martinlest2

Hi, Just wondered if anyone has managed to make the nVidia Control Panel AA work in FS9? It makes no difference in the sim, whatever I set. I'd use nVidia Inspector instead, but it doesn't seem to support my driver. FS9's own AA cuts my fps from 30 to 2 or 3 when I activaye it!! Please see (if interest piqued!) here: http://forum.avsim.net/topic/443665-nvidia-inspector-sweetfx-antialiasing-problems-anyone-able-to-help/ Thanks, Martin

... aslo tried using the AA in the nVidia Control Panel, but it has no effect in FS9. (Why not?)...

I am looking for a new driver for my nVidia 8700M card (on a Dell XPS M1730, which I use for FS9 when abroad). The current driver, 179.48, works fine but I am having big anti-aliasing problems and it seems that this driver is not supported by nVidia Inspector - at least, the configure icon does nothing when I click it at the moment. Does anyone know where I can get a more recent graphics driver for this O/S that will allow me to use nVidia Inspector? No luck Googling so far... Thanks, Martin

Of course, yes - I had forgotten I can adjust AA in the nVidia Control Panel. Unfortunately, though I have set AF and AA there, there is no visible effect in FS. I have tried several options, but to no avail. Aircraft etc lines are as jagged as with no AA set. If I enable AA in FS9 by the way, all is fine until I go from windowed mode to full screen. Then the fps drops from 30 to 2 or 3. In windowed mode, the AA setting is not effective - it only works in full screen mode. I seem to be between a rock and a hard place here! Thanks, Martin

Thanks Mel. But what is the driver's interface? How do I access it to make AA changes?

I am working abroad and have brought my Dell XPS M1730 (rather than my main FS PC) so that I can at least fly FS9 whilst I am away (2 years...). Getting my PC here is too much of a hassle, and a risk.. So, the M1730 runs with XP x64, 2.2GHz CPU, GeForce 8700M GPU & 2GBs RAM. Hardly cutting edge, but should be OK for FS9 and a small selection from my thousands of addons (aircraft/scenery etc.). My problem is with Antialiasing at the moment. If I enable the FS9 AA from Options, frames rates go from 30 (capped) to just 2fps! I have tried SweetFX, as I use this on my PC, but that still cuts the fps to about 14 or so when I install the dll files etc into the FS9 folder - AA enabled or not. I need to experiment with this more, probably. Also tried nVidia Inspector. Downloaded the latest version, but when I start the interface, the configuration button does nothing (doesn't open any config page). Is that because my driver is not supported in this version (or in any??): 197.48 ... As the O/S is XP 64-bit, it's not going to be easy to find a suitable driver, if that's why I can't configure things in nVidia Inspector. (Can't seem to confirm this anywhere). I'll keep Googling, but help here would be much appreciated. I am amazed that I can't use FS9's own AA. Why the huge frame rate drop (enabling a filter or not - none, bilinear, trilinear - makes no odds)? Thanks, Martin

I have installed nVidia Inspector on the laptop, but the configure button doesn't open the configuration page. Is the a compatibility issue? (GeForce 8700M GPU; 197.48 driver - supported by NvI??)? If I remove SweetFX entirely (and the dlls) I get a much better frame rate, but now I have no AA. If I add FS9's own AA the fps drops to 2 or 3. Can anyone help? May post separately about the nVidia Inspector problem... Thanks Martin

Hi. I do have nVidia, but if I disable the SweetFX AA I don't get any change in FPS, so I guess it isn't contributing to the relatively low frame rates. I use nVidia Inspector on my main PC, but haven't added it to the laptop yet. I have quite a lot of processes running in the background too, but Googling this has always shown that killing off the unnecessary ones has little if any effect on frame rates in FS9, thugh maybe some disagree. I could try AlacrityPC perhaps? Martin

