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  • Please see the most recent updates in the "Where did the .com name go?" thread. Posts number 16 and 17.

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R U Ready for "Flight"?

falcon409

falcon409

SOH-CM-2025
I'm taking this from the latest Edition (September/October) of "Computer Pilot". "Ready for Microsoft Flight?", page 26. Among other things they discuss the use of "Tessellation" and DXT11 as integral parts of the coming Sim and whether a lot of our current computers and graphics cards are up to the task. We all remember the claims of "minimum requirements" for FSX and what it "actually" took to be able to fly (with any autogen at all, lol).

This article gives a link to a benchmark program called "Heaven Benchmark 2.5" which will run a beautifully modeled surreal flight through a maze of various highly detailed floating mountains and every manor of texturing to test your setup and give you a readout at the end on how your system stacks up. Just Google the name Heaven Benchmark 2.5 and it will take you right to the correct link. Installation is simple and just as a heads-up, if your card isn't already DXT11 capable, don't bother running the test, you won't get the most out of what it's testing. Mine did fairly well, although my NVidia 9600GT does not support tessellation, so at some point if I decide to venture into the next Sim, I'll have to upgrade.

Tessellation: Implemented in the GPU to calculate a smoother curved surface resulting in more graphically detailed images, including more lifelike objects in the gaming world.
 
I hadn't played much with the benchmark last evening other than to let it run through one time and then run the benchmark. When you're in the video, there are some selections at the top. . . .try the "Camera" dropdown, it let's you freely walk all through the models to get a closer look. . .the texturing is quite amazing.:salute:
 
"Heaven" has been, and still is, my benchmarking application of choice.

I use it mostly to determine any improvements in performance after driver updates though.
 
ED I tried the benchmark and my numbers went from a low of 14.6 up to 92.1 fps. I overclocked my cpu from 3.0ghz to 3.4ghz and there was no change in the fps. The graphic card is a asus 4600gt and my cpu is a e8500 using vista 64bit.
 
I'm not ready as I am still using a 8800GT and Windows XP, so no DX11 for me. I'd have to upgrade to Win7... then my Core2Quad may not be enough for Flight... 4GB of RAM is not likely enough for Win7-64bit... GT8800 certainly isn't enough... guess I'll be starting from scratch. I'm not worried, Flight won't be out until some time in 2012 and seeing as how the world ends it 2012 it won't matter! :icon_lol::icon_lol::icon_lol:
 
4GB of RAM is not likely enough for Win7-64bit...
Click to expand...

Seems to be working fine here, not sure about the GT8800 I can't remember if I'd already upgraded from it when I installed the Win 7 beta but I don't see why it wouldn't work you just won't be able to run anything above DX9 on it.
 
I havent found anywhere to compare results but the test walk-through ran very smoothly.

[h=1]Powered by Unigine Engine[/h][h=2]Heaven Benchmark v2.5 Basic[/h]
FPS:42.5
Scores:1072
Min FPS:23.4
Max FPS:101.9

<tbody>
</tbody>
[h=2]Hardware[/h]
Binary:Windows 32bit Visual C++ 1600 Release Mar 1 2011
Operating system:Windows Vista (build 6002, Service Pack 2) 32bit
CPU model:Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz
CPU flags:3329MHz MMX SSE SSE2 SSE3 SSSE3 HTT
GPU model:NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 8.17.12.5896 2048Mb

<tbody>
</tbody>
[h=2]Settings[/h]
Render:direct3d11
Mode:1280x1024 fullscreen
Shaders:high
Textures:high
Filter:trilinear
Anisotropy:4x
Occlusion:enabled
Refraction:enabled
Volumetric:enabled
Tessellation:normal

<tbody>
</tbody>
 
SkippyBing said:
Seems to be working fine here, not sure about the GT8800 I can't remember if I'd already upgraded from it when I installed the Win 7 beta but I don't see why it wouldn't work you just won't be able to run anything above DX9 on it.
Click to expand...

Not exactly...the 8800GT is a DX10 card :)
 
Roger said:
I haven't found anywhere to compare results but the test walk-through ran very smoothly.
Click to expand...
Yep, I'd say you're in great shape Roger. When I tried to add anti-aliasing to the mix, the walk-through just about went to a slide show. I know my system is marginal for "Flight", but take anti-aliasing out of the equation and the rest of the test went smoothly enough for me. I don't have a card that will handle Tessellation (NVidia 9600GT), but it is DXT11 compliant.
 
My results. I'm ready I think, but I'll let others sort the bugs out first ;)

FPS:36.2
Scores:911
Min FPS:8.1
Max FPS:85.2

<tbody>
</tbody>

Hardware

Binary:Windows 32bit Visual C++ 1600 Release Mar 1 2011
Operating system:Windows 7 (build 7601, Service Pack 1) 64bit
CPU model:AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 965 Processor
CPU flags:3400MHz MMX+ 3DNow!+ SSE SSE2 SSE3 SSE4A HTT
GPU model:ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 8.892.0.0 1024Mb

<tbody>
</tbody>

Settings

Render:direct3d11
Mode:1920x1080 fullscreen
Shaders:high
Textures:high
Filter:trilinear
Anisotropy:4x
Occlusion:enabled
Refraction:enabled
Volumetric:enabled
Tessellation:normal

<tbody>
</tbody>
 
I'll just have to hope that Flight is DX9 compatible :running:


Powered by Unigine Engine

Heaven Benchmark v2.5 Basic

FPS:
48.3
Scores:
1218
Min FPS:
30.5
Max FPS:
95.1

<TBODY>
</TBODY>

Hardware

Binary:
Windows 32bit Visual C++ 1600 Release Mar 1 2011
Operating system:
Windows XP (build 2600, Service Pack 3) 32bit
CPU model:
AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 940 Processor
CPU flags:
2999MHz MMX+ 3DNow!+ SSE SSE2 SSE3 SSE4A HTT
GPU model:
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti 6.14.12.7533 2048Mb

<TBODY>
</TBODY>

Settings

Render:
direct3d9
Mode:
1920x1080 fullscreen
Shaders:
high
Textures:
high
Filter:
trilinear
Anisotropy:
4x
Occlusion:
enabled
Refraction:
enabled
Volumetric:
enabled
Tessellation:
disabled

<TBODY>
</TBODY>

Unigine Corp. © 2005-2011
 
Welllll, i figured I may as well add mine too.. Cant make heads nor tails of what its telling me though in relation to whether i will be able to run future software or not.. Theres nothing that says what the numbers are actually saying..

[h=2]Heaven Benchmark v2.5 Basic[/h]
FPS:35.7
Scores:898
Min FPS:22.7
Max FPS:69.7

<tbody>
</tbody>
[h=2]Hardware[/h]
Binary:Windows 32bit Visual C++ 1600 Release Mar 1 2011
Operating system:Windows 7 (build 7600) 64bit
CPU model:Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz
CPU flags:3001MHz MMX SSE SSE2 SSE3 SSSE3 HTT
GPU model:NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260 8.17.12.8026 896Mb

<tbody>
</tbody>
[h=2]Settings[/h]
Render:direct3d11
Mode:1600x900 fullscreen
Shaders:high
Textures:high
Filter:trilinear
Anisotropy:4x
Occlusion:enabled
Refraction:enabled
Volumetric:enabled
Tessellation:disabled

<tbody>
</tbody>
 
Here's my results...

Heavennoaa.jpg


Heaven4xAA.jpg


8xAA was very clear... beautiful!

Heaven8xAA.jpg

​
 
warchild said:
Welllll, i figured I may as well add mine too.. Cant make heads nor tails of what its telling me though in relation to whether i will be able to run future software or not.. Theres nothing that says what the numbers are actually saying..
Click to expand...
Pam, it's just letting you know, by virtue of the numbers (FPS mostly) and the setup you ran with (DXT11, Tessellation available, Anti-aliasing), that if the demo ran smoothly, or close to it, then Flight, in it's release form, should run well on your system. If your Vid Card isn't DXT11 capable, you don't have the option of Tessellation on your card and anti-aliasing brings the demo to it's knees (like mine did), then you'll be looking at an upgrade of, at the very least, your Graphics Card.
 
I see everyone is running with ansio set at 4x. If you run your vidcard setting at 8x anti-a and 16x ansio shouldn't you
run the benchmark at the same settings? I also would like to know if anyone is also overclocking their GPU (vid card)
or is it running at clock speeds?

Joe
 
Looks like I am right on the line as always


Powered by Unigine Engine

Heaven Benchmark v2.5 Basic

FPS:
27.0
Scores:
679
Min FPS:
13.4
Max FPS:
56.7

<tbody>
</tbody>



Hardware

Binary:
Windows 32bit Visual C++ 1600 Release Mar 1 2011
Operating system:
Windows 7 (build 7601, Service Pack 1) 64bit
CPU model:
Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz
CPU flags:
2400MHz MMX SSE SSE2 SSE3 SSSE3 HTT
GPU model:
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 8.17.12.5896 1024Mb

<tbody>
</tbody>



Settings

Render:
direct3d11
Mode:
1920x1200 fullscreen
Shaders:
high
Textures:
high
Filter:
trilinear
Anisotropy:
4x
Occlusion:
enabled
Refraction:
enabled
Volumetric:
enabled
Tessellation:
normal

<tbody>
</tbody>



 
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