Am I demanding too much?

[Drewsta]

Hi guys, Just a query for the pc Guru's.

MY sim setup

CoreI5 760 2.8ghz turbo boosts to 3.2-3.3GHz with fs9 running.
Gigabyte p55 usb3.0 motherboard
4gig 1333mhz Ram
Nvidia GTX275 896MB
Nvidia 7600gt 256mb
360HDD 7200Rpm
winXP 32bit sp3
fs9/LVLD767/REX2004/Ultimateterrains/SB/Various airport addons/Fsuipc registered.

I have 3 projectors through a TH2go running at 1280x800 from port 1 on the gtx275 and the FDS FMC from the 2nd port same card. The 2 mip monitors (with splitter cable) running from the 7600gt. I'm not running sb or fspassengers yet and my frame rates are still a little too stuttery for my liking and takes away from the realism somewhat. I always test my system at KORD with grey and rainy set because it demands alot and If I can get that smooth it will be smooth everywhere else. I would love to squeeze say an extra 8-10 fps from the system if i can. I will run SB and weather from a 2nd networked pc. I have tweaked fs9 with the new Nhancer and with good info from forums. I 'm going to overclock my i5 to 3.6ghz if i can using the artic freezer pro rev 2.0. I live in Queensland Australia and it can reach 35c in summer  in the sim garage so i'm not sure i could overclock it anymore than that without problems.
I'm hoping that may give me the few extra frames im looking for or do you think i'm being to demanding of my system? The corei5 is doing an amazing job so far considering i am running absolutely everything from it at present except fspassengers or weather/sb. The reason i ask is that i've heard from other builders that they are running very similar setups with slightly slower machines and acheiving 40-50fps with fs9 maxed. I can't seem to get a steady 25 everywhere. A few small stutters or hiccups here and there at very dense areas i can handle, just a smooth overall flight would be nice. If i was running fsx i wouldnt be writing this but as its fs9 I was hoping I could get the smooth 25fps at least I am looking for. I seem to b be getting around 12-15 on the ground at Kord and around 20 when airborne. Using Vista scenery in australia and other addon sceneries  I get alittle better frames all round.

Any comments guys? Am i expecting too much or would this be achievable with the I5 or should I be looking at a faster I7?

Thanks for your input
Drew

[jackpilot]

Hi Drew
I'm far from a PC Guru! very far!
My ¼¢
Fs9 flies on machines much slower  than yours ( mine for instance) but in most cases as long as that PC is dedicated to scenery and only scenery.
Most of those who  get silky smooth display use PM or SimA on a network for instruments, with all slides maxed and tons of Addon scenery.
but...I have no experience with LevelD which seems to be a tough cookie for cockpitbuilding!
Jack

[Nat Crea]

Drew,

Everybody has different expectations.

All I can say is that I run ONE wideview client  i7920 @4.0Ghz PER projector ...
ie. 3 projectors + 3 i7's + another i5 PC to run FSX wideview Server= 4 visual
dedicated computers.

I know youre on FS9, but my set-up gives me just enough to make me happy...
but im a demanding b--ch remember

I think you maybe expecting too much...but thats just my experience...

Cheers,

Nat

[saabpilot]

Hi Drew,

Just a thought - the new Intel Sandy Bridge (2500K) I7:s are easy overclocked up to 4.5 Ghz and should probably do the job better than the I5.  They are not too expensive either.

Best,
Bjorn

[XOrionFE]

Someone correct me if I am wrong but I don't believe FS9 takes advantage of multiple processor cores.   

Therefore you could be loosing a lot of the advantage of the i5.  That is unless you can force addons to use the extra cores somehow.

Scott

[Bob Reed]

I think you are asking too much from the computer. To test this, load up the stock 737 and setup all you can. There will not be a CDU but close enough. What are you frame rates? Acceptable is my guess.

[saabpilot]

Hi Scott,

Right and wrong I believe.

FS9 is not a multi core program, however the Sandy Bridge (I7 2500K) gives a whopping 4.5 Mhz+ per core easily overclocked, and has a better (larger) cache.
Also it is possible to direct FS9 to a specified core that is kept free of other tasks.
The I5 processor is the predecessor of the Intel Core2Duo family but is a bit slow for FS with all/most on max.

FS9 and FSX both need to use the fastest possible CPU. 
5 Ghz however seems to be the limit, faster than that our "old" FS9 and FSX seems to have a hard time.

Bjorn

[Drewsta]

Hi guys, just following up with some interesting news. I Saved some new flights as I was playing around with the projectors and visuals. I did alot of testing with other addons and scenery and found my frame rates were excellent..very acceptable 25 plus fps. I went back to KORD and found they did drop somewhat but because that is just a demanding scenery area. (perhaps badly written software, who knows) I dropped the weather to fair conditions and I got good frames around that demanding scenery too. So the coreI5 really is an amazing machine considering its running everything.

Cheers
Drew

[NeoMorph]

Bjorn, I think you may got it backwards (but I could be wrong). I thought the Core2Duo was the predecessor to the I3,I5,I7 family of processors.

I've got an I5 clocked at 4ghz and it's stable as a rock while running FOUR monitors for FSX. I was trying to make it stutter thinking "No way this will be able to handle it" but it does. My Xbox 360 has crashed loads of times but this PC has crashed a total of two times (and that was running Crysis at max settings).

I'm actually wondering what FLIGHT is going to ask of our computers more than FS9/FSX.

[saabpilot]

    
Swedish is my native language. 
Sorry for the misuse of "predecessor".

The Core2Duo is of course the ancestor to the I3/I5 processors.

Best from Sweden,
Bjorn

[Joe Lavery]

Hi Bjorn,

I think in your original message you meant to say " the i5 is the successor to the Core2Duo"
Incidentally your English is perfect, I'm sure very few of us would be able to write in Swedish 

Regards
Joe.