- Oct 2, 2009
- 137
- 0
- 18,680
"Besides being the Intel Thermal Specialist here at Tom's, I'm also the FSX Xpert. 
"
So I read in a recent post of yours! Being an FS nut myself for over 12 years, I hope you can advise.
I am getting a new mini-PC to run FS9 & FSX. Mini, because I work abroad a lot of the year and want to be able to take it as hand-luggage. The specs are pretty good, but could I ask you (or of course anyone else who can help!) about the CPU and GPU?
I decided on an i7-4790K @ 4GHz, but have been persuaded that a cheaper i5-4690K would run FS as well. But then I saw your reply here and now I am not so sure:
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2459111/4690k-4790k-run-flight-simulator-games.html
Is the i7 worth the extra outlay in performance? I fly FS9 mostly, but want the PC to be able to handel FSX with ease too. You say "FSX is also one of the very few titles that takes full advantage of the i7's Hyperthreading feature": but I have always read that FSX can't use hyperthreading??
I want to keep to out-of-the-box clock speeds I think, as the PC will be used in Sri Lanka, where, in the tropical heat maybe overclocking is not such a good idea? Or would the CPU/GPU/RAM o/c with no issues? I am always nervous of overclocking, to be frank...
As for the GPU, I was going with a 4GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 970, but I know, as you say, FS is not so GPU dependent. Would a far cheaper 2GB GTX 960 do almost as well? Can't see much advantage to paying for 4GBs of GPU memory (or is there?).
I'll get 8 or 16GBs of 1600MHz Kingston RAM (16 is overkill I think?). But the supplier only does single sticks of RAM: I either get 1x8GB, or 2x8GB; there's no 2x4GB option.
Two 480GB SSDs & win7 x64...
OK, many thanks for comments.
Martin
"So I read in a recent post of yours! Being an FS nut myself for over 12 years, I hope you can advise.
I am getting a new mini-PC to run FS9 & FSX. Mini, because I work abroad a lot of the year and want to be able to take it as hand-luggage. The specs are pretty good, but could I ask you (or of course anyone else who can help!) about the CPU and GPU?
I decided on an i7-4790K @ 4GHz, but have been persuaded that a cheaper i5-4690K would run FS as well. But then I saw your reply here and now I am not so sure:
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2459111/4690k-4790k-run-flight-simulator-games.html
Is the i7 worth the extra outlay in performance? I fly FS9 mostly, but want the PC to be able to handel FSX with ease too. You say "FSX is also one of the very few titles that takes full advantage of the i7's Hyperthreading feature": but I have always read that FSX can't use hyperthreading??
I want to keep to out-of-the-box clock speeds I think, as the PC will be used in Sri Lanka, where, in the tropical heat maybe overclocking is not such a good idea? Or would the CPU/GPU/RAM o/c with no issues? I am always nervous of overclocking, to be frank...
As for the GPU, I was going with a 4GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 970, but I know, as you say, FS is not so GPU dependent. Would a far cheaper 2GB GTX 960 do almost as well? Can't see much advantage to paying for 4GBs of GPU memory (or is there?).
I'll get 8 or 16GBs of 1600MHz Kingston RAM (16 is overkill I think?). But the supplier only does single sticks of RAM: I either get 1x8GB, or 2x8GB; there's no 2x4GB option.
Two 480GB SSDs & win7 x64...
OK, many thanks for comments.
Martin
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram