As with any FSX user, tuning and tweaking is an ongoing process. this is simply because, its rare to be able to lock down an FSX instance and never have to touch it. there is always a new aircraft to install, a new airport scenery to apply, the next revolution of weather engine that simply can’t be passed. Given this, while it is worthy to think of locking down a well working instance of FSX, it is not practical.
There is a long slew of FSX tweaks that have been discussed, debated, argued, accepted and rejected. One of them is BufferPools.
This is a partly understood tweak and even though I have tried working with this for many years I am yet not convinced that I have it set optimally. Any discussion regarding FSX tweaks and results MUST BE in the context of the configuration that the simulator is built on. Here is a little about my configuration – i7 3770, 8GB, nvidia 660 GPU/2GB. Triple projection rendering 3840×1280 pixels.
Firstly BufferPools is best set as the section header in fsx.cfg file. UsePools is the setting. This is typically applied along with the RejectThreshold parameter.
I have tried this with Nvidia 580 and Nvidia 660 cards.
My best mileage has been achieved with UsePools=0. For some reason, Nvidia cards don’t seem to like the BufferPools model.
I see a average frame rate drop of at least 4-6 frames/second each time I try to use the parameter – with or without the RejectThreshold. And before the question comes up as how i measure FPS, I want to clarify that whichever method is used the impact is relatively the same.
On the other hand, I don’t subscribe to the view that we should be increasing the water shader parameter to HIGH merely to force FSX to leverage the BufferPools model.
So if you are using an nvidia card! especially the 500 or 600 series, I would say leave BufferPools at 0.
As always, YMMV.
CPJ
