Posted: Sat Feb 27, 2010 2:45 pmA couple of things have come together this month, culminating in this flight. First was a query via my site asking why I didn't give an accurate list of system requirements for my scenery. This turned into a long email discussion about system performance, particularly the problems which people have with FSX.
My answer to the system requirements query always comes down to this: if you can run FSX to your liking, then you can run Real New Zealand scenery, and enjoy it. However there's no one-size-fits-all solution to the first part. Some people get better and better equipment, but are still not satisfied. Others just plod along with the default setup, and think this is all there is.
The web is full of tips on improving FSX performance, so I won't go there, but if you type 'how do I improve my fsx performance' into your search engine, I'd be surprised if you don't find a mountain of information.
Making sense of it is another issue. You really need to put some work into this if you want to see any real benefit. Just following tips willy-nilly will lead to frustration, and the chance of really screwing up your sim.
Anyway, back to my query. In the end, I decided that it was no good telling people what I knew to be true, if I hadn't put it into action myself. So I decided to make FSX run the way I liked it.
I don't mean ideally -- I don't have a games system, I have an old work-station. I mean good enough that I can immerse myself in flying, and make it real enough to suit my particular idea of what makes a good simming experience.
The other thing which got me thinking was a post on Avsim --A Miracle Tweak! -- which really demonstrates how there is as many solutions to simming performance as there are simmers.
But the basic premise is valid, especially for those of us with mediocre systems. Use the sliders in FSX to improve performance.
Sure, we all want to turn everything up, after-all we paid good money for the sim, and want to see it in all its glory. However we all know what happens when we do that -- it just doesn't work.
So first I needed to make a list of what I couldn't live without, what I could happily lose, and what was negotiable in the struggle between my pragmatic and imaginative selves.
A lot of the final result sprung from a cost-benefit analysis (hey, the pragmatic Rob normally wins). What gave the best and worst bang for the performance buck?
The following had to go:
Screen resolution. On my system GPU performance is a major limiting factor. Therefore the lower the resolution, the better the performance. I settled on 1280x960, a bit of a difference from my lovely 1680x1050, but a lot better than the old days...
Anti-aliasing. OMG, it took a lot to turn this off. I never thought I'd ever be without it, but the performance hit is about 50% on my system.
Water textures. All the way down to Low 1X...
These on 50%:
LOD Radius;
Mesh Complexity;
Mesh Resolution;
Special Effects Detail;
Autogen Density: a lot of tweakers recommend turning autogen off, but this is not acceptable to me. So 'Normal' has to do. Actually, I can turn this up in most circumstances without too much of a hit.
Scenery Complexity: extremely dense. I like to see my own fences...
Land Detail Texture and Scenery Shadows off. I love my scenery shadows, and this was the most difficult to give up. Ok, I can turn them on if I want, but for this exercise they don't make the cut. However this would motivate me to upgrade!
Weather: overall, Medium High. I just can't do without my Real REX weather.
Aircraft: Don't care, turn it down...
Traffic: Hmmm, various answers here, but for this flight, turn it off. (Apart from highway traffic -- a secret weakness...)
So here's the test -- a helicopter flight from the West Coast to Ashburton, real weather courtesy of REX2. Scenery courtesy of Vector Landclass beta...
...all at a steady locked 22FPS. I didn't take these screenshots to prove my point here, I took them because I liked the view.
No blurries, no brown desert expanse, no phoney atmospherics, all just good clean fun.
My answer to the system requirements query always comes down to this: if you can run FSX to your liking, then you can run Real New Zealand scenery, and enjoy it. However there's no one-size-fits-all solution to the first part. Some people get better and better equipment, but are still not satisfied. Others just plod along with the default setup, and think this is all there is.
The web is full of tips on improving FSX performance, so I won't go there, but if you type 'how do I improve my fsx performance' into your search engine, I'd be surprised if you don't find a mountain of information.
Making sense of it is another issue. You really need to put some work into this if you want to see any real benefit. Just following tips willy-nilly will lead to frustration, and the chance of really screwing up your sim.
Anyway, back to my query. In the end, I decided that it was no good telling people what I knew to be true, if I hadn't put it into action myself. So I decided to make FSX run the way I liked it.
I don't mean ideally -- I don't have a games system, I have an old work-station. I mean good enough that I can immerse myself in flying, and make it real enough to suit my particular idea of what makes a good simming experience.
The other thing which got me thinking was a post on Avsim --A Miracle Tweak! -- which really demonstrates how there is as many solutions to simming performance as there are simmers.
But the basic premise is valid, especially for those of us with mediocre systems. Use the sliders in FSX to improve performance.
Sure, we all want to turn everything up, after-all we paid good money for the sim, and want to see it in all its glory. However we all know what happens when we do that -- it just doesn't work.
So first I needed to make a list of what I couldn't live without, what I could happily lose, and what was negotiable in the struggle between my pragmatic and imaginative selves.
A lot of the final result sprung from a cost-benefit analysis (hey, the pragmatic Rob normally wins). What gave the best and worst bang for the performance buck?
The following had to go:
Screen resolution. On my system GPU performance is a major limiting factor. Therefore the lower the resolution, the better the performance. I settled on 1280x960, a bit of a difference from my lovely 1680x1050, but a lot better than the old days...
Anti-aliasing. OMG, it took a lot to turn this off. I never thought I'd ever be without it, but the performance hit is about 50% on my system.
Water textures. All the way down to Low 1X...
These on 50%:
LOD Radius;
Mesh Complexity;
Mesh Resolution;
Special Effects Detail;
Autogen Density: a lot of tweakers recommend turning autogen off, but this is not acceptable to me. So 'Normal' has to do. Actually, I can turn this up in most circumstances without too much of a hit.
Scenery Complexity: extremely dense. I like to see my own fences...
Land Detail Texture and Scenery Shadows off. I love my scenery shadows, and this was the most difficult to give up. Ok, I can turn them on if I want, but for this exercise they don't make the cut. However this would motivate me to upgrade!
Weather: overall, Medium High. I just can't do without my Real REX weather.
Aircraft: Don't care, turn it down...
Traffic: Hmmm, various answers here, but for this flight, turn it off. (Apart from highway traffic -- a secret weakness...)
So here's the test -- a helicopter flight from the West Coast to Ashburton, real weather courtesy of REX2. Scenery courtesy of Vector Landclass beta...
...all at a steady locked 22FPS. I didn't take these screenshots to prove my point here, I took them because I liked the view.
No blurries, no brown desert expanse, no phoney atmospherics, all just good clean fun.
