Addicted2FSX

Hello All, I have been indecisive on purchasing FTX Global since it's release and have a few questions that maybe some of you can answer that would probably help my decision (and others) on going forward with purchasing FTX global or leaving it alone. First before I start with the questions I would like to note that from what I have read about FTX Global in forums a vast majority of simmers claim its outstanding and others say it has many issues. Like other addons, issues will be expected for a brand new product especially one that covers the whole world...That is simple. In addition to FTX Global, Like most users if you plan on purchasing this you are more than likely looking into purchasing Global Vector or at least considering it so there will be some questions regarding that as well. I myself currently own a couple of orbx regions and I must say that I am very impressed with the level of quality that orbx has put into these regions and the airports I have purchased. I will also add that I am even more impressed with the performance you get when using orbx products. They are very good on frames(at least the ones I have), but every PC is different! One would also expect such orbx products to mesh seamlessly with FTX Global. I understand that there are a lot of loyal orbx customers out there that are not going to give an honest opinion of an orbx product simply because of their loyalty. I am asking not for biased opinions but simply YOUR honest 2 cents from your personal experience. Everyone has a different idea of how their simulator should look and that's why some products are not for certain simmers. Let the questions begin... 1. How friendly is FTX Global with other addon airports? 2. Is FTX Global "Fully" compatible with UTX? 3. Is the quality of FTX Global similar or better than an orbx FTX region? 4. Do any users have issues with Hybrid mode? 5. Is there a way to disable FTX global for certain parts of the world if you wish to use other scenery? 6. Do users prefer Global Vector versus other terrain such as Ultimate Terrain X? 7. Are a good percentage of users experiencing a significant performance hit with FTX Global? 8. Are a good percentage of users experiencing a significant performance hit with Global Vector? 9. How friendly is FTX Global with other addons in general? 10. Is orbx addressing the problems users are experiencing in their patches or do the issues remain? 11. Has Orbx created an uninstaller for FTX Global and does it successfully wipe the program from FSX without having to reinstall the sim? 12. In your opinion, is the value of FTX Global "good enough" or do users need to spend more of their money on openLC packs and other DLC from orbx to have better quality?

Ive tried the PMDG NGX in the same situation with REX,GEX,and other addons and I get an average of 18-20 FPS with it. At this point I was satisfied because visually, the sim was enjoyable at least so I lowered my frame limit to 20. It still managed to stay just under 20 most of the time at 19. From my past experiences with other aerosoft scenery, such as Madrid and Frankfurt it seems that aerosoft seems to push my system pretty hard! At madrid with a frame rate friendly addon like the CLS a330 I was seeing average 7 frames per second! Im curious to know how other peoples machines react to aerosoft scenery? I installed all of my chipset drivers very carefully doing a restart after every installation and I just updated to the newest nV drivers that came out on 7-1-13. My bufferpools I set at UsePools=0 because I have a strong graphics card but this setting seems to nothing for me as well! Same with HIGHMEMFIX=1, that did nothing whats so ever for my addon aircrafts performance. Ive heard that setting is just supposed to help compatibility with addons. Again I dont understand why my FSX runs on all cores when I set AffinityMask=14! Ive tried it set to =7 and it doesnt utilize core 1 "as much" meaning that 0,2,and 3 cores are all using close to 100% of the cores and 1 fluctuates from 20-40%. Im guessing this is because of programs running outside of FSX. If I manually set the affinity for FSX.exe in the task manager to use cores 1,2, and 3 it slows my Sim down to 7 FPS and lower!

I have looked into the BIOS almost a million times to see what settings could be possibly effecting the performance and i'm stumped! All my voltages are ok and going by what my BIOS monitor says and cpu-z my CPU always stays below 40 degrees C. I have C-states disabled as well as all power saving features so the clock speed isn't adjusted. As far as the sliders, ive done a simple test by setting the hard hitting scenery sliders all the way to the left as well as tried them all the way to the right...NO difference in performance. I tried tweaking my cfg countless times and the same thing, no difference. There is one setting though that seems to play a factor; the FIBER_FRAME_TIME_FRACTION. Ive tried this with multiple numbers and seen the different results and its interesting. At first when I try the default .33 I get 12-13 average FPS in the VC of the captain sim 777 at aerosoft chicago. When i change the value to .25 "once in a while" I get 1 more FPS. With the number set to .15 I get a slow horrible running sim with an average of 8 FPS. I thought the lower the number the better your frames are supposed to be? What did your final build end up being?

