I have DDR400 ram.....and I see it's now SLOW compared to new stuff!

[ace6879]

Hey all,

For just a budget "upgrade" should I replace the DDR400 speed RAM this machine came with the the newer DDR 800 or faster?

I am running XP SP3, so I think there is no limit right>??

THanks again!!

Kelley D. Ellison

[Old_Codger]

That's dependent on your Mother Board and whether it can handle it or not.

[rdamurphy]

True. Actually, it's your chipset, if it can't use RAM over DDR400, you can put DDR1200 in there, it will still run at 400.

Robert

[plainsman]

Hi Kelley,
Happy Holidays!!
I don't think you would notice a lot of difference for the money even if your MB will accept the faster memory. The things that will improve MSTS are:
1} A faster processor, not more cores, just processor speed. More cores may free up a little speed from running background tasks, but it helps little with the sim itself.
2} A better video card if you have something less than a Nvidia 8600GT. With enough processor power, even the old Ti-4400 will run the sim nicely. But if you have a GF 6200 or GF 7300, you will probably notice significant improvement with a GF 9600 GT. One reason these help, is that the late model Nvidia cards run a special PhysX software that really boosts frame rates markedly. I noticed at least 15-20 FPS improvement with my GF 8600GTS (you have to use the latest drivers to get the software). I can't say much about ATI other than I know if you have anything less than a 9700, you need a better card.
3) A high speed hard drive. A 10,000 RPM drive will really reduce the disk read time, which shows in MSTS as periodic stutters. What I want to try is one of the solid state HDs. They should really work well in MSTS. At the momment they are still pretty pricey.
4} Indirectly, a better power supply may keep everything working at full speed if it keeps things cooler and better supplied with adequate power. If you are running onboard 375 watt PS that came with a bargain computer, you are probably not running enough power for all of the modern components. This will shorten life on system and reduce performance on the system. Once you have enough, more won't help. If you have a good 500 watt PS with a good fan, adding a 1200 watt won't help. Now if you run 3 HDs and two 9800GTX video cards, you may need that 1200 watts?
Hope this helps

[ace6879]

Hi Kelley,
Happy Holidays!!
I don't think you would notice a lot of difference for the money even if your MB will accept the faster memory. The things that will improve MSTS are:
1} A faster processor, not more cores, just processor speed. More cores may free up a little speed from running background tasks, but it helps little with the sim itself.
2} A better video card if you have something less than a Nvidia 8600GT. With enough processor power, even the old Ti-4400 will run the sim nicely. But if you have a GF 6200 or GF 7300, you will probably notice significant improvement with a GF 9600 GT. One reason these help, is that the late model Intel cards run a special PhysX software that really boosts frame rates markedly. I noticed at least 15-20 FPS improvement with my GF 8600GTS (you have to use the latest drivers to get the software). I can't say much about ATI other than I know if you have anything less than a 9700, you need a better card.
3) A high speed hard drive. A 10,000 RPM drive will really reduce the disk read time, which shows in MSTS as periodic stutters. What I want to try is one of the solid state HDs. They should really work well in MSTS. At the momment they are still pretty pricey.
4} Indirectly, a better power supply may keep everything working at full speed if it keeps things cooler and better supplied with adequate power. If you are running onboard 375 watt PS that came with a bargain computer, you are probably not running enough power for all of the modern components. This will shorten life on system and reduce performance on the system. Once you have enough, more won't help. If you have a good 500 watt PS with a good fan, adding a 1200 watt won't help. Now if you run 3 HDs and two 9800GTX video cards, you may need that 1200 watts?
Hope this helps

Hi Bob!!! Back at ya on the holidays!!

One of the things I did when I got this 'puter was set it up specifically FOR MSTS. I have two 10000 RPM HD's....Admitedly, they aren't the highest capacity. but they work. I'll have to check into the "Solid State" HD"S.

All in all, my machine is now four years old. While top-end then....I need new a new vid card set up, probably a dual-card setup. (MSTS is NOT the only game I play.....COD5 goes SLOW on this machine.

THanks for the hints though Bob and all of you guys!!

Kelley D. Ellison

[djt1]

One reason these help, is that the late model Intel cards run a special PhysX software that really boosts frame rates markedly.

PhysX is actually Nvidia’s technology not Intel’s. PhysX does absolutely nothing to help the performance of MSTS.

[plainsman]

Hi Daniel,
I did mess up and type Intel when I meant Nvidia.
As to PhysX and MSTS, it does have a big effect. When I installed the driver with PhysX (178.13), I went from some high demand areas that were before at 15 FPS to 35 FPS after the install (I think 178.24 is the same as to MSTS performance). I frequently now get 59 FPS where before I was getting about 44 FPS max. A lot of others with 8600GT or better cards noticed the same dramatic increase in performance. It may not be supposed to work, but it does!!

[djt1]

Hi Daniel,
I did mess up and type Intel when I meant Nvidia.
As to PhysX and MSTS, it does have a big effect. When I installed the driver with PhysX (178.13), I went from some high demand areas that were before at 15 FPS to 35 FPS after the install (I think 178.24 is the same as to MSTS performance). I frequently now get 59 FPS where before I was getting about 44 FPS max. A lot of others with 8600GT or better cards noticed the same dramatic increase in performance. It may not be supposed to work, but it does!!

Bob,

The video card driver itself not the PhysX software is most likely the reason for the change in performance. In addition, seeing a frame rate increase of 20 from just a video card driver in a game that is CPU bound would lead me to believe you had some other issues going on before you installed the new driver.

MSTS is using very little of the GPU’s resources to begin with let alone sending particle effect calculations work load to the video card via the PhysX driver/software.

Installing the PhysX driver/software and expecting it to benefit an eight year game is highly unlikely.

[djt1]

Here is information on the game titles that actually use PhysX -

http://developer.nvidia.com/object/p...d_company.html

http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_physxgames_home.html


Here some info on how the PhysX software can benefit games that are actually written to take advantage of PhysX -

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3462&p=3

[plainsman]

Hi Daniel,
I can't explain it, but about 8 different people saw the same result with nothing more than going from previous version to 178.13 or 178.24 drivers. There was a previous release I didn't try, that gave some improvement, but going from 2 iterations back to 178.13 caused the jump I described. Folks with Nvidia 7 series (7800 for example) did not see any improvement at all. Most saw similiar improvement to what I described if they had an 8 series card at or better than 8600GT. I carefully clean my old drivers when I install, and the previous set performed just like the system when it was new. The only time I saw any difference was with post 178.13 driver install, and it was dramatic. I already had a pretty good CPU (E6750) and fast memory (1066) and 10,000 rpm HD. There were no changes made other than Nvidia driver. Like I said, about 7 other folks saw something very similair with no other changes to their system??