Jason_Peters

As someone who operates an XL (as well as the II,V, & Ultra) for my day job in the Real World, I'll be keeping my eye on this one to see how the 64bit version turns out. Personally, I don't see the price point as problematic as long as the visual quality, depth of systems, and excellent customer support are all there...we'll see. Simmers have increasingly made the move towards study-level simulation, and FS aircraft at that level take years to complete, the price point reflects that work. That said, count me among the potential customers disappointed in the choice of NavData provider. Like it or not, Navigraph has indeed become the standard and I'm not excited about having to purchase yet another database provider to fly with updated databases. Went through the same issue with the Vertx DA-62, though they are working to provide Navigraph integration in the future. Years ago, ESDG released the very best GA add-on aircraft for FS2004/FSX and then basically fell off the radar. P3D updates eventually came along for the CX, which I purchased, though in my opinion it'd been left behind graphically by other newer products and was relegated to back of the virtual hangar. Regardless, It's a good thing to see them back in our community providing much needed competition the GA space. We NEED good study-level complex GA aircraft! Hopefully, they've kept up with where flight simulation technology has gone in that time-span. They've got my attention. If the product lives up to it's price point, I'll likely be purchasing... and I'll probably begrudgingly update that stupid database too...

Keeping it simple and running the AIO and fans with NZXT's CAM software. Currently working on tuning it as a positive pressure set-up and so far it seems to be working nicely. It'll take some time to find the sweet spot between noise/cooling needs. Agreed. I just like to have it idle at 35C or below without running the fans up beyond 45-50%. I'm finding the 9700K tends to run a bit hot as it is, I've been idling (5-8% load) closer to 40C. Lowing the clock from 5.2GHz to 5.1GHz, had had other nice benefits though, my 100% load temps fell to around 70C. I'll keep tinkering with it, pretty happy overall though. I finally installed P3Dv4.5 last night and it was giggle inducing coming from the previous system. Basically maxed all my sliders, 3440x1440 screen resolution, and with the default scenario it reported nearly 200 fps, and hardly broke a sweat! I can't wait to get the add-ons loaded and start tweaking the sim to get some real world numbers.

Greg, thanks for this! I'm not sure how I missed this last night while searching for a solution! At any rate, I utilized a few of the settings mentioned and now have the RAM running at 3200Mhz as advertised. Though I'm still not on the XMP profile (May try it tomorrow), running with it manually set to the correct numbers. Ryan, yeah the 2600k was a beast! I got nearly 8 years out of that build and it was still putting up respectable performance. But like you I've been ready for an upgrade for some time, and when the wife gave me the go ahead I swung as close to the fence as I could afford. So far I'm quite pleased. I was running 5.2GHz without issue, but wasn't happy with the temps even though they were safe. I've since backed it down to 5.1GHz which appears to have made a really nice improvement 8-10C drop in the temps under 100% load. Though I'm still idling at 35-40C, and would really like to bring that down a bit. It'll be a few more days of testing and tweaking my overclocking, AIO, and fan settings before I'm ready to install P3D again. Hopefully this system crushes P3Dv4 without issue!

Well, I've spent the last few days assembling the build and the last day or so tinkering with the overclock and stress testing. Pleased to report, the system is stable and running 5.2 on all cores! Idle temp holds at approx 35-40c (Would like to get this down a bit, may back down the overclock a tad). During stress testing, with all 8 cores running 100% load (a load level I seriously doubt I'd see in normal use) the cooling held strong averaging 75-77C with a brief max at 82C. Not too bad I'd say...only one real disappointment so far is I've been unable to get the RAM to run at 3200. I can't get it to post in either XMP or manual. It's a G.Skill TridentZ RGB Series 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4 3200 (F4-3200C14D-32GTZR). Best I've done so far is 3000 at 14-14-14-36 1.35v, which is stable. Not sure if I should continue searching for the quoted speeds or give up and be happy, I'm not the most seasoned overclocker... Anyone have any thoughts/ideas?

Removed.. See linked thread above.

