Hi Again!

[Guest cornclose]

Hello all,Been away from FU3 for some time now, and although I do enjoy X-Plane and FSX (when I'm not developing stuff for them!) I, like many others, feel drawn towards FU3 again.So, last night I installed FU3 on a system here at home. I remember from my last experiences with it that frame rates and overall performance were fairly good in all but cloudy/overcast type weather (which is the weather I like the most), so was suprised to find that I still get frame rates bumping along around the 10fps level in these conditions on the following system :-Pentium 4 3.0Ghz with Hyperthreading512mb RAMATI 9600 SeriesA fast Hard DriveWindows XP/DirectX 9.0cAlthough by no means a powerful system (I have a number of others I may try FU3 on too, much more powerful than this) I expected to see a marked improvement in frame rates in poor weather compared to the last systems I ran it on. It's fair to say though that the above system does run other games and sims pretty well, it's just FU3 in bad weather it struggles with.So, this begs the question, what system WILL run FU3 in bad weather at at least 20-25fps ? If any ? Or is it it a case of the way it's programmed and optimized (or not as the case may be) that's limiting it ?Is anyone using or can anyone point out a system that will run it at 20fps absolute min under any weather ?Cheers for reading, love FU3 but want better performance! I'm even prepared to get a new system just for FU3 if I know it'll run better.In the mean time, when I get chance, I'll copy it on to a few other systems to see how they perform.Edit: I forgot to add that I have installed the UK Patch to V2.0 and I have tried three flt3.cfg file; The default (out of the box) one, Robert Driscolls (from the avsim library) and one I kept from my last system when I had it installed. None of them really improve frame rates from 8-12 in bad weather. :-(_______RegardsChris Ehttp://www.circle-software.co.uk/php/html/images/logo.gifVisit http://www.circle-software.co.ukHome of X-Plane Photographic Scenery : England & Wales

[agtim 0]

Hi Cornclose,With my NVIDIA GEForce 8600 GT , Windows XP/DirectX 9.0cIntel Dual core 2.13GHz, 2048MB RAMBad weather fps:12 to 20nice weather fps:30 and morefor me it's ok :-):-wave Andre

[Guest cornclose]

Thanks for the info Andre. I guess there is something inherently limiting FU3 in producing higher frame rates in bad weather. Either that or the code as is doesn't scale very well, and we'd need 10GHz CPUs before we get 25+ in ALL conditions.I did a search here for 'performance' and 'fps' etc but didn't find many with ultra modern systems to gauge the performance against. I found one user with an overclocked 4Ghz Core 2 system though, I wonder what frame rates he gets on that ? Have there ever been any systematic tests or benchmarks carried out to try and determine which settings yield the best frame rates whilst still maintaining good visuals ?I also found lots of other interesting posts re scenery development and conversion of MSFS photoscenery packages. I know this is possible. :-)If any of you would like to contact me off list about this then feel free._______RegardsChris Ehttp://www.circle-software.co.uk/php/html/images/logo.gifVisit http://www.circle-software.co.ukHome of X-Plane Photographic Scenery : England & Wales

[Guest colsie12]

How can I find out the FPS I am getting in FU3.

[Guest cornclose]

I'm not fully up to speed with all the keyboard shortcuts in FU3 now (I was before!) and I'm not at a system with FU3 in it to confirm, but I think it's Ctrl+R (or Shift+R)._______RegardsChris Ehttp://www.circle-software.co.uk/php/html/images/logo.gifVisit http://www.circle-software.co.ukHome of X-Plane Photographic Scenery : England & Wales

[Guest colsie12]

Thanks I will try that.

[Guest colsie12]

It is control F in clear weather I get between 31.3 and 32.6. That is in a renegade. In stormy weather it is between 8 and 11.

[Guest cornclose]

And what are your system specs colsie12 ?_______RegardsChris Ehttp://www.circle-software.co.uk/php/html/images/logo.gifVisit http://www.circle-software.co.ukHome of X-Plane Photographic Scenery : England & Wales

[Guest colsie12]

Sorry for got to mention. i have a very old system. i am getting a new system at chrostmas (dualc core etc).Current:Pent3 730mhzIntegrated graphics168,012KB of RAmwin 2000Anything else you would like to know.Oh yeah ctrl R is for resolution.

[Guest cornclose]

Hi Colin,I think that might confirm my fears - you don't get the performance improvements that you might expect with FU3. Most if not all other games and sims would improve from 10-12fps on your system to something much more noticably better with a faster system.As it is, I'm shocked that your PIII 730Mhz gives the same frame rates as my PIV 3.0Ghz. I think we already knew the video card and RAM make little real difference to FU3. This really is strange and it's something I've not seen with any other game/sim.I suppose the main reason that I was looking at FU3 again was my assumption that it would run at silly (high) frame rates at max settings on modern hardware, but alas this is looking more likely not to be the case. :-(_______RegardsChris Ehttp://www.circle-software.co.uk/php/html/images/logo.gifVisit http://www.circle-software.co.ukHome of X-Plane Photographic Scenery : England & Wales

[Guest colsie12]

I seem to recall a comment by a member here of getting 60+ FPS in any weather. i do not know if they knew how to check though. My suspicion is this that the new config file most of us have is preventing a higher FPS. I am goign to find out. i just need to find the original config.

[Guest colsie12]

I just done a quick test with the new config and have lloked at the old config. i think the probelm is the date this config was made FU3 was not designed to handle a dual core so will only use one, and the fact it was released for pent 3 processors may be the rpoblem. in that config is something we have to crack to get good FPS.

[Lars Peter 0]

Hello there.Please have i mind that the "written code" for FU3 was initially made for FU2 back in 1994-1995 with some updates for the fu3 software 1999.Even with todays computers and a lot of "ram" the code itself will not receive the new computer hardware input, and will just run to the edge what is written in the code.There was a lot of complains, and forum discussions with the folks at L.G. studios just after the release of FU3 about framerates etc, but they refused to go back with tecnology of the time.They new what was coming, a lot of new better hardware to improve the framerates and a better experience of the sim.That's true, but we are still stuck with an old written code never rewritten for todays software/hardwareThe company went down, and also the 3dfx company (VOODOO 3DFX videocards).we are all stuck with the old code, and some not updated framerates in bad weather.Take care.Lars Peter. :-wave

[Guest cornclose]

There is a lot of weight in the flt3.cfg argument. I just removed my flt3.cfg and allowed FU3 to recreate a new one. The one it's created has almost nothing in it now, only a few dozen entries to save the options from the options screen - in other words it has far less active stuff in it than the default out-of-the-box config file.Frame rates are vastly improved, even when I start to put the sliders back to the right in the options screens. So there are some parameters in this file which are crippling the frame rates even on relatively modern hardware. More investigation is needed of course, but if anyone knows of some investigation in this department that's already been carried out, please let me know to avoid duplicating effort! :-)_______RegardsChris Ehttp://www.circle-software.co.uk/php/html/images/logo.gifVisit http://www.circle-software.co.ukHome of X-Plane Photographic Scenery : England & Wales

[Christopher Low 5,331]

The best "bad" weather for framerates in FU3 is probably a warm front. That produces the misty, low visibility conditions that look very attractive on the ground (or at VERY low flight levels). I can run FU3 comfortably in these conditions, even with 4xFSAA and 8xAF enabled, all sliders slammed to the right, and SanFran 2006 installed.However, when there are lots of textured clouds and heavy rain, the framerate drops like a stone.AMD Athlon 64 3200+1GB PC3200 RAM256MB GeForce 7600GT AGP