Would a high end GPU improve FSX?

I'm thinking about buying a dedicated computer for flight simming (is "flight simming" the right term?). Mainly because I'm currently using my little gaming laptop which means I have to connect/disconnect everything when I want to switch from laptop to multi-monitor and back. It would be nice to just sit down, fire it up, and go.

 

I've read in several places that FSX uses the CPU and not the GPU. Is this true? I notice in the settings that my GPU is available in a drop down menu, but if FSX doesn't use it, why would it be available there?

 

Obviously a computer with a higher end GPU is going to cost more, so if it isn't going to substantially increase performance/graphics, would it really be worth buying at the higher end GPU?

 

My laptop has a GeForce GTX 1050 ti. I can afford a dedicated desktop computer that goes as high as a GeForce GTX 1080 ti. But if I don't need that much GPU for FSX, I wouldn't want to spend the money.

 

(If X-Plane 11 ever addresses the massive left pull on single engine aircraft, I might switch from FSX. I think it gets more use out of the GPU. So I'm kind of keeping that in the back of mind also.)

 

Any guidance would be appreciated.

I think I just found the info I needed, from CRJ_simpilot, in a different thread. Sorry... I should have looked better before posting. :(

Essentially, like everything else computer, the answer is "Yes, but..."

 

The sim uses the CPU predominantly, but it does make use of the GPU as well, just to a lesser extent. A much lesser extent. That's why the GPU is listed in the menus. You DO need to tell the sim what GPU you have, and what the resolution you need to use is.

Which, BTW, should match up with you main monitor's resolution. It's "Native" resolution. The default resolution it's set to when it comes from the factory. Like 1080 X 720 X 32 colors, for example.

 

If I were you, though, I would focus on the best CPU you can afford. You'll get a lot more effect from a higher end CPU than you will from a middle-of-the-road CPU and a high end GPU.

 

Does this help at all?

Pat☺

Hi Pat. Yes, it does help. It tells me that the GPU listed in the settings is there for a reason. I wasn't sure. So is it helpful to set up both the GPU and the CPU in that settings area or does one set of settings negate the other?

Ummm...

I don't recall ever having seen the CPU in a setting in the sim anywhere. Can you maybe post a screen-shot where-of you speak?

 

Just go to the Settings>Display>Graphics menu, and tell the sim what GPU you have, and what resolution you have the main screen you use for the computer set for.

Like this shows:

 

 

That should, as far as I know, be the "PU" type setting there is in FSX.

But like I say, I am far from a super-FSX pro. If there's a place for setting the CPU in the sim, please, let me know. I've just never heard of it. Doesn't mean it doesn't exist, though :)

 

Good luck, and let us know how things go for you :D

Pat☺

Pat - when I was using FSX I remember tweaking the GPU settings in the fsx.cfg file, but can't remember the details. I do remember improving the use of multiple cores and hyperthreads - try to google the subject.

 

Kirk - since you seem to becoming serious about flight simming, I would suggest not to consider just FSX in your planning. After maybe 25 years of simming with M$ products, I recently updated from FSX to P3Dv4.3 and XP 11, and I have not regretted doing this. Chances are that you will do similar changes in the future. In that connection I have found that P3D is much like FSX, i.e. almost linearly FPS dependent on GPU speed and moderately on the CPU, while I find XP 11 dependent on both. I think XP makes better use of multi-cores, and it works my GTX 1080Ti very hard on high graphics settings - I sometimes get high temperature warnings for the GPU when running XP.

 

 

 

Intel Core i7-7700K @ 4.5GHz; NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080Ti 11GB GDDR5X; ASRock Z270 K6 Gaming MB, 16GB DDR4-3000 RAM; 500GB SSD + 2TB HDD; Windows 10 Pro 64-bit; 34" 21:9 curved 4K Monitor

@PhantomTweak: You are absolutely correct. I was seeing the built-in Intel graphics card, NOT the CPU. So, obviously, I would select the GeForce card there.

 

 

 

 

@johnost: You meant to say you have found that P3D is much like FSX, i.e. almost linearly FPS dependent on CPU speed and moderately on the GPU, right?

 

I bought FSX SE and X-Plane 11 and used them both for a bit. I knew I'd want 3rd party addons for scenery and such so I knew I'd have to make a decision between the two and ended up going with FSX -- for several reasons. But the main one being the seemingly unrealistic torque in XP's single engine aircraft. I've read the yays and nays concerning that being realistic/unrealistic (depending on who you read) and opted to go all in with FSX. I've already spent some money now on Orbx files for FSX.

 

Having said that, I'm not at a point of no return with FSX. If I switched away from it I would chalk up the money spent on 3rd party as lessons learned and not look back.

