New Computer

[Joseph Mallinson 1039354]

Hi All,

 

I am getting a new computer very soon, this will just be for flight sim. Could you please reccomend some of the computer what you think would be best.

 

I would like something powerful so it runs smoothly and also what has really good graphics. It is not a must have but also maybe have wireless.

 

Any suggestions would be really grateful.

 

Thanks

 

Joe

[Larry James 901346]

Hi All,

 

I am getting a new computer very soon, this will just be for flight sim. Could you please reccomend some of the computer what you think would be best.

 

I would like something powerful so it runs smoothly and also what has really good graphics. It is not a must have but also maybe have wireless.

 

Any suggestions would be really grateful.

 

Thanks

 

Joe

 

New FSX Comp.:

viewtopic.php?f=79&t=45197

 

-- L. James

 

--

L. D. James

[email protected]

www.apollo3.com/~ljames

[John Graham 1036677]

I would recommend that you either build your own computer or get a custom computer build for you.

 

For hardware, i have some recommendations.

 

Processor: Saying that you will only be using FS2004 or FSX, I would recommend buying a Dual Core Processor because Flight Sim only uses 2 cores at max, so anything more would be redundant. Dual Cores are fairly cheap right now, and you could get an E8500 clocked at 3.16 for $190 US on Newegg. Plus the Dual Cores are fairly good for overclocking, so it would be very easy to overclock to 3.6 Ghz (i wouldn't recommend anything further because it would make much of a difference). Some may argue that an i7 may be a better choice because they have faster cores, but the price/performance ratio is very much in favor of the dual core.

 

Memory: Depending on your operating system, here are my recommendations:

 

XP- 2 GB (windows XP only uses 4 GB of memory MAX. So if you have 2 GB of RAM, 1 GB video card, and 1 GB sound card that is 4 GBs right there, so I would recommend you getting extremely fast DDR3 RAM).

 

Vista/Win7- 4-8 GB depending on what you want your performance to be.

 

 

 

Graphics Card: Lowest- 8800 GTX Recommend - GTX275 (easily and best overclocked) Highest- 4870 X2

 

 

 

 

Hope this helps

[Luke Kolin]

Saying that you will only be using FS2004 or FSX, I would recommend buying a Dual Core Processor because Flight Sim only uses 2 cores at max

 

This is incorrect. FS9 will only use one core, and FSX can use up to either 64 or 256.

 

Cheers!

 

Luke

[John Graham 1036677]

Saying that you will only be using FS2004 or FSX, I would recommend buying a Dual Core Processor because Flight Sim only uses 2 cores at max

 

This is incorrect. FS9 will only use one core, and FSX can use up to either 64 or 256.

 

Cheers!

 

Luke

 

Ya FS9 is only one core. But test done my PC Pilot and a bunch of other people say that FSX can only efficiently use 2 cores. That is why its such a problem.

[Nicholas Taylor 1104922]

Saying that you will only be using FS2004 or FSX, I would recommend buying a Dual Core Processor because Flight Sim only uses 2 cores at max

 

This is incorrect. FS9 will only use one core, and FSX can use up to either 64 or 256.

 

Cheers!

 

Luke

 

Ya FS9 is only one core. But test done my PC Pilot and a bunch of other people say that FSX can only efficiently use 2 cores. That is why its such a problem.

FSX can run up to 256 cores. Whoever told you that it only uses 2 cores is lying. That's why there is and was a quantum leap in performance from an old dual core I had to an i7 both overclocked to the same speed.

[Erhan Atesoglu 1050499]

Uhmm actually if you simply hit ctrl-alt-del.. you'll see how many cores it's limited too. The fact FSX has any extra cores to work on was an after thought brought in by one of the service packs. My system only shows 3 processes and it's an i7.

 

Also the quantum leap difference between and i7 and dual core has to do with the QPI, nothing else.

 

And actually there is a version that handles many more cores closer to what Nicholas is suggesting but was only "internal" at the time of the Aces shutdown. I saw 16 cores demo'd at CES 2009.

[Charan Kumar]

I run a C2Q so I was just wondering, does this mean setting an Affinity Mask to use 4 cores is of no use and won't make a difference? BTW, I do see all 4 processors spiking when FSX is running, and setting Affinity Mask to 3 servers "seemed" like it was slower, not sure if it was reality

[Erhan Atesoglu 1050499]

Charan: well if it did make a difference don't you think your OS or FSX would handle it, given you already have 2 processes created by FSX that uses the affinity mask. Also if you're already idling at 99% CPU what's the point?

 

To be clear on the topic, the reality of modern GPU's is they can only talk to one processor/thread. Unfortunately this means the only thing the other processors can do graphics wise is load textures and objects and prepare the autogen for the main thread. So what's really going on is even though you get more autogen than you paid for, you still have to pay some overhead to have them displayed.