Aluminum Donkey

I seriously doubt that any female will be the least bit interested in your prowess with a combat flight simulator. This sim could have just as soon been named "Guy World" ;) AD

Give it another 2 to 5 years. Maybe 1-2 if we're *really* lucky (and you don't mind a really buggy, half-finished pre-alpha Open Alpha.) This stuff isn't happening overnight--it's insanely effort-intensive, and ED have to spend most of their time and effort doing something that could make them enough money to stay in business :) As for how it affects performance, well obviously it should improve it! Otherwise, why bother? :) AD

It isn't that at all. The handling really is different. Also, DCS World control setups are the same regardless of what map you're flying in--they go with each aircraft module, not the map. AD

They don't have to look too good when all you're gonna do is pump them full of lead. I'd prefer an update to the Ka-50 cockpit so the stupid indicator lights work properly. For AI-only aircraft and other assets, I'm content with moderate visual quality, since they're only there to be blown up :) AD

All interesting stuff everyone :) Imma have to try the 109K-4 in Caucasus at maybe 1-2 km altitude above MSL, because that's the alt that I usually end up at in the 8 vs. 8 dogfight mission. The 109 is *really* wobbly and hyper-sensitive in pitch in that mission--I reach maybe 15-20 degrees AoA with only a few mm of stick deflection. Only noticing it since I always fly the WW2 birds in the Normandy map, which seems very close to MSL over almost the entire map. Thanks :) AD

Go to Options menu, System. Change Visibility Distance to Extreme. With 16GB RAM and an 8+ GB card, set preload radius to max (150,000.) Make sure the fog isn't cranked up, 'cause it'll obscure your view of the horizon--which is what the stuff does! :) Peace AD

Greetings, I've noticed that the Bf-109K-4 is extremely 'wobbly' (very little damping) when flying the 8 vs. 8 mission in Caucasus, and it's hyper-sensitive in the pitch axis. In the Normandy map, however, it handles much more like the way I *think* it should. Are the maps optimized for different aircraft types? i.e. does the Normandy map have different air characteristics best suited to simulate smaller, slower prop planes, and the Caucasus, NTTR and Persian Gulf better for modern aircraft/jets? Reason I ask is that it's really obvious to me now. I'm used to flying the prop jobs over Normandy and they really behave differently in Caucasus. I have yet to try them in Nevada & the Persian Gulf. So, different atmosphere model (air density/damping) for different maps? Could this have something to do with simulated Reynolds numbers (something I used to understand long, long ago, but no longer?!) AD

Should be a great combination! Four-core i5 is a great CPU for DCS, and anything over 4.0 GHz is excellent. Also, GTX 10xx and RTX 20xx card support FreeSync monitors with the newest drivers, so if your monitor has FreeSync (or G-Sync for that matter) you'll definitely want to enable it. What it does is cause your monitor's screen to refresh once per frame delivered by the graphics card, so the card and monitor update the image on-screen at the same time. It eliminates stutters and hitches, and gives *really* nice, smooth, fluid motion even as the framerate varies. Very worthwhile checking out if you're gonna run an RTX 2070! AD

Good points, but night is... Night, and at least it's appropriately dark :) The lighting in DCS is just gorgeous at dawn and at dusk--it really brings out the very best in the scenery, aircraft, and everything in general. For whatever reason, it's awfully un-convincing during most of the day, when all the scenery just looks cartoonish and "cardboard", but the aircraft are still pretty good. I don't know how to describe it, and I'm certainly clueless about what has to be done to fix it! But, the daytime lighting has a long way to go. So, I just fly at dawn or dusk, when everything looks awesome and I avoid the "plastic/cardboard scenery effect" :) AD

You very well could be right, I bought my NVMe drive a while back when I found DCS loading times to be dreadful (250GB Samsung 960 Evo, only for DCS--I use my SATA 3 SSD for Windows, paging file, and other stuff.) Loading times aren't bad now, although I do wonder if it's because of the NVMe drive or because DCS itself has been refined. Only way to find out for certain is to copy DCS to the SATA drive, and time it to see how long it takes to load. I'm too lazy to bother :) The NVMe drive certainly benchmarks very well, 3200-3500 MB/sec reads, and I have it installed so that's what I use for DCS. But, under no circumstances should anyone ever get the idea that fast storage improves the "performance" of your computer by increasing framerates! :) AD

Good ol' paddle switch! :) I probably would have grounded my country's entire air force at this point. Either that or I would have been scrubbing dunnies and/or been on KP for 20 years :) AD

It's not supposed to improve FPS/"performance". The NVMe drive has very high data transfer rates. It reduces mission loading times to more reasonable/tolerable levels, especially when running max settings at the highest preload radius. Nobody ever said using a faster storage device would increase your framerates! It doesn't have anything whatsoever to do with that! AD

If there's a real aerial engagement happening over your house, you'll have more entertaining things to watch than the football game :) AD

Nope, I'm using a GTX 1080 Ti (Amp Extreme) and an i5-6600K at 4.5GHz. The graphics card is *always* the bottleneck. Great card for DCS, though. Overkill for most other games when running a single screen. DCS World is really, really hard on graphics cards because of the very high object count and extremely long draw distances--in other words, it's a flight sim :) AD