 

I never really looked at P3D because I understand it to not be intended for "home entertainment" use. Plus it just looks really complicated. LOL.

Pat - when I was using FSX I remember tweaking the GPU settings in the fsx.cfg file, but can't remember the details. I do remember improving the use of multiple cores and hyperthreads - try to google the subject.

 

Yes, there's a number of settings in the FSX.CFG file concerning both the GPU, and other items you mentioned. Bear in mind that FSX, sadly, cannot make use of multithreading. The GPU may, I'm not sure.

Some of the settings I, personally, use in the FSX.CFG file are as follows:

 

[GRAPHICS]

SHADER_CACHE_PRIMED_10=1693751041

SHADER_CACHE_PRIMED=1693751041

D3D10=0

HIGHMEMFIX=1

TEXTURE_MAX_LOAD=4096

NUM_LIGHTS=8

AIRCRAFT_SHADOWS=1

AIRCRAFT_REFLECTIONS=1

COCKPIT_HIGH_LOD=1

LANDING_LIGHTS=1

AC_SELF_SHADOW=0

EFFECTS_QUALITY=2

GROUND_SHADOWS=1

TEXTURE_QUALITY=3

IMAGE_QUALITY=0

See_Self=1

Text_Scroll=1

ForceWindowedVsync=1

STALE_BUFFER_THRESHOLD=1024

 

MultiSamplesPerPixel=8

MultiSampleQuality=8

SHADER_CACHE_VERSION=1

 

[JOBSCHEDULER]

AffinityMask=62

//use 60 to free first TWO cores, 62 for only first core. HT OFF

//60: 111100

//or 62: 111110

Note here: I have a 6-core CPU. This would be totally different for a 4-core, and that would be completely different from a 2-Core. Google for your PC's CPU.

 

[bUFFERPOOLS]

//Poolsize=0

UsePools=1

PoolSize=8388608 //PoolSize //8388608 //5242880 5M //10485760 10M //20971520 20M

RejectThreshold=126976 //RejectThreshold //131072 //262144 //524288 //786432 //1048576

 

//RejectThreshold=71072

 

//Try that and if it works great, but if you get image glitches raise RejectThreshold until stable.

 

[TERRAIN]

LOD_RADIUS=4.500000

MESH_COMPLEXITY=71

MESH_RESOLUTION=23

TEXTURE_RESOLUTION=23

AUTOGEN_DENSITY=4

DETAIL_TEXTURE=1

WATER_EFFECTS=4

 

IMAGE_PIXELS_FOR_AUTOGEN_POLYGONS=512

TERRAIN_MAX_AUTOGEN_TREES_PER_CELL=3000

TERRAIN_MAX_AUTOGEN_BUILDINGS_PER_CELL=1950

 

//TERRAIN_MAX_AUTOGEN_TREES_PER_CELL=450 // default=4500

//TERRAIN_MAX_AUTOGEN_BUILDINGS_PER_CELL=1500 //default=3000

 

TEXTURE_SIZE_EXP=10

 

[Main]

//FIBER_FRAME_TIME_FRACTION=0.20

//NOTE: This is system dependent! If you are pushing too much scenery this can BLUR the textures so you must experiment with this and scenery settings. This value can go lower (0.10-0.12) if you do not see any blurry ground textures.

DisablePreload=1

 

[DISPLAY.Device.NVIDIA GeForce GT 610.0]

Mode=1920x1080x32

TriLinear=0

Anisotropic=1

This should match what you set in the sim's menu. If it doesn't, search farther through your FSX.CFG file for another entry that does match. When you find the right one, delete any/all other versions of this setting. Sometimes, when you change the setting in the sim's menu, it can glitch, and write the proper entries higher in the .cfg file than than the original. If it does, it will read them in the order they occur in the .cfg file, and thus, the incorrect settings will be used.

 

 

These are the settings, concerning GPU and such, that I have found work best in my system.

The entries in BOLD seemed to me to have the most effect. ON MY SYSTEM.

All systems are different, so anyone else's computer may, or may not, benefit from these settings.

Change/add only ONE setting line at a time, and test it thoroughly. Make certain you make a back-up copy of the .cfg file before you change ANYTHING, and there-after, every time you change any one setting. That way, at the very worst, you can start over from the beginning. By making a back-up copy before changing/adding another setting will ensure that you won't have to try and remember where you were, and start again from line 0. You will always have a copy available that has all your changes up to that point.

Worst-worst case scenario, you can rename your FSX.CFG to something else, like FSX-BAK.cfg or whatever, and restart FSX. It will create a "vanilla" .cfg file again, and away you go.

 

@PhantomTweak: You are absolutely correct. I was seeing the built-in Intel graphics card, NOT the CPU. So, obviously, I would select the GeForce card there.