I have a question; how come when i start recording with fraps the frames drop significantly with 1920x1080x32? They also drop with 720 but not as much. The default resolution(i forgot what it was) has no frame drop with fraps. What is it about 720 and 1080 that make fraps want to eat fps? I also tried bandicam and same thing! can't put my finger around it and i searched for an answer and can't figure it out.

thanks for the reply, I agree, i figured since I managed to get my processor up to 5 ghz than the processor itself is pretty strong and I also figured that if it was degraded like you said I would problably just get alot BSODs or other crashes, which thankfully I don't...knock on wood! As far as the video card is concerned; the gtx 680 that I use was taken from my other computer to put in this machine. I was wondering also, since sometimes(especially under heavy scenery) ill get those tacky black squares on lights in the sim and other stutters could there maybe be an issue with my video card? I just updated to the newest nvidia drivers.

Hello, First and formost, I love flight simulation and FSX. I consider it my favorite hobby and even 7 years after this old software came out its still enjoyable today as it was in 2006! I also consider this post to be a cry for help in bettering my sim quality! I appreciate everyone who wants to help and gladly apreciate it if you do. If your a negative person with a poor attitude and plan on giving non-productive advice than do me a favor and please quit reading this and continue what you were doing before you stumbled upon this topic! If you can relate or have had similar issues I would love to hear about those as well! Sorry for the length of this thread but i felt it was the best way to explain what ive tried and what hasn't been done for the reader to better assist in a solution or fix. Im having issues with of course; the main problem with FSX- "Frame Rates" Ive had my system now for about a year and I use it strictly for flight sim so i dont know how it would act towards other software but I can't seem to figure out why it just doesn't like FSX! My main hardware is listed below: CPU: i7 2700k @ 4.5 MOBO: ASUS sabertooth z77 RAM: corsair vengeance 16gb @ 1866 GPU: EVGA GTX 680 PSU: corsair AX1200 COOLER: corsair h100 Also I will note that I am running FSX acceleration on Windows 7 64bit basic home premium and all updates installed and I use nvidia inspector. I have an SSD for FSX itself, an SSD for the OS, and a 1tb WD harddrive for other programs and where I keep the scenery files for FSX. I figured with these components i should be getting fairly good frame rates out of FSX...shouldn't i? but i don't! first i will start by saying that what I consider "good" frame rates is 20-30 at all times. Im getting an average of 10-14 FPS in the captain sim 777 with aerosofts chicago with alot of the sliders to the left with GEX, REX, scenery-tech, accu-feel, and ENB series. Ive configured my ENB to where it has no performance hit and ive tested regular "raw" FSX with no addons except the captain sim 777 and i get around around 18-20 with the default chicago and 24 fps with the PMDG 737. Also im using FRAPS to record and fraps loves to bite off half of the fps with 1080p. So if i wanted to record i would be left with usually 7 to 8 fps to work with! Why it does this I don't know, maybe you do?!? So after countless fresh FSX installations, a couple of OS re-installs, a million new cfgs and tweaks(useless), TONS of trial and error, Money wasted on parts, and sleepless nights ive come to think that maybe I simply have bad luck! Ive pondered buying a 3970x or 3960x processor thinking that one of those would help but after researching i think that would be a waste of a perfectly good $1000 seeing that those processor's only pros over the 2600/2700k is that they have a bigger cache, and more cores(which are useless for fsx). Not too mention I would probley cry after handing over $1000 dollars to intel for a processor that would only give me slightly better performance in the sim. That being said, i didn't spend this much money to keep spending money looking for a solution to one sim. I really love simming and all the addons and i can't even imagine not doing it, but the performance issues really take the excitement out of it and I spend 95% of the time testing and tweaking rather than flying! I don't want to give up FSX even after 7 years but even tell this day there is no way to enjoy the game with my beautiful addons! I test the captain sim 777 at aerosoft chicago like i stated earlier in windowed mode with task manager showing performance and even with affinity mask set at 14 its still running in all cores. Also changing anything in my cfg does not do anything to the sim! I can change any number or setting in my cfg and ill always get the same results except if you change the physical things like resolution or frame rate limit which I keep at 30 by the way! Also, in task manager it shows FSX is using 100% of my cpu, i know its a cpu dependent game so i figure thats normal, but i wonder if anyone doesn't get that with huge addons? I have also tried different downloads of the aircraft and addons to ensure there is not a corrupt installation. When it comes to the overclocking side of things ive tried different clocks and tested each one with NO DIFFERENCE to the sim! Overclocking for me did nothing, maybe 1 or 2 fps at the most, and ive managed to get my processor as high as 5.0! my cpu doesnt seem any faster and there is no way to tell because i get the same scores on benchmarks as i would with the base clock! These scores are usually lower than average too so its frustrating. FSX depends alot on processor speed and even today the 2700k/2600k get the best overclock over anything and the best temps for that overclock so when it comes to buying a new processor there really isn't anything significantly better thats worth the money! So what im thinking is...Is it possible since ive seen other users get great performance with this processor and the 2600k could maybe mine be a lemon? The 2600k/2700k are the first processors that pop up when you think FSX so why am i not getting exceptional performance like ive seen in other users? I would like to know would it be worth maybe buying a new 2600k or 2700k to see if the performance is different with another one or could there just be a bottleneck in my system somewhere preventing my processor of using all of its potential? I am desperate now and I can't see putting the sim away even after 7 years but this is a frustrating problem not worth investing tons of money and time in to achieve the same results! You can't tell me ALL of these users who have these nice lifelike youtube videos with no stutters and no lag and maxed out settings really get only 10-15 fps in this aircraft and have FANTASTIC video editing skills!! Is there anyway of knowing if my processor is bogging down? Also just a thought but ive noticed alot of people still use the outdated i7 920 and see great fsx results with that even though the highest speed you can achieve with one of those is 4.2, and thats only with the most special cherry picked 920s in the batch! I wonder what the population's thoughts are on these processors even today? I've also been curious about Haswell. Ive heard mixed reviews about the 4770k. Some people say yay, some nay. Some say performance couldnt get any better and the frame rates are amazing with fsx and others say its nothing special and has crappy overclocking ability and worst than ivy-bridge temperatures when overclocked! Does anyone have an honest opinion on that one? My last thought was maybe i should wait tell tax season and purchase the mysterious 4970x that "should" be out this september! its rumored to have 10% better performance than the 3970 which isnt much but its gotta be better than the performance im getting! If so, there goes 1000 of my hard earned tax dollars all over again.

