So far I’ve found no useful data on electricity consumption for MSFS on either platform. Given the way power prices have shot up in much of the world, this is something to consider. Where I live prices are very near A$0.50 per kWh so if a PC was burning 1000W then that’s 50c per hour and could add up fast.
Trying to guess actual power usage from component ratings is a waste of time because it really depends on what is running.
Having access to both PC and Xbox I decided to make some measurements to get some useful data. Therefore these numbers are actual power drawn from the wall socket on a 240V mains supply.
The systems tested are:
Xbox series X
PC: 7800X3D with X670E, 64GB RAM, NVIDIA 3060 12GB VRAM, Samsung 2TB NVME, 2 fan AIO cooler, 80plus gold PSU, 3 fan case. This is all running at stock voltages and clocks, no automatic or manual overclocking applied.
Both were tested with a 1080p 60Hz TV (which is not counted in the measurements) but note that frame rate will have a significant difference on power consumption.
MSFS configuration was everything standard ultra configuration on PC with TAA and frame rate locked to 30fps except where noted.
Test results
Shutdown (power off from menu)
PC 0W
XB 20-45W for a few minutes then 0W
Sleep from menu
PC 4W
Idle at desktop, no apps running
PC 75-83W
XB 75W drops to 50W after 10s of inactivity
MSFS main menu
PC 255W by default with no frame limit. With low power selected in MSFS settings mode and no frame limit (220fps) 135W. With low power mode and 30fps locked 90W.
XB 140W
World map
PC 150-200W
XB 125-145W
Vision jet, cruise
PC 210W. (250W with unlocked frame rate at 55fps)
XB 175W
A310, cruise
PC 195W. (215W unlocked 35-40 fps)
XB 155W
PC only measurements
NXCub 195W in low VFR cruise
C152 195W in low VFR cruise
Fenix v1 200W
Drone cam watching over WSSS with FSLTL traffic 215W. (255W unlocked at 40 fps)
It’s definitely worth enabling low power mode for the menus. If anyone else can get accurate power measurements please post.
I’m going to grab my clamp-on ammeter next time I’m in the office and test the power draw on my UPS. Everything is attached to it. The UPS has a current meter in it, and I see 650W when running a GPU stress test. I’ll check it in flight later today.
90 fps limit in RSS. Frame sync on @ 50% of 165Hz monitor refresh. Normal flight in my Bonanza I see a steady 82.5 fps in low stress areas (down to 40 fps landing at KLAX.)
A lot has been written about what size power supply one needs for a specific PC build. I personally have also used online power supply calculators. But interestingly enough, and in spite of owning a Kill A Watt device, I have never gotten around to measuring my PC’s power draw. Until today. And for perspective: this is my PC configuration:
Asus Prime X570-P AM4 Mobo
Ryzen 7 3700X CPU
RTX 3080 GPU
32GB G.SKILL DDR4 3200 memory
1 x 500GB NVMe
1 x 2TB NVMe
2 x SSD’s
Corsair RM850 PSU
I run at 4K mostly Ultra settings, 200 OLOD, 300 TLOD and typically get 30 - 60fps depending on scene, obviously highly detailed airports bog down my CPU while flying GA aircraft @ 5,000ft over relatively benign scenery gets me up towards 60fps.
So today I plugged in the Kill A Watt and tried a few scenarios. Short summary while flying from Heathrow over London to be sure I was adequately taxing the system. And recognise the numbers are always fluctuating so the numbers below are sorta kinda representative over a bit of time
Idle power: around 80W
Loading MSFS: 120W
Menu: power drawn rockets up to 500W and stays there! Clearly there are great optimisation opportunities here. This is almost as much as the worst case while flying, so the GPU is obviously being heavily (and unnecessarily?) taxed.
Once flying: In cockpit, looking at instruments: 425W. This is due to a quite big GPU load
Landing view in cockpit: 475W.
External view: 540W. Clearly this is a worst case for the power-hungry GPU due to the PG detail etc.
Note that the high power draws are all pretty much due to my GPU being maxed out at its 350W limit.
As a “CPU worst case”, I decided to load FSLTL and FSimstudios CYVR. These two together pretty much swamp my CPU. Hanging out above the airport with the drone cam once FSLTL traffic had built up delivered 375 - 450W. This lower load compared to flying over London is an obvious result of the lower power draw CPU (65W) being maxed out (as far as MSFS maxes out CPUs) with (350W) GPU use only around 60-80%. So completely as I would have expected.
Nothing new or startling but I thought it was good to quantify things for myself. It confirmed to me that my 850W PSU is well suited to my system. I am planning on going to a 7800X3D and RTX 4080 Super by year end and, in looking at the power requirements of these components, I am still comfortable with keeping the 850W PSU
Hopefully this is of some value to some builders out there.
Are you capping your FPS to your monitors refresh rate? Sounds like your FPS is running away on the main menu due to the low scene complexity compared to flying. Mine doesn’t come anywhere near peak power on the main menu with it locked to 75 FPS (my refresh rate)
There is an experimental option in the PC version where you can choose to not render the hangar in main menu. Instead it places a Gaussian blurred image as the menu background. This significantly reduces GPU usage.