Microsoft Flight Simulator X: Gold Edition
by Microsoft
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Product Summary
Brand: MicrosoftAudio: English (Original Language)
Format: DVD-ROM
Release Date: 2008-09-23
Platform: Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP
Model: EGC-00001
Publisher: Microsoft
Product features:
- Choose from more than 80 missions that will show you the world with fun assignments from around the globe
- Race alone or against friends online
- Experience the day change from afternoon sun to evening dusk while flying at 32,000 feet
- Keep track of how you?ve done on each mission and improve your skill levels until your ready for the next challenge
- Fly from your local airport during the winter and then experience the change as you fly from the same airport in summer
Video Game Reviews of Microsoft Flight Simulator X: Gold Edition
Customer Review: How much PC Hardware do you need? I finally found out!
Summary: 5 Stars
As a kid, our family owned one of the first IBM PCs, and MS Flight Simulator version 1! Over the years, I've bought each new version of Flight Simulator and usually I bought a new PC to fly it. When FS-X came out, I don't think there was a PC on the planet that could fly FS-X with all the settings on max. (Well, maybe Microsoft had some, and maybe a few people built their own machines that came close, but I'm still not sure that in Oct 2006 when X first came out, that flying the simulator with all settings maxed out was a good experience for anyone). Almost everyone's review says the same thing, basically, "you will need a very powerful PC and a huge/fast graphics card, lots of memory, etc..."
But the question remained, just how much of a PC do you need if you want a good experience with all the settings maxed out? A few weeks ago, I took delivery of a new PC with:
* Intel Quad Core i7-920 2.66GHz
* ATI Radeon HD 5870 graphics card (1GB of memory on the video card)
* 12GB tri-channel 1066 memory on the mother board
* Windows 7 Pro (64bit)
* A 7200rpm 1TB Hard drive
And yes, now I can max out all the settings in Flight Sim X and still get 20-30 frames per second, very smooth! In populated cities (with all the settings on Max, and I do mean all) you will see frame rates at times like 15-20 but the planes are still very flyable, and it's not too jerky).
I am not over clocking my CPUs, and even though I know we can get faster CPUs, I do believe the Intel Core i7 920 2.66GHz processor is fast enough for most of us to get FS-X running well -- but only if you also get a very large and fast video card. In my case, the manufacturer of my PC (the one in Texas) offered a few graphics cards, and I just got the biggest one they had (some of you know you that you can put 2 video cards - connected, in a PC for a lot of money, but I don't think that's needed for this simulator). I'm guessing that anything smaller or slower than my card would have some impact on some of the settings in FS-X (my card supports DirectX 11, though DirectX 10 might have been enough). I do know that 12Gigs of Ram is overkill for FS-X; you don't need that much to max out the settings in FS-X (I'd recommend at least 4Gigs of ram, more if you want to run other larger programs at the same time.
Win 7 Pro (and Ultimate) let you run older programs in compatibility mode, such as Win XP, or Win 95 mode. I'm running FS-X in native Win 7 mode. My Win 7 is 64 bit, which helps the operating system address (support) more than a few Gigs of memory, among other benefits, but it's possible if you had Win7 32bit with 4Gigs of ram and a very fast video card - you would also be pleased with the Flight Sim X performance.
As always, your mileage may differ, but I finally have a PC that can flight Slight Sim X really nicely!
Description of Microsoft Flight Simulator X: Gold Edition
Flight Acceleration X-pack enables gamers to play head to head against their friends or others in exciting racing missions, in addition to 20 new missions and new content.? Looks better than ever with enhanced DX10 graphics!Computer and Video Games
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