Sound advice as always Bob, I had all those on the list already. I'm currently working my way through my file structure and backing items up to an external HD to be moved to the new system. I haven't even gotten to the P3D drive yet, but will likely tackle it tomorrow. Any idea which P3D file contains our keyboard assignments? I'd rather not go through figuring those out again. I know the FSUIPC ini file contains the aircraft profiles for my custom button assignments. Hopeful I can back up both and do some cut and paste of the relevant sections to speed up configuration on the new system. Will likely attempt similar for PMDG and FSLabs too.

I’m using a different h500, NZXT. But it’s good to know that a smaller 280mm AIO cooler is able to keep the 9700k running cool.

For those of you following the saga in my previous thread, you already know I'll be assembling my new P3D rig this week which will include a fresh copy of Windows 10. I was doing a little prep, and was trying to figure out what needs to be done on my current rig before the move, backing up files, etc. I'd like to make sure to keep my P3D key assignments, FSUIPC aircraft profiles, and other little things to make the move as seamless as possible. With that in mind, does anyone have a checklist of items and or files to grab and back up? Many of us have years tied into getting P3D and associated add-on's running the way we like. What do you guys do when moving everything over to a new system? I've got a bunch of work to do...

Yep, that's the stuff. It's on the way! Glad I chose wisely... really struggled with the RAM decision. Yeah, I thought about that. But, aesthetics won this round. I really want to put my case up on my desk this time to show off the build, hence the largely unnecessary, but super-cool RGB lighting stuff. My previous case, a Corsair Graphite 600T, is huge and resides under the desk hiding my nice build and trapping heat from the top mount H100i. I'm hopeful the Kraken X62 will be up to the task and keep the temps reasonable, fingers crossed...

118 lookers and zero help other than Vortex the awesome flying bear above... super! Who needs you guys! I can light money on fire all by myself! 😆 Anyhoo' I've done a bunch of homework over the past few days, putting together various mock builds and such... below is what I settled on, or rather what's on the way: Jason's swing for the fence (ish) new P3D rig: Case: NZXT H500 Black Power Supply: Corsair HX850i, 850W 80+ Platinum Cert'd CPU: I7-9700K (Plan to overclock, not sure how aggressively yet) Motherboard: ASUS ROG Strix Z390-E CPU Cooler: NZXT Kraken X62 AIO RAM: 32GB G.Skill Trident Z RGB Series DDR4 3200, CAS 14 (I really struggled with this decision, I probably only needed 16GB. But future proofing, right? 🤪) GPU: EVGA GTX 1070 Ti (Recently purchased a used one intending to upgrade the GTX 960 in the old rig. Obviously I'm going to run it in the new one until I can sell a kidney and mortgage my house to afford a 2080 someday) OS Drive: SanDisk 480GB Ultra II SSD (reused from previous build) P3D Drive: WD Black SN750 500GB NVMe M.2 2280 SSD Backup & Storage Drive: Seagate BarraCuda 2TB Other: NZXT RGB Exhaust Fans x2, NZXT HUE 2, NZXT GRID+v3 A lot has changed since I last built a PC in 2011! Here's hoping I chose wisely enough to pull off another 7 1/2 years with this build like I did my i7-2600k rig.

Slight change of plans, I got to thinking and decided it probably wasn't wise to push my nearly 8 year old power supply into the new build. So I plan on using a new Corsair HX850i 850W instead. I'm curious about 16 vs 32GB of RAM.. is the jump to 32GB worth it?

Well my wife surprisingly gave me the okay for a modest budget ($1500-1600) to upgrade my P3Dv4 system. I've been limping along an I7-2600K build from late 2011 with respectable results, but it's time. Below is what I've come up with, any thoughts on system balance, or obvious poor choices etc... Rig is primarily for P3Dv4, but I do occasionally dabble in other games as well. i7-9700k ASUS ROG STRIX Z390-E G.Skill DDR4 3200 32GB (2x 16GB, Cas 14) Should I drop to 16GB and save some money? EVGA GTX 1070 Ti (just purchased used, will reuse) NZXT Kraken X62 AIO CPU Cooler 500GB WD Black SN750 M.2 2280 SSD 500GB Corsair SSD (reuse from current build) NZXT H500 Case Corsair AX850 Professional Series Gold 850W power supply (reuse from current build) Thoughts?

