Best Computer/Graphic Card for FSX

Although my system is not the highest, but it is still fairly decent AMD 4400X2 2.4Ghz OC, 2GB of Ram and a 7800GT OC. I can't manage to put the sliders on full and can only manage around medium high settings with autogen on sparse for good performance. I thought my system would fair better, but every edition of Flight simulator has required high specs to look their best.
If you want Flight simulator on its max then I'd imagine you would end up with a costly system. Something like a Core 2 Duo 2, 2GB or more and the very best high end Graphics card from ATI or Nvidia.

You would think that, but even on my Core 2 Duo (E6600 OC'd to 2.9Ghz) system running with Dual NVidia 7900GTXs in SLI, the system can still be brought to a crawl with everything turned on.

Flyer4000 wrote:

If you want Flight simulator on its max then I'd imagine you would end up with a costly system. Something like a Core 2 Duo 2, 2GB or more and the very best high end Graphics card from ATI or Nvidia.

Use the drop down to see which card you want.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/09/26/the_best_gaming_video_cards_for_the_money/

does a sound card make a difference? Are you running a sound card? If so switching it on and off make a diff? I've found that since installing a sound card on my system for fs9 it raised the frame rate by twice. Makes sense I guess, takes the load off the cpu for sound. So I'm wondering if the lame frame rates in FSX may be partially resulting from sound on the main chip. I'm wanting to build a system to run this flightsim and need information. Thanks.

They have a new site on Microsoft..... Here are their stats for recommended equipment for Flight Simulator X

Item Minimum Recommended Best
CPU 1.0 GHz 2.8 GHz 3.6 GHz
Memory 256 MB 1 GB 2 GB
Video card 32 MB 64 MB 512 MB
Internet 56.6 modem Broadband Broadband
Other Sound card
Speakers or headphones
Joystick or Xbox 360 Controller for Windows
Microphone (required for RT voice)

Maybe you folks can help. I have a HP a810n desktop, Athlon 64 3300+ processor, 1gb pc3200 DDR SDRAM. The graphics card is an ATI 9550. I'm looking into upgrading to a PCI card. My budget is $200-250 US. The ATI X1650 512mb card looks good, but I don't know. Any ideas, suggestions, reviews? I've heard the Athlon proc is not the ideal for FSX, so I'm looking for ways to tweak this sytem to make it work nicely. Thanks.[/b]

that table I posted above is direct from Microsoft. You might want to compare what you have to that.

only problem chaps, is that i have everything that they reccommend for best performance, and still cannot have any of the sliders at max, so their reccommendations suck!

Dont listen to rubbish like that, you wont get what you expect.

Micah

could you please list what exactly you have for components?

I am going to try and do further research on this through Microsoft.. their chat link is...

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=gp;en-us;cu_chat&ssl=1

For anyone interested, nVidia DX10 compatible graphics cards are now available. Starting price around £350 UK pounds sterling!

According to a test I recently read, one of those is better than the best of the previous cards run in SLI, ie. two cards.

So the price looks high, but one of these is apparently faster than any two of the others.

Available at present from Novatech.co.uk, but supplies will be very limited.

Right wrong or indifferent I talked with Microsoft via phone concerning this and this is the information they gave me about getting the most graphics capability from FSX.

Microprocessor:

a) If buying processor of Intel Core Duo E6600 then go for Intel Motherboard that is Intel 955X (Model No. D955XBK)

b) If buying processor of AMD Athlon 64x2 4800 FX then go for Asus motherboard (Model Name: Crossfire).

Display Card:

a) Getforce 7900 GTX, manufacturing company is NVIDIA.

b) Getforce 8800 GTX, manufacturing company is NVIDIA.

c) ATI X1900 (PCI Express card), manufacturing company is Radon

I asked for real-life information not just spec information.

I have an

AMD Athlon 64 939 Socket 4800 Dual Core
Windows XP x64 Professional
single 6600GT PCI Express Graphics Card
1 Gigabyte RAM
1 x 37 Gigabyte SATA "Raptor" drive
1 x 300 Gigabyte regular SATA drive
Cooler Master Stacker case

Thermotalke big typhoon cooler for CPU
http://www.virtual-hideout.net/reviews/Tt_Big_Typhoon_VX/index.shtml

I am getting about sixteen frames in the widerness in Alaska and down to five frame at Seattle Airport

Really I doubt if there is any Cross Fire / SLI based single processor socket dual core machine that can run this software at acceptable frame rates.

