Simviation Forums

I was reading over the original specs for minimal FSX requirements, and thought, "oh my". Then I had a good laugh!
How far we've come, and still chasing peak performance for FSX.
Really. GPU with 64MB RAM is all one needs, although that will probably keep you with sliders all the way over to the left.
I'm not sure if this is a hardware question and for that particular forum, but I figure it's about FSX, maybe this is good enough.

If inappropriately placed, please move.

My question is a technical one, and in need of a good explanation, because I can't really make sense of it myself.
Would a GPU with a 512 bit memory interface really help FSX much? I have an AMD 7870 now, with a 256 bit memory interface. It does pretty good, with 2 GB of RAM, but what is the difference in memory interface, and could it help FSX?
I suppose more is better, sure. I just don't know if it will do another $200-$300 worth of good. If a guy were to buy a new R9-290X, would FSX really benefit from it?

I don't know if this really helps, but when I went up to a XFX ATI Radeon HD 5670 with 128-bit DDR5 memory FSX did extremely well.

When I moved up to a ASUS Radeon HD 6870 1GB with 256-bit GDDR5 the improvement wasn't nearly as great.



At the moment I have my main screen using the HD 6870 and it performs fairly well. The screen off to the right is using the older HD 5670.



When I was using FSX there was a little, but noticeable, difference if I moved FSX from the center monitor over to the right side monitor. Of course, I'm talking FSX in windowed mode.



Flash forward to Prepar3d V2.2

In Prepar3d V2.2 Lockheed Martin has moved some of the flight sim computations onto the video card. So the more powerful the card, the better the sim CAN run.

(I've read post of some people with a couple of thousand dollars invested in dual NVIDIA cards, set up in in SLI mode, running like a dead dog.)


ON THE OLDER CARD - The first time witching from an outside view to an inside view, I see this for about 30-34 seconds.


After 30 odd seconds I get this. You can actually see one element at a time popping into view.


Subsequent switches take about 1 to 2 seconds (With no hesitation on the newer card).


One thing to remember is that you have a much faster system than I do. So where it's VERY noticeable for me, you'd have the same thing happening. It'd just be less noticeable.



Long story short - you have 2GB of very fast DDR. The memory bus is 256-bit wide. All of that is on a fast system.

If you stay with FSX I doubt that you'll see much, if any, improvement on screen. With what you have I'd suggest a second 256G SSD exclusively for FSX.

I don't have the specs of my GPU's in mind, but let's say this. I used the GTX570 and according to GPU-Z, a tool to check gpu performance, the GTX570 was only running at 50%. I waited a long time to spend money for the now used GTX770, since I thought, the 570 is only used half. The performance of the 770 is much better. I get better FPS and higher settings with the same CPU and clock. A result I never had expected.

Dan

Well thank you all for the replies!
I don't know if I'll be migrating over to P3D just yet. Maybe when PMDG has their licensing for the 777 worked out.
However, I've been watching it move forward, instead of stagnating like FSX has for 8 years. It's not off the table, just not now.
I figured that if I need any more performance from FSX, it will come in a 64 bit version. I think I've about reached the limit of all I can do for it. It works great, and get 30 FPS all the time. Just wondering, really.
So, I'll just stay put for now. Thanks, again!

Forget P3D. We deserve something that works.