Am i wasting my time?

[ARMY 342]

Hey Folks,

 

At last I finally managed to get a new laptop that should have allowed me to play MSFS easily. The main specs are:

 

CPU: i7 10750H @ 2.60Ghz

GPU: NVIDIA 1650

RAM: 16 GB DDR4-2933 Mhz

HDD: Hitachi 1 TB SATA III

OS : Windows 10 Pro

 

I first tried to download through STEAM. After 2 weeks of effort, I gave up. Never got it to work. They were kind enough to refund me without a quibble after I explained all the errors that had arisen.

 

I then downloaded directly from Microsoft Store. The download and installation seemed to go well but starting it meant sitting quietly for up to 8 minutes while waiting for it to open properly...

 

I have experimented with online and offline and with medium to lowest settings, in particular on graphics. However, I cannot get the simulator to run smoothly at all. Frame rate is very unstable and in the region of 10 fps. But, to me, the confusing stat is that my GPU has yet to go above 12% usage. In short, I am getting nowhere.

 

May I ask if anyone can identify something I am doing totally wrong? Or should I just give up and go back to FSX - for which this laptop is not optimised....

 

Thank you.

 

Ian

[plainsman]

There are several things here. First, we don't know your internet connection speed. If that is slow, that may be part of the problem. Second, it isn't very desirable to run the sim off a HDD. You really need a SSD or M.2 drive. Your GPU is at the low end of the performance envelope needed to run the sim, it will not get high frame rates with the other issues solved.

You might try running GeForce Experience optimization.

Edited March 26, 2022 by plainsman

[terrylawdinn]

Your GPU is okayish - I run the sim quite satisfactorily with it (desktop but it's the same thing). But your problem is your HDD is never going to be fast enough to run it properly. Also 16GB RAM is really a minimum although plenty of folk do manage. The good news is your CPU is fine.............

 

Surprised actually to see a "new" laptop with a SATA disk, most are SSD's and Nvme drives are becoming standard fare. Can you upgrade your laptop with an SSD or even better if you've got the funds an Nvme. 500GB will do but 1TB would be preferable.

 

It WILL run with your existing setup but, as you've found out, loading is incredibly slow and you will suffer freezing and stutters if you try anything more than the stock sim - no decent addons or better aircraft.

 

Sadly, have to agree with your sentiment - yes IMO you're wasting your time. Plus you'll forever be disappointed with MSFS2020.

[gordonbennett]

Not sure why you would have problems with that set up. My Laptop is a Ryzen i5 and I have 8gb of ram plus a dual GPU set up giving me 5gb of video. I run MSFS fine with it. I run it with medium settings. I get low to mid 20's FPS which runs smoothly too. Sure my gaming desktop machine will give me a lot better but I am happy with what my laptop gives me. I do have a 500gb SSD though so maybe you should get a techie to put one in your machine. With loading times it usually depends on what you have added to the sim. Maybe go get a cup of coffee when you first fire MSFS up.

[ARMY 342]

Thanks everybody.

 

Please forgive my late response but I took the key advice and sent my laptop off to have a SSD installed. All works perfectly now.

 

Thank you again

[RI_Red]

Thanks everybody.

 

Please forgive my late response but I took the key advice and sent my laptop off to have a SSD installed. All works perfectly now.

 

Thank you again

 

Yay! Glad you weren't wasting your time!

[Herc79]

... sent my laptop off to have a SSD installed. All works perfectly now.

 

Yea, we are pretty much at the point where SSD's are basically almost mandatory for flight simulation titles. Not hard stop "mandatory", but "mandatory" for a good time.

 

Give it another 5 years and it will be a required prerequisit to install...

[plainsman]

We are glad the SSD did the trick! Enjoy the sim!