Any X-Plane users? Slow graphics problem.

[0TreeLemur]

I'm in the midst of IFR training, and am trying to use X-Plane to work on my multi-tasking without having to burn avgas poking holes in the sky and boring my instructor to death while improving my information management skills while flying an airplane.  I used X-Plane over 1 decade ago, and it was pretty decent.   So I bought X-Plane version 11 last month (Ho Ho Ho) and the Carenado M20J, and installed on a Windoze 10 machine that has a decent graphics card in it.

Running X-Plane version 11.30r3 (updated today), on a 64-bit, 4-core, Intel Xeon-based computer with 16 GB Ram.

NVidia GEforce 730 graphics card with 4GB of graphics ram, and with driver version 391.35 (updated today).

Here's the problem: even with graphics detail and number of objects displayed turned way down to their minimum slider values in the graphics setup menu, I still only get 10 fps when the target is 20.  That means that simulation time passes at half speed.  Not very realistic.    Anybody else dealt with this issue?

Thanks in advance.

Fred

[autopatch]

What is the CPU speed and the exact name of the chipset? Having multiple cores doesn’t necessarily help with X-Plane.

 

Xeon is typically an LGA2011 family, and depending on if your motherboard is new enough you *might* have an LGA2011-v3 socket which *could* get you into a Broadwell chip (such as an i7-6700 or an i7-6850) running about 4 GHz

 

Under 6GB if video ram is also sometimes problematic.

 

Rate your system at this site:

 

Game Debate

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[0TreeLemur]

Hi @autopatch the cpu in my machine is an Intel Xeon 1230 Sandy Bridge.   Not the hot new thing, but not a slouch either.  2Gflop class. 

<whine> Still- a I've got graphics detail and number of objects turned down to the minimum.   Is their graphics engine that much of a hog? </whine>

So, the Game Debate link you included tells me that my CPU and memory are good enough, but that the GeForce 730 graphics card is a no-go.   Man, I used to run flight simulators that looked ok with much less graphics power.  I guess they are asking them to do a lot more.   Any recommended high bang/buck cards?

[NeedSpeed]

I’m running mine on an i7-6700 with a gtx 1080 card. Works well. X-plane 11 does use a lot of horsepower, and you do need a fast general purpose CPU in addition to a strong graphics card. They also recommend 4 cores, but more cores than that don’t help apparently.

-chuck

[autopatch]

Hi [mention=7477]autopatch[/mention] the cpu in my machine is an Intel Xeon 1230 Sandy Bridge.   Not the hot new thing, but not a slouch either.  2Gflop class.  Still- a I've got graphics detail and number of objects turned down to the minimum.   Is their graphics engine that much of a hog?

So, the Game Debate link you included tells me that my CPU and memory are good enough, but that the GeForce 730 graphics card is a no-go.   Man, I used to run flight simulators that looked ok with much less graphics power.  I guess they are asking them to do a lot more.   Any recommended high bang/buck cards?

 

 

The good news is that with CES 2019 happening now both AMD and nVidia dropped announcements in the video card market.

 

Depending on your budget, the just announced nVidia RTX 2060 is MSRP $364 and beats the former top in it’s class 1070 TI and also future proofs your system at the same time.

 

IMHO, Pascal cards are in short supply and the RTX 2070 / RTX 2080 are priced to high for the benefit (other than bragging rights.)

 

If that’s not your budget, DM me and I can help you do some selection research.

 

If you can figure out how to send me your MSINFO output, then I might have some good news about your potential CPU upgrade path.

 

It looks like you have an LGA1155 socket, and if your motherboard supports it the best CPU for that socket is the i7-3770.

 

Tom’s Hardware LGA1155

[Moh]

NVidia GEforce 730 graphics card with 4GB of graphics ram, and with driver version 391.35 (updated today).

Hi Fred

I have close configuration to yours, even purchased the m20j few days ago, but I think your problem could be in the graphics card. I use GTX960 2GB RAM and works fine. Xplane 11 is graphic intensive and not much cpu dependent. I suggest you upgrade your graphics card. You can try a used one from eBay. Details are not important for your IFR training as you can select low IFR setting and details won’t show anyway.



Thank you
Mohamed

[carusoam]

While you work out the details...

Try the Microsoft FSX Steam edition... Steam is a download system online...

They have two versions of a Bravo... should work easily on the system you have... a very low dollar test...

If it doesn’t work, your system needs some tuning....

Good luck...

