System Hardware: PC | MOBO | RAM | CPU | HDD | SSD | PSU etc

hello everyone, newbie here and i'm Looking for a good joystick to play with flight simulator. I was thinking about getting a joystick with force feed back but I

I have 2 GB of memory. I read that with >1 GB of memory, disabling the swap file may speed things up. my eliminating the need to access the hard drive based swap file.I notice that the memory does often go unused.Has anyone tried this or know if it will work, or create any problems?ThanksGreg

I thought about posting this in the Hardware forum, but I want to hear from MSFS flyers, i.e. who have joysticks not used for missiles, HUDs, etc.The problem is I'm looking for a new joystick that doesn't break the bank... i.e. under $50-80, and is good for flying FS2004 commercial jets. Fancy features are not important.I've owned a CH FlightStick for 15 years. I loved it. It's probably way too loose to be realistic, but I became accustomed to being able to make fine control inputs. I loved the analog trim.Now everything is USB, so last year I went looking. All I found at the store were $100+ BeefyMegaForceFeedbackCombatGear joysticks and $30 Logitech Attacks. I got…

Having bought the Saitek X52 flight system, I am now trying to programme it. Mostly this has been quite easy - though some things, such as elevator trimming, seem better done through FS9's assignments options.What I haven't really worked out is what the rotaries on the throttle are supposed to do - one around the 'E' button and the other around the 'clutch'. Is there a preferred use for these? Or has someone come up with something really useful?As I already have a Nostromo N52, I have almost more buttons around me when I fly than I can use! Hardly ever need to reach over to the keyboard or mouse now..M. :-)

Okay, I love my X52. It has all the switches I want, and I can make flying easier without having to use the mouse/keyboard as much with it. There's just one problem.The throttle will go to 100%, but it can't go to 0%. It stops around 20% and I have to press F1 all the time when taxiing the PMDG 737 for example because I'll accelerate too fast for the taxiway. I've tried calibrating, and everything. I just can't seem to fix it.

Good afternoon everybody,I just retired my 9 months old computer and bought a new one. Can anyone advise me if it it necessary to overclock my video card.GIGABYTE Nforce4 SLI-ready; AMD64 4600+2 Dual-core; 3GB DDR400 RAM; ATI X1900 XTX 512MB; 19"LCD; 160GB Maxtor HDD; Saitek X52.I am hearing a lot of negative feedback about the ATI driver & CCC. Mind to give me any suggestion.Regards,Isagani

Hello,This started happening not too long ago, I don't recall doing anything major just one day it started happening. First the Problem:http://images.fs2004.com/images/6443/shot1.JPGhttp://images.fs2004.com/images/6443/shot2.JPGhttp://images.fs2004.com/images/6443/shot3.JPGhttp://images.fs2004.com/images/6443/shot4.JPGWhen I don't have an extra program running such as FSPax or Squawkbox 3 or FSInn I don't get this problem obviously.System Specs:Dell XPS Gen 5P4 3.4GHz Dual Core2GB DDR2 667MHz Dual Channel RamNVidia GeForce 6800 256mbWindows XP Pro x64Direct X 9.0c if that would make a difference.Now I've tried running nothing else in the background, down to 20 processes i…

http://www.pcoption.co.uk/pcbaseunits/index5d_x1600amdx2.htmthats the one am contemplating on buying, any suggestions? any good for fs9?Would it be fine to slap a DX10 card in when available? and how well will fsx run on it?Is it a good system?Thanks for any help!Ian

Last week I finally succumbed to AMD's recent price drop and picked up an X2 3800+ to replace my faithful 3000+ single core. Unfortunatley the upgrade experience was anything but smooth, firstly with a few solid, but resettable, freezes followed by a spectacular one that took out my Windows XP installation and requiring me to do a full reinstall of everything. My hopes that a fresh install might fix it all were quickly dashed when the regular (usually within 1 hour) freezes started happening again, no matter what I tried. FYI, I have tried all of the following to no avail:1. Flashing motherboard to latest version that definately supports the X2 processor - 10172. Reins…

