Advice on Graphics Upgrade

[davidgate]

I am currently running an nVidia 8800GT graphics card - it has given good service but struggles with FTX airports. I plan to upgrade soon - would an ATI 5770 give a significant boost in fps or should I go to say a 5850?

Any advice appreciated.

Dave G

[John Venema]

The 5870 would be the best best, and give you 18 months good service. Make sure you get a 2GB version.

[davidgate]

Thanks John.

I notice on your spec that you have 12G RAM on your 64 bit machine - how do you get high utilisation of so much RAM? I have 8G and am flat out utilising 30%.

Dave G

[John Venema]

12GB is for Photoshop editing of large photoreal TIF files, which can sometimes be 2-3GB in size each before layers, so 12GB can get chewed up pretty quickly

[jlr91]

Hi John,

I've been following all your advices.

Could you explain me why 2Go for the graphic card ?

And I'm still hesitating between a GTX285 and a 5870 (quite big differnce of price for which improvement ?)

Regards,

Jean-Luc

[TenBlade]

There have been a few quirks with the ATI card regarding FSX, but probably nothing a driver update won´t fix. Performancewise those two cards are very similar according to Jetline Systems (see product guide). The support for the GTX 285 is probably still better, all the tweaks and guides for nHancer are out there, but they will probably follow for the ATI card (except for nHancer settings, of course).

I´m a very satisfied GTX 285 1GB owner. And I hardly play any games on my pc, so what the ATI card will do for other games, I don´t know. But remember FSX´s true bottle neck is the CPU, so I´d throw my money in that direction, and save money on a well proven GTX 285. I got the EVGA superclocked edition, and I applied a triple fan to cool it and silence it (x-plane would run my card very hot).

Hope this clarified some things for you. There´s also the nVidia 400-series now, but I´d wait and see how they perform.

Bjorn

[jlr91]

Thanks Bjorn,

I just changed my CPU for a I7 930@4.2 (with watercooling) and now it's my Graphic card which is the bottleneck (8800GTS).

Jean-Luc

[NaveenB]

I have both a 5870 2gb and a GTX 285.

I got the 5870 for Eyefinity and a 3 monitor setup, I agree the 5870 is a good card, but the Image Quality is slightly off compared to the nvidia offering. 

It still slows down in heavy clouds, but it's not too bad.

The GTX 285 on a single monitor is great, beautiful performance and IQ.

Nvidia is releasing a driver update which would allow 3 monitors to be run as a single widescreen if you have two cards in SLI, if that works then that would be the nvidia deal sealer for me.

nb

[TenBlade]

My GTX runs three screens @ 5040x1050 with TripleHead2Go Digital, still with excellent framerate overall. FSX is not supposed to run well on SLI at all.

[Sniper31]

My GTX runs three screens @ 5040x1050 with TripleHead2Go Digital, still with excellent framerate overall. FSX is not supposed to run well on SLI at all.

That is very true, FSX does NOT like SLI at all. Some of us on here have pointed that (and tested it) out to folks in the past here, and many times, FSX does not even like it that there is a 2nd GPU SLI card plugged into the MOBO. In those case's it actually brings the FPS's down.

[TenBlade]

And that includes the GTX 295 which has two gpu´s, so essentially SLI.

[stiletto2]

My GTX runs three screens @ 5040x1050 with TripleHead2Go Digital, still with excellent framerate overall. FSX is not supposed to run well on SLI at all.

Hi TenBlade,

I would be interested in what tweaks you made to fsx.cfg and what your framerate runs.  I am just now tweaking my new setup which has a lot of similarity to yours and would like to learn from your experience.  Perhaps you could send me your fsx.cffg or something.  Any feedback would be appreciated.

Thanks.

Stiletto2

[TenBlade]

Hi Stiletto.

Sure, no problem. There´s not much more than NickN´s and some of the Jesus tweaks (see Avsim forums) that specifically relate to having a 1GB gpu. But you can copy/paste this into notepad and compare line by line, and make changes as you go along. I wouldn´t just copy my cfg into your FSX, but see what lines I´ve added and test the effect. If you lose track and FSX gives you a hard time, just delete the cfg and let FSX re-create a fresh cfg.

Now, frames are all about where you fly, taking off from Newark and cruising over Manhattan in my EH-101 leaves me roughly at 20 frames, intermittent drops, but still smooth flight. Same RC taking off from Aeropelican with FTX Blue frames are 40-50.

Enjoy!

Bjorn

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[TenBlade]

Just made a few screenies of my settings, easier to appreciate than reading through my cfg.

And this is a good read, it´s regarding the Jesus tweak etc. which has drawn a lot of attention and comments, it´s been compiled here http://forums1.avsim.net/index.php?showtopic=281538

[stiletto2]

Thanks, TenBlade!

I will be working through these with my new system as time permits.  I will get back to you if I have any questions.

Stiletto2

[TenBlade]

Any time! Oh, and change to Anisotropic in fsx, was a mistake on my part.

[Wolter van der Spoel]

Hi Bjorn,

I'd advice you to clean up your fsX cfg as it states twice the vidcard with different settings, not good for the proper working of fsX

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[TenBlade]

Yeah, I saw that, but had no clue what to make of it. Have not idea how it got there, must be recent, ´cause I know it wasn´t there when I recently installed my quad and made the affinity-thingy?!

Thanks for the tip, Wolter!