Best and Warm Regards
Adrian Wainer

psalm10720 wrote:

Right wrong or indifferent I talked with Microsoft via phone concerning this and this is the information they gave me about getting the most graphics capability from FSX.

Microprocessor:

a) If buying processor of Intel Core Duo E6600 then go for Intel Motherboard that is Intel 955X (Model No. D955XBK)

b) If buying processor of AMD Athlon 64x2 4800 FX then go for Asus motherboard (Model Name: Crossfire).

Display Card:

a) Getforce 7900 GTX, manufacturing company is NVIDIA.

b) Getforce 8800 GTX, manufacturing company is NVIDIA.

c) ATI X1900 (PCI Express card), manufacturing company is Radon

I asked for real-life information not just spec information.

Right the simple analysis of that is that if you spend a sack full of money on high end components you will be able to get a middleing sixteen to the low twenty frames performance out of FSX and not all the sliders pushed to the max alternatively you could buy a shed full of add-ons for FS9 or if your present computer is so out of date it is not worth playing FS9 on it or upgrading to play FS9 you could buy a lower specification machine and have FS-9 whizzing along at high frame rates and the sliders set to the max!

Best and warm Regards
Adrian Wainer

With

ASUS A8N32 Deluxe Mobo 939 Socket
AMD 64 +4400 Dual-Core
4 Gb of mem
GeForce 7950GTX SLIe

I get an average of 25fps, so in settings I adjust for 20fps, and it runs OK for me. If I leave the setting fps speed at max, it can rise to around 70fps, but can then get a dose of stutters, dropping to 5 or 7 fps. So setting at 20fps cures those problems, and runs very smoothly. This is with most other options at max, except for the dreaded (Blimey forgotten the name now, will return and edit), and this is left at zero.

Won't be back for a while, just had warning one of my IDE HDs is about to die, so must hastily do some backups, or a clone to a spare SATA drive.

I have 2 IDE HDs, working with 2 SATA HDs. The SATAs were new for this build, but the IDEs were from previous comp. 3 or 4 years old. They don't last forever, what does?

KenTel wrote:

For anyone interested, nVidia DX10 compatible graphics cards are now available. Starting price around £350 UK pounds sterling!

According to a test I recently read, one of those is better than the best of the previous cards run in SLI, ie. two cards.

So the price looks high, but one of these is apparently faster than any two of the others.

Available at present from Novatech.co.uk, but supplies will be very limited.

Ken where did you see the test, I am not doubting what you are saying but if this is a manufacturer's test as opposed to a reliable third party's.........well!

Best and Warm Regards
Adrian Wainer

ExtremeTech, don't have the URL handy, but expect you can find it. The test was by the resident hardware tester, think the name is 'Case' or similar. If this lump keeps going for a while, I'll try to get back with the URL.

Perishing HD failure, got my secondary OS system on it.

OK try these - >

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2054231,00.asp

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2054230,00.asp

by the way, the ASUS Motherboard name is Crosshair not crossfire. I have seen some reviews on this board which are pretty positive.

Does anyone have that GeForce 8800GTX board? It's pretty expensive but I guess for 768mb of onboard ram..... Would be curious if anyone has one how it has impacted their gaming.....

The "Crosshair" Mobo is a quad board, ie, two dual-core CPUs, and Intel only. That should be lightening fast.

See below

It's more than performance, it's about REAL

The gamer's dream platform-P5N32-SLI PREMIUM/WIFI-AP. It's the best Quad-SLI™ ready motherboard that support Core™2 Extreme. No doubt the gaming performance is over the top. But what we care is not only performance, it's also about realistic. Extreme HD gaming with the highest resolution that feels like the enemy jump out of the screen, the supreme audio with a stand-alone card-SupremeFX, induce a better Signal-to-Noise Ratio, features with DTS surround sound, sounds like the enemy is just around. The unique 3 PCIex16 slot, reserved one additional slot for GPU Physics card when running Quad-SLI™, the experience can't be more real. This board is also of AI Lifestyle descent, quiet thermal solutions increase the stability and reliability when running resource demanding games or applications, EZ DIY features enhance the DIY experience and make PC much more interesting.

I don't like to think about the cost of a build using that lump.

3 Graphic Card slots, thought 2 was plenty. Gee what a set up for FSX............

I have yet to see any dramatic visual differences between FS9 and FSX that warrant such poor framerate performance in FSX. I'm not sure what it is they did to the engine to screw it up so royally but I'm probably going to be giving up on it soon.

But what do I know. I haven't been around since FS2000.