New FSXer...

[hhomebrewer]

Alright, already. You have sufficiently twisted my arm, Sub. I am downloading SP 1 and 2 as I write this. Will consider putting FSX back on tomorrow, but will leave off the v2 and try v1.1 FSGenesis stuff instead-- after I do an unadulterated installation and see what it looks like clean. I have had FSX running on an AMD 3800+ single-core machine with a single nVidia 7900GS-KO card and 3 Gb of 400 MHz RAM. It ran, albeit a bit herky-jerky. The sky was properly represented. It did not exhibit those speckles or those vertical bands in any way at all. I expected this machine to do much better, but was sorely disappointed. Now I have to pull myself out of the bottle and install FSX again. Life is hard, but it's harder if you're a flight-simmer wannabe...

[Flight Ace]

Alright, already. You have sufficiently twisted my arm, Sub. I am downloading SP 1 and 2 as I write this. Will consider putting FSX back on tomorrow, but will leave off the v2 and try v1.1 FSGenesis stuff instead-- after I do an unadulterated installation and see what it looks like clean. I have had FSX running on an AMD 3800+ single-core machine with a single nVidia 7900GS-KO card and 3 Gb of 400 MHz RAM. It ran, albeit a bit herky-jerky. The sky was properly represented. It did not exhibit those speckles or those vertical bands in any way at all. I expected this machine to do much better, but was sorely disappointed. Now I have to pull myself out of the bottle and install FSX again. Life is hard, but it's harder if you're a flight-simmer wannabe...

I have read all the advice given you.

By all means, a clean install including SP1 and SP2 (which is a must) and a hard drive defrag will improve your performance to a point well over that what you have been getting. However, don't get your hopes too high, as a 2.2 GHz CPU for FSX will still require you to keep your settings from mid to low.

An added approach to the above is to pop out the 2.2 CPU and replace it with maybe a 2.8 or 3.0 dual or quad CPU. I am not an expert with AMD products, however I did go on the internet and found a 2.8 GHz Black Edition Dual Core new boxed AMD Athlon X2 7850 for around $80.00 and which appears to be compatible with your motherboard (65 nm technology and AM2+ socket). And if you have never done this before (replace a CPU), get a knowledgeable friend to help or get instructions over the internet and treat it like a learning experience. As a matter of interest, I am an Octogenarian and have been building PCs for Microsoft Flight Sims since they first came out. I currently have an old Intel 3 GHz CPU coupled with an 8800GTX that runs FSX quite well. My new over clocked i7 920 coupled with a GTX285 OC has elevated quite well to almost perfect.

My interest in flight sims is that I spent a whole career as an Army Aviator rated in both real fixed and rotary wing aircraft and at my present age this is the closest I can come to flying.

Good luck in your venture.

Flight Ace

[hhomebrewer]

My board is a Gigabyte S-Series GA-M57SLI-S4 that supports the AM2+ cpu. There is something on the box regarding nVidia nForce 570 SLI, but I have no idea what that means. Is that the northbridge chipset thingy? I would be very interested in knowing the name, designation and any other descriptors of any chip that would help to increase the number of ones and zeroes I can crunch with this thing. I get lock-ups quite frequently. I had to reboot twice this morning just to retrieve my email.

When I run FS9, I have zero problems. I looked at FS9 vs. FSX when I was taking FSX off the hard drive. FS9 is something like 15,800 Mb in size. FSX is approaching 29,000 Mb. Probably a good explanation right there why FSX takes forever to load from Desktop. I like FS9 because the colors look very rich. I noticed the colors in FSX look very "dusty" and have a lightness to them. They just don't seem to be very saturated.

Would this chip work? http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819103680

[hhomebrewer]

Well, I be dingled! I re-installed FSX just like I did a week or so ago, and it is fabulous! It now looks every bit as good as the splash screens you see when you install it. The water shows up just perfect-- I couldn't ask for more. I am beyond overjoyed. I have no idea why this installation is any different than the previous, save for I have not yet installed the FSGenesis stuff like last time. I have trilinear filtering and anti-aliasing checked. I have installed the SP1 and SP2 updates. Settings are pretty much at default, although I pumped a few up and a few down-- but not by very much. Target frame rate is set at 50 or so. Panning from Cockpit view in the ultra-light is rrrapid--

[Flight Ace]

First, congratulations on getting your FSX up and running. And by the way, did you defrag your hard drive after installing FSX?

Now reference your question about the 3.1GHz CPU.

From what I extracted from Newegg.com, it appears that the CPU you were looking at (AMD Phenom 11 X2 550 Black Edition 3.1 GHz) requires a Socket AM3. The specs for your motherboard show support for a Socket AM2 or AM2+ so it appears like

[hhomebrewer]

Dare I install the FSGenesis v2 scenery? It's four DVDs. Takes a very long time to put on. It could all be for naught...

[Boikat]

Dare I install the FSGenesis v2 scenery? It's four DVDs. Takes a very long time to put on. It could all be for naught...

I'm always of the opinion that "if it works, don't fix it".  But that's just me.

[hhomebrewer]

I did put the Rockies and West Coast DVDs on. Again, it's fabulous. I don't know what I did differently, but this install is abundantly blessed. In the 747, I can select Locked Spot view, push the hatswitch on my flight control stick all the way to the left or right and the view will spin and spin and spin, all the while never herking, jerking, lagging or hiccuping in any way. I switch to VC and gave it the same spinning torture test. Again with the flying colors-- no jerks, stutters, lags or lock-ups. I can toggle through the VC-Locked Spot-Tail-Tower view sequence as fast as my thumb will allow-- no problems. No "slow" painting of the instrument panel (always was a problem for me in FS9) when the view comes back to the VC-- nothing. I have no explanation as to why this is so much, much better than the disaster of last week. I almost gave up on FSX and FSGenesis Terrain Mesh, v2. I want to thank those of you who responded throughout this thread when it looked like I was talking to myself. Your comments and suggestions are very much appreciated. I should post a few pictures in Screenshots to see if you see something that can be done to improve the look of the sim. There may be things about which I am ignorant. Again, my thanks to all...