SteveW

Before using NCP (Nvidia Control Panel) settings, make sure to go to NCP "Manage 3D Settings" first and in "Global Settings" tab choose the "Restore" button to factory default the settings, and then in "Program Settings" tab choose the Prepar3D.exe profile and again choose to Restore the defaults to that as well. Now, only use NCP for making settings that are unavailable in Prepar3D. If a setting is available in Prepar3D use that primarily, and for settings not found in Prepar3D but are found in NCP use the Prepar3D.exe profile in "Manage 3D Settings" "Program Settings" to set those.

They have all been updated and reconfigured to improve performance and include various changes: 6.0.26 = 23 .cab files: P3D1.cab = 1,560,561Kb, P3D2.cab = 1,507,020Kb, P3D3.cab = 1,613,101Kb, etc. 6.0.30 = 42 .cab files: P3D1.cab = 817,292Kb, P3D2.cab = 791,047Kb, P3D3.cab = 746,175Kb, etc. 6.0.34 = 42 .cab files: P3D1.cab = 818,493Kb, P3D2.cab = 791,023Kb, P3D3.cab = 746,195Kb, etc.

The patch installer only downloads the files that have changed. For example 6.0.27 was 474Mb, 6.0.28 was 1194Mb. Patch 6.0.30 had to download all the new cab files hence was a big download. Patch 6.0.34 also has all new cab files so again is big. The older way to patch P3D versions would be just as big, if for example all the scenery changed in the update. So in short we are still only downloading client or scenery etc. and installing that, except that now we are automatically notified of the updates and it is done for us if we accept.

ATC is following what is asked in your flight plan. The waypoint Intersection FANUP has defined an AT_OR_ABOVE flight level constraint of 19000 in Alt1FP: <ATCWaypoint id="FANUP"> <ATCWaypointType>Intersection</ATCWaypointType> <WorldPosition>N25° 38' 44.80",W78° 45' 58.99",+010000.00</WorldPosition> <Alt1FP>19000</Alt1FP> <AltDescFP>AT_OR_ABOVE</AltDescFP> <SpeedMaxFP>270</SpeedMaxFP> <ArrivalFP>OLAHS3</ArrivalFP> <ICAO> <ICAORegion>K</ICAORegion> <ICAOIdent>FANUP</ICAOIdent> </ICAO> </ATCWaypoint> Similarly the waypoint Intersection JEKER has defined an AT_OR_ABOVE flight level constraint of 14000 in Alt1FP: <ATCWaypoint id="JEKER"> <ATCWaypointType>Intersection</ATCWaypointType> <WorldPosition>N25° 42' 20.99",W79° 2' 49.77",+010000.00</WorldPosition> <Alt1FP>14000</Alt1FP> <AltDescFP>AT_OR_ABOVE</AltDescFP> <SpeedMaxFP>270</SpeedMaxFP> <ArrivalFP>OLAHS3</ArrivalFP> <ICAO> <ICAORegion>K</ICAORegion> <ICAOIdent>JEKER</ICAOIdent> </ICAO> </ATCWaypoint> in Flight Plan Definitions (flightsimulator.com) scroll down to Alt1FP and AltDescFP for descriptions of the flight plan items.

OK. Well done!

What I meant to say there is that when the sim is started up from the desktop shortcut there's a lot of code that is only loaded during the startup. In fact all file operations are accelerated with more cores or HT (or SMT) enabled.

...I have been considering more of what you said in your post, specifically: So you are saying you had CTDs before. Often this can be caused by a bad texture in an addon airport or imported traffic model. So depending on where you fly you may be in range of an airport with a bad texture or depending on the time of day or location where an AI aircraft is invoked that aircraft may have a bad texture. Then in another area flying gives no CTD. To check that through, it might be a good idea to eliminate imported AI aircraft and addon scenery for some test flights to be sure. Also it's possible when flying with some older aircraft made for P3D v4 and used in v5 to get odd results. For example, I tested a free Falcon model for a customer that had CTDs and sometimes caused P3D v5 to claim it was unregistered, that cleared after a restart of the sim. Also, sometimes after the sim was closed, a process of the sim was still running so that upon attempting to restart the sim, the sim stopped, claiming the sim was already running. In that case I had to close the rogue process from Task Manager whereby this process was appearing in the list of background processes. Problems were resolved by avoiding flying with that particular model.

Actually, I found CTD was possible in P3D v5 when they initially included the main thread scheduler locations in the jobscheduler section. Back then I found on one machine this result: During testing with different orders I recorded: Main, Render, Frame: is smoothest Main, Frame, Render: works OK Render, Frame, Main: works but less smooth Frame, Render, Main: works but less smooth Frame, Main, Render: CTD Render, Main, Frame: CTD Something I have have not since tested. It's best to keep the order - MainThreadScheduler before RenderThreadScheduler before FrameWorkerThreadScheduler since I never found a problem with that order.