Best regards,

-a-

[0TreeLemur]

45 minutes ago, Moh said:

 

Hi Fred

I have close configuration to yours, even purchased the m20j few days ago, but I think your problem could be in the graphics card. I use GTX960 2GB RAM and works fine. Xplane 11 is graphic intensive and not much cpu dependent. I suggest you upgrade your graphics card. You can try a used one from eBay. Details are not important for your IFR training as you can select low IFR setting and details won’t show anyway.



Thank you
Mohamed

Regarding the M20J in X-Plane, I went into the .acf file and deleted the pilot.  I kept seeing eyeglass frames moving randomly in front of my eyes!  Really distracting.

Ejected him.  Much more pleasant now.   BUT- the inner knobs on the NAV/COM radios won't rotate!  Makes it impossible to change frequencies.   Also, knob to turn transponder to ALT skips from "ON" to "TEST".  Have you had these problems?  Any hints on how to solve them?

[Moh]

Regarding the M20J in X-Plane, I went into the .acf file and deleted the pilot.  I kept seeing eyeglass frames moving randomly in front of my eyes!  Really distracting.
Ejected him.  Much more pleasant now.   BUT- the inner knobs on the NAV/COM radios won't rotate!  Makes it impossible to change frequencies.   Also, knob to turn transponder to ALT skips from "ON" to "TEST".  Have you had these problems?  Any hints on how to solve them?

Hi Fred,

You can delete the glasses object as well. For the knobs, I suggest positioning your mouse over it and use your mouse scroll. Much easier this way.


Thank you
Mohamed

[Raptor05121]

4 hours ago, Fred_2O said:

I'm in the midst of IFR training, and am trying to use X-Plane to work on my multi-tasking without having to burn avgas poking holes in the sky and boring my instructor to death while improving my information management skills while flying an airplane.  I used X-Plane over 1 decade ago, and it was pretty decent.   So I bought X-Plane version 11 last month (Ho Ho Ho) and the Carenado M20J, and installed on a Windoze 10 machine that has a decent graphics card in it.

Running X-Plane version 11.30r3 (updated today), on a 64-bit, 4-core, Intel Xeon-based computer with 16 GB Ram.

NVidia GEforce 730 graphics card with 4GB of graphics ram, and with driver version 391.35 (updated today).

Here's the problem: even with graphics detail and number of objects displayed turned way down to their minimum slider values in the graphics setup menu, I still only get 10 fps when the target is 20.  That means that simulation time passes at half speed.  Not very realistic.    Anybody else dealt with this issue?

Thanks in advance.

Fred

Fred, that graphics card is horribly underpowered to run the train that is XP11. I have an GTX850 (newer and faster) with an i7 and 12GB RAM in my laptop and its still not enough on low settings. My desktop is a 8GB GTX1070 with an overclocked i7 and 16GB RAM and its barely good enough to run it on medium high. I am using the Alabeo M20R Ovation for my IFR training. Its the same company that made the M20J but has better systems and easier to see gauges.

I'd recommend a new computer if you are going to get into serious simming. About as effective as lining up against a Porsche with a 1993 Honda Civic.

[0TreeLemur]

1 hour ago, Moh said:

 

Hi Fred

I have close configuration to yours, even purchased the m20j few days ago, but I think your problem could be in the graphics card. I use GTX960 2GB RAM and works fine. Xplane 11 is graphic intensive and not much cpu dependent. I suggest you upgrade your graphics card. You can try a used one from eBay. Details are not important for your IFR training as you can select low IFR setting and details won’t show anyway.



Thank you
Mohamed

I just got a GTX 970 for $110 on the ultimate garage sale (eBay).  Thanks for the advice!   That Game Debate site indicates that this configuration should work with X-Plane.

[0TreeLemur]

42 minutes ago, Moh said:

 For the knobs, I suggest positioning your mouse over it and use your mouse scroll. Much easier this way.

I tried that, but the screen zooms in/out.

[Moh]

I tried that, but the screen zooms in/out.

You should see a circle with up and down arrows inside when the scroll is ready to be used.


Thank you
Mohamed

[bradp]

When I started using x plane it was version 5 and maybe a PowerBook G3 in about 2001.  The thing barely ran... but it did.  Xplane turned down flight visibility when processor and graphics processing speeds were insufficient... I think I flew in no more than a mile visibility no matter what.  I got to be a pretty IFR proficient sim pilot that way :-)

[Niko182]

A lot of the flight sims are usually processor powered instead of graphically powered. I used to be big into sim, and realistically to run a sim at a good quality, a very powerful PC is usually needed. The GTX970 will definitely help you a lot. what processor are you currently running?

