StrongHarm

I did aviation environmental systems in the USN, which included ejection seats and safety equipment. When you go in the drink you have a very bright strobe, green florescent dye, and a buoyancy vest that automatically actuate with contact of sea water. We were told that in WW2 red dye was used instead of green. Pilots were constantly being eaten by sharks and they couldn't figure out why... until they found out that the dye was made of dried pigs blood! Concerning helmet tape; in the 90s we were encouraged to cover flight line and pilots helmets with reflective tape, and there were no real rules about design. As riggers, the pilots would pay us booze to do cool designs for them. Cartoon characters flipping the bird or engaged in unwholesome acts were pretty common, as well as skulls and messages for the enemy. Mine said "F*@# the whales, save the humans".

Did you know that FCLP is pronounced Fikel-P in the USN? It's my favorite military backronym. I know I know... it's weird that I have an affinity for it.. but it takes me back.. and this is the least of my eccentricities.

Concerning the PD discussion: try 1.2PD and 2xMSAA. I've found that the graphical difference is minor compared to higher settings, but the performance is optimal. I have a monster system and still choose to run at this setting. See this for more info.

Judging the ME is kind of a relative thing. I've built missions in several different sims/games and find DCS ME to be the best of them. Much more powerful and friendly than the Arma3 ME for instance. There's a learning curve that has nothing to do with the interface. It's a question of becoming comfortable with the concepts of design and logic. Stick with it. Once you break the knowledge barrier it's very rewarding. After getting comfortable with the ME interface you can then take it to the next level with LUA scripting. It's not that difficult to learn and gives you complete power to do virtually anything you want with your missions. ED invests extra time in giving us the tools we need to be creative. There's a lot of great information and good people in the Mission Builders' Corner that can help. (disclaimer: I'm not a PhD)

That's a really damned good point Cacher! I personally read the manual in its entirety, then ran a bunch of missions I put together in the mission editor to get the practical of each subsystem. Only then did I refine my setup and gear. Flying with others and swapping TTPs really cemented my knowledge of the bird. Don't wait too long to link up with other pilots. Some may seem querulous in the forums, but once you get out there on voice comms most are friendly and receptive to questions. I use glasses with VR. It was hard for me to find a decent pair that worked well with the Rift (since I have an enormous noggin). I finally found these and they are working great. They cover the VR lenses almost perfectly and I can't even feel them.

Cacher, I don't know if you're interested in acquiring additional hardware, but the Oculus Rift works beautifully with DCS. I was previously using 3 52 inch 4k monitors.. but now I can't fly unless I have those silly looking goggles on my face. The most striking difference is that you can perceive depth and distance very well. I don't stare at the altimeter anymore. I found it so realistic that for my first few weeks I would get disoriented as my body was expecting G forces that didn't occur (may not happen to everyone, I flew in military aircraft while I was in the service). There's a section in the forums about it. Also, the JetSeat is a good investment and it really helps with VR immersion and combatting motion sickness. FYI. Luck to you and welcome to a great sim and a great community.

jaxx_za's profile looks pretty thorough and easy to use. You might try mine as well. It works for X52 and X52pro. I'm a Business Intelligence Architect/Dev so I have a deep understanding of user interface and interaction. I did a thorough analysis to come to conclusions for this profile. Hope it can at least be a good foundation for you: http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=59208 You can find a lot more information in the linked post, but to answer your questions: 1. Advise if I need to install the Saitek software for the X52? - I would, even if you don't use this profile. If for no other reason than to disable the clutch function. 2. Direct me to diagrams and a profile that is up-to-date for the X52? - See above 3. Can I make all the necessary assignments for the X52 just using the DCS Software? - You simply copy my files from the post and you have it all in place, other than the items in the diagram that are black. Those are set in game. Extensive directions and observations are available in the post. Click to expand. Screenshot the HOTAS Matrix on the right, if nothing else. I found it really useful when I was getting started.

I'm anxious to see these problems fixed as well, but as a developer I find myself admiring ED more than anything else. DCS is not only the most complex sim code ever developed, it's one of the most complex applications period. Imagine the moving parts behind what you're seeing in the sim.. then multiple that by several orders of magnitude. Their priority is definitely not making money, else they would do something besides sims. Through the powers of logical deduction, we should be able to assume that there are complexities and development paths that we're not privy to. Some of the comments in this thread might be seen as pretty shallow. Everyone has their own personal standards in how they conduct themselves and perceive the advantages they enjoy, but one word I'd personally hate to tag myself with is "entitled"... that's best avoided. I say this not with scorn or anger, but as a thoughtful friendly observation. If I had a booger on my nose, I'd want someone to tell me.

