Pepe J

My Feedback: (2)

Hi Folks,

I have Real Flight G2 and the Microsoft Combat Flight Sim. 1 & 2. All three work flawlessly! I just recently purchased the Microsoft Flight Sim. 3 and am having video problems so I need a little advice please from those who can offer.

I can fly the "Quick Combat" mode with very little video hesitation or freeze-up. On certain missions the video totally freezes up. I have done every thing suggested to improve this, all the lasted download upgrades (including the BIOS) and shut down all programs to free up the RAM (93% free). If I turn the video acceleration rate right down, it improves some what, but not much.

My system is as follows:

Dell Dimension 8100 series
Pentium 4 1300mhz processor
128 mb rd-Ram
20 GB ultra ata 7200rpm hard drive (10 gb free)
Nvidia GeForce 2 MX400 (32mb) video card
Creative sound 64v pci sound card
Operating system: Windows 98 SE
ViewSonic A70 monitor.

I have more than double the operating requirements Microsoft asks for, Any suggestions would be very much appreciated. Every one have a Merry Christmas.

Globemaster8600

I personally cannot help you, but I suggest you register (free) with www.fsgateway.com, and post your problem there.
You will almost certainly get help for your problem, and uveryone is really friendly over there too.

David Cutler

Looks like a nice system

How come you are using Windows 98? The paging on the earlier builds of W98 was a bit slow so the virtual memory wasn't used efficiently. Maybe that's your problem?

As an attempt at a fix, try running it with the maximum virtual memory, if not already set by the OS.

(Right click on 'My Computer' ----> Properties---> Performance ---> Virtual Memory, then choose the maximum, if it's listed there. Before doing that, is Windows managing your virtual memory at the moment? If not, select that check box and try running your progs again)

David C.

Pepe J

My Feedback: (2)

Thanks for the tips and reply's. I will definitely present my problem at the web site suggested by you GM8600.

Thanks Dave, I think you're one the right track? One of the trouble shoot tips is to adjust the Virtual Memory to a Min/Max of 1024mb. I have tried a number of different settings. Improvement? Yes, but not much. I think you maybe correct about Win. 98 thou. I'm going to try the program on my Daughter's system. She has twice the system using Win. XP, but has the same Video card. This should help eliminate a problem possibly.

I noticed the frame rate is only 15-30 fps? I have seen it as high as 65fps. Real flight G2 runs around 85fps. There was a trouble shoot about a override/ bypass of the Video card and Motherboard, but I really don't want to venture there at this time.

I was hoping to find someone with the exact same problem/system and knew of a cure, but I'm still open for suggestions. Thank's again and both you Fella's enjoy the X-mas season.

Pat.

RJMCOM

My Feedback: (1)

Hello,

I too have CFS3 and also have had nothing but problems with the video. I have done quite a bit of tweaking and reading up on the problem and from what I have read on the Microsoft website is that the game is flawed. There will be a free product upgrade coming out just after x-mas to correct most of the games problems. The main problem is that the game was written to use Direct X 9.xx Video Driver software, which has not been released yet.

System Specs. (Home built by myself - R.J.M. Computers)

- 1.8 P4 Northwood - 512k onbaord L1 and L2 cache
- Asus P4-333 M.B.
- 1024 Megs PC-333 DDR Ram
- 100 Gig 7200 Maxtor H.D.
- 128 Meg Nvidia GeForce 4 Titanium 4600 video card
- Sound Blaster Live 5.1 +MP3 - Full surround sound
- 2 Gigs of HD allocated for Windows Virtual Memory
- 256 Megs System Memory allocated as Extra Video Memeory.

With this setup the highest frame rate I could achieve was 125 FPS with the graphics turned almost off. If I set the graphics to high everything the frame rate would plummet to around 35 FPS and it would also have the occasional hiccup where the game would stutter for a second and then return to normal.

Really the only thing you can do is wait for the product upgrade,
I have given up on the game for the time being and have written a nice long letter to Microsoft about their minimum system requirements.