[Michael]

Fred, 

Select a paint scheme (I believe X-plane calls the "liveries").

The pilot disappears and all the controls work in 3D....I had the same problem.

Mike

[0TreeLemur]

9 minutes ago, Michael said:

Fred, 

Select a paint scheme (I believe X-plane calls the "liveries").

The pilot disappears and all the controls work in 3D....I had the same problem.

Mike

Thanks @Michael I'll give that a try. 

[carusoam]

Great first post, Michael.

Amazing what topics bring out a person’s first post. 

Best regards,

-a-

[Andy95W]

21 hours ago, Fred_2O said:

installed on a Windoze 10 machine that has a decent graphics card in it.

Running X-Plane version 11.30r3 (updated today), on a 64-bit, 4-core, Intel Xeon-based computer with 16 GB Ram.

NVidia GEforce 730 graphics card with 4GB of graphics ram, and with driver version 391.35 (updated today).

 

Good luck on your IR, Fred.

In 1992 I had to use Microsoft Flight Simulator 3.0 running on a second-hand computer with a 386 processor.  Compared to that, your "computer problems" don't really sound that bad!

On the plus side, it is proof that any simulation, no matter how poor, helps with the Instrument Rating.

[Michael]

Hopefully it works for him....I know I spent too much time trying to figure that out for myself.

I've been lurking on this site for quite a while....finally felt I had something useful to contribute

Mike

[0TreeLemur]

15 minutes ago, Andy95W said:

Those were the days!  That and "Gato" and "Leisure Suit Larry"!!!  Don't forget my favorite DOS simulation: TRACON.  I could vector planes around the LAX airspace for hours.

It is pretty amazing that X-Plane 11 drags so much on the XEON E3-1230 Windoze machine I'm running.  It is no slouch with about half the compute power (FLOPS) of the i7-7700 I use for my main Linux work machine.   They've got so much graphics detail that the program requires a tremendously powerful graphics card.   Seems like there could be a happy medium option between what you show from the old DOS world and photo-realism that the developers seem to be striving towards...  Especially if you are going to simulate low visibility IFR conditions.

[carusoam]

MSFlight Sim circa 1987..? 

Color graphics in place of monochrome wire outlines... 

The chicago sky line built up out of five buildings....

The perfect city runway... 

The name of the most recognized building in Chicago has been changed...

Other than that, very little has changed...

Best regards,

-a-

[jaylw314]

31 minutes ago, Fred_2O said:

Those were the days!  That and "Gato" and "Leisure Suit Larry"!!!  Don't forget my favorite DOS simulation: TRACON.  I could vector planes around the LAX airspace for hours.

It is pretty amazing that X-Plane 11 drags so much on the XEON E3-1230 Windoze machine I'm running.  It is no slouch with about half the compute power (FLOPS) of the i7-7700 I use for my main Linux work machine.   They've got so much graphics detail that the program requires a tremendously powerful graphics card.   Seems like there could be a happy medium option between what you show from the old DOS world and photo-realism that the developers seem to be striving towards...  Especially if you are going to simulate low visibility IFR conditions.

I'm kind of guessing, but I think that for most flight sims, the bottleneck is generally the CPU, not the GPU (as opposed to shooters and games where the bottleneck is often the GPU).  That's not to say that you couldn't add all sorts of fancy graphics techniques to marginally improve (or at least change) the overall visual effect that couldn't bog down the GPU, but the render quality of trees 10 miles away isn't typically one of the cues we use for IR flight  

I'm surprised nobody pulled up screencaps of the original subLogic FS!

 

[0TreeLemur]

10 hours ago, Michael said:

Fred, 

Select a paint scheme (I believe X-plane calls the "liveries").

The pilot disappears and all the controls work in 3D....I had the same problem.

Mike

@Michael I added a livery, the M20J became red striped, but the small knobs on the radio still don't work.  When I put the mouse over them, I see the ( ) , but when I rotate the mouse wheel, the screen just zooms in/out.   Am I not doing something else?   I can't fly the ILS if I can't tune the NAV.    Anybody else have this problem and solve it?  Thanks in advance.

[carusoam]

There must be a 100 page POH to go with the program...

MSFS has a help section that covers a bunch of the 101 possible keystrokes, and alt and ctrl versions for another 202 different possibilities...

Xplane is the better sim, but it can’t be much easier...

Best regards,

-a-