FSX Play fps issues with i7 / RTX 3060 setup

[smkershaw]

Is anyone aware of a thread that might help me debug quite severe graphics frame rate issues with FSX Play?

My setup:
Razer Blade 15 Base Model - Full HD 144Hz - GeForce RTX 3060 - Black

• i7 11800H 2.3G
• 16 GB DDR4
• 8 GB GDDR6

Panasonic WUXGA (1920 x 1200) 60fps HDMI projector

I have upgraded to latest V1.4.0.4 version of FSX Play - if anything the fps seems worse

I have tried all sorts of display configs (incl simple duplicate of laptop to projector).

I am trying to use FSX Play in “Balanced” mode and I have no problems at all with FSX 2020.

Is it possible 2.3G i7 / RTX 3060 with 1920 x 1200 output is simply not up to it? Seems crazy given the amazing performance you can get with modern 3D games.

thanks for any tips / references / like experiences

Simon

[KidDoc]

Similar set up here and Foresight told me to use Full Performance. Works great.

[smkershaw]

Thanks KidDoc…ok that’s reassuring it’s most likely something as simple as drivers or setup. Here are a couple of screenshots with graphics performance (laptop only, no projector connected).
- Entry screen for Play is fine at 60fps
- Static waiting for shot in Balanced mode @ Kinscale is maxing out GPU, fan going crazy and.15-16fps without anything going on…and this is after fresh reboot

[sinkingputts]

I have a Alienware NVIDIA® GeForce RTX™ 3070 Ti, 8 GB GDDR6 and the only course that runs smooth on full graphics is pebble beach every other course is either balanced but there are a handful of courses that will not play smooth unless i go all the way down to performance. Torrey Pines is terrible. I’m not a huge computer guy so i thought the same video card in a laptop was going to preform like a desktop but now know they are about 50% less powerful. Every course runs smoothly on FSX2020. So it’s definitely a problem with FSXPLAY. It you play with the wind on at a course with lots of trees the frame rate drop makes many some courses unplayable. It’s weird that Pebble works so well on full graphics with the waves motion and the geometry detail out into it.

[MongoOnlyPawn]

I think if you had the same setup in a desktop you'd be fine. Laptop GPU's have capabilities similar in some areas to desktop GPU's but not all. I'd be reasonably certain your laptop GPU would melt if it were running at the same speed, cycles, specs, etc as a similar desktop GPU. I'd bet the software designers aren't working on laptops.

Try running it on the laptop only and drop the resolution to 1280x720 and see how it runs. Try it at 1900x1200 on full performance, laptop only, and see how it does. Try disabling your laptop screen and running the projector only at a couple of different resolutions.

Laptop GPU's have the same base core as desktop GPU's, but at the higher end of performance requirements they can't do the same things.

[dawms]

Indeed. The most obvious indication of this is the massive fans which are required to keep a high-end GPU cool in a tower computer box while running busy software. The heat sinks required to cool the laptop GPU, and the fans necessary whisk the heat away are totally impractical in a laptop. They run the nVidia drivers but a slow speed.

[smkershaw]

Thanks for the input everyone. You have given me some good ideas to debug / find limits. I did already disconnect projector and just run w 1080p laptop configured for 60Hz refresh but no discernible improvement. It does make sense that laptop graphics performance for similar “spec on box” can’t reach equivalent desktop…but I would still be a bit surprised this class of gaming laptop can’t handle 1080p FSX Play (when plugged in) given the modern gaming titles it can handle (some at 4K)…but it could be FSX play just has so many polygons to render (eg leaves) that it can bring my system to its knees. But KidDoc’s post gives me some hope One thing I am trying to make absolutely sure of is that Windows really is targeting the Nvidia GPU rather than the embedded Intel GPU…even this is a bit of a rats nest to debug. Then I need to get into Nvidia performance tuning maybe.

[Tom Howarth]

I am running RTX 2060 Laptop successfully with FSX 2020. Foresight and other reputable online sources say I should be fine with Play since I'm not trying to project a 4K image (1080P only). But I am still concerned, even buying Play at today's discount, that I won't really be able to use it much until I upgrade my PC.

[jasonreg]

Tom Howarth - you are right to be concerned. I think you will find Play may be a lot for that Laptop. That said, the graphics are very nice - and they are slowly working out the bugs. You might be OK at performance settings vs Full Graphics. I would not try to add cameras until you can upgrade the computer.

My two cents.

[Tom Howarth]

Thanks for the input. I have two Imaging Source cameras that work great with FSX 2020. I thought you could not use cameras with Play?

[jasonreg]

I too have Imaging Source Cameras. You are correct that the camera functions are not yet incorporated into Play as they were with 2020 (and I am not certain they ever will be, but one holds out hope). I use the Swing Catalyst bundle for FSX and while it runs as a separate program it records extremely well and I find it much more user friendly then I did the 2020 software. It does however compete for resources with FSX Play. Hope that helps.