Aluminum Donkey

That's too bad, I guess DCS is particularly demanding. I'm running my 1080 Ti at ~1850 MHz right now, nice and stable (it seems). I can now fly the F/A-18 off the Supercarrier in missions with ground units engaging. It runs pretty well but eventually I'm going to have to see how fast I can run my GPU without it crashing. You'd think a graphics card would run well right at its factory default settings! AD

For those with mysterious crashing issues, it may have something to do with GPU overclocking. I'm running my 1080 Ti at ~1850 MHz now, and for the time being it seems better. I'll only be able to tell after quite a while of course. Missions with lots of ground units engaging and moving seems to cause crashing, and it very well might be related to GPU overclocking. Even factory OC'd graphics cards are still overclocked. Some of them (like mine) very much so. It's something to try if crashes are driving you bananas, and no other game/app seems to do it. Just use MSI Afterburner and reduce clock speeds. DCS World just seems really demanding on the GPU and it's picky about excessive overclocks. AD

Rip through the canyons in Caucasus listening to Nitro from The Offspring :) AD

OK!!! I've had luck flying with my 1080 Ti downclocked to 1850 MHz, instead of the usual 2000+ MHz. Flew a couple strike missions from the Supercarrier with the F/A-18. Minimum stuttering, minimum BS. No crashes so far. Imma have to try this out a while. It's possible that I could run it fast with watercooling, but I'm too cheap and lazy to try it right now. We'll see. If it works, it works and I can try running the GPU faster with the fans going full blast, and see if we can hang. XAiracobraX, try running your GTX 1080 slower. It won't kill framerates that badly and might just work. Give it a try, you've nothing to lose. AD

The Supercarrier module itself is mighty cool, even though it's only a place to take off and land. I'm sure you'll really like it. As for running without overclocks, most graphics cards (including your GTX 1080) are factory overclocked. It causes no problems at all for most stuff. DCS World, however, isn't so much a video game as an extremely visually-pleasing stress test. I'm playing around with down-clocking my 1080 Ti, just to see how it behaves. It'll take a while. I'm currently running a -150 MHz GPU clock, with default VRAM clock for my card (1400 MHz X8.) I use MSI Afterburner to set my fan curve so the GPU chip never exceeds about 60 degrees C. I get shot down a lot so it'll take more than a wee while. I need to overclock my piloting skills :) I'm sure we'll get a handle on this. Eventually. I don't know what ED is doing with the Vulkan API conversion, but I bet it's gonna kick ass. Peace and happy warfare AD

Hi Bignewy, I'm using Windows 10 64-bit. My graphics card (GTX 1080 Ti) is factory overclocked, and causes no problems in anything else. It runs at a default speed of typically around 2000-2038 MHz. I've downclocked it by 150 MHz just for testing for a while. Even a factory OC is still an OC, and while it certainly shouldn't cause problems, I'm mildly to moderately desperate to sort this out. I'm trying to figure out if it's either the GPU OC or the graphics memory (VRAM) OC that's causing it--if it's causing it at all. The reason why I bought the 1080 Ti is because of it's high performance and having to downclock it kinda sucks, but so be it. I'd rather know for sure. Is there any reason why DCS World should be intolerant of GPU OC's when nothing else has any problems with it? Thanks AD

I just got it today, not sure if I should have, but oh well. It crashes with or without it. Seems to be certain missions, ones with lots of ground units engaging. I'm experimenting with down-clocking my graphics card to see if it helps. AD

I guess we'll just have to wait for the next patch to see if they can iron it out. No reason for it to be this 'crashy'. That's what the SAMs are for :) AD

Ok, Flat shadows and removing GPU overclock helped for a while. Then it crashed when I switched to the other F/A-18. Oh, man... Maybe it's ok if you never switch aircraft. This sort of thing has happened before, people have mentioned it. AD

All right, I have Terrain Shadows on Flat and I'm running my 1080 Ti at 2000 MHz even, instead of +38 MHz. Not a huge difference in speed, I know. In the F/A-18, I was able to do a whole bunch of LGB bombing with the targeting pod, and A2A as well, without the sim crashing. So, we'll see. I didn't take off from the Roosevelt carrier this time, but almost made it back before running out of fuel :) It could be either excessive GPU overclocking, or a problem with Default terrain shadows. Try disabling either one on your system. Performance is a bit better with Flat terrain shadows, anyway. AD

Ok, I tried setting Terrain Shadows to Flat. I normally have them on Default, but someone somewhere mentioned that it can cause GPU crashing. We'll see what happens. This could take a while to sort out. It's also possible that downclocking my GPU (1080 Ti) might help. I'm running it at over 2000 MHz and maybe that's a little too fast. The Supercarrier is pretty cool, too bad I keep getting shot down :) AD

I thought I had it going pretty nicely there for a while, got the nice new Supercarrier module, looking forward to some missions... Crashing again. Whether a mission crashes or not, the log file is chock-full of warnings and errors. I just take it for granted that that's how the sim works, kinda like Windows with its incessant string of DCOM errors. Nothing to get worked up about. It seems to happen with missions that have ground units that move and engage. Not sure at all if that's the core problem though. Aircraft furballs are no problem, even with tons of planes, but I want to do more than that. Performance of the sim, framerate-wise, is excellent now, but the constant crashing is unreal. It's a mighty shame that all I can do is 'play' with the sim rather than get into it more, with the F/A-18 module coming full circle. Man, screw this noise. AD

