Low FPS at airport (FSX)

[cmpbllsjc]

Just got the scenery this morning and you guys or Martin specifically did a wonderful job. I can see why it took one man a year to complete, lol.

Anyway, I am seeming to have a little issue with FPS, specifically when at the airport itself or facing it. I new I might have an issue when I first installed it and loaded the default Bell 206 and saw that I couldn't get more than 19 FPS when on or around the airport and 15 FPS tops in the NGX.

I've tried disabling all the "extras" in the install menu, turned off all AI (plane, car, boat) and still cant get more than 19 FPS when around the field. Now in the NGX as soon as I take off and fly around the city, as long as the airport isn't in view the FPS are 25 to 35 even when all the high rise buildings are in view, but as soon at the airport comes in the the FPS plummet back to the mid teens.

As an extra test, I turned off the majority of the vegetation BGL's and it didn't seem to make any FPS difference, in fact even leaving all the trees and all the install "extra's" turned on, I get the same FPS as I do when I have those features turned off.

I am guessing the FPS issue I am having is directly related to something at the airport but cant nail it down since disabling features and vegetation objects doesn't seem to make a difference and the FPS are only bad when the airport is in view.

I do have an older rig, E8400 at 3.85ghz, 2GB RAM, GTS250 OC video card and XP32bit. Now even with the low RAM I dont have any issues with blurries, or texture loading when changing views, just that the FPS are bad around the airport itself.

In the Bad FPS (FS2004) thread I think Martin said he might have identified something with the terminals that might cause issues for people with older rigs. I'm not sure if the same thing could be related with the FSX version or not, but seems to be a similar problem since I only have a problem with the airport in view.

If you have any ideas or things for me to test I am all up for it since the mid to low teens in the heavies makes it hard to enjoy.

Regards

[george[flytampa]]

Respectfully, I'm sure we can get another 1 or 2 fps out of the terminals if we spend hours nit picking but you please must bare this in mind....

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.p ... 0GTS%20250

[cmpbllsjc]

Respectfully, I'm sure we can get another 1 or 2 fps out of the terminals if we spend hours nit picking but you please must bare this in mind....

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.p ... 0GTS%20250

Yeah, I dont want you to fiddle with it for 1 or 2 FPS. The only reason I mentioned the terminal was since you had mentioned it in the FS9 thread about FPS. I thought what ever it was you might have "found", might also apply to the FSX version.

On the subject of the video card, I was always under the impression that FSX was more CPU driven for sheer FPS than it was from a GPU, hence a better GPU wouldn't make that much of a difference in the FPS problem. Not to say that a new one wouldn't help, but I didn't think it would really boost FPS that much. I am actually in the process of building a new rig and just bought a 2700k and Asus V-Pro mobo, just need to gather the rest of the parts and finish. It will be interesting to see how much difference on an updated rig.

I guess I will just let it be for the time being and see how it runs when I finish the new build. Overall it looks like everyone with newer/better rigs haven't had any issues. I was surprised that I finally got a scenery that bogged me down a little. I've got just about all major payware airports and run them all well, except the big ORBX hubs.

[martin[flytampa]]

FSX is still CPU dependent but unlike FS9 it can handle extremely high poly and texture intense 3D models with ease. This isn't obvious everywhere because FSX also does other tasks like Land/Water geometry, mesh, AI etc that have little to do with the excellent 3D model rendering part of the engine.

So in a place that is burdened by other assets being processed (such as NYC or other US cities) fps are low to begin with. Because of how the FSX engine prioritizes tasks/threads, adding a heavy airport scenery to such locations often has little effect on the fps (that were low to being with). Thats why we hear claims like AirportX is as fast or faster then default, despite the Addon adding 500.000 polys and 500 MB of textures to the workload.

Attached some comparisons I just took ... What this tells me is this:

1. On my 2,5 year old computer "dumb" scenery 3D models have little impact and removing or LOD'ing some of the 3D is a waste of time. 1.6 fps (margin of error) gained by completely removing terminals, jetways, static apron clutter.

2. FSX's AI engine is abysmal and the main reason performance goes down the drain on big hubs.

3. I have not seen default OMDB in over a year... our scenery looks slightly better so was worth the effort

Results will vary on different hardware of course, and FSX likely does not scale the same way on older gen Gfx cards etc.

[cmpbllsjc]

Wow, I can't believe you have 79 FPS with no AI on an older rig or 35 with some AI, that's impressive. I'll just have to wait until my new build is done and hopefully I will be getting the same performance as in your examples. Guess in this case its just a combination of things with my rig showing its age that I cant get the performance I desire out of this particular scenery.