I would imagine that we won't be waiting long for a resolution on this, since they only have one standard to work with now that 'no deferred shading mode' has been cut from the sim. I know there are mixed feelings about this, but I equate it to Microsoft doing away with the old 16bit components in Win10. It hurt some people that had legacy hardware, but what an improvement in the SDLC.

Fair enough. I was an ejection seat mech and tiger team leader responsible for full bird 256 day inspections, so I know about not cutting corners. In the vid they said they were doing hot turn arounds to test how many sorties they could put out if the ol' "Fulda Gap" incident were to happen. I'm sure at that early stage in the Hawg program they didn't have too many PnPs to follow, so in the vid they had it down to 20minutes. What's the current turn around time on the Charlie for 50% fuel, hardpoints, and rounds? Just curious.

This video was featured in a 05/03 Popular Mechanics article titled "The A-10 Warthog Was a Badass Even in This Old-School '70s Film". Interesting read. They say max turn around time is 20 minutes from wheels down to wheels up. Hey Snoopy, what are the average turn around times with the newest Hawgs? https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/aviation/a20136657/a-10-warthog-70s-film-strip/

Added to Science section: More about Deferred Shading.

Yeah, you should do some research on the differences between the 4790k and 6700k. Two very different architectures. One is 4 years old, the other one is 5 years old.. so upgrade should happen soon with either one. 4790k has a 25gb bandwidth and the 6700k has a 35gb memory bandwidth. This is important for flight sims, and dictates your 'bottleneck'. The benchmark on the 6700k is 700pts where the newest processors are in the 3000s. In contrast, the 4790k is in the 500s. The newest processors are more capable, despite their 'megahertz' number because they're more capable at math. The 'megahertz' or 'frames per second' isn't always the best way to rate a CPU. With this being said, I still have an old 5960x (runs away).

The 4790 was a beast no doubt. With the 1k series of cards it will be somewhat of a bottleneck, as will the motherboard. I like to put data flow in terms of water, for logical comparison. Think of your 1070 as a showerhead (pixel shower) you installed, which is capable of putting out a lot of water pressure. If your motherboard and CPU are of a previous generation of architecture, it's like having skinny water pipes in the wall. Even though the showerhead is 'capable' of high pressure, the old pipes can only feed it so much water per second. Therefore, you still get decreased water flow from an otherwise capable showerhead. Is it better than a previous generation showerhead? Sure, but it's still not operating at it's full potential.

I feel your pain buddy, but most of the games out there which have VR support were made specifically for VR. They don't have the intense physics math going on in the background, or the huge amounts of terrain and objects that DCS has. Do you know of any other 100gb apps that have VR support? I've often wondered why more dev shops aren't porting existing games to VR. As a developer myself I've come to a simple conclusion; they're not capable. I'm glad you found a decent compromise with your settings.

Tests were done in Nellis with DS on. The only significant change to my test results since 2.5 launched was AF. I now run at 16x. I no longer see evidence of edge bleed due to high AF when performing my "stevie wonder" test.

NAKE350, did you take the time to read my post? NVidia settings don't affect VR. Try turning your PD in game up to 1.2 and MSAA up to 2x, you might be impressed with the balance of performance and quality. The table below shows how I quantify the different settings in my analysis. I loaded a mission I created for graphics testing with each setting combination. After collecting data and analyzing I found that 1.2 PD and 2xMSAA were the best balance for me. The mission starts as a blank map then slowly adds 38 aircraft attacking an invincible target. Values are taken at 8 different points in the mission then calculated to average. The ratio of performance to quality may be different for you. Your video card is not optimal for VR. I used to run DCS in VR on a 980ti, which is only slightly better than the 1070, and I had to make some compromises. The 1080ti runs smooth as butter.

I'm running the latest NVidia drivers. I always do unless there's a bad build. The difference between 1.2 and 1.3 PD is pretty significant if you're running MSAA and DS. There's a link in my analysis that explains why a single point of PD can be a big resource drain with little return. Here's how I quantify the difference in the analysis. I loaded a mission I created for graphics testing with each setting combination. After collecting data and analyzing I found that 1.2 PD and 2xMSAA were the best balance for me. The mission starts as a blank map then slowly adds 38 aircraft attacking an invincible target. Values are taken at 8 different points in the mission then calculated to average.