I decided to order a gently used EVGA GTX 1070 Ti (08G-P4-6775-KR) off of eBay.. fingers crossed!

What about the 1070Ti? As far as the RAM I was just going to buy another 8GB kit, same part as the last time... would that not work?

Thanks for the input Bob. Any particular model of the 980ti? I'm browsing around Amazon, and new is probably more than I want to spend. But there is a decent amount of them floating around used on eBay to consider. What about a 1070Ti? I'm also considering adding another 8GB of RAM too, DDR3 1600 has become cheaper than I remember. Be nice to give this system another year or more!

I built my current rig in late 2011, and it has held up surprisingly well. However, as I've moved up into P3Dv4.4 and soon 4.5, it's really been showing some occasional struggles. Most recently I've really struggled with frame rates at FlyTampa's KLAS, and PacSim's KSLC sceneries which I know are tough on frames in general. The majority of my flying is in PMDG or FSLabs aircraft, with occasional GA. I'm wondering if upgrading the graphics card will net me some increase in performance, and perhaps get me another year or two out of this system? It's currently running with an NVIDIA GTX 960. Obviously it's probably time to re-build, but I don't really have the budget for another complete build right now. Thoughts? Recommendations on cards? Current Specs: i7-2600K (stable overclock to 4.4 since built) ASUS P8Z68 Deluxe Gen3 Corsair H100 Liquid Cooler 8GB of DDR3 RAM NVIDIA GTX 960 Dell U3415W Ultra Widescreen Monitor - 3440x1440

My apologies for the delay in returning to close the loop. After working with PMDG Support, I was able to complete the flight on Wednesday. It appears my NTDLL.dll crashes were caused by a corrupted 747 installation following the update, along with an issue with FSL's Spotlights. The following is a synopsis of the fix: PMDG Support recommended a complete uninstall & reinstall of the 747 using freshly downloaded copies. Following the re-install, I set up the same scenario I had been trying to complete. The 747-8 from EDDF (Aerosoft Mega Airport) gate A25, to KIAD. GSX, ActiveSky, etc. all running as normal, did not disable anything. This scenario had resulted in consistent NTDLL.dll crashes. Unfortunately, the software crashed almost immediately but with a different error this time. Instead of a full CTD, P3D reported "dxgi_error_device_hung" and asked if I wanted to exit. Bad news, but progress! I had seen this one before in the past, and had a hunch. So, I uninstalled FSL Spotlights, downloaded a fresh copy from their website and re-installed it. Re-loaded the same scenario, and made a beautiful departure from EDDF in the rain just before it switched over to snow, enabling Auto Cruise as I coasted out to begin the oceanic leg. Everything looked to be back to normal and running well! The sim did crash approximately 2+35 (real time) into the session as I passed to the south of Nova Scotia, and the event Viewer reported NTDLL.dll yet again... However, this also occured at the exact same time-stamp as an FSUIPC auto-save. I was also working in the FMC, and Auto Cruise was still active at sim rate of 4x. I'm guessing I made an entry in the FMC at the exact time the auto-save occurred somehow making it angry, bad luck. I was able to load the auto-save and complete the flight without any further issue. Final report: EDDF - KIAD, 8.8 hrs, landed about 30 min behind schedule due to a pushback delay, and an enroute weather deviation near JFK. Back in business! Don't hesitate to submit that Support Ticket and ask for assistance! The PMDG Support folks are there to help. Even though I'm an experienced simmer, another brain on the task, with another set of ideas on how to troubleshoot the issue proved helpful.

