Frame Rates

[Jim Kamp]

How do improve frame rates for fs2004? I have a 64MB grapchics card.
If I get a 128MB graphics card, would that improve my frame rates and
stop stutters?

[Murmur]

"Jim Kamp" > ha scritto nel messaggio
...
>
> How do improve frame rates for fs2004? I have a 64MB grapchics card.
> If I get a 128MB graphics card, would that improve my frame rates and
> stop stutters?

Hi!

A hint on your present configuration (CPU, RAM, graphic card) would be
useful.
I will talk grounding on my personal experience:

1) FS suffers quite easily from stutters. It is probable your stutters can
be significantly reduced doing some tweakings to FS2004 and your O.S.; my
advice is, subscribe to this forum (MS flight simulator tips and tricks):
http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=177
there are many posts explaining how to optimize FS2004 and Windows;

2) There are some features of FS that rely heavily on CPU power:
particularly, some add-ons (like planes with a very complex cockpit) and
some graphical settings too (e.g., scenery density, etc); so, if you can
upgrade your CPU without spending too much money, it's worth;

3) FS eats a lot of RAM; 512MB or more are recommended. With less RAM, you
can experience pauses and slowdowns while flying; you can buy a 512MB module
at a low price today;

4) Getting a modern 128MB graphic card helps for sure, especially
considering your 64MB card is probably a very old one; it will let you
increase graphic settings without frame rate dropping;

Marco

[Jeroen Wenting]

stutters have nothing to do with framerates.

"Jim Kamp" > wrote in message
...
>
> How do improve frame rates for fs2004? I have a 64MB grapchics card.
> If I get a 128MB graphics card, would that improve my frame rates and
> stop stutters?

[Peter Duniho]

"Jeroen Wenting" <jwenting at hornet dot demon dot nl> wrote in message
...
> stutters have nothing to do with framerates.

Nothing? Nothing to do with frame rates at all? That seems a little
strong.

At a minimum, a stutter will reduce your frame rate. It is, by definition,
something that delays the presentation of the next frame. Duh.

In addition, stutters sometimes happen because a particular frame takes
longer to render (often because textures are moving across the AGP bus). In
other words, a slow frame IS a stutter.

I would say that stuttering and slow frame rates often go hand-in-hand.
They are very much related.

Pete

[FatKat]

is your card a PCI, AGP or PCI-e card?

[FatKat]

is your card a PCI, AGP or PCI-e card?

[Jeroen Wenting]

"Peter Duniho" > wrote in message
...
> "Jeroen Wenting" <jwenting at hornet dot demon dot nl> wrote in message
> ...
>> stutters have nothing to do with framerates.
>
> Nothing? Nothing to do with frame rates at all? That seems a little
> strong.
>
> At a minimum, a stutter will reduce your frame rate. It is, by
> definition, something that delays the presentation of the next frame.
> Duh.
>
> In addition, stutters sometimes happen because a particular frame takes
> longer to render (often because textures are moving across the AGP bus).
> In other words, a slow frame IS a stutter.
>
> I would say that stuttering and slow frame rates often go hand-in-hand.
> They are very much related.
>
I've seen stutter free gameplay at 10fps, and heavy stutters at 100fps.
The reverse can also happen.
There is NO generic link between the two phenomenons.

At least, if you use the FS framerate counter which is what all the fps
junks use to see their framerates.
That counter is after all generated in the CPU while stutters occur in the
GPU which doesn't change that counter :)
So the fps counter is a theoretical number showing how many frames of
animation the system can display as a maximum. The actual fps might be
different but your average user isn't going to see that as he is fixated on
getting the highest possible fps count from that counter, thinking bigger =
better because in Doom it used to be.

[Peter Duniho]

"Jeroen Wenting" <jwenting at hornet dot demon dot nl> wrote in message
...
> I've seen stutter free gameplay at 10fps, and heavy stutters at 100fps.
> The reverse can also happen.
> There is NO generic link between the two phenomenons.

