Oh, and after spending hours getting FSX configured to run reasonably well, I'm now confronted with a relative lack of aircraft compared to FS9. Yes, some FS9 aircraft have been converted to run in FSX, but I just tried AFG's outstanding Beech B300 and it does not work anywhere near flawlessly in FSX and there is a frame rate hit when using converted aircraft in FSX.
Yes, you will usually get more of a hit using ported FS9 aircraft over native just because of the way the model is compiled for each sim and the formats. If you took the same model and recompiled it for FSX, usually it will be easier (more efficient?) on the frames.
People tend to associate FPS for gaming goodness because that is usually the case. FSX is about the only game that is actually playable/enjoyable at such low framerates so it's hard to break that stigma if you are a gamer.
People can argue till they are blue in the face about how many framerates the human eye can distinguish, BUT the main reason higher framerates are important in FS is so that when you hit a high detailed, polygon dense area (detailed city with detailed airports with lots of AI traffic and real weather)
you DO NOT lose fluidity, plain and simple. This is something MS and ACES need to realize as well and is the source of all our frustrations.
THIS IS ALSO SOMETHING simmers need to take into consideration, EXPECTATIONS, the more you have to render on the screen, the more resources it takes. I wonder how many would actually get acceptable performance out of the sim if we did not have payware, detailed addons to add to it and affect our performance. Could explain why I have a good experience with my old rig, I am very selective as to what I use in my sim.
People tend to get upset when they can't run detailed addons, well think about it for a second, the sim wasn't designed with that particular addon in mind was it? So of course you are going to have some issues going from default to addon on many levels. this is always why I ask about new aircraft and to compare performance to the defaults, to ensure I won't have a problem using it.