I can tell you from firsthand experience the autoland in my aircraft at work is often “firm” to say the least. In fact, we hate it and don’t really trust it. In addition to it often landing hard, it will occasionally drop the nose at the runway, or fail to correct quickly enough in gusty winds. It can get really uncomfortable! It’s not uncommon at all for us to disconnect it in the flare and complete the landing if safe, or just go around. But, then there are days where it works perfectly... these machines are temperamental! Now bear in mind my aircraft is based on a 747-200, so a much earlier version of the autopilot. I think we are often spoiled in the sim with aircraft and systems that function to perfection all the time. In the real world these things age, have issues, and often act up. Just cause it can autoland doesn’t alleviate you from your duties as PIC or Captain. If the automation isn’t performing, disconnect it and fly the dang plane!

Doesn't apply to my crash, I don't currently run Immersion manager with the 747. But, a link to EDDF (Aerosoft Mega Airport) and GSX is entirely possible... Perhaps I'll see if it happens with a different departure location...

Robert, First, let me say thank you for the personal reply! I've been a PMDG customer since the FLY! 757 days, and will continue to support PMDG far into the future! Why? First class product, first class product support! Second, to be clear I'm NOT blaming these crashes on PMDG. This is complex software and things like this happen from time to time. I also agree that COUATL has huge problems, and limited (read non-existent) support from it's developer. That said, these crashes are not specifically occuring in any of the known COUATL problem areas. I merely went down that troubleshooting path as a precaution, and frankly for a lack of better ideas. My main concern is COUATL or not, the 747 and the sim was running without issue prior to the update. I've begun working with the PMDG support staff by submitting a ticket and the initial speculation is I somehow ended up with a corrupt file following the update. The plan is to perform a complete un-install and re-install of freshly downloaded files and see where we end up. I was planning on getting to this tonight, but I've just returned from a long day training. I'll likely tackle it tomorrow evening (AKA: Soon TM ) instead... This Flight Engineer needs a break from airplane stuff... More to follow... I do want my simulated 747 back. It's a lot more reliable, a heck of a lot less stressful, and a bunch more fun than the one I argue with at work. 😉

Yeah, support ticket is in... this dude is out of ideas. I may try a complete un-install/re-install of the 747 entirely next. The whole thing is odd as it was running without issue prior to the update...

Guys, I'm looking for ideas here... the 747-8 is now unflyable for me. I NEVER had even one hiccup prior to the update. I'm getting constant NTDLL.DLL crashes, but only with the 747-8. I've been trying to complete a flight from EDDF to KIAD. I've tried everything I can think of short of a complete uninstall/re-install. In addition to multiple restarts, I've disabled GSX, attempted the Restart Coutal fix, updated graphics drivers, deleted shaders, etc.... Nothing works. Any ideas? Not new to Flt Sim or troubleshooting it, been in the hobby since pre FS4. Help!

This looks great! Thanks to the team for all the hard work!

Dan, I sure hope you didn't lose my point in translation! We agree! For the sim world these simpler work arounds work great! The point I was making is that users should learn to accept these types of workarounds, rather than demanding infinite realism down to the minutiae. Otherwise, I'll hand em' my 400 page performance manual full of spaghetti charts and tables and they can have at it. Also, you'd be surprised at some of similar work arounds we older FE's will use to scrape together some data on the quick in the real world! Ha! Simon, that was a great explanation for folks to use! The use of tables, or Tab-Data as we refer to it, in newer performance manuals sure makes things a lot faster and the data card much shorter. The E-4B (747-200) performance manual still uses spaghetti charts for everything... much more time consuming.

As a Flight Engineer, I kinda do performance calculations for a living. A reduced thrust, takeoff data card, with obstacle clearance for the 747 is a full page long and can take someone who is entirely familiar with the process upwards of 30-40 min to compute manually using the performance manual... for each available runway or scenario! Obviously, computer based performance software has greatly reduced both the required time and workload, but this software is incredibly expensive! I've been working to procure a new version for our aircraft and it's upwards of $500k for the software plus a year or two of support, and thats with us providing our performance data and manuals directly to the developer! This is not an easy task, and what PMDG has managed thus far is nothing short of outstanding. I'm all for maxing out the available realism and procedures of my desktop sim, but at the end of the day it's just that, a desktop simulation. It's intended to give you a highly realistic peek behind the curtain at what it's like to operate one of these magnificent machines, nothing more. Perhaps some of these complex tasks are better left to our imagination...