DCS is *not* single-threaded (or 2-threaded) and hasn't been for a long time, but 4 cores is sufficient. It shares the load about equally on all 4 cores. For DCS you need a high clock speed (4.0 GHz or faster). Core i3-8350K is a great choice and great for your GTX 1070, get an overclocking motherboard and you can run it at faster speeds than that. Fairly inexpensive, great-performing CPU. More expensive processors will *not* perform better--performance in DCS, as with many/most other games, is directly tied to CPU clock speed. Again, 4.0 GHz (or above) is good. I don't know anything about AMD Ryzen ones, but if you get one of those, get one with 4 cores and the highest possible clock speed. You need 16GB of RAM (2 modules, 8GB each for dual-channel operation). Some people like 32GB, but 16GB is enough. More than 16 might be good if you like enormous multiplayer missions. You don't need the most expensive, fast memory, but you *do* need enough of it :) I have great results with 16GB of DDR4 3000 Mhz, but RAM speed doesn't affect performance in DCS too much. Storage: You NEED an SSD. Yes, you do :) An NVMe (ultra-fast, 3000+ MB/sec reads) M.2 drive is really nice, but a SATA 3 one will do. An appropriate case and PSU and you're good to go--about 500 Watts or a bit more should do fine, the GTX 1070 is pretty easy on electricity. Let the flame wars begin ;) AD

Yep, F-16 is coming soon! ...you know, "soon" in DCS terms. Maybe 1-2 years if we're lucky, 3-5 if we're realistic. Remember kids, the F/A-18C is still in early release, and doesn't even have a targeting pod yet, never mind the fancy stuff like A2G radar :) In a nutshell, ED will release a barebones, early-release F-16 (many years of their work) if and when they feel like it, not when *we* are itching and scratching to pay them 50 bucks for it :) AD

I wouldn't worry about it. Where there's money, there's a way. AD

Welcome to the wonderful world of computers. The latest-and-greatest Super-Duper-Hyper-Ultra-UberTech hardware costs a huge chunk of dough and is merely decent after two years. It's considered dang near obsolete after 4 or 5, and it's hilarious watching people trying to unload it on various websites for top dollar with the tagline "It was very high end when I bought it"!! Graphics cards are often the worst offenders :) Just the way it is, and that's why it's a good idea to only buy exactly what you need, instead of buying super-expensive stuff that won't actually improve performance in what you bought it for, but "might be nice to have". DCS simply needs a fairly cheap CPU with 4 cores and the highest possible clock speed, 16GB of RAM, a hefty graphics card, and a cheap SATA 3 SSD :) AD

I've noticed this exact thing a *lot*. I always give my wingdudes a lot more fuel than myself. They still always run out of gas when I have plenty left, and it's especially a problem when flying any of the jets that have afterburners. I've noticed that when I'm flying straight and level in the Flanker, Fulcrum or Eagle at maybe 85-90% RPM on the gauge, my wingmen always need full afterburner to try to catch up and join the formation. When they're doing that, they can barely climb and accelerate at full AB, and invariable use up all their fuel. I know that AI aircraft use different flight models from the human-piloted aircraft, but the fuel consumption is much, much too high. AD

Gotcha, so in other words, it's no big deal. Only 3 bugs is a "perfect" driver :thumbup: AD

Awesome, I gotta play with this, thanks SO much! Does "noiseBack" imply loss of detail with distance? As in, increasing it allows greater distance from the viewpoint until DCS starts dropping detail levels to prevent excessive VRAM usage? I'm only asking because I hardly use half my VRAM almost all of the time, and I even have an "old" graphics card (1080 Ti) but I'm still disliking/wishing away/resenting the blurriness of the ground textures at higher altitudes despite getting sky-high framerates on my modest system. I wish all this stuff was adjustable in-sim using the Options menu, instead of having to "Kindergarten-Hack" various .LUA files. AD

Hehehe all true, but I was still talking about single-CPU single-card systems. Does the AMD Threadripper 7nm really yank more than half a horsepower out of the wall?? If so, that CPU with 3 hefty graphics cards can justify a kilowatt PSU. But, not a one-CPU one-card system. I've just seen too many people on this forum with one i7 and one 1080 Ti or even two of them, buying a 1200W PSU or even more. It's your dough, buy what you want. ;) AD

He can just use what the graphics card manufacturer reccommends. A kilowatt PSU for any single CPU, single card system is drastic overkill. Lots of people buy 'em and they're wasting cash that could go into a better system. There's no advantage to it. I'm using: i5-6600k @ 4.5 GHz (4 cores/threads) (~100W absolute max) 16GB DDR4 GTX 1080 Ti @ 2050 MHz (384 Watts max.) 2 hard drives, 2 SSDs DVD drive 3 fans ...and I put an ammeter on my computer's PSU power cord, and the most I could measure under a heavy stress test (Furmark, AIDA64 and all that) was about 4.5A of current. At 120 volts AC input, that's 540W in. So, with a PSU efficiency of 85%, that's only 459W into the computer itself. My CPU is pretty average, maybe 100-110W in Prime95 (which I know I shouldn't do to it), but the 1080 Ti Amp Extreme is a *very* power-hungry graphics card! So, a *properly-rated* 500W PSU should be fine. The new hardware actually uses less electricity than the older stuff, too. My 750W PSU is very much overkill, I probably should have just bought a cheaper one. AD

It'll run like a whole new sim man, if you use G-Sync/FreeSync with it it'll even be really nice and fluid right down to the lower framerates at all max settings. I'm not kidding, you really should give it a solid try and get it working. 418.81 + 1080Ti + G-Sync/FreeSync =kickass :) AD

Gotcha :) I've always found 12 bits to be plenty. That's 4096 steps over the whole range of control movement, and I'm using maybe 3500 of them (Hall effect sensor not using the whole 0-5V range.) There doesn't seem to be any advantage to higher resolution input devices. AD