[martin[flytampa]]

If you get actual current hardware, Ivy Bridge i7, 8Gigs, NV6XX series... you should be seeing much higher fps then mine. George maybe able to tell you what he gets at Flydubai, I recall it being much higher with AI.

[booforty]

I use this software to get extra fps and its worth every penny, read the reviews!

http://secure.simmarket.com/fsps-xtreme-fsx-pc.phtml

[george[flytampa]]

I am actually in the process of building a new rig and just bought a 2700k and Asus V-Pro mobo, just need to gather the rest of the parts and finish. It will be interesting to see how much difference on an updated rig.

That'll be a good system, I have the 2600K. Don't forget a decent gfxcard, it doesn't have to be too expensive either.

[cmpbllsjc]

I use this software to get extra fps and its worth every penny, read the reviews!

http://secure.simmarket.com/fsps-xtreme-fsx-pc.phtml

No thanks. Before his recent passing, Michael Greenblatt of FS-GS did my whole setup. I have gotten as much as is technically possible out of the hardware that I am currently using. When I finish my next build, since FS-GS is no longer, I will use NickN's OS setup guide for Win7 and his FSX setup guide. That's as close as I will be able to get to an FS-GS type service. No need for payware programs to shut down services and things of that nature when I can do it all for free.

[cmpbllsjc]

I am actually in the process of building a new rig and just bought a 2700k and Asus V-Pro mobo, just need to gather the rest of the parts and finish. It will be interesting to see how much difference on an updated rig.

That'll be a good system, I have the 2600K. Don't forget a decent gfxcard, it doesn't have to be too expensive either.

Yeah, since the 2700K overclocks well in the 4.5 to 5.0ghz range, I should be good for the next 4 years I'll probably start to accelerate my purchasing to get this rig finished quickly to start enjoying this scenery. I had been picking parts at a slow pace up until now. The only thing that I am having a hard time deciding on is what GPU to get as well as which RAM. I've read conflicting info on RAM regarding Sandy Bridge saying that you need to run RAM that is rated at 1,5v for my CPU, while others (majority) say 1,6 to 1,65v RAM is fine as long as you keep the VCCIO voltage within .5v of whatever the RAM voltage is rated at, and some say you dont even need to do that.

Anyway, it will be interesting to see how the new build will perform. The way I look at it is if I generally get pretty stellar performance in FSX out of the system I have now, which is severally limited, then a new rig at a higher OC with a lot more and faster RAM, plus a better video card, it will probably blow my mind.

[cmpbllsjc]

Happy to report that my problem with the low FPS is solved. When I first installed the package yesterday I went straight into testing it out and hadn't done a defrag yet. Usually on smaller scenery packages a defrag after install doesn't seem to make much difference, but with the size of this package it did.

After running a defrag and reboot, I can happily say that while FPS aren't as good as what you guys get on your hardware, I can get 25 to 30 around the airport with AI on (not cars though) and 30 to 40 around the city. Its even higher in the default Bell 206 which I struggled to get even 20 FPS with yesterday.

I've never seen a defrag make that much of a difference in the past for performance but in this case it made a huge difference.

[martin[flytampa]]

Very glad to hear that. I was surprised too at first when you said a defrag made such a difference but looking again at your RAM only being 2GB, I can see why. Your computer must be constantly loading data off the harddrive and using the Pagefile while moving around Dubai.

RAM is so cheap these days and while FSX is a 32bit app, I recommend you install Win7 64bit and get at least 6GB. With 8 or 12GB you can even turn the Pagefile off completely in Windows.

[cmpbllsjc]

[quote="martin[flytampa]"Very glad to hear that. I was surprised too at first when you said a defrag made such a difference but looking again at your RAM only being 2GB, I can see why. Your computer must be constantly loading data off the harddrive and using the Pagefile while moving around Dubai.[/quote]

I'm sure that was the case and is the reason the defrag made a difference in this case. When I fly in some of those super dense ORBX areas the disk swapping must be off the charts.

[quote="martin[flytampa]
RAM is so cheap these days and while FSX is a 32bit app, I recommend you install Win7 64bit and get at least 6GB. With 8 or 12GB you can even turn the Pagefile off completely in Windows.[/quote]

I will. I am going Win7 64bit and 8gb of the G.Skill 2133mhz CL9 ram with the 2700K I just got. Really excited to see the difference on a 64bit rig with 8gb of ram vs. my 2gb.