Sorry I can't be of more help.
RJMCOM

Pepe J

My Feedback: (2)

Hey RJMCOM,

Thank's for the info. That's what I really wanted to hear. I really didn't think there was much of a problem with my system. Sounds like you could run NORAD with your system!
I guess I'll have to wait along with you for the upgrade(s) also. That's good to know thou, I can quite chasing my tail and put it a side.


Thank you all again, Have a Merry X-mas season and all the Best in the New Year!

Pat.

Globemaster8600

I think the version of DirectX which came with CFS3 was known to cause problems.

I suggest downloading DirectX 9, and installing it.
That should help.

Pepe J

My Feedback: (2)

Hey Aj/RJMCOM,

I Just downloaded and installed Direct X 9.0. I see the the upgrade has only been available for a week?
It improved the problem somewhat, but not a fix. I could not find any upgrade's or patches at Microsoft Support at this time.
I think you're a 100% correct RJM, there are Flaw's in the Game! Let me know please if the Direct X 9.0 cures your problem. Thanks.

Pat.

Globemaster8600

Yeah, directX9 is new.
Micro$oft plans to release a patch for CFS3 shortly.

Pepe J

My Feedback: (2)

Thanks AJ,

I will post a thread here when the time comes and let all know if the problem is cured?

Do You Pilot that Sikorsky S-64 you have pictured? I've seen them operate "Heli-Logging". Very Impressive to watch! A lot of that in my Area here in British Columbia.

Pat.

Globemaster8600

Yeah, just to let us know you no longer have a problem.

No, I don't pilot the helo in the pic.
Wish I did though
BTW, you can get more info on those helos, along with some great pics at:
http://www.erickson-aircrane.com/ and
http://www.air-crane.com/index.asp

=XGC= OzZ

Upgrade you drivers for you Video card this is a must.
Then Upgrade to Direct 9X MUST this should be done ,for anybody who is playing Hi end Games.

And I would really upgrade your memory to at lest 256 but I would have 512 it that system.

You will notice a very big deferents in game playing if you do theses steps.

FunXtra

u shoul get win XP home (pro is nothing but the same thing, but with higher price), i dont like this system very much but CFS3 was designed to run in it....
if win XP duznt work well enough u should boost up ur cache memory, u wont need a new video card.

Pepe J

My Feedback: (2)

Thanks for the additional input. I have all the latest downloads available for my system. There is a flaw in the game as stated by RJMCOM in an earlier post. The next move is to install the latest patches when they become available and go from there. No sense throwing good money after bad at this point. Thanks again.

Pat.

Globemaster8600

More info on the patch at: http://www.fsgateway.com/topic.asp?T...bat+Flight+Sim

Trucker-RCU

As pointed out by someone earlier, boosting memory is your best bet. will really up your system performance. better off adding memory that is cheap at the moment than upgrading to xp, which itself is memory hungry. I just maxed mine out and it no longer hangs up or stalls, really helped on g2. win 98 se is still a good operating system, stable with few remaining bugs, make sure you keep it updated on a regular basis.

Pepe J

My Feedback: (2)

Thanks Trucker,


Right now I'm just going to wait for the update patches when they are released. I looked into a memory up-grade and was just about to install it and I thought I would give DELL Tech. a call. The young fella' on the other end was very knowledgeable. He said it was a definite NO-NO to just throw in some more Ram in my machine. He gave a detailed explanation why and what would happen? Bottom line.... Kiss my Motherboard good-bye! He said "save your money, you don't need it." BTW, 128 Mb. of Dell Ram is around $500.cdn OUCH! Makes ya wonder don't it, when you can go downtown and get 256Mb. for $75.
Apparently a lot of people with Dell 8100 series have cooked their MB's because of doing just that. (Any comment here RJMCOM?)
My game runs the same whether I have 40% or 93% of free Ram? My G2 has always ran flawlessly along with any other game I have so far. I'm not saying that that's not the problem, I just want to eliminate all others first before I spend a whack of cash to go take on the Luftwaffe.

Trucker. Do you actually have the Microsoft CFS 3 installed on your machine and did the memory up-grade cure your problem?

David Cutler

RAM, in itself, doesn't actually do anything when you get above a certain level.