It doesn't seem to have anything to do with that. I seem to have had some luck with DDU and the latest Nvidia driver, 446.14. Completely scrub your drivers with DDU and install the latest ones. See if it helps. If you're already using 446.14, maybe it has something to do with overclocking? Is your CPU or RAM overclocked? AD

Like Rudel said, typically every few months. But, the F-16 is new, so it's a little on the pricey side and modules are usually fully/mostly developed before you can get them for 50% off. Money you'd spend on the F-16 could be put toward the Typhoon in a couple years ;) AD

No doubt! This kind of 'soundtrack' is what's always been obviously missing from flight sims, and DCS World is no exception. There's tons of air whizzing over the surface of a fighter jet in flight, it isn't all smooth and quiet in there--especially at high AoA. These aren't cushy-tushy passenger airliners and they aren't flown like them. A great sound scheme that reflects how the plane is being maneuvered would add greatly to the immersion! AD

DDU is Display Driver Uninstaller, a little program that completely scrubs any remnants of your graphics drivers from your machine. A great little tool that you should always use when changing graphics drivers. You reboot your computer to Safe Mode, and run DDU. First remove Nvidia Geforce Experience (if installed), then remove the graphics drivers. Then reboot, and install the new driver. Then set up all your options in the new driver, then reboot again and giver a go! I'm using 446.14 now, and it's good! Performance is better, and apparently it doesn't crash! If you haven't got it, download DDU, scrub your driver install, reboot and install the newest Nvidia driver (446.14). It really seems to work! (So far anyway, but I flew that infernal F/A-18 1989 CAS mission without crashing. Well, I *did* crash, but only after taking some AAA rounds to the knee...) If nothing else, it could improve your FPS. Peace and happy warfare AD

Ok, I just removed my graphics driver with DDU and installed version 446.14. Not only is the performance better, but I was able to fly the F/A-18 1989 CAS mission (Caucasus) for quite a while before being shot down, and DCS didn't crash. Imma have to use the new driver for a while before I can really tell, but at least it didn't crash this time! Woohoo! AD

Weidlich, that's what I was thinking. Nothing else is crashing on my system so it must be DCS itself. It seems to affect missions that have ground units moving and engaging each other. Stationary ground units just sitting there waiting for you to blow them up don't seem to be a problem. If it's the graphics driver, then it only affects DCS, which sucks because I really want to fly *missions* now, not just turkey shooting :) AD

I'm getting crashes out the wazoo now too. With all the great new refinements and improvements to the new version, they seem to have forgotten to fix the crashing. That sucks since DCS is better than ever now and I wanna fly it :) It mostly seems to affect missions with moving ground units that engage each other. My huge furball missions with 30+ planes in the air run really well. AD

I just noticed that... That sux, I figured I still had hope. Guess I'll just have to wait and see if they iron it out sometime in the future. My WW2 'furball' missions all work just fine, and I can have as many as 32 airplanes in the sky all at once, buzzing around like a swarm of insects shooting at each other, and no crashing. But, the Hornet 1989 CAS mission keeps crashing! I wonder if it's the ground units--I recall someone saying that ground units moving and engaging can cause crashing. AD

That's cool, too bad I keep getting crashes even with 445.75 drivers... I can't make arses or teakettles of the DCS.log file. I really don't know what's causing it. System seems stable for everything else. I'm trying to fly the F/A-18 mission called "1989 CAS". I can't get far in it, I take off from the carrier and start to wipe out ground targets, and then DCS crashes. It really sucks. Maybe I should just suck it up and try the Stable release, and see if it's any better. AD

Much as we love our sim, I seriously doubt that the damage model is anywhere near that detailed. You get hit, it does damage, and if it's enough, your virtual aircraft drills a virtual hole in virtual terra firma. Damage models are greatly simplified, as any fan of the WW2 modules can attest. A missile hits your fighter jet, and you have no MFD screens, only half thrust, and some of your flight controls don't work. That's about it. There isn't even a "bang" when you get hit by missiles/guns in DCS, and I've wondered why for a very long time now. AD

It doesn't use any fuel type. It's a simulation. Just a continually-decreasing number somewhere in the dark, murky cellar of your system RAM. As long as it's greater than zero you're good to go for a while longer :) AD

It's entirely possible that the apparent lack of yaw-roll coupling is due to the FBW system correcting for it. No roll input from the stick? No roll. The control surfaces are moved automatically to prevent the uncommanded roll. You'd have to ask someone who's flown the real deal. Airplanes generally do have yaw-roll aerodynamic coupling, but it won't show up when flying it if the control system is designed to prevent it, which might be the case with the F-16. Same thing goes with a sudden crosswind gust on landing--the plane won't roll due to sideslip if the control system won't let it. AD

445.75 seems pretty stable. I have to fly more missions to really see if it's as good as I thought. The one just after that (I think it was 445.87?) was a major crash-fest for me. If I'm thoroughly bored I might give 446.14 a try :) AD