Probably more than any other setting, including TLOD, OLOD, Live Weather, clouds, or any other graphics setting.
I turned all my traffic settings down to zero, and loaded a flight. I went from 45 FPS to 80 FPS and very good latency. No other changes (same airport, same plane, all other graphics options the same.)
I’m slowly increasing the various traffic options one at a time to find the best balance.
Do any of the freeware/payware traffic injectors like FSLTL or FS Traffic work better as far as not hammering my performance? I’ve never tried any of them, but have read mixed reviews, with some people saying they’re better, and some saying they’re worse.
I’ve been an FSLTL user since release. Is it any better or worse than the sim is really hard to say. I’m not sure how you would be able to compare apples to apples.
The one thing FSLTL does provide you is greater control over how much traffic you get, down to the number of planes it injects in the air, on the ground, IFR, and VFR. It also allows you to change your traffic “bubble” so you can have the sim remove traffic at a distance you set.
You can probably make FSLTL as good or bad as you want.
The other variable FSLTL inserts into the equation is model fidelity. If you are worried about VRAM, there are third party tools that let you down-sample textures to 2K or 1K to reduce the GPU load, if that’s important. This, however, is separate from what you are discussing which appears to be more of a CPU bottleneck, not a VRAM bottleneck. Just something to keep in mind.
I use a PSXT and AIG combo and see no noteworthy performance hit on a pretty decent, but by no means top end system, (i7-13700k, RTX 3060 and admittedly a ridiculous 128 gb of RAM, hey it was on a really good sale!)
I am in the mid-60s FPS 90% of the time. Traffic will always have an impact but I do know that there are people with very middling systems running PSXT with consistent performance in the mid-40s
Real answer to your question though is that performance results for traffic are as individual as the users systems themselves, so there really is no direct answer. Trial and error to see what works best for you and provides you with acceptable results is really the way to go.
Turning traffic off is one of the first things I do. It has been a performance hog even in the FSX and earlier days.
Personally, I don’t care about it anyway. If there is no proper ATC and communication between airplanes, then traffic makes no sense to me. Unless I’m flying on VATSIM. Then it’s obviously on (but it’s the VATSIM traffic).
I turned off In Game traffic about a year ago (I have never used any outside traffic injectors) and found I dont really miss it. As said without proper ATC integration it doesnt work very well - and I do get better performance without it which is more important to me. I miss seeing some traffic at altitude - but its not work the performance cost for me.
I’m tempted, but $107 annually is a pretty big chunk of change. Not saying it’s not worth it. I think I’ll do a trial run of RT. I would really like to see a lot more traffic in the sim, and the idea of being able to park a drone at the end of a runway and watch planes taking off and landing in ‘real time’ really appeals to me.
I think my system should be able to perform OK, but that’s what the trial is for.
I spend so much money on planes. Why not planes around me?
Definitely do the trial.
Like all AI traffic solutions, PSXT isn’t perfect. You might find some foibles that annoy you more than other options.
Whereas for me, I’m a huge fan of PSXT.
No other traffic option shows aircraft in the hold, landing traffic following the Canarsie approach at KJFK, proper traffic spacing, genuinely live (and historical) traffic and the daily 3pm runway alternation at EGLL.
I take my flying ‘seriously’ by having a full Navigraph sub, fly the Fenix A320 with failures enabled and topped off by having traffic as ‘real as it gets’.
I read some earlier discussions about those tools and they seem rather complicated to set up and fine tune. I suppose all of these 3rd party traffic simulator tools are.
I have a Navigraph sub as well, although at this point I use LNM for VFR GA flying. As I start to graduate more towards being able to do IFR bizjet, I’ll take advantage of Navigraph. I’ve still got a LOT to learn.
Only if you choose to go into the config files and tweak settings, runways, spacing, etc, etc… I’ve never done that. You click on the .EXE and it minimizes into the system tray and you never look at it again.
I suppose it’s too much to ask that in FS2024 the sim itself monitors performance and automatically adjusts certain parameters like traffic, LOD, and graphic element quality, scaling them based on user-defined priorities and performance targets.
Things like that have been in several Wishlist posts, and I’ve voted for every one.
As it stands, I sometimes end up adjusting those parameters during a flight (ESC > General Options > Adjust > Apply > Resume.) How much I have to do that depends on which plane I’m in, and where I’m flying. I have a fairly high target FPS, a very high fidelity desire, and very low ‘stutter tolerance.’ It’s always a “Rob Peter to pay Paul” kind of thing.
The only other option is to spend gobs of money on the best computer components, and even that’s not guaranteed to eliminate that sort of manual in-flight tweaking.
I’m not averse to tweaking config files, and there seems to be a fair amount of good info out there. I had to laugh when I read that the default settings can result in a plane sitting at the takeoff threshold for 40 seconds, than shooting into the air like a rocket. Actually, that might be kind of fun to watch.
