I bought a new PC and video card in hope to improve the quality of my gaming time. To my horror the quilaty of the game did not improve that much. I still had to reduce the sceneries Settings to low standards just just to get a decent resolution. I tried every trick I now and still when I played the difficult missions the frame rate would dropped dramatically. Well I remember reading that sound takes a lot of your PC capabilities. So I decided to reduce the sound output of my of my PC sound card and reduce the sound setting in the CFS2 program. Guess what ,I now for the first time was able fly missions at the maximum setting. WOW what  a difference that make . I hope to help others that  have the same
problems with unsatisfactory frame rate. I still get acceptable sound quality. You do not need to hear the vioces of the other Pilots very loud since in the real air war the sound of the engines and AAA would drown out the Radio. Try it and maybe it will work for you also        James007
PS: Remember you do not need Radio messages for the US missions you should now the Language by now. That also reduce frame rate. Unfortunately most of us do not speak Japanese. Tha same cannot be done for does of us who fly Imperial mission also.