SurClaro Flight Simulator Resources

Hello folks,

I have had this problem a long time ago, and I am experiencing it yet again. Can anyone tell me just WHAT am I running short of? RAM? Pager space? *beep* space? Processor speed? Power shortage??? Shocked

I do not know what caused this error after a long flight to Heathrow.. because I have checked programs like SpeedUpMyPC and Task Manager.. but the PF did not reach maximum levels and the RAM was still 50mb left (out of 1gb). Is it the RAM I am short of?

I want to know because I seriously am considering priority upgrade for this component as it is seriously disturbing my long flights. Surprised

It always happens when I fly into Europe (not in the US.. where I have all sorts of MegaScenery installed).

Please help!

Captain El Shocked

P.S. Current Specs:

Intel Pentium 4 3.2GHz
1GB PC3200 RAM
nVIDIA FX5500
Seagate 500GB drive (where FS is installed on)
17.5GB partition FAT32 where the OS XP is installed
FP 4GB usage utilized in 500GB Seagate

Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 9:27 pm Post subject:

Try downloading and installing Memstatus software to monitor your memory usage:

http://forums.surclaro.com/sutra53505.html&highlight=memstatus#53505

I had the exact same problem years ago at the start of my use of XP in 2/2003. It is all the stuff you have loaded for "pretty, pretty" and the fact that a long flight to JFK from Heathrow can take a minimum (on mine ) of 150-200 MB orf ram for the FLIGHT ALONE, one way!

Now consider the settings. Add mesh, high fx, REAL WEATHER! BANG, YOUR DEAD! On the return trip, the pagefile.sys works very hard on that huge DISK you have. Plus you state it is OS XP on FAT32, 32 bit. That is not good, a compressed disk is slower to access and r/w due to the extra time it takes to uncompress the data and read it, then recompress to the hdd. It is too late to fix that. Once you make it FAT32, it stays there. If it was fat32 to start with you could uncompress, not now, it is stuck in that format, only way is a total reformat & repartition the drive. Some engineers might say move to other partition. DON'T! It is time consuming, CAUSES too many FRAGMENTED FILEs during conversion and often just slings file and folders all over the HDD.

One other thing, RESET the PF to 4095 MB, SET, REBOOT, do for max cache and min cache. Too long to tell you why. XP takes a min. of 185 MB of DDR RAM. You state it is at 50 Mb. It means the whole PC is running VERY SLOW! IT could crash to desktop (CTD) due to low memory. So plese buy the ram, it is about $85-$115 USD per 1 Gb stick of of SDRAM for PC 2500 DDR, CL 2.5, 4 bank. Timing set at at 7-3-3. THIS IS MY RAM NUMBERS.

YOURS IS DIFFERENT. HAVE THEM GET IT AND CHECK IT RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU! The PAGE FILE: UP the min/max to 4095 MB, RAM: Get another 2 Gb per strip x 2 strips= 3 GB strips @ 1 Gb per stick. Timings must match exactly! ASK: IS THIS HIGH DENSITY or LOW DENSITY ram?

REFORMAT HDD TO NTFS FILE FORMAT or just live with it.
Best solution: DO GET MEMSTAT, I use it to test my RAM, it is freeware. Go to:

http://www.download.com Crucial.com will have it.

GET the ram sticks matching the timing exactly, along with the density and width of ram chips in bits. ASK the SALES TECH to read the P/N, research for exact match, correct p/n you need.

OR, go to www.crucial.com. They sell the best (as do a few others) ram in the world. Great low $ cost. Lifetime warranty.

So much stuff to do, oh well, you will learn a great deal. I am beat, so I do not think I missed anything major, someone else will drop bye to
see the post and might add a line to mine, ok by me, long day.
Restart, a bullet again!

Goodluck ! Ty for allwing me to help.
Steven D. Hinson
TomcatDriver

Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 11:38 am Post subject:

I find the things you said very interesting. (I forgot to mention that I have 2 drives.. one Maxtor 120GB, and the new on is 500GB Seagate. The OS XP is installed on a FAT32 partition of containing 17.5GB, and the rest is NTFS (I have NO idea why the OS XP was installed on the smallest partition and different format.)) The RAM thing, I agree, I plan on getting at least 4GB, since FSX is going eat up a whole lot of my system resources. As for the OS XP thing.. I will get Vista (later on) and install it on the big NTFS 250GB partition on the 500GB Seagate drive. Hopefully that would make the OS go faster (my OS currently is quite slow).

Captain El

Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 1:00 pm Post subject: aa