silverheels2

1997 start here on Flightsim.com

FS 7, 9, (skipped 8), X.

Didn't bite on P3D or MSFS.

Happy with beautiful FS X. No CTDs, no VAS issues. Great aircraft.

Hi all (again):

After experimenting with the Leclercq textures it seems that they are in conflict with either GTX or UTX. I notice that the textures are installed in Scenery/World/Texture, but GEX/UTX don't use some or all of those textures. I'm puzzled. Does that sound right?

Thanks

Rick

Thanks everyone for your responses. I investigated Top Gun's suggestion to look at Aime Leclerc's work and was very pleased to find that Aime had developed wide ranging Texture upgrades as well as rock Texture upgrades. The rock Textures were a noticeable, immediate upgrade on GEX/UTX. I'm still looking at the general Texture upgrades.

Thanks again

Rick

Hi all:

I have been running FSX now for about 7 years and I have my installation quite good. I am running UTX, GEX, mesh addons, etc. I did try Orbx but their stuff just didn't work out for me. The one area I am not happy with FSX is the mountain terrain where the surface is rocks. The textures seem coarse and the color isn't right. Areas with vegetation are satisfactory, but the rocky terrain just doesn't look right. Does anyone have ideas on add on textures for that narrow rocky area? Payware or freeware is ok.

Thanks in advance

Rick

Open root folder and double click on the FSX executable. That should start FSX. If that works, then create a new FSX icon on your desktop.

Hope this helps.

Rick

you have SE or boxed....?

Sorry. Boxed.

Hello all:

Recently I have noticed that some add ons are having trouble finding my FSX installation. I have FSX installed in C/FSX. I am running Win 7 Pro 64. When I run some add ons (F1GTN cfg is an example), a dialogue box pops up and tells me it cannot find FSX. Some add ons just ask to be pointed to FSX and proceed normally after that. But some just stop at that point.

FSX launches and runs normally. AS16 launches and runs normally and links up with FSX normally. I have not reinstalled FSX in about 4 years.

I would appreciate your ideas on this.

Best regards,

Rick

Better is the enemy of good enough! There are all sorts of interests in flightsim. Some guys like to build new computers and spend time tweaking their hardware and software for performance. Some guys like to try new sims and spend hours, days, weeks, months building a new sim with airports, aircraft and other add ons, then spend hundreds of hours optimizing. Some guys just take the default aircraft and default scenery, and fly! I too am veteran of FS7, FS9, and FSX (I skipped FS2000). I have spent over 20 years and thousands of hours flying and tweaking. Right now I have FSX as good as it gets and I am done, done, done peaking and tweaking. No P3D and no FSNext, whatever they call it for me. I have a great FSX rig, great add ons, no crashes, no OOMs, just flying and enjoying. As I said, better is the enemy of good enough. Think about it.

Rick

I was wondering if anyone here has had an issue with window 7/10,

Graphics, specifically with the (windows 7 color scheme has reverted to basic) this make the flight and viewing a lot less sharp, particularly blurry centerlines and circular shapes when flying fs9. The easiest discription is less anti aliasing.

 

Has anyone here had the same thing and if so how’d you fix it?

 

Thanks

This occcurs occasionally on my system also. I recognize it immediately when I boot the system. I then right click on the screen and open nVidia Control Panel. There is one page in that which returns the display to my preferences.

A good idea.

But you won't win any prizes with it, unfortunately.

 

As this was exactly the philosophy behind SceneryConfigEditor.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/fs-sceditor/

 

Sorry,

Wim

Yeah, thanks Wim. As I said, I didn't expect it to be an original idea. On the other hand, I don't see the need for an application for this. It is trivially simple.

Rick

Hi all:

I just wanted to pass along a tweak for FSX that is really very effective in controlling VAS and eliminating stutters. I'm sure I have read this elsewhere so I do not claim to be the originator, but I cannot remember where I first saw it.

This tweak involves controlling add on sceneries (airports) on flights where they are not used for departure or destination, or alternate. I simply create a "working" scenery.cfg file which contains all the default scenery files and any essential scenery files such as GEX, UTX, and any others one might have. Then simply add the departure and arrival add ons at the very bottom of the"working" scenery.cfg.Then carefully save the full scenery.cfg file in a safe place and substitute the "working file". My scenery.cfg file contains over 500 add on airports all over the world. The "working"scenery.cfg file is updated from the carefully saved original scenery.cfg file. For example, imagine I am flying from KMIA to KSTL, and I have add ons for both fields. Well, I search the original scenery.cfg file for KMIA, then copy the entry and paste it on the bottom of the "working" scenery.cfg file. Same for KSTL. In so doing, one must be careful to avoid having two scenery listings with the same numbers. These entries look like this:

[XXX]

Name=KMIA Miami Int

Location=Addon Scenery/KMIA Miami Int

Layer=XXX

Required=

So one must be careful to avoid repeating numbers. This takes only a couple of minutes before each flight. I found OOMs are essentially in the past in my rig and the annoying micro stutters are eliminated completely.

It may be that many guys are already doing this but it was such a wonderful tweak I thought I should pass it along.

Rick

Merry xmas all.

Just wondered if there was anyway to edit the 'go to - airport' list in the freeflight UI to highlight addon airports (ie, add a prefix, change the text colour or text size?). I have LOTS of addons worldwide and apart from consulting a long list it would be nice to know which airports i have upgraded within the game UI.

Probably impossible but just a thought?

Cheers

Mick

Little Nav Map can help with this....

Another thing to look at and I'm not knocking the good advice you have already had, I had something a bit similar and I read on another thread something I never thought about.

 

Are any of your fans clogged up with dust, I was surprised when I opened my case, I gave them all a good blast with a blower, one fan was very bad, since then I give them a blast more frequent now.

Again just a thought and worth a look.

 

Col.

Hi Col:

Interesting. Do you mean that the condition of the fans affected FSX and cleaning them fixed it? Actually, I am due for a cleaning of the cases.

Thanks

Rick

Hi Jethro:

Well, I've been looking at all my hardware and can't find anything broken. I have watched the task manager panes and my memory use, cpu use, and GPU use all look reasonable. I have been trying to capture the process bar but it just happens randomly and it is over so fast I have been unable to capture a screen shot. I have noticed that the are words but I think it says "Loading Complete", or something like that. I do see it less frequently when I use FSX weather themes rather than AS16. Also I think I can correlate the appearance of the box to dense scenery approaching, and heavily congested A/I traffic, although I only run 25% A/I. I do however run the LOD at 6.5.

I did increase the page file size to 15 G, I think. It was set at 8.5 and the "recommended" size given on that box was 12.

I'm wondering whether my memory is just too slow. I am running: 8GB (4GBx2) DDR3/1866MHz and I wonder if I should upgrade. I actually have 2 rigs right next to each other and I do not see this behavior on the other rig which has 16GB (4GBx4) DDR3/2133MHz. Both run FSX from hard drives. I ran the memory check on the 1866 with no problems. Your comment "If the Normal scenery loading screen is coming up during a flight this is unusual and would suggest a Caching issue" intrigues me. What is a "caching issue"?

The rig with the issue drives a 4K HD TV as the monitor and the other rig drives a 1080 TV. Both are 60hz. Looking at the GPU performance though on the issue rig shows the 970 is only running at 30% capacity.

Anyone have thoughts on the memory issue or anything else?

Thanks

Rick

Hi TG:

Thank you for your thoughts. I suspect you are correct on the WX update, as I wrote above to Jethro. I need to research this further as I am not real sure what AS 16 is doing behind my back, so to speak. I certainly agree that it looks like something occurring normally, but this is new and I am always suspicious of something that pops up like this.

Thanks again,

Rick

Hi Rick,

 

The dialog box that opens when the screen goes black may have a "Title" indicating what program initiated the event or it could be a .net warning dialog with details about the momentary error.

 

You can check for bad memory with "Memtest86+" run as a standalone on DVD (10 Passes) much better than inbuilt OS memory checker. But it is always advisable to reseat your "Memory Modules" (DIMM's) and have them in the correct channel config for testing, one module at a time.

For Bad disk WesternDigital HDD's, use "Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for Windows" download from the WD site.

For Over-Full disk, you can use the OS File explorer Properties tool, or you can use a comprehensive Program like "WinDirStat" which will give you a comprehensive graphical overview of your Drive's and folder structure to determine if you have enough free space, if you have run out of free space on Drive C: it can affect the Pagefile/swapfile available.

 

Just a wild guess, but do you have FSUIPC paid version, and do you have "logging" enabled or the "Autosave" option enabled. If these are enabled there would likely be a short pause during your flight, only thing is that this would happen at regular intervals. Do you notice when the event happens and the dialog opens at regular intervals during your flights. It could also be some other program or process like Antivirus or Weather Update/injection like FSXWX, are you using FSXWX for user defined weather.

 

Some food for thought, I'm experiencing an intermittent Blackscreen issue myself atm (no warning event log or dialog indicating the problem), I haven't found the culprit/reason yet, it occurs slightly different to yours, in that I have to open the task manager, where I find that even though FSX.exe is still running in "Processes tab" the "Applications tab does not show FSX as a running application, I press Pause then Alt+Enter to place FSX in window mode, then wait for screen redraw, FSX then magically reappears in Applications and FSX continues as if nothing happened, once again pressing Alt+Enter back into Fullscreen mode I am able to continue my flight.

