choppy framerates in Flight Simulator X? (An overclocking problem?)

[Deja Q]

When playing FSX, sometimes (especially when using spot viewer camera) there are noticeable frame drops and the jet is in a different position.

Even if I'm flying way up in the air and rotating it; the background being sky or distant water.

It happens at 9x333 or 8x400 configurations.

Systemn:
Vista Ultimate 64
Nvidia 8800GTS 640MB RAM w/stock cooling
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L
Intel Q6600 (o/c at 9x333, or 8x400 but will keep 9x333 due to lower heat emission)
Sound Blaster Fatal1ty
Samsung 7200RPM drive
8GB RAM (Two pairs of 2x2GB Corsair XHS RAM, sold as being capable of doing 800MHz @ 2.1v, 4-4-4-12 timing)

Prime95 and SuperPi testing works for HOURS with no checksum errors.

I am reinstalling an old game (Unreal Tournament 2004) as I know for a fact that runs blindingly fast and rock solid stable.

It's all probably due to overload on even this system, but still...

Temps:

9x333: Idle 30C, Load 49C, room ambient 22C
8x400: Idle 38C, Load 58C, room ambient 22C

8800GTS video: Idle: 58C, Load 69C.

I did order a replacement cooler, as the 8800's stock fan wasn't all that grand to begin with... but given I haven't had any other problems (that I know of), I doubt I have a thermal-damaged video card. When testing these setups, especially CPU and mobo, if anything went over 60C I *stopped*

Thx!

[regnaD kciN]

1. No, a Microsoft problem...

FSX is a beautiful program, but the fact is that practically no current hardware will run it properly. Maybe by about the time they release Flight Simulator XI, computers will be able to run the old version decently. ;-)

[Deja Q]

4. LOL

That's good to know -- thanks! :D

[RoyGBiv]

2. Check other things ...

Just because you're driving greased lightning doesn't mean you don't slow down for traffic. There's only so much current hardware can do.

Are you using DX9 or DX10?

What are you AA settings?

What's the resolution setting?

Those things will affect your gaming experience rather significantly on some games regardless of your rig. If you're running it on ultra-mondo-whooboy-lookie-here-at-this mode, it's gonna slow down a lot more than if it's on, hey-I-play-this mode.

[Deja Q]

3. Thx...

DX10
1920x1200, 32-bit
AA is on, anisotropic
I've kept real-time traffic at 15%, but most items are high or highest in terms of quality.

I know DX10 and FSX has some occasional artifcating issues, so I'm not entirely worried about overheating/damaging my video card... And with only +0.2v for the (G)MCH and FSB, mobo temps remained cool so I doubt I damaged the north bridge by heat...

I also got creeped out because, at 9x333, a Windows service had unexpectedly quit. (SearchProtocolHost.exe, failing module Microsoft.Interop.Mapi.Impl.dll) -- I did have Outlook open and, so far, no obvious data corruption occurred...

UT2004 seems to play flawlessly, but I haven't maxed the bot count (all graphics settings have been maxed)

I am doing Prime95 throughout tonight; torture test; hopefully I didn't damage something, but I'd see something more obvious...

I did check event log and there are some repeating errors, so far none of which coincide with hardware failure...

Again, given no BSODs, funky freezes, and Prime95 behaving for hours on end (all CPU cores @ 100%) with plenty of space to do a SuperPi calc and playing an emulated Amiga game, I'm feeling more likely that it's all FSX right now. :S

I should try SimCity Societies -- it's the only other game I have that's truly visually taxing.

I'll still keep 9x333 -- bandwidth improvement wasn't much, and temps being 10C cooler (never mind not overvolting anything)...

[RoyGBiv]

5. Since I don't use Vista ...

I don't use DX10, but discussion on the forums is that using DX10's features with this game can crash your FPS.

Same with AA. It does okay up to certain settings, at which point the frame rate plummets.

As for your other issues, as you know, overclocking can be a risky business. If you're getting a lot of little glitches, I'd say it's time to tone it down a notch.

