First - Tune your system and FSX. Good advice here: http://205.252.250.26/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1208959973

Second - There are many different opinions on what's "perfect" display settings in FSX. You have make up your own opinion on how to balance display settings and performance/smoothness. Eventually you might use different display settings depending on the type of flight you do (VFR flying low and slow, IFR flying high and fast).

jwenham wrote on Sep 27^th, 2009 at 8:49am:


Exactly what I found! My experience is that AA 4x, Multisampling is the best trade off between visuals and performance. I don't use nHancer because I couldn't get rid of the shimmering and with the later nVIDIA drivers I got pretty much the same result with 4x Multi as with nHancer 4x combined. I now use the nVIDIA drivers 190.62 and have enabled AA in FSX since the nHancer beta recommended this for FSX due to changes in the nVIDIA 190 drivers. I also have set Enhance the application setting in the CP.

As said, I'm happy with running FSX with 4x multi + Enhance the application setting and AA enabled in FSX.

laurits wrote on Sep 27^th, 2009 at 1:37pm:


The latest nVIDIA drivers for the Geforce 8-series is 190.62. I think most simmers use older drivers. 182.50 seems to be recommended by most simmers since nHancer do work with these drivers. For now there is only a beta version of nHancer available for the 190.62 driver.

laurits wrote on Sep 27^th, 2009 at 1:37pm:


I haven't experienced any impact on performance in FSX with any the latest nVIDIA drivers (181.22 - 190.62).

No I'm not using nHancer. I used to, but for some time now I haven't noticed much difference in shimmering (AA performance) in FSX with or without nHancer. But this is my opinion. Running nHancer with combined AA will decrease performance in FSX.

As I said in the other thread... 32 bit operating systems only see 3.7Gb memory (usually. But for this, it is pretty much that)

3.7Gb - 2Gb graphics memory = 1.7Gb actual RAM type memory your computer can use.

But I don't think on 32 bit that any software is allowed to use more than 2Gb RAM, so either way, you have more memory than you think you have.

Getting a 64bit operating system would probably help, but is costly. A cheap solution is to lower the amount of autogen.


I'll let someone else confirm this, but this is probably the issue. You've set up the game for specifications you thought you had, but don't.

Well,

I have now installed the nVIDIA 191.03 beta drivers and nHancer 2.5.5. I'm now running nHancer with 8x AA combined and I still have some shimmering in FSX, but it's OK. I'll continue to use nHancer.

Quote:


When I used nVIDIA CP settings 4x AA Multi, I set FSX display settings for Filtering = trilinear and Anti-Aliasing checked.

laurits wrote on Oct 3^rd, 2009 at 11:25am:


I don't understand that comment? Shimmering textures has nothing to do with performance. You get some amount of shimmer using any graphics card. There was some hope that the new AA features on the Radeon 5870 card would help, but initial reports on another forum is negative on this point.

Some FSX autogen building textures shimmer and that's caused by bad texture design. Only help would be autogen replacements.

laurits wrote on Oct 3^rd, 2009 at 1:04pm:


Well, you have to explain to me how shimmering relates to performance. 

laurits wrote on Oct 3^rd, 2009 at 1:04pm:


So you seriously think that spending more or less money on hardware would have any impact on texture shimmering? 
You can't be serious.

And of course new hardware is fun. During this winter I'll replace my i7 940 with a i7 975 and the GTX285 with a GTX300. And it's fun. I have a very smooth and fast FSX and it's going to be even better. 

JoBee wrote on Oct 3^rd, 2009 at 2:10pm:


Sorry, but I plan to build a computer from old hardware.

laurits wrote on Oct 4^th, 2009 at 5:44am: