Running Out of System Memory

Devildog73

Devildog73

SOH Staff
Staff member
Okay, I am at a loss for solutions. I am running an AMD Ryzen 7 3700X 8 Core CPU. I have 32 Gigs of System RAM. 4 Gigs of Video RAM on Geforce GTX 1050Ti Vid card. I changed my paging file to 5600 to 6400. And STILL I fly FSX Acceleration for one flight and begin another and the program stops with a "ran out of system memory" error msg. Thoughts? Solutions? Thanks, Lee
 
I know this used to be a problem for some people even though I never ran into it myself.

Do you have this line added to the FSX cfg.

HIGHMEMFIX=1

Under graphics.
 
Devildog73 said:
Okay, I am at a loss for solutions. I am running an AMD Ryzen 7 3700X 8 Core CPU. I have 32 Gigs of System RAM. 4 Gigs of Video RAM on Geforce GTX 1050Ti Vid card. I changed my paging file to 5600 to 6400. And STILL I fly FSX Acceleration for one flight and begin another and the program stops with a "ran out of system memory" error msg. Thoughts? Solutions? Thanks, Lee
Click to expand...
Hi Lee,

I guess you are referring to the 'Out of Memory' (OOM) message that is followed fairly quickly by FSX crashing to desktop? Unfortunately this is nothing to do with the amount of RAM in your system but is related to the amount of Virtual Access Space (VAS) the program is using. Think of VAS as a portion of your hard drive that is being used for FSX operation. Unfortunately FSX, being a 32-bit program, has a VAS limit of 4GB - FSX itself shouldn't use more than about 1.5 to 2GB of VAS but if you are using some resource intensive scenery addons perhaps combined with a resource intensive aircraft, you can rapidly approach the 4GB VAS limit. The PMDG 777 for example uses just under 1GB of VAS itself so if you combine that with a flight starting in an intensive addon airport such as Aerosoft Frankfurt, then you will be very close to the 4GB limit right from the start and will be prone to an OOM crash..

The highmemfix recommended above is vital as it increases the FSX VAS limit from 2GB to 4GB, but nothing will increase it above that.

I have a load of addon aircraft and a lot of addon scenery and I have to be very cautious about the combination of aircraft and scenery that I use. I modify the FSX scenery configuration for individual flights using a scenery configurator in payware called SimStarterNG so that only the scenery I am using is active in the scenery library. By not having other high demand sceneries, that you are not planning to use, active in FSX you can same some VAS. Unfortunately as far as I know SimStarterNG is no longer available for FSX but there are freeware scenery configurators available although I have no experience of these.

I have been flying FSX for years and at the beginning OOM crashes were the bane of my life until I started flying using modified scenery configurations as above and now OOM messages are unusual. Sometimes however this does require a trade off between aircraft and scenery if resource intensive addons are being used.

Hope this helps answer your question,
Bill

Ooops didn't realise this was a June 12 2023 question!
 
This is an old thread, but I do want to add that FSX: Steam Edition does not require the HIGHMEMFIX modification as this was incorporated into the recompiled Steam Edition version.
 
This is why I switched to Prepar3D V4.5 which uses as much of the RAM as it needs with its 64 bit programming and no matter what I fly from/to whether PMDG, Coronado, Aerosoft, FSDT no matter what. I get with my old Dell Optiplex and the AMD Radeon over 20fps and sometimes up to 40fps with default scenery and a Cessna Skyhawk. If you are able, get it. I have been able to use almost all my FSX stuff on it only exception is Feelthere and PMDG who created P3D versions of their aircraft and the FSX ones don't work in P3D. I recently uploaded scenery that I created in 2018 for FSX which sometimes max'd it out with no flickering and perfect operation into my P3D . More freeware developers and designers are updating the FSX stuff to Prepar3D V4 and V5 and uploading for free downloads. I have successfully done that with ModelConverterX (FOR MY OWN USE ONLY) Just check out Flightsim.com, Simviation or AVSIM for lots of them that have been converted with permission. Milviz, A2A, and Aeroplane Heaven migrating to MSFS have generously offered a lot of their former payware for free download at ORBX or the Milviz site too. There are posts here and at the P3D Forum.
 
Many years ago, before MSFS came on the scene I contemplated switching to P3D for that reason but, to be honest, with a huge amount of addon aircraft and scenery in FSX, I didn't want to hassle of having to reinstall (or if necessary buy) them again for another platform. So as I had a pretty smoothly performing FSX and was very happy with it, I decided to stick with FSX until I was forced (by hardware failure or whatever) to purchase a new rig or reinstall it. That situation still hasn't arisen but when it does I will now also have the option of MSFS and would have to carefully weigh up which platform to choose, bearing in mind that none of my FSX payware addons would be usable in MSFS where as some might be in P3D. Could be a bit of a dilemma but at least, for now, I'm still happy with my FSX setup!

Bill
 
tgycgijoes said:
This is why I switched to Prepar3D V4.5 which uses as much of the RAM as it needs with its 64 bit programming and no matter what I fly from/to whether PMDG, Coronado, Aerosoft, FSDT no matter what. I get with my old Dell Optiplex and the AMD Radeon over 20fps and sometimes up to 40fps with default scenery and a Cessna Skyhawk. If you are able, get it. I have been able to use almost all my FSX stuff on it only exception is Feelthere and PMDG who created P3D versions of their aircraft and the FSX ones don't work in P3D. I recently uploaded scenery that I created in 2018 for FSX which sometimes max'd it out with no flickering and perfect operation into my P3D . More freeware developers and designers are updating the FSX stuff to Prepar3D V4 and V5 and uploading for free downloads. I have successfully done that with ModelConverterX (FOR MY OWN USE ONLY) Just check out Flightsim.com, Simviation or AVSIM for lots of them that have been converted with permission. Milviz, A2A, and Aeroplane Heaven migrating to MSFS have generously offered a lot of their former payware for free download at ORBX or the Milviz site too. There are posts here and at the P3D Forum.
Click to expand...
Which A2A payware is offered for free??

Cees
 
Good evening friends
as I have nearly the same problems on FS2004 as described here,
does it also work on this older sim to add the line
"
HIGHMEMFIX=1

Under graphics.
?
Best regards
Michael
 
@michaelvader for your hardware, this may perhaps also prove helpful: https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/large-address-aware.112556/ as it would potentially enable your FS2004 install to use more than the default allocated 2GB of system memory - up to a maximum of 3GB - thus the required 3 GB switch - instructions are contained in the spoiler links

And there is a further fine-tuning command - addition of the userva switch https://mskb.pkisolutions.com/kb/316739 in addition to the 3 GB switch - helpful because it does not lead to OS Kernel starvation from allocating an entire added GB of memory to the application such as FS2004 - the switch serves an intermediate middle ground that provides the breathing space for the OS to still have adequate memory to function while enabling FS9 or any LAA modified program to have more than the default 2GB of memory on a 32-bit setup - and note while the article gives an example of /fastdetect /3GB /Userva=2900 which I believe would be cutting it close and potentially lead to errors and general instability, better would be, a slightly reduced value i.e. /Userva=2700 or at most Userva=2800 to be at the optimal sweet spot between normal OS-functioning and a smooth MSFS setup

cheers!
 
Scianoir said:
The highmemfix recommended above is vital as it increases the FSX VAS limit from 2GB to 4GB, but nothing will increase it above that.
Click to expand...
incorrect, for that which you write about pertains to the LAA (large address aware) flag that enables the FSX VAS to be increased from default 2GB to the maximum 4GB permitted for 32-bit applications on 64-bit systems - anyhow this is taken care of in FSX-SP2/Acc. and FSX-SE

the HIGHMEMFIX has to do with improving the efficacy of graphics memory management, when a system has an installed graphics card with more than 512 MB of video memory, per https://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/fix-tweaks-for-fsx.19432/post-127653 - addressed in FSX-SE

as self-evident, there are two different sorts of memory bottlenecks

cheers!
 
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