Hi, I know frame rates have been done to death in these forums, and will continue to be no doubt.. but maybe someone can advise as I haven't really solved anything as yet. I am currently working in Sri Lanka and will be here for a couple of years at least. I didn't want to be without FS9 altogether when I moved here from the UK, but I didn't want to ship my main (and highly beloved!) FS9/FSX PC (specs as per my signature) as it got damaged when I last shipped it (to Bangkok: I shift around the world every couple of years for my job). Not seriously damaged: the heatsink and thermal paste parted company with the CPU with the jolting, but it was a hassle to fix and I don't trust the folks here to fix any further damage it might sustain in transit. Plus, getting the PC through customs in this part of the world is a real pain too. So...... ..... I reinstalled FS9 on my Dell XPS M1730 and brought that with me (plus my Saitek X52 and so on). It's a disappointing after my PC's performance of course, but it's better than nothing. It's supposed to be a gaming laptop after all (if it's good enough for the guys on 'The Big Bang Theory', then it's good enough for me!) and was always OK with FS9 when I used it as my main FS machine, several years ago. I am getting frame rates of around 14 fps: not spectacular. If I add antialiasing it plummets to 2fps. So I use SweetFX for that and switch the FS9 AA off. As say, that way I get about 14fps (at the payware VIDP in a PSS A321). I am sure I can get more though. That said, turning down settings in Display, or reducing AI from 75% to 25% makes little difference to the fps I achieve. I don't have scenery casting shadows (just the aircraft). I am running out of ideas to tweak, so any advice would be welcome. At default FS9 airports in a default Cessna, I get much nearer to the 30fps (where I have capped the frame rate), but I don't fly default airports much (yawn). I hardly dare go to Aerosoft Heathrow, as I am sure fps will fall to single figures there! My O/S is XP 64-bit by the way. (The laptop's not really capable of supporting Windows 7). Intel Core 2 @ 2.2GHz & 2GBs RAM. The real joy (by the way) of going back to XP is having FSHotSFX running again after all this time! I really miss it in Windows 7!! Thanks, Martin

Think I am going to have to wipe the drive and reinstall Windows. Can't see any other option... :angry: :(

I run FS9 and FSX on my main PC on Windows 7 64-bit. It's great. People knock (or even hate!) Microsoft, but how can you not love a company that gave us Windows 7 (the ultimate o/s IMHO - I have to use Windows 8 at work and hate it) AND Flight Simulator. The cornerstones of my life !! Have bought 2 64GB pen drives, but my problem now is this: http://forum.avsim.net/topic/438390-cpu-at-constant-40-50-so-fs9-hardly-runs/ :( M

I get this even when I start the MSConfig utility in diagnostic mode - in that case there's almost nothing in Task Manager or the system tray. Might just try reinstalling Windows (XP x64) and see what happens. Can't see it's a hardware problem, as I say, as if I boot into the x86 O/S all is OK. Thanks

Nothing shows in Task manager as I said. Not a temp issue (or do you mean temporary, not temperature?) as otherwise rebooting into XP x68 wouldn't fix the problem...

Ran virus scan & Malwarebytes.. nothing relevant. CPU still constant 40%

Yes, good idea. This is a new installation of both x64 and x86 - and I have run a virus check, but not for malware. Will certainly try, but I think the problem probably lies elsewhere. Thanks

Sorry I omitted a vital piece of information!! This is a dual boot machine with XP 32 and 64-bit, not Win7. :blush: Run FS (or trying to!) in 64-bit version of course. The CPU is a Intel Core 2 T7500 (2.2 GHz). I just tried booting into XP 32-bit and the Hardware Interrupts there are minimal - 1% or 'n/a' in Process Explorer This hopefully will provide someone with a clue. M

Hi. I am going abroad in a couple of weeks for work - be there for 1-2 years: a long time to be without FS9!! I decided not to take my FS PC for now, but to use my Dell XPS M1730 (gaming laptop), which used to run FS9 really well. But having reinstalled FS9 the results are pretty shocking. After a bit of analysis, I could see why: the CPU runs at 40% or more all the time, with no applications loaded. Ran MSConfig and tried again, but with the same result. Task Manager shows no CPU usage from running processes, but Process Explorer shows 40-50% under Hardware Interrupts. So been Googling this, but it's all very depressing. No improvements... I checked that my HD is set to DMA mode (5). I had two entries for IDE Primary - following other forum advice, uninstalled both and rebooted twice. both now back and in DMA mode again, but same CPU usage. Not sure what else to do, I feel I am on a wild goose chase. Unless I can fix this quickly I shall be abroad with no FS9!!! Unthinkable really after all these years. If I can solve why the CPU is always running at 50% or so, I am sure FS9 will load and run just fine, as it always used to when it was my main FS machine. Can anyone help please? Thought I'd post here rather than other hardware forums as you FS folks will be sympathetic to what I am suffering here ! B) Thanks, Martin

Yes, on my main PC (specs are per my signature) I have Windows7 x64. I have FSX there and it runs well, but I prefer FS9 on the whole, so am leaving FSX in the UK; as long as I can fly FS9 when I am away I'll be OK!! Use Active Sky for weather.. Thanks!