MAN...I am pleased to say that after alot of trial and error, reinstalling programs, overclock tweaking, and changing all sorts of settings i have finally achieved a great FSX! I didn't even think it was possible to get a locked 30 fps in the Captain Sim 777 until now which i am achieving on the ground in the VC! Next up, NGX. I probley owe the most to Nvidia Inspector and my bios settings but none the less I have a great looking simulator. There are still some places i get minor stutters but nothing major. Im glad i am finally getting the kind of performance i should be from my 2700k! My water in my game looks beautiful as well! Hopefully now i can start enjoying my addons with a whole new level of detail and performance.

well you know i would be satisfied with 20 smooth fps but depending on what AC im in and scenery i can get 14(CS777) to 35(AirbusX) in the air at low altitude, but i have many stutters! I would like to find out a way to reduce those.

I usually have HT disabled all the time. My temps arent bad(avg37c) but like you said if i go over a certain temp it might try to downclock the cpu. I knew that happens with video cards but didnt know the CPU can be limited by that as well. I still havent OCed it again so im still running the plain jane cpu but getting pretty good FPS(19-31) on the ground and 35-100 in the sky. This is with GEX and ENB series installed so far on the fresh install. The 100+FPS is usually at around 20,000 feet and higher. The higher you go the better the frames get. In regards to Fullmetal02 I strongly agree which is why ill probably keep wasting my money on PC upgrades in hopes of running an 8 year old game at its finest! IMO That is another reason to keep playing it...to see if you can achieve the results you want with this years setup haha. That and the fact that its the most "practical" simulator out there next to Xplane which i have yet to try due to the fact that ive always stuck with FS since 2000 when the twin towers were still part of the manhattan skyline! Im sure in 8-10 years from now there are going to be some people(me for sure) that are going to get bored with the current game they are playing and stick FSX in their current setup to see how well it does with a 2023 PC. Those people are going to be dissapointed when FSX is running the very same as it is now! I dont want to believe it though. Its a shame that microsoft didnt want to keep the series running but who knows what p3d will achieve. Today im going to try more installing and see where my performance pans out with more and more things being slowly added.

Yes thats what ive always come to think in the end. Although alot of people claim these little tweaks are the difference between night and day in their FSX i still believe that inside the game itself you are doing the same exact thing with the settings menu. Balancing the Sliders plays a key role in how your sim will perform. With out a shadow of a doubt i do believe that some of these tweaks can cause noticible differences in some peoples performance but only because they have a good balance of hardware.

JUST HAD A TEST FLIGHT IN THE DEFAULT 747 OUT OF KJFK WITH 49-63 FPS SMOOTH!! Had around 19-29 FPS at jfk with default 737. ALL SCENERY SLIDERS MAXED EXCEPT THE MESH ONES WHICH WERE ALMOST MAXED. Traffic at 50% and only light bloom and Antialiasing unchecked. Most who fly this region in FSX know that the whole New York area is a Frame eater but i made out pretty good this time. Heres what ive done so far: FIRST OF ALL, I went back to my vanila cpu. nothing special, just the original "out of the box" default processor. Then i uninstalled ALL ADDONS and FSX itself. Then i wiped the drive clean and rid my registry of all the old FSX stuff. Then i did a fresh install of FSX on the same drive but this time my cpu is not overclocked. Then i did a test flight with the 747. it was alright- getting around 19-30 smooth FPS. Then i used NICKN's Nvidia Inspector guide. http://www.simforums...topic36586.html Then i tweaked the sliders to the settings stated above. Finally i went into my FSX.cfg file and added the HIGHMEMFIX=1 just to start with to see how the game acts. Although HIGHMEMFIX=1 is probably not going to help my frames in a default Aircraft im adding the necessary tweaks little by little after every test flight to see how much performance i can gain just on my CPU running at stock speed. Next im going to try to add the AffinityMask=14 to see if i can achieve more out of FSX and also i will begin to experiment with some addons.

