PCI Express video card for G3, need help

[Stan Myers]

I have a nvida pcx5300 128meg in my 3.0 gig 1 gig mem machine. I'm getting about 5-6 frame/sec however when I switch to cockpit mode my frame/sec drops into the 3's and screen is pretty jerky.

Will the 256meg card make that much difference and which card do you recommend.

tia

Stan

[rutat]

It is not so much the memory that makes a diff, if is the bus width ( and number of pipes. And are you sure you posted those frame rates right? 5-6 frames/sec?? That is awfully low.

[Malc C]

Rutat, he's running a PCI express graphics card, I thought that the bus speed of these new PCIexpress boards were 4 times the speed and twice the bus width ?? of the current AGP cards ??

[Stan Myers]

It sometimes goes as hight a 11 f/s. Its very smooth until I go to pilot view.
I'm flying Mistrel 3m glider.

Stan

[rutat]

Malc, it really depends on how the mfg. has designed the card. His card is a low end card so I would not xpect much. But even 11 FPS is awfully clunky. You need to be in the 25-30 range IMO.

[Stan Myers]

I'm reading the frame rate from the window that appears on the screen when '1' is pressed. Is there another key stroke that brings up frame rate?

Stan

[vitek]

RealFlight G3 attempts to identify your graphics card and choose reasonable defaults. The software doesn't know about all graphics cards and will occasionally choose defaults that will cause low frame rates.

The screen resolution and AA/AF settings that you choose in the driver settings will also have a big effect on frame rate.

Click Simulation | Settings | Graphics | Quality. Chances are that the Shadow Quality is set to Highest. Set Shadow Quality to Medium. Set Set Terrain Density to 0 and Tree density to 0. Restart the simulation and see how things are working. You might opt to lower the Particle and Texture Quality, and maybe even disable Terrain Detail and Clouds.

I don't have the specs for the 5300 here in front of me, but I know that the 5200 isn't a high performance type card. It is actually considered a 'business class' card by some.

Travis
Knife Edge Software

[Hotrod69]

Travis, how do you find the frame rate on G3?

[Catkicker]

no matter what video card you choose i'd wait till next month to buy it. the 7800 series of nvidia cards get released then, meaning the older 6000 series will go down in price. i'd think a 6600gt at the low end or a 6800gt on the high end would do well(i use a bfg 6800gt oc on a 2.6 athlon xp and get 30-80 frames)

[Catkicker]

no matter what video card you choose i'd wait till next month to buy it. the 7800 series of nvidia cards get released then, meaning the older 6000 series will go down in price. i'd think a 6600gt at the low end or a 6800gt on the high end would do well(i use a bfg 6800gt oc on a 2.6 athlon xp and get 30-80 frames)

opps, did i say next month, i meant tomorrow :) yes, the 7800's are released and available at least somewhat better than the 6800 ultra was last year. however, unless you NEED the ultimate video card right now, dont buy one. starting prices are $600 and go up from there. in a few days the 6800 series should see a price drop and then a 6800 gt would be a good deal.