Since about a month ago MSupdate in my Win764 .Net 4.8 my issue began, maybe or maybe not the culprit, still investigating all other possibilities. Win update also installs the End of W7 support Telemetry tools which will run processes that interfere with other running applications, also consuming Processor cycles that would otherwise be available to FSX.

 

Cheers Jethro

Hi Jethro:

Well, thank you so much for taking the time to respond so fully! You have given me a ton of stuff to think about.

1. Yes, I use FSUIPC to Autosave the flight. I have it set for 15 minutes between captures. I thought that was a good candidate but did turn it off and still saw the issue. By the way, there is no application name on the box, just the progress band.

2.I think the Wx update may be the guilty party. I run AS 16 in off line mode. I download the weather before the flight and then switch AS 16 to "manual" so presumably it does not look for the web connection. I never allow my FSX machine to be connected to the internet other than the initial WX download. But I just recently updated to the latest version of AS 16 and that is a good candidate. I need to research this.

3. I turn off Windows Defender and Windows Firewall right after I disconnect from the web, so they are not running.

4. I now need to research the hardware/software suggestions you made also.

Thanks again and good luck with your issue.

Rick

Hi all:

I didn't know where to post this issue, but it looks more like a problem for this forum than any other. My rig is as follows:

Win 7 Pro 64

FSX Gold, sliders maxed except for water 2x low

Intel 4790k @ 4.5

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 ACX 2.0 4Gb

Memory:8GB (4GBx2) DDR3/1866MHz

Running on:1TB Western Digital Caviar Black SATA-III 6.0Gb/s 7200 RPM (about 50% full), recently defragged with the Win 7 defragger

Ok, so what happens is I will be flying along and all of a sudden the screen goes black and a small box opens up with a progress bar and quickly finishes, and returns to FSX with no apparent damage to anything. The whole thing may take 3 to 5 seconds. This is fairly new in the last month or so. It is not a show stopper but as we all know, with our hobby things only get worse with time.

The potential causes I thought of (and believe me, I am no wizard at troubleshooting):

1. Bad memory stick

2. Bad disc

3. Over full disc.

I'd appreciate any thoughts/ideas.

Thanks

Rick

Hi Rick, I don't know what UT and GEX is but I can highly recommend ORBX scenery (payware) for Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea. If it wasn't for Head Trackr, FSUIPC, and ORBX scenery, all of which have provided a very significant improvement in simulator immersion and situation reality I would probably not be flight simming anymore. I realize there is a noticeable cost involved but for these 3 products in particular you get a very high quality " big bang for your buck " and great support!. Best wishes, Max

Hi Max:

Thanks for your response. I will follow up and take a look at the Orbx stuff for that area. I did try out the Orbx global coverage a few years back and it did not end well once I decided to roll back to FSX default and Flight1 UTX and GEX. But time has moved on and the developers continue to turn out better stuff.

Thanks again,

Rick

Hi all:

Well, after 20 some odd years of simming I never explored the Pacific, including the tropical islands, Australia, New Zealand, the island nations between Australia and Japan, and Japan itself. I have acquired the UT and GEX packages and freeware airports for the entire area it seems, other than between Australia and China. It seems that Malaysia, New Guinea, Indonesia, and the Phillipines terrain are not covered by any UT. I have found adequate well done freeware airports but no terrain coverage so that the island shorelines are very basic, reminding me os default FS 2004 and FSX. Do I have a correct understanding of the scenery available for FSX?

Thanks in advance

Rick

Thanks Mark & Tim.I didn't answer immediately as I was waiting to see if anyone else would weigh in with an opinion.

I have seen an improvement by experimenting with Mipbias=3,,4, or 5 in FSX.cfg. I am now working on using nVidia control panel in place of Inspector to see if I can see a difference. I'll report back.

Thanks again

Rick

Hi all:

The twinkling of autogen trees is really annoying me. At altitude it is not an issue but in descent or approach, they twinkle. When stationary on the ramp there is no twinkling. But as soon as I begin to taxi, the twinkling begins. I don't see any shimmering of buildings or other objects, just the trees. I am running FSX Gold boxed. My system is I7-4820k running at 4.5, GTX TITAN 6GB, 16GB DDR3/2133MHz. I am running Inspector with AA settings maxed, display is a 1080p HiDef TV running at 19/10 @ 60 hz. I have the usual tweaks in FSX, affinity mask at 84, Pools=0. The trees are default. Generally, the system runs fine but the twinkling trees bothers me.

Can anyone suggest what the cause of the twinkling and any thoughts on correcting the problem would be appreciated.

Thanks

Rick