Do you mean you tried the 10 LPs setting with HT on? (01,01,01,01,01,01,01,01,01,01=AffinityMask = 349525), and this is way hotter than 10 LPs (P3D default) with HT Disabled (1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1=AffinityMask = 1023). There should be only a very small difference since P3D is only using 10 LPs (one per core) either way. If so, it might well be something other than P3D utilizing the doubling of LPs when HT is enabled. I would look at the Task Manager graphs and check that when P3D is running (HT enabled) you see activity on LPs 0,2,4 etc. and little or no activity on LPs 1,3,5 etc.

...as a caveat to that, loading times from sim startup contain a lot of stuff loading up that does not improve with core count. So it is only a ballpark number to start with. When the loading times are getting near the same with increased cores there can still be milage in adding more cores for when the flight is underway. Experiment with that in mind, even though I said you don't "need" any more cores. As a quick test I went from 4 HT cores (35s) to 8 cores (25s) and then 16 cores (23s). I use 16 cores without heat issues but I don't have all the sliders to the right, mesh resolution at 19m and Texture res at 1m.

When we see only tiny increases in processing speed or in other words when we see only tiny reductions in loading time. If you experiment adding cores in the affinity settings you will see loading time come down by several seconds at first but later as you add cores this becomes only a second or less. At this stage you don't need any more cores.

Something I have not talked about in this thread is that as we increase the number of LPs (logical processors) dedicated to file processing, eventually we see only tiny increases in processing speed. At this stage there is not so much point in adding more LPs since this also places more load on the simulator to administer the extra tasks. The file processing is divided up between those LPs and as we increase the LP count we see each LP spending less time doing the processing, shortening the time of the file loading sequence. A way to see this behaviour is with Task Manager graphs displayed in LP view, watch as the simulator starts up and loads the initial scenery and objects the activity on those LPs shortens with each additional LP enabled in the jobscheduler settings. We can set the simulator to start up right into the cockpit by setting the Options, Application settings - unchecking "Show Scenario Startup Screen". Now when the simulator is started up it goes straight into the cockpit view of the default flight. The file processing performance can be seen to increase with each additional LP by timing how long it takes to get to the cockpit from a desktop shortcut startup. Remember that after freshly booting the PC the first time the simulator loads it will take longer as files are not cached, so it is best to do a few starts to settle in the system caching. With whatever display settings selected, the amount of work the CPU does to process the files is the same, work done is the same. However, as I already mentioned, with too many LPs enabled the simulator does a little more work to administer those extra tasks. In short, heat is generated more quickly with more LPs available and generated slower with less LPs. Overall it is the same. Dissipating that heat comes down to how efficiently the cooling system of the PC handles that.

Hi Sean, Let's look at what you get with HT Off in P3D v5... i9-10850K 10 core CPU with HT Off - typical P3D v5 setting using 10 LPs, one per core: HT Enabled 10 core HT Off 9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1,0=core number 1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1=AffinityMask = 1023 1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1=P3DCoreAffinityMask = 1023 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1=MainThreadScheduler = 0 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1,0,0=RenderThreadScheduler = 2 0,0,0,0,0,1,0,0,0,0=FrameWorkerThreadScheduler = 4 [JobScheduler] AffinityMask=1023 P3DCoreAffinityMask=1023 MainThreadScheduler=0 RenderThreadScheduler=2 FrameWorkerThreadScheduler=4 Let's mimic that with HT enabled... With HT Enabled using the same 10LPs: HT Enabled 10 core 20 LP affinity equivalent of HT Off 09,08,07,06,05,04,03,02,01,00=core number 01,01,01,01,01,01,01,01,01,01=AffinityMask = 349525 01,01,01,01,01,01,01,01,01,01=P3DCoreAffinityMask = 349525 00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,01=MainThreadScheduler = 0 00,00,00,00,00,00,00,01,00,00=RenderThreadScheduler = 2 00,00,00,00,00,01,00,00,00,00=FrameWorkerThreadScheduler = 4 [JobScheduler] AffinityMask=349525 P3DCoreAffinityMask=349525 MainThreadScheduler=0 RenderThreadScheduler=2 FrameWorkerThreadScheduler=4 I would check that first. If you have reasonable temperatures then you can start adding LPs to increase the file processing. The bottom line is that you can only increase file processing performance (which adds smoothness to the flight) in P3D going with more LPs enabled. Any increase in file processing performance will add heat to the CPU.

Stock scenery in P3D v5 is approximately 39Gb and includes 24,553 airports, stock scenery in P3D v6 is approximately 57Gb and includes 26,869 airports: P3D v5 Airports: 24553 Runways: 60534 Airways: 11209 Routes: 97312 Navaids: 8854 Waypoints: 187397 P3D v6 Airports: 26869 Runways: 62460 Airways: 11818 Routes: 98086 Navaids: 8929 Waypoints: 209107 (information extracted by Ideal Flight)

Good luck! When HT is enabled you get more file loading work done in the same time and since work=heat we may want to curb the amount of file loading tasks allowed or turn down the settings in P3D as I have shown. The jobscheduler theory I have provided in this thread should enable anyone to balance their CPU loads properly and allow the use of HT enabled on their CPU. Disabling HT very simply allows only one task per core and by doing that reduces the overall computer speed for all applications all the time. With the correct jobscheduler settings we need not disable HT at all for P3D and get the most out of the PC.