by Jean-Paul Mes

Why this heading ?

Who did not already wonder if his PC or Mac were well adjusted to make working a simulator as demanding as Fly! II ? Often, we can see on the forums that someone obtains 20 fps in such situation whereas somebody else got 40 fps with machines theoretically rather similar. But on what are they based ?

• Which visibility ?
• Which resolution ?
• "AI" planes ?
• Where did these performances take place ?
• ..... ?

Thus it is necessary to define common parameters to be able to compare.

What do you need ?

Fly! II v 2.30, ROTW TBM 700, Rennes scenery and a little bit of patience.

Which parameters ?

Check that, in your "fly.ini" file ("C:\Program Files\Terminal Reality\Fly! II\system\fly.ini"), "allowDebugInfo" value is well set at 1 in order to be able to visualize your displaying speed.

Start Fly! II while pressing simultaneously on ALT key, you will see appear the following menu :

Let us see the options of this menu :
Renderer : according to the possibilities of your graphics card. Test it (people equipped with Nvidia GeForce2 and more can choose Direct X 8 T&L).
Resolution : 1024x768 (800x600 is possible but would distort the results).
"Bit depth" : 32 bits per pixel (lower (16), you could get strange colors).
High detail textures : no, because, to be able to use them correctly, it is necessary to have a graphics card with more than 32 Mb of memory. This is not yet the case of everyone.

Following menu: scenery option

Carry out the same adjustments as above. It should be noted that the adjustment "High Resolution Radius" is disabled. That is normal because high resolution textures are disabled too.
Note also that the option "Computer Controller Aircraft" is set at zero, quite simply to avoid unexpected change of one 757 to 20,000 polygons which would distort your results.

Think also to set your "sound" options like this :

Now, select the TBM 700 and position your plane in Rennes on runway 28 like below. Start the engine and switch on the avionics.

Results :

As it is necessary to begin, here are the results which I got with my configuration (that we can consider as an average one). Moreover I invite you to make know yours by leaving a small message on the Fly.Simvol forum.

The results which will follow were obtained on the following configuration :

Windows XP Home, AMD Athlon 1.2 Ghz, 512 Mb SDRAM 133, graphics card GeForce 2 GTS PRO (not-"overclocked") with Detonator 21.85 drivers (without anti-aliasing !!!!). Hard disc IBM 40 Gb UDMA, Creative Labs SB Live Value sound card.

Runway 28, no cloud (38 fps)

Above Rennes, no cloud (70 fps)

Jure Dolanec "broken" type clouds at 4,000 feet (40 fps)

In crossing a cloud, dear oh dear ! (21 fps)

Little trick

Unless you have a current graphics card, disable antialiasing (outline smoothing) in your graphics card parameters. For example, for a GeForce :

You will especially feel the difference by seeing another planes or in flying in the clouds.

And now, it is your turn...

Our forum is at your disposal to compare your results. Share them and let us known your little tricks to improve your Fly! experience.