Ground texture question

[patchz]

I am reasonably satisfied with my world scenery, considering my crappy computer, setup, and only 512 mb ram (hope to get more ram soon). But most of my flights are low level and the ground texture and number/types of trees leaves something to be desired. Can anyone suggest a method to improve this without payware or excessive fps hits? Thanks.

[Travis]

Sorry, the FPS is always going to suffer if you want better quality.

Try just turning the Global Texture Setting up as high as it will go.  That might not hit your FPS very badly, and it should improve the ground textures drastically.

[patchz]

[quote]Sorry, the FPS is always going to suffer if you want better quality.

Try just turning the Global Texture Setting up as high as it will go.

[Rocket_Bird]

I use Real Environment Pro (freeware) and it seems to improve the ground terrain and autogen considerably without a noticeable performance hit on my not too spectacular laptop.  But yeah, setting the Global Texture Setting higher does help....  What are your specs btw?

[patchz]

[quote]I use Real Environment Pro (freeware) and it seems to improve the ground terrain and autogen considerably without a noticeable performance hit on my not too spectacular laptop.

[Rocket_Bird]

PC

[patchz]

2.6 Ghz P4, 512 MB RAM, Radeon 9800 Pro, 80 gig drive with 20 gigs of free space..
It was already worn out when I got it and I have worked it to death. I am going to try to increase the RAM as much as I can, depending on price. Hopefully, that will make a noticible difference.

[Travis]

2.6 Ghz P4, 512 MB RAM, Radeon 9800 Pro, 80 gig drive with 20 gigs of free space..
It was already worn out when I got it and I have worked it to death. I am going to try to increase the RAM as much as I can, depending on price. Hopefully, that will make a noticible difference.

It isn't your RAM that will make a difference, but the processor speed.  At 2.6 Ghz, you're running a system better suited to FS8.  If I were you, I'd look into overclocking your system.  Instead of more RAM, get yourself a cooling system or some really heavy-duty fans.

[Fozzer]

2.6 Ghz P4, 512 MB RAM, Radeon 9800 Pro, 80 gig drive with 20 gigs of free space..
It was already worn out when I got it and I have worked it to death. I am going to try to increase the RAM as much as I can, depending on price. Hopefully, that will make a noticible difference.

Hello Larry...

In some respects your system is better than mine, but ALL my sliders are at Max, ALL the Boxes ticked, etc, giving me fantastic Scenery all around me, (with Freeware add-on scenery and various effects), SMOOTH flights with max AI Traffic and fancy Clouds, and I have no need to upgrade my System for FS 2004*...
...it runs a treat!
...and no problems in Multiplayer!
---------------------------------------
Home built.
Case: Horizontal Office Desktop...(easy to get at!).
Processor: (ancient!) Socket A Athlon XP Thoroughbred 2600+ (2.1 GHz). (Old faithful, runs HOT!)
Graphics: AGP. nVidia Ge-Force 78000 GS 265 MB. (The last, and fastest of the AGP series).
Memory: 2 GB. (Essential!)
Hard Drives: 256 GB + 80 GB. (Plenty of spare/free space for page swapping!).
CD.
DVD.
Floppy Drive. (Little darling!)
Sound: Creative Labs 1024 Sound Card, with Surround Speakers.
Power Supply: 700 Watt Storm. (Needed!)

External Zoom Broadband USB Modem. (NO ROUTER!).
-----------------------------------
There you go!
Not fantastic, but it runs FS 2004 absolutely flat out...with NO overclocking or tweaking!.... [smiley=2vrolijk_08.gif]...!

I am a happy Bunny!.. ...!

Paul...G-BPLF..FS 2004...and a real smoothy!... 8-)...!

*....you can see from my Specs, why I don't use my copy of FSX...... ... ... ...!

[Travis]

Dangit!  Having another "D'oh!" moment.

After taking another look at what your specs were, I realized that when you said you needed more RAM, you were RIGHT!  I didn't connect that you only had 512.  Having 2 GBs, as Paul said, really is a good idea with FS9.  Any more than that is useless, since you wouldn't be able to use it anyway, but less than that will suffice, as long as it's over 1 Gig.  I used to have just over 1.5 GBs on my other laptop, and it seemed to be okay.  But I still couldn't raise all of the sliders to max, because my card speed was low.  I guess hold off on the overclocking and get more RAM instead.  But keep the OCing in mind in case you don't get the desired results.

Thanks for the correction, Paul!

[Groundbound1]

More ram is important, but I personally would spend my first useable money on a video card upgrade. With a Radeon 9800 Pro (which isn't a bad card), we're still talking about AGP right?

If so, something like this is rather reasonably priced now, and would make

[Daube]

Patchz, try to find a little addon nammed "Treegen".
It's a set of replacement textures for the trees. The texture of a tree is replaced by another texture showing two or three smaller trees. The effect is quite convincing, and it also changes the impression of distance (the FS9 default trees are too big and make everything look smaller/closer).

For the ground, you can test the addon nammed "US rural textures"

[Fozzer]

[quote]More ram is important, but I personally would spend my first useable money on a video card upgrade. With a Radeon 9800 Pro (which isn't a bad card), we're still talking about AGP right?

If so, something like this is rather reasonably price now, and would make

[Groundbound1]

[quote][quote]More ram is important, but I personally would spend my first useable money on a video card upgrade. With a Radeon 9800 Pro (which isn't a bad card), we're still talking about AGP right?

If so, something like this is rather reasonably price now, and would make

[Fozzer]

There you go, Larry...

Lots of good advice there... ...!

For a low cost, slight hardware upgrade, and a few free bits and bobs in the scenery department, you should be able to zip along very nicely in FS 2004....

...and join us in FS 2004 Multiplayer!... [smiley=2vrolijk_08.gif]...!

...doesn't that sound good?... ...!

Paul..G-BPLF..FS 2004...Californian Tours a Speciality... 8-)...!

.... ...!