CPU vs. GPU ugrade for MS FSX.

[noriseghir]

A friends who possed a pentuim D 960 + a geforce 7900 gtx ask me what is the best upgrade to increase perfomances in MS Flight Simulator X Service Pack 2.

Knowing that this software is widely processor depandant and that since SP1 it managed multicore CPUs I tell him to keep his graphics card and buy with the money a new CPU : Q6600 or E8400.

What do you think?

 

[NXIL]

Hey No,

check out this chart, on which you can add the 7900GTX: looks like it's a pretty good GPU:

http://www.tomshardware.com/ch...5%2C1611%2C1610%2C1624

The difference between that 7900GTX and an 8800ultra is 2FPS, meaning that the benchmark is CPU limited, essentially. (That chart is 1900 x 1200 resolution, but there are other resolutions available.)

Looking at some other benchmarks, it looks like the dual core CPU with a high clock speed is a bit better than a quad core at a lower clock speed.

http://forums.avsim.net/dcboar...rum=197&topic_id=31320


A quick footnote on FSX's apetite for cores. On some of the 2, 3 and 4 core runs I recorded FSX total CPU utilisation. Every minute the sim runs up all available cores for scenery pre-loading (I expect) and the amount of time it spends doing so is inversely proportional to the number of cores it has at its disposal (ie. less cores mean more time pre-loading).

What is interesting however is that average CPU usage over the entire run across 2, 3 and 4 cores is roughly the same at around 1.5 cores of equivalent full time use. This means that a dual core has 25% spare capacity to run addons with FSX, which seems optimal, and that a quad core has horsepower to spare.

Anyway, bottom line, looks like you are correct, max out CPU for flight sim....

HTH

NXIL

 

[Markfw]

I think flight sim likes and uses more than 2 cores. (not positive)

Get a Q6600, and OC to 3.4

 

[GundamF91]

FSX does use more than 2 cores, so it does matter. Also FSX offloads lots of physics to CPU, so having a quad core does help.

 

[NXIL]

From:

http://blogs.msdn.com/ptaylor/...sx-perf-benchmark.aspx


Gary ( Reset MCP Alt ) at AVSim has an excellent FSX benchmark and from that has deduced some quite interesting bits about FSX perf on dual and quad cores. Basically if you dont use add-ons, a dual-core CPU is good enough. If you do use add-ons, then a quad-core CPU is likely what you want.

From:

http://www.extremetech.com/art.../0,2845,2178787,00.asp

Specific FSX benchmark:

http://www.extremetech.com/art.../0,2845,2178794,00.asp

Intel Core 2 Quad 6850: 63.3 FPS

Core 2 Duo 6850: 63.4 FPS

Both clock at 3.0ghz....

And:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M...oft_Flight_Simulator_X


A fast CPU is essential for good performance. While Service Pack 1 improved performance on multicore processors, FSX performance is largely dependent on raw CPU speed.[11]

And, here is some good benchmarking:

http://www.tomshardware.com/re...u-upgrade,1928-10.html

Looks like a Q6600 overclocked to 3.2 is the sharp call....or, as Mark said, to 3.4....and, I do note from that last page of benchmarks that upgrading the vid card helps more than that first page of benchmarks I linked to says....

HTH

NXIL

 

[Cutthroat]

When I upgraded from a E6400 to my Q9450 I seen a great difference in performance of FSX. But when I upgraded from a 8800GTX to a GTX 280 I don't see as much of a difference. I still can't max out the settings, I'm not even close.

I did a flight the other day, I was getting 40fps in the air, but landing at CYYZ it dropped to 6fps. My settings are fairly demanding, but as I said not nearly maxed out. And people think Crysis is demanding, I can play it now on very high at a reasonable fps.

BTW RAM is also important for FSX if you want to use the better textures, 4GB at least.

 

[noriseghir]

More CPU and More RAM !
Thx very much