So what? That has nothing to do with whether the two are related.

First of all, the original poster never attempted to try to imply that the
two problems were one and the same. He didn't even try to say they were
related (even though they are). What he said is he wants to minimize
stutter and improve his frame rate.

Secondly, your particular example is especially flawed. Many stutters have
to do with getting data to the video card, either because of disk access or
moving texture data to the card (and some other things). If the frame rate
is already low, you are much less likley to notice stutters than if the
frame rate is high.

Thirdly, even if your example wasn't flawed, it is still true that
stuttering can and does reduce frame rate. Any stutter means that the frame
rate is momentarily reduced. BY DEFINITION.

And that, my friend, is the main reason I replied to your post. To say that
the two have NOTHING to do with each other is simply wrong. They are not
unrelated, they in fact often have a lot to do with each other.

Does that mean that one always is the cause of the other? No, of course
not. Does it mean you will always have one if you have the other? No, of
course not. It just means one ought to be a little more careful about
throwing around absolute statements like "stutters have nothing to do with
framerates".

> At least, if you use the FS framerate counter which is what all the fps
> junks use to see their framerates.

Irrelevant.

> That counter is after all generated in the CPU while stutters occur in the
> GPU which doesn't change that counter :)

Stutters occur in a variety of places. And just because it's the CPU
tracking the frame rate, that doesn't mean that it doesn't know when the
video card stutters. Frame rate is usually calculated based on how many
"flips" in a given second happen. If the video card stutters, the number of
flips is reduced. Since the CPU is tracking the flips, it has immediate
feedback regarding stutter, even when the cause is entirely in the video
card (and it often is not).

> So the fps counter is a theoretical number showing how many frames of
> animation the system can display as a maximum.

Wrong. Very wrong. The FPS counter is the *actual* number of frames being
displayed in a given second. Depending on the implementation of the
counter, it may be averaged over the last few seconds, which reduces the
instantaneous accuracy. But it is still directly measuring the video card
performance.

Pete

[Jeroen Wenting]

>> So the fps counter is a theoretical number showing how many frames of
>> animation the system can display as a maximum.
>
> Wrong. Very wrong. The FPS counter is the *actual* number of frames
> being displayed in a given second. Depending on the implementation of the
> counter, it may be averaged over the last few seconds, which reduces the
> instantaneous accuracy. But it is still directly measuring the video card
> performance.
>
>
Wrong, very wrong.
At least in the scenario of MSFS the fps counter bears no relation to what
your videocard puts out.
If it did you'd see it reflect stutters, but it doesn't :)

[Peter Duniho]

"Jeroen Wenting" <jwenting at hornet dot demon dot nl> wrote in message
...
> Wrong, very wrong.

You are funny.

> At least in the scenario of MSFS the fps counter bears no relation to what
> your videocard puts out.

The MSFS frame counter does do a moving average, as I mentioned earlier.
But that doesn't mean it's not related to what the video card puts out. It
just means the information isn't instantaneous.

Just like almost every other program that displays a frame rate, all that
the MSFS frame rate counter is doing is watching how many flips the graphics
card can do in a set length of time. I know this for a fact. This is
EXACTLY the frame rate of the video card.

> If it did you'd see it reflect stutters, but it doesn't :)

Actually, it does. Depending on how severe the stutter is, you will easily
see the drop in the frame rate on the MSFS frame rate counter.

In any case, all of this is irrelevant to your original false claim (as
opposed to your more recent false claims) that "stutters have nothing to do
with framerates". You didn't restrict your claim to the frame rate counter
displayed in MSFS, and so asserting after the fact that that's the counter
your statement applies to is just so much backpedaling (even if your
qualified claim were true, and it's not either).

Pete

[Jim Kamp]

On 29 Jul 2005 09:54:40 -0700, "FatKat" > wrote:

>is your card a PCI, AGP or PCI-e card?

AGP