You are perfectly correct :D

 

Good luck, all!

Pat☺

I think I just found the info I needed, from CRJ_simpilot, in a different thread. Sorry... I should have looked better before posting. :(

 

You're welcome. And thanks for heeding my advice. I can tell you right now you could get by with an old GTX 560 TI and still play FSX perfectly fine. How do I know this? Because I once used a GTX 560 TI and an I5 6600k myself and the Sim worked fine. Now I use a GTX 1050 TI because I thought a GPU upgrade was needed when I was desperately trying to get the Reality XP GTN 750 to work, and I wanted to update the GPU to some extent anyway. I wanted a GTX 1060, but at the time I was in the market for a new GPU, the stupid Bitcoin craze was going on and GPU prices were through the roof, past the exosphere and on Mars! Total BS that manufactures capitalized on the Bitcoin mining craze. But then again, that's the nature of Capitalism and there's nothing wrong with trying to earn a profit based on those willing to pay the prices. I wasn't willing however. So I ended up with a GTX 1050TI. One day I may just get two GTX 1080's and SLI them for GTA or other games I've been meaning to buy. For FSX it's meaningless. FSX and FS9 were chiefly coded for CPU mathematical commutations. Just using your GPS in the Sim and your CPU is crunching a boat load of math problems, and to make matters worse, the Sim was only coded for single thread capability. In fact, it uses mostly the second core. You can see this by launching Task Manager and watching the CPU graph while flying.

 

So in a nut shell, if your only game is FSX or FS9, focus on a CPU with fast single thread capability withen your budget. Look here: https://www.cpubenchmark.net/singleThread.html Dedicated graphics would be a plus over built-in Intel graphics though.

 

TEXTURE_MAX_LOAD=4096

 

This is waaaaay too high and your asking for an OOM fault.

This is waaaaay too high and your asking for an OOM fault.

 

Well, so, since I bought FSX:SE the day it came on the market, I've had a total of, get this, now...one whole OOM. And that was before I made any changes to the FSX.cfg file. None at all.

 

Maybe it's something special about SE, maybe another setting is protecting me, maybe I just don't use a lot of very complex scenery. I don't know, nor do I really care much. All I know is that it works for me, on my system. I can't, and won't, make any promises about any of it for any one else, on any other system.

 

Have fun, everyone!

Pat☺

"Having said that, I'm not at a point of no return with FSX. If I switched away from it I would chalk up the money spent on 3rd party as lessons learned and not look back.

 

I never really looked at P3D because I understand it to not be intended for "home entertainment" use. Plus it just looks really complicated. LOL. "

 

 

Kirk: I was not suggesting that you should leave FSX, I had years of fun with it, and the SE version seemed to solve some problems with the FSX disc version. I was only suggesting that, as you progress with the hobby, you may sooner or later want to move to a 64-bit system. P3D is based on FSX and I find it much easier to migrate from FSX to P3D than to XP. And of course I do not use it for home entertainment, it is strictly for my pilot training!!! I ran FSX-SE just fine with an I7-960 CPU at 3.8Ghz and a GTX 570 GPU. However, I got a new computer to enable moving forward with the new technologies.

 

 

 

Intel Core i7-7700K @ 4.5GHz; NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080Ti 11GB GDDR5X; ASRock Z270 K6 Gaming MB, 16GB DDR4-3000 RAM; 500GB SSD + 2TB HDD; Windows 10 Pro 64-bit; 34" 21:9 curved 4K Monitor

"Yes, there's a number of settings in the FSX.CFG file concerning both the GPU, and other items you mentioned. Bear in mind that FSX, sadly, cannot make use of multithreading."

 

 

Pat: I agree with everything you say. I used a 4-core CPU and can't remember the Jobscheduler settings, but I do remember that I was able to funnel more background processing to the secondary cores and also to eliminate hyperthreading, which did seem to affect FSX negatively.

 

 

 

Intel Core i7-7700K @ 4.5GHz; NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080Ti 11GB GDDR5X; ASRock Z270 K6 Gaming MB, 16GB DDR4-3000 RAM; 500GB SSD + 2TB HDD; Windows 10 Pro 64-bit; 34" 21:9 curved 4K Monitor

maybe I just don't use a lot of very complex scenery.

 

That's probably why. It happens when you have a lot of scenery, etc and it all loads no matter where you fly increasing the RAM usage, and once past about 3.5 GB it will error out.

 

I personally don't need resolution like that. I can't remember what I have set now. I think it's 2048 or some damn thing. And I don't use HD anything. I just know that FS is an old horse and I try to treat it well. It's not like BF3 or Call Of Duty, etc. That would be different, but would be more dependent on the GPU.