Wow, never imagined all of FS9 would run OK from an external drive. Well, I don't need to do that, but I may try having my FS Genesis files and perhaps my Addon Scenery folders on two separate 64GB pen drives. Are you using USB2.0 or USB3.0 by the way? As I say, the laptop doesn't have USB 3.0 on it... Martin

Hi, I am about to move abroad again (for work). I'll be there for some years I think and I don't (for various reasons) want to ship my main (Flightsim) PC over when I go, so, as I don't want to be without FS entirely, I am going to use one of my laptops to fly FS9 (a Dell XPS M1730: it runs FS9 pretty well. it has Windows XP 64-bit on it, 2GB of RAM and Intel CPU at 2.2GHz. It only has USB2, not USB3, sadly). A bit pathetic by modern standards, but I get 30fps easily in most scenarios). However, it only has a 200GB HDD (c.185GBs effective space) and will not hold all my FS stuff including FSGenesis mesh etc., so I am wondering what parts of my FS setup I can run from an external USB2 flash drive that would cause the least performance hit. Large folders which could be candidates include REX, GEPro, FSGenesis mesh, as well as the native FS2004/scenery folder. Apart from FSG, by far the largest folders are my addon scenery and aircraft folders but I'd like to avoid moving those on an external drive (essentials, like the default Cessna apart) and copying the scenery & aircraft I need for my flight to the laptop each time - it's slow and it's just asking for a CTD. Obviously, the best candidates to run from a flash drive would be a folder of files that FS9 only needs to read occasionally, but I am not sure which that might be... Also need to get a suitable 64GB (or even 128GB) USB pen drive to accommodate this. Without my starting to do a lot of benchmarking myself (I don't have time - I am leaving the UK very soon and am really busy getting ready, and working full-time too up to the day I go) would anyone have any data as to the read speeds needed to run various parts of FS9. In other words, does FS9, for instance, read FSGenesis data only very intermittently (in which case it might be a good candidate for putting my 60GB FSG folder onto the flash drive??) or is it reading it all the time? And what would be an acceptable read speed capability for any drive I might get? There are drives that (in theory) read at 20MB/s and others at 180MB/s, but I have to consider cost too. I could load up Process Monitor and spend some time analysing what's happening, but maybe someone already has a good idea by now how to advise me? Finally, I know this is not ideal - I'd never dream of it for my main FS machine. But I am not going to have time to get a bigger hard drive for the laptop and reinstall everything, so this is the 'solution' I am going to have to go with. Thanks a lot for any help, especially from anyone who also runs elements of FS9 from a flash drive for similar reasons. (And if no one can really advise, I'll just have to experiment and see what works best, trial and error, I suppose). Martin

Thanks - I fly the PMDG I haven't really tried this again. The obvious solutions didn't work, as far as I recall. I'll have another look.

I had made a similar alteration to a Mooney (in FSX) so thought this would be easy - but I don't recall exactly what I did in that case. Well, it was easy to fix this: I did as you suggested and reduced the drag parameters (had to change them big time to make the required difference, - 0.9 down to 0.25) and now I can get more realistic airspeeds. I had been looking through the various 'speed' entries in the aircraftcontainer SDK doc and didn't think about the drag.. I didn't touch the propeller values BTW, 'cos, as I say, I didn't want the a/c to taxi any faster than it does currently. Thanks, Martin

I have a version of a SAAB 340 which at full throttle in level flight refuses to travel faster than around 180KIAS. I can't see any problems in the aircraft.cfg file: [Reference Speeds] flaps_up_stall_speed=110.0 //Knots True (KTAS) full_flaps_stall_speed=140.8 //Knots True (KTAS) cruise_speed=300.0 //Knots True (KTAS) max_mach = 0.58 max_indicated_speed = 293 //Red line (KIAS) and the Vmo in the .air file is at 265, so a faster speed than I am getting has been anticipated.. I don't want to mess with thrust settings in the aircraft.cfg file as the plane is more than 'racy' enough when taxiing. Thanks, Martin

I don't remember now as I haven't noted then down as and when they occur - and with 1250 entries in the scenery library, it's not.obvious to track them down now. Will let you know if I find any more. I know the AVSIM name is a rip-off, but there are some great freeware sceneries on the Russian site which are not available elsewhere. Not sure why you avoid them like the plague (but your choice of course!). :-)

Well, I have had lots of examples over the years - this is definitely a known problem (not something I have just discovered) with lots of references on the forum (but no explanation, as I say). Some Readme files which accompany the scenery downloads even suggest moving bitmaps to the FS9/texture folder in order to have buildings (etc.) show with their intended textures. The example that prompted this thread is 7524_UTAA-Ashgabat.zip (from the .ru 'AVSIM') - a pretty good rendition of UTAA. On my PC at least, when I move the bmps which begin with 'UTAA_____' to the main texture folder, all is OK. If they sit only in the texture folder which is 'next to' the UTAA scenery folder, just grey buildings. As I tested this, moving the bmps back and forward, it was 100% clear that the textures only show in Fs9 when the bitmaps are in the main FS9/texture folder. Martin