II Boeing 737 on 04th January 2008, so the matter is serious and urgent)I flew without probs ex EDDS (Stuttgart, Germany) on the LBU 8B SID to Luburg VORDME. thereafter 25 NDB, G/A to enter TGO Hold, thereafter Standard 07 ILS Cat II. I went to the minimum and had the cloud bases set to 1000 AGL. I saw EDDS in 2200 MSL as planned but saw only the AP itself. I was fully established and the RWY 07 was absolutely dark. Just to stress it: System Time was 2255 Z so well at night.I could not land properly because I had no reference below the DA.I have to emphasize that I started the flight "very realistic" on the gate and not with engines running on the active but at any terminal (4?) ...I was taxiing with problems to the 25 holding point. I could not see any edge lights nore could I see the center line lighting. May this phenomenon be the reason why also the later 07 APCH was fu**** up as there was no RWY lighting?I can tell you guys that the rest of the scenery was enlighted: Stuttgart city, the suburbs, everything. So how can I fix the "dark TWY / RWY - prob"thx to you all who can help!!Yours Maastricht UAC

EDDS is my home airport and i can assure you, the runway and RW lights are there in FSX :)Thinkpads are good for working, but not for gaming, especially not for FSX. Sorry to say, but i think you should try an earlier FS version on that laptop. I don't think that your onboard graphics chip is shader 2.0 capable and 786MB Ram are really not enough and FSX installed on an external disk with USB 1.0 is also not really good.It's a miracle that you can start FSX on that laptop.You can try to set "Shader20Plus" to zero in the display.cfg (find the line relevant to your video card and add "Shader20Plus=0"), but i don't think, you will be able to enjoy FSX with your laptop.Perhaps this would be better for you: http://www.aerowinx.de/

Or: Two cans and a string to not a telecommunications system make.I'd be interested in how your laptop compares to my workstation. Go to this page and run a system test. Report back the results:http://www.nzone.com/content/nzone/srl/nzo...asp?gameid=3892