I have run into a problem with video hardware acceleration (or lack thereof!) that seems to be specific to fs9, as no other program/game is experiencing issues.I noticed a couple of weeks ago that the frame rate had slowed right down, and on investigation a number of video setting options were unavailable and the video card is not listed on the hardware tab. When I tried to adjust some settings a message came up that hardware acceleration was not available and it was switching to software acceleration.If I re-install fs9 the system "sees" the video card and I get frame rates up to 30 FPS, if immediately run after the installation.Shutting the game down and re-booting, fol…

Athlon 64 4000+ or Athlon 64X2 3800+. The 64X2 is only a little more expensive, but I gather that it wont do me any good until Vista comes out, and even then it is questionable whether FSX will take advantage of it. FOr singe core operations is it safe to assume, based on the number, that the 4000+ is more powerful?Secondly, is this a good middle of the road graphics card? http://www.compusa.com/products/product_in...0_GS_Video_CardI need one or $100 for less to replace the integrated GPU in the machine I am getting.

Hey everybody- was thinking of "bumping" my rig up a notch or two, and was looking for your opinions on the matter. This might be a bit lengthy but I am trying to be as complete as possible here, such that you hopefully will have all the info you need from this initial posting.Here's what I have running: (slimmed down to performance-specific hardware)AMD64 3200+1GB PC3200 RAMnVidia 6600GT 128MBVideo settings: 1024x748x32 4xAA 4xAF (My LCD is 1024x768 so that's the highest res I can run) -FS9 detail settings are pretty much maxxed out on all slidersBasically I see three options: upgrade the CPU, upgrade the RAM, upgrade the GPU. Upgrading the RAM does not make mu…

I have given up. It

Hello FSers. I am newbie to the Microsoft world of flight sims (coming over from another sim). I am having a problem getting my CH Yoke to work the way I feel is correct. Mainly the sensitivity of the elevator. I can barley fly the 172 by hand. She seems WAY to sensitive. All it takes is the smallest amount of back pressure and she is nose up with the stall horn blairing. I have FS2004 with the latest patch. No 3rd party addons installed (yet). I have played around with the sensitivity settings and they seem to only help a VERY small amount. I read the PowerPoint slide on CH's web site but that didn't help. I have everything working in the other sim so I don't …

I've been simming since the early 80's, and my hardware has always been a little short of the task. Rather than go out and get a sports car to curb a mid-life crisis, I want to build a machine where I'll be able to run with all sliders wide open. I've been pricing Conroe systems -- due to budget-- the E6400 mainly. I'm trying to come in around $1,700 for the rig and a good LCD monitor, and haven't had much luck thus far. A few questions:I read a single story on building a budget gaming rig that indicates the on-board sound on most new PC's is good enough that a sound card is no longer an automatic need to boost FS performance. Any comments? Also -- is it REALLY that…

*I decided to start a new thread on this subject as the other topic I started is getting pretty long and mainly discusses CPU selection*I'm thinking about upgrading my rig a little by way of a new CPU/GPU combo. I am pretty sure I will try to get a X2 4800+ CPU, but the GPU I am pretty stuck.I am limited to looking at single-slot solutions only because my computer case is an SFF and does not handle the dual-slot coolers on the highest end cards.Therefore, I have narrowed my choice down to 2 chips: the nVidia 7900GT or the ATi X1900GT.The 7900GT seems to be a pretty clear winner in the majority of tests, however I don't know how well that translates to FS9 performance- as…

For some long while I have been trying to find a fix for a 'faulty' rudder toggle on the X45 throttle control.In FS2004 when I move the rudder toggle (and even sometimes when I don't touch anything!) the aircraft rudder flicks and jumps about. Naturally causing the aircraft to do very strange things!Only recently I looked at the X45 config window and see that moving the rudder toggle gives a smooth change from one extreme to the other. So the fault must lie between the X45 and FS2004.If I switch to keyboard control, the aircrafts rudder moves slowly from left to right and back as commanded.If anyone can help me work this out I would be most grateful!I am missing my regula…