i meant i use either "4096" or "2048" not both numbers but i still get the same performance. i guess its because i dont have any 4096 textures except REX. What ive actually trying now is what ryanbatcund suggested and uninstalling FSX and doing a fresh install with the default bios settings with my cpu at regular speed and checking stability. I think I might install all of my addons at this speed too. Id like to think of it as liking my girlfriend without makeup! Getting to know what my processor can do straight out of the box!

i tried the CFG uploader before and for some reason it made my sim Worse. had lots of stutters and tearing. I deleted my FSX.cfg and let it make another one. except in the new one i added just a few entries such as: [JOBSCHEDULER] AffinityMask=14 [bUFFERPOOLS] Poolsize=0 [GRAPHICS] ForceFullScreenVSync=1 TEXTURE_MAX_LOAD=4096 and 2048- same performance HIGHMEMFIX=1 [MAIN] FIBER_FRAME_TIME_FRACTION=0.20 [TERRAIN] LOD_RADIUS=6.500000 After adding these i didnt see anything i could really notice in terms of performance. Some people say they do some say they dont. What led me to think something is wrong is no matter what i do and what i tweak im getting the same performance. Well not actually because when i get in the NGX at any airport the frames go down. thats the only downfall to that great product, it eats resources.

hi, thanks for replying. I tried setting Antialaising inside Nvidia inspector to overide application and it didnt seem to work as well as the game setting. Also right now i have it set to enhance the application. That makes my FSX look realistic as it can get without video editing. I highly recommend this setting to anyone with high frame rates to try out! especially with high AA settings. As far as addons, i use the usuall PMDG NGX and Airbus X. lately ive been flying the CLS A330 alot. I do alot of flights out of UK2000s heathrow because its good scenery with alright frames. I got Aerosoft Madrid and had to uninstall it because i felt like i was watching a slide show haha. i thought id install it again after i try to higher my performance.

I am new to AVSIM, thought i would post to see if anyone is having the same performance issues as i am or possibly a solution to my (hair pulling :mad:) problem. My Frame rates are fluctuating from 7-30 FPS at any airport(addon scenery and default) any aircraft(addon aircraft or default) and do not go any higher than my record 31 fps :lol: . My average is about 21 FPS in the air and 11 FPS on the ground. I have FSX gold which comes with Acceleration so both service packs are installed. My setup goes as follows: HERES THE KICKER- I7 2700K CPU OVERCLOCKED TO 4.8GHZ(SCRATCHING MY HEAD) ASUS P8Z68-V PRO/GEN3 MOBO 1200W PSU 8GB VENGEANCE RAM @2133MHZ EVGA NVIDIA GTX 680 VIDEO CARD WITH 2GBS OF V MEMORY OCZ AGILITY 3 480GB SSD(ONLY FSX INSTALLED ON THIS) I am getting the same performance on fsx now as i did when my processor was not overclocked!!! In fact I recently restored default settings in my bios and for some wierd reason FSX loaded textures quicker without the overclock!! same frames though. what ive already tried: Ive already tried the ******* tweak! -after this i had crazy stutters, horrible FPS, and slow texture loading in the default 747! Ive already tried setting frames unlimited- no difference Ive already tried an External frame limiter- set at high 60 fps or above w/ the FSX limiter at 40 gives best results(31fps not locked goes down to 18 in some areas) also lots of shimmering and tearing when moving camera angles. Ive already tried changing things around in Nvidia Inspector- yeilds alright FPS but who wants to fly a plane that looks like FS 2000? Besides i have sufficient hardware that should handle it fine. The best results ive had and that is 30 FPS LOCKED with no stutters or shimmering was with Word Not Allowed's Hardware and Tuning guide. I would stick to these settings but with Antialiasing turned off i might as well have saved a few hundred bucks and not have built such an expensive machine, or spent all the money on addons to have the same look as freeware! I get frustrated when i hear that people are getting smooth 60fps and higher in their sims with alright hardware and im barely pulling 28 on a good day with high end components! there has to be something not right to have such a high overclock and no better performance. I even tried it at 5.0ghz and still no difference! Im sure there is a setting missing somewhere.