Brother, you have purchased some sweet software if they have the physics and accuracy of DCS, multiple full fidelity airframes, and full VR support with multiple geographies. I can fly through Vegas NOE and see Donnie in the suite of Trump Tower with no lag.. so I'm personally in awe of DCS. The only other game/sim I use in VR is Elite Dangerous from time to time, even though I own dozens of titles. All others got an "ok that's cool" and an uninstall. Seriously, can you please share your "better than DCS" software list with me please (toggles wallet)? EDIT: I missed your post where you named IL2 and FS2. I'm not going to argue with your opinion. I would encourage you to look at the development lifecycle of DCS, what it actually is, and where it's headed. I believe it's a monumental achievement. DCS in its current state makes my heart flutter at least once per mission.. I can't wait to see what they achieve in the near future. Good luck to you on getting your system to run it well. Please check out the VR performance analysis I linked before and tell me if I can help.

WARNING WILL ROBINSON I would highly recommend that you run PD in game with 1.2 and MSAA at x2 with deferred shading. I used to have to run PD at 1.5 to see the gauges, but that's no longer the case. Lowering it to 1.2 gives you some headroom to engage MSAA and DS. It's an entirely different (better) sim with these settings. See the analysis linked above for science.

Mags, I did a full analysis on VR performance in the VR section of the forums. The only thing I've changed since then is turning AF up to 16x. You may have to invest some time and work to get acceptable performance from your hardware. You have both a CPU and a GPU that will be strained by VR. If you had a 4790k and a 1080ti, or a newer processor and a 1080 standard, it would be easier. I think it is doable though. My analysis contains information that may help. Analysis: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=201647 VR Section: https://forums.eagle.ru/forumdisplay.php?f=497

NAKE350: Right. I was trying to convey that I received the benefits of the latest version without a performance penalty in VR, so it is possible. See my analysis/specs and tell me if I can help: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=201647

This has always been so. Back in the twilight home of computing, the best technicians out there were people who flew sims. If you think this is challenging, try spending 30 minutes tweaking your system and loading drivers into high mem or chasing down hardware IRQs and DMAs, every single time you start your sim. In consideration of today's recreational computing there are two things that stretch any hardware; 1. VR 2. Sims. We're talking about compounding two variables which, even when individually factored, are a strain on current hardware. The fact that we can do it at all is *amazing*, but to do it well it takes time and it takes money. There's no way around it. I've spent both on getting DCS to run well in VR and I couldn't be happier (except for minor things like map lights). If you want my VR performance analysis and specs I've done a full writeup on it: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=201647 . Take note that in my analysis I found that the benefits of turning AA up in VR wasn't worth the performance hit. Since that writeup there have been a few patches and I'm now running AA at 16x with no performance hit. This is an example of the steady improvements we're seeing in VR in DCS. tldr; PD 1.2, MSAA 2x. ED has done a magnificent job of integrating VR even though they were under no pressure or obligation to do so. They've also steadily improved support and provided tools to tweak VR, even though they were busy building a *world* with uber accurate physics and airframes (F/A-18!). It's my belief that their motive is simple... they're simmers too.

It seems to me that they've been steadily working on VR, and they've achieved far more than most other dev shops. In the next patch we'll be seeing a new default view position in VR for instance. Not long ago I had to run with PD at 1.5 to clearly view the gauges, now I run in 1.2 and everything is crystal clear. I'm now also able to run with MSAA and deferred shading, which wasn't possible before. I maintain between 80 and 90 FPS in most situations, dropping to 45 when there are a lot of objects. Here's my writeup on performance tweaking in VR if you're interested: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=201647 My Rift would gather dust if not for DCS. Elite Dangerous is decent in VR, but other than that no one has the skill that ED does and most other games/sims fall flat. Fallout 4 is a good example. They tried to create a VR mode and had to completely change the game and make a lot of compromises. From a functional standpoint, DCS is the same in VR as it is on a monitor if you have the correct hardware and settings. From a visual and immersive standpoint it completely owns me. When I compare DCS in VR to my experience in early sims where I had to tweak my config.sys and autoexec.bat to keep my wire frame from stuttering, I sometimes wonder if I'm only dreaming. Also see this: https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=3466347&postcount=12

Magic!