Hello all,I'm brand new to this forum, I'm Jamie and I'm looking to upgrade my processor to run FS2004 like a bullet!I also want it to be compatible with the new FSX.I've done a research and here's the best one's I've foundAMD Athlon 64 FX-55AMD Athlon 64 4000Can anyone recommend a real fast processor which could run FS2004 like a bullet, high frame rates with also full AI traffic?My price range is from

I have an older machine which I built myself a few years ago - AMDxp 2400 with 1 Gig RAM and a Geforce4 TI4200 vid card.I am not intending to get a completely new machine until the new Windows Vista OS is out and firmly established. I note this week that MS has announced another delay in it. To me,it is now not worth the expense of buying/building a machine which would span the gap from what I have now to a new Vista/DX10 machine (which I think will need another 2 years).My current machine has an AGP slot for the vid card - and these are getting harder to find. I am prepared to upgrade my vid card as the Geforce4 TI is only a DX8 card. I do have DX9 installed - and I not…

Hi, my system is--AMD64 3500500w PSUATI X800xtpe1g RamASUS A8V deluxe mobo.It has stock CPU fan, 80mm case exhaust fan + stock PSU fan and one on X800. Normally it runs around 50/55c under load. During this hot spell it's going up to 60/62c, so I thought it a good idea to upgrade one or more of the fans and nipped to the comp. shop for advise. He looked at me as tho' I was crackers ( maybe I am) and said you just can't do that as the airflow is balanced and adding or altering the size of any of the fans would do more harm than good. Now, for other reasons, I don't have much faith in this guy, so any other opinions would be greatly appreciated. He says 60/62c is nothing …

I need hardware to keep up with the adcancement of Flight sim...and I don't mean PCs and stuff...which seems to do its part.I mean.. like Yoke and Pedals etc. Right now I am using CH yoke and pedals.. But I really need a good yoke that would have a resistence like the real thing thats physcally connected to a Physical Trim Wheel. I think I saw a version somwhere..but it was in the $5000 range.I also need a reasonable pedals that needs a little more pressure than the ones from your toes.Throttles..there are few choices I think. Avionics...Here too there are few options... so I am ok with that. Go flight seems to be solid in this front..and there are few others as well. so …

I would like to set up a 3 monitor system for FS2004 using Matrox's TripleHead2Go hardware. It says that it supports FS2004 but it shows three differant views FROM inside the aircraft on the cotpit view. I fly a lot in the spot plane view and I am worried that I would see my own aircraft in ALL 3 views, which to me would be unsatisfactory.I'm trying to locate anyone who is using this system for more info. Please advise if you are also using this system. Thanks, Jerry

Fellow Simmers, Need some advice on graphics settings for my new card. I really wanna pump up the settings but really not sure if there are tricks to setting the proper settings thru the options display and hardware tab. What are the best settings for mip-mapping, anti-aliasing & Lighting. System is Amd Athlon 3200+ gig of ram at 400mhz and running on a 10,000 rpm raptor. As far as the settings in the hardware tab should I set that thru the software or on the desktop thru my nvidia settings etc? And if so what should I set them at? Thanks, …

Hello all!About a year and a half ago I would say I built the following systemAMD 64 3500+EPOX Motherboard (I forget what model)ATI X800XT1GB Dual Channel Ramand it runs quite well but can get somewhat jerky in heavy clouds and stuff (I run 4x AA and 4x AF so I could jack those up for a better picture) and not full settings.I am thinking about upgrading to an FX-55 processor. Since the prices came down (about 350 on ebay) but still dont want to spend that much lightly. What do you guys think? Worth it? Would I be better off upgrading another part?Thanks!

Hi,I have a dilemma here. I see a $400 difference between the AMD4000, which is 2.4Mhz and the FX55, which is 2.6Mhz.Are the $400 worth the difference?Does the FX have any special treatment that makes it work way faster than the AMD4000, or is it only the .2 difference that there is between them (nothing difficult to overclock if this is the case)?Thanks for your answersLeo