[Deja Q]

6. Ah... I knew about distortions (blockiness, and bits getting distorted) but not crashing...

I'll try FSX without DX10. (Grr)

And, yup, I'm sticking with 9x333 - I know it has worked. 400MHz FSB would be nice, and I know the mobo officially supports the speed, but as always YMMV -- from reading, the values I used weren't atypical, except having all 4 RAM slots populated, that does add another dimension into overclocking. (As the mobo only does 8GB, couldn't do two 4GB modules, which would have been expensive anyway)

[Deja Q]

7. Update -

Changing the rez to 1366x768 helped a LOT.

Removing DX10 support actually improved MUCH of the graphics and lighting (and most visual anomalies are gone), though of course the water isn't as nice any longer

Still acts jerky, which still seems odd given the minimal amount of buildings added, but the overall improvement is quite obvious and in all likelihood due to it being too big for its own good and not hardware failure; I'm thinking of memories not being quite true... :D

[RoyGBiv]

8. Dearlord ...

What resolution were you running it at? Your resolution can have a HUGE impact.

I did a little idle reading of some gaming forums. Using the same video card you have and similar other specs, a lot of people are reporting FPS around 30 dropping down to as low as 17 in the clouds. There are those outliers that get monster frame rates, but one never really knows whether to believe them when so many people are reporting issues.

I've not played FSX, but based one what I'm reading I'd suggest its just one of those things that doesn't have an efficient gaming engine.

I built my base system when Doom3 and Quake4 were sorta standards for testing performance, and my system would scream with the super-mondo settings. Simcity 4, on the other hand, had issues. Lots of issues. Made no sense really, but there you have it. I ended up consulting tweaking guides to get rid of most of the problems, but there are still weird glitches, pauses, stuttering, etc.

I've upgraded my graphics card and memory since then (we won't talk about how many hard drives I've added), and most games I throw at it don't even hiccup. Simcity 4 still does.

[Deja Q]

10. You're sitting down, right?

1920x1200.

Apart from the irregular jarring, it was amazingly playable.

But at HDTV (~720P) resolution, it was FAST -- and while there was still some irregular jarring, it was very limited.

And, again, DS9 with light flare and other effects turned ON looks immensely better than DX10 with the same features on (far fewer distance artifacts or angled blocks appearing inappropriately on the screen) -- faster too. And then those lighting effects -- WOW!

DX10 sucks. And not in a good way.

[RoyGBiv]

11. I sat down before reading ...

Glad I did. :)

As they say in the mechanic business, Well there's your problem right there. :)

As for DX10, it's not implemented properly I don't think, and it probably won't be for some time as long as its real power requires such a high grade rig. You've got games coming out with DX10 implementation but also that work with DX9. I don't think I'd want to be the engineer on that project.

I mean, I remember when DX9 first came out and designers started using it. The first thing you were told when installing the program was to make sure you had DX9 installed because the thing wouldn't work with previous versions. Developers can't do that now and hope to get a decent market. It is a very few people who will buy an entirely new system just to play a game. Upgrading to DX10, realistically, for a lot people or staying with what they have and getting a DX9 compatible game is the difference between a thousand dollars or so and 50 bucks. And there's the "somewhere in the middle" now with just dumping the idea of gaming on the desktop and getting a console.

[Deja Q]

12. Update:

This AM, I was getting weird black vertical lines that would appear for a frame then disappear. GPU temp got to 80C very quickly. Took FOREVER to cool down after exiting. (All other system temps were ok)

I think my 8800GTS is close to thermal death. x( (it is 2 years old and has had a fair amount of use)

I spent a couple hours looking at the AMD 4870 and the nVidia GX260 -- despite AMD's hardware being superior AND having DX10.1 support, I know driver quality is crap -- and confirmed on some forums (discussing photoshop). Plus, the extra 384MB of RAM on the 260 would help FSX anyway.

I'll be putting in the 260 later today.

The new fan I got for the 8800 will probably go back, unless it can be fitted to the 260:

The ACCEL X8800 fan - on newegg, it's $55 and looks great... for the 8800 series...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186026

[regnaD kciN]

9. I assume you've checked out AVSim.net...?

If not, go there at the first opportunity. If there's a solution to any MSFS problem, most likely they'll already know all about it.