It's how this RAM is used that makes the difference. Even fast RAM isn't anywhere near as fast as the caches and especially, the register RAM in the CPU and chip sets, and it's how the data is switched between them that speeds up applications.

Most modern CPUs have the fast cache memories actually as part of the CPU die and they utilize the main memory when necessary. In recent computers, there is so much RAM that its speed and size are becoming less important than parameters like the wait state (created by the difference between the RAM speed and the cache speeds, which means the CPU has to wait for the RAM to catch up)and bus speeds.

So, doubling the RAM size, which in the past, had a huge effect on speed, won't have the same effect in, say, a Pentium 4.


David C.

=XGC= OzZ

Microsoft and Intel both state That memory does affect proformas of a PC, yes the statement to hold some Merritt but,the case is more memory and that your system is set to reform and tweeted is important.
Ram does make a deferents.
Tweeting OS makes a deferents.
P4 P3 P2 P1..

David Cutler

Who in Intel? Their moves recently (in the hyper-threading facility of the latest Pentium, for instance) has been towards the technology involved in memory usage, as opposed to sheer size of the RAM. Both L1 and L2 caches are now in the CPU, and there are many more registers, which is where the true speed lies. Even the incredibly fast RamBus RAM can't supply data quick enough for the cache onboard (hence the need for more cache, and the fact that wait state has suddenly become relevant), and the increases in speeds recently have come almost entirely from the branch forecasting chip and the bus communication between the caches, registers, and, to some extent, the north bridge (i.e. memory section) of the chip set.

As for Microsoft, they take what they are given in hardware, and try their best to handle it efficiently.

Or, to put that in English, increasing RAM used to be the most important way of getting speed, (and still is for old machines) but, now that there is an abundance of it, it's how that memory is used that has become the holy grail.

David C.

Trucker-RCU

Ya gotta love Dell, they just love to sell their overpriced parts. That how they can sell millions of cheap computers. But they all do that. The support guy is right, you need to be sure what kind of RAM you put in your machine. 8100 uses rdram, which runs about double of simm. go to www.centon.com, they have a nice little ram config utility to match memory to your machine. I just chked for dell 8100 and it sent me to the right memory on amazon for $189 for 256 rdram for your machine. This might be more than you want to inves right now but give it a couple of months, memory is getting cheaper all the time and the next change in format is already coming down the pipe.
I dont have the cfs3 on my machine, so not familiar with it, but I run video editing software and you can really see the diferance in performance. If your program needs memory, and its not in ram, then your computer uses your disk drive as extra space. this is slow, it is much better and faster to be able to draw directly from memory. IMHO

Pepe J

My Feedback: (2)

Hey All,

Thanks all for the input on my thread here. I have just upgraded with the patch for the CFS 3 to 3.1

NO GO! Video hesitation worse than ever. Controller starts acting up also which it never did before and some of key-board commands not working either.

I just down loaded and installed the patch, calibrated the controller and tried the game in Quick Combat and flying one Mission. It is a total mess and I may have to do a little reconfiguring, but don't have the time to waste right now on an "arcade game."

I am still open to suggestion here and any of you out there who are also having problems with this game please comment especially if you have same system or similar to mine. (See 1st Thread posted)

Thanks.

Globemaster8600

I suggest you make an account at www.fsgateway.com and post your problem over there.
You are certain to get help and/or suggestions to help you out.

Pepe J

My Feedback: (2)

Thanks AJ,

I posted a thread as you suggested. There are a couple of config's I will try when I find the time. The bottom line here in my opinion (and others) is that the game is a bit of a P.O.S. unless you have the complete system it was designed to run on, like a new, top of the line, maxed out, fully loaded system for the minimal requirements?

I'm not going to spend some big $$$ to upgrade for a game when I can spend it on perfectly good model stuff that I do know works. I will keep you all posted on the results.

Thanks.

Globemaster8600

Yeah, i read the forums over there too!
I am planning to upgrade soon, as my current system is a bit behind.
The key is to not buy a ready made package, but buy and build your own, as it works out much better value.