FRAME RATE BREAKTHRU!!!! (Long, but worth the read)

[shermank]

Ok, I understand there will be skeptics who read this, but it works for me. And, I have seen almost 300% improvement in some scenarios. First, the background:

I have a Tyan 1854S mother board with a P3 1gig Intel processor.
My video card is a GeForce Ti 4200 and I have 512 megs of ram. It is, in short, a fairly conventional, and by today's standards an outdated machine. I had been getting in the upper single digits, mid teens in most cases. Some aircraft, notably, Geoffa's Debonair were simply unflyable with an exterior view frame rate of about 4 to 5. The new version of the Stratocruiser was also difficult, especially in exterior view, and at a busy airport, impossible.

Earlier today, while scanning around, I came across a web site that was discussing viatech chip sets. I have tried in the past to upgrade, usually to face a lockup which I think was related to the agp driver. Let me add that I am no techie, by any stretch. I am merely familiar with the terms, but do not have a whole lot of background and am not sure what much of the alphabet soup of initials used in computering even means.

Anyway, I decided to try again, so I downloaded the latest drivers from the viatech web page...1448 is part of the designation. I rebooted, did a dxdiag test, and the whirling cubes were wild, with somewhat mixed imagery. Realizing the something was clearly different, I booted up fs2002. When I picked a plane, my computer locked up. I did a cold reboot, but went into setup on a hunch and completely disable agp x 4 in the chipset section. Then, I saved the setting to cmos( more arcane initials) and rebooted. Then, it was on to fs2002...and what a shocker. I was getting frame rates in the upper teens, even low to mid 20s depending upon aircraft and view. The Stratocruiser was like a brand new baby, flyable, viewable, lovable...if you have a taste for whales that fly. True, with all sliders maxed, I was back to the low teens from exterior view, but, there were no hesitations, no stutters, and no blurries. After a test flight that was completely satisfying, I loaded up the Debonair, another craft that for all its bells and whistles, was beyond the capabilities of my computer. Bingo! I had complete control, exterior views went from 4+fps to the low teens. I have not tested any of the stock aircraft yet, which have always given me decent frame rates. But, I will do so and expect some great results.

One more note...just to experiment, I went back into dxdiag, and disabled agp. FS images remained sharp, but it seemed as if frames lagged a little bit. I reopened dx diag and renabled agp, and was completely satisfied.

So, I don't know if this will work for you, but if you want to experiment, disable agp in setup, but leave it live in dxdiag. Maybe you'll be as pleased as I was. I invite your comments and responses.

Thanks for reading through my mini white paper.

Sherm

[shwncplnd]

hmmm, I'll give it a go when I get the chance. I've got the VIA chipset. Which DirectX are you using?

Shawn
Nobody beats the Rizz

[bigal1977uk]

Like we always say, always get the most upto date drivers for your hardware.

Well on my mobo if i was to disable AGP in the bios then the computer would fail to boot my graphics card so i would then get no picture on the monitor. I would then have to go through either my on board graphics or put a vid card in a pci slot just to get a picture to change the bios back to AGP.


Alan.


AMD 1900xp
M810 LR motherboard
512MB sdram
win 98se
gforce4 ti4200 64mb ddr
sidwinder FF2
1280 x 1024 x 32
3D marks 7795

[shermank]

A couple of points. Shane asked about which DX...I am using DX9.a with no problems. As for my graphics card, it is an AGP card. Go figure...:-)

Sherm

Someone on Avsim posted that this has been known for a long time. Maybe so, but it was new to me, and perhaps it can help someone else out who never knew about this tweak. It has been a gigantic breakthru to the point that I do not feel the need to upgrade now for fs2002...as for fs2004, we'll see when that arrives....:-)

Sherm

[Captain_Slarty]

ALL you have done is installed the appropriate chipset driver...

the agp thing is nonsense.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/captain...s/coolskul.gif

'A Chicken and an Egg in bed smoking cigarettes... Chicken leans over and says "That answers that then"'

[bigal1977uk]

Way hay :-) joe

Nice to see you again,

Ive been struggling with out you on here to help aswell :-)


Alan.


AMD 1900xp
M810 LR motherboard
512MB sdram
win 98se
gforce4 ti4200 64mb ddr
sidwinder FF2
1280 x 1024 x 32
3D marks 7795

[MadMaster]

Yea that AGP thing seems a little fuzzy.

Regards,
Paul

[Captain_Slarty]

No Probs Alan. been messing on the Lounge forum with the guys :-).. also Sonar5's site.. kewl...

trying to retire and buy a boat... sell the houses... ya know.. the normal kinda shite lol :-)

Joe.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/captain...s/coolskul.gif

"Are you jealous that the voices are talking to ME ?"

[bigal1977uk]

Ah right, i think a few of us in here got a bit worried about you cos you'd not been in for so long, glad to hear your ok :-)

Have you got a link to Sonar5's site so i can take a gander?

Hope your gonna stick around for abit longer, although there's not been much happining on here last couple of weeks, every one just seems to have dissappeard, think they've all got fs2004 blue's lol.

well hope you join us all in the fs2004 forum when the sim gets released :-)

P.S. Frontier (Elite II) on Amiga, best sim ;-)
Commander jameson (i think) long time ago now, but, whatta guy :-)

R,grds



Alan.


AMD 1900xp
M810 LR motherboard
512MB sdram
win 98se
gforce4 ti4200 64mb ddr
sidwinder FF2
1280 x 1024 x 32
3D marks 7795

[Captain_Slarty]

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON Jul-04-03 AT 07:37PM (EDT)[/font][p]Ah !.. What bliss.. to wait at Commander Jameson's door.. :-lol

I only ever got to 'Dangerous' then 'Deadly'.. never managed Elite Al .....

hee hee

http://pub227.ezboard.com/fpoliticsg...ivemedeathfrm9

One of Joe's forums.. a great place.. search around though.. it's fun...



http://homepage.ntlworld.com/captain...s/coolskul.gif

"Are you jealous that the voices are talking to ME ?"