Hello, avsim community! Hope y'all are doing good.
After five years of hiatus I returned to the world of flight simulation, built new PC, performed full Prepar3d v5 installation and absolutely loving it! My fps never drop below 30 and everything is running cool.
However, recently I ran into this very strange problem.
I mostly fly PMDG 737NGXu in Europe and my main base of operations is London Stansted airport. I noticed that every time I take-off and head directly east, after several minutes of climbing I begin to experience extreme freezes (every freeze can last between couple seconds and a minute - the longer ones mean the sim goes into the "not responding" state for its duration - but in the end it always recovers). After I fly a bit further, those freezes stop, and everything reverts back to absolutely smooth flight.
I started my investigation, switched off all addons - it is happening even in the very basic scenario in the clean sim state (default F-35, clear skies etc.), but every time in the same location. Even if I slew my aircraft there, put the sim on pause, and just rotate the camera. I began to tune down my graphics settings and found that the single slider is responsible - the "special effects detail" one. When I put it to Low - freezes are gone. Anything higher than Low - freezes come back.
My PC is high-end, and is handling all other setting at near-maximum values with no problem at all.
The general area, where I experience these freezes - (N51*53' E1*5'), and it is the only one so far. I can't figure out, what's so special about this place. There is absolutely no demanding scenery or anything else there. Even more confusing - what does it have to do with the special effects setting?
I have tried every possible combination of hardware and affinity mask settings, but the result is always the same. I am yet to find any logical explanation of such behavior, as well as any means of mitigating it.
Any help will be highly appreciated.