[Maurice_King]

I wish some bugger would send me 2 or 3 of the current cards so I can do a PROPPER review rather than rely on a HUGE amount of salt when looking at what these cards can and can't do

[Rimshot]

I am currently running an nVidia 8800GT graphics card - it has given good service but struggles with FTX airports. I plan to upgrade soon - would an ATI 5770 give a significant boost in fps or should I go to say a 5850?

Same question for me. I read John and others advice a much faster card like the 5870, but wouldn't a card like that be to much for my system?

[TenBlade]

I don´t think you can have a card that´s too much, unless your power supply isn´t up for it. I run 750 W, which is probably more than enough.

Is your processor is overclocked? I´d recommend it. All the gpu´s in the world won´t help your FSX if your processor is not up for the job.

But by all means, get a 1GB gpu. The ATI cards have reportedly had some graphics issues in FSX, I have no personal experience. So, I can just recommend the GTX 285 1GB edition.

Bjorn

[davidgate]

I see the new GTX470s are starting to drop in price (U-Mart) - about $60 more than a 5870 and $130 more than a GTX285. Might be worth waiting a bit longer - still a lot of money though.

Has anyone had experience with the 470/480 series?

Dave G

[Sniper31]

I see the new GTX470s are starting to drop in price (U-Mart) - about $60 more than a 5870 and $130 more than a GTX285. Might be worth waiting a bit longer - still a lot of money though.

Has anyone had experience with the 470/480 series?

Dave G

Yes! Great cards, both of them.

[Phil Manhart]

I see the new GTX470s are starting to drop in price (U-Mart) - about $60 more than a 5870 and $130 more than a GTX285. Might be worth waiting a bit longer - still a lot of money though.

Has anyone had experience with the 470/480 series?

Dave G

Some posts I've made about the GTX 480:

http://orbxsystems.com/forums/index.php?topic=21838.msg186580#msg186580

http://orbxsystems.com/forums/index.php?topic=21834.msg186543#msg186543

Spirit Flyer's excellent comparison between GTX 275 and GTX 470:

http://orbxsystems.com/forums/index.php?topic=21612.0

Phil

[Rimshot]

Is your processor is overclocked? I´d recommend it. All the gpu´s in the world won´t help your FSX if your processor is not up for the job.

My E8500 runs at 3.33 GHz, so it is marginally overclocked. I'm reluctant to overclock any further because I do not want to mess up things. So keeping it at 3.33 GHz, will it be able to keep up with a ATI 5870 card? Or with a GTX 285 or even 480 for that matter?

I'd like to upgrade to get better performance with the Orbx airports. Either I get a new card for my current system or I wait a while longer and get a completely new system.

[TenBlade]

It won´t matter what card you throw in if you don´t squeeze your processor more. It´ll do 4 gigz, I´m pretty sure of that. If you google about a bit, you can find a how-to or review out there telling you just how much you should be able to get from it, you most probably won´t even have to mess with voltages. Your ram must be up to it too, of course.

Now, it´s all about how much money you want to throw down the money pit (a.k.a. flightsim hobby). I upgraded from a decent E8600 doing 4 gigz steadily to a quad Q9650 and overclocked that. I´ll squeeze it some more when I get the time. So, I´d say, most performance for the money would be a quad and the 285. The ATI is said to have issues with fsx, but I have no personal experience.

Next you need the right tweak on your fsx.cfg.

If you spend big time for a new rig, you should get an i-series processor and the 480, I would, if I sold a kidney or struck gold.

[Rimshot]

Thanks for the feedback. I decided to ugrade my card with the ATI 5770 1GB. Although not spectacular I can see an improvement in performance. In Company of Heroes the improvement is much greater, but I guess that game utilizes the GPU more. I'll get a completely new system later, probably in the first quarter of the next year

[davidgate]

After taking in the dsicussion and reading other posts I've decided to go with the GTX470.

There's been a lot of rave reviews for the 480 - how does the the 470 perform in FTX territory?

[Barry Meiklejohn]

davidgate,

I would be interested in seeing your results with the 470 - maybe start a new thread in this hardware forum please? (If you haven't already).

I have just gone down the road of the GTX480, upgraded from my previous GTX285. I am over the moon with the results, although to get the best performance I have had to tweak with some of Jesus' BP0 settings. The results of smooth flight around Brisbane is incredible.

I suspect the 470 should be just as capable for us in FSX but haven't seen too many reports. If the card gives as good a results, then it is a winner as I suspect it would run slightly cooler and draw a little less power.

Cheers,

Baz.

[Guest strider]

Gtx 480 ! Max sliders ! Max weather ! No stuters ! No lagging textures ! I7,quad(3gh) 30fps !

[davidgate]

davidgate,

I would be interested in seeing your results with the 470 - maybe start a new thread in this hardware forum please? (If you haven't already).

I have just gone down the road of the GTX480, upgraded from my previous GTX285. I am over the moon with the results, although to get the best performance I have had to tweak with some of Jesus' BP0 settings. The results of smooth flight around Brisbane is incredible.

I suspect the 470 should be just as capable for us in FSX but haven't seen too many reports. If the card gives as good a results, then it is a winner as I suspect it would run slightly cooler and draw a little less power.

Cheers,

Baz.

Baz,

Will do - I think I will need to upgarde to a 750W PSU first. I don't think I can justify the cost of the 480 on my current rig - I'm hoping however to get a significant improvement over the 8800GT.

Regards

Dave G

[brianos007]

Go for the 5870 much lower power consumption over the 480 less noise and  less heat.

  And a lot of power and of course the price.

I am using it and its works great in Fsx.