I’m having a frustrating issue with MSFS performance. On some days, I’m able to get over 50 FPS (using the Fenix A320 at places like Frankfurt EDDF), but on days like today, I’m struggling to get even 15 FPS. It often takes multiple restarts to make any improvement.
My Hardware:
Mainboard: TUF Gaming B650
CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D
GPU: ZOTAC GF RTX 4070S
RAM: 32GB
My Graphics Settings:
TAA
2K resolution
Mostly “High” settings, with textures on Ultra
TLOD 100 (sometimes 150 on good days)
OLOD 100
No AI traffic or multiplayer
I’ve also ensured no background programs are running, and the Flight Simulator is set to a higher-than-normal priority in Task Manager.
Here’s what I’ve tried (multiple times) so far:
Enabled/disabled G-Sync/Freesync (worked a while?!)
Adjusted Nvidia settings based on tutorials
Cleared all caches and tried both with and without the Rolling Cache
Cleared the Community folder entirely
Switched PBO Enhanced Mode On/Off
DX11 and DX12
Hardware acceleration on/off
Gamemode on/off
Framegeneration on/off
Updated BIOS and tried default settings
Updated Nvidia drivers
Limited FPS to 30/50/60/Unlimited
With and without Vsync
Lowered LOD to minimum (FPS then at 29)
Tested default sceneries with the default A320 (5-7 FPS improvement)
Ran MemTest
Monitored temperatures (all within normal range)
I’m at a loss. On evenings like this, I just want to enjoy our hobby without these constant issues. My hardware is less than four weeks old and runs other games without any problems, so I feel like there’s some bottleneck affecting MSFS specifically. The developer FPS display shows Mainthread most of the time, and jumps to GPU here and there while moving the camera.
Any insights or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Edit: I’ve also read through numerous forum posts and tried many of the suggested solutions (see “tried so far”), but nothing seems to make a lasting difference.
Your 4070 Super has 12Gig of vram like my AMD 7700xt on my second PC. If my vram fills up Windows then uses a disk cache file for the overflow which slows things down and this can cause stutters/lower fps. Having texture settings on ultra tend to fill up vram faster.
Try turning on the fps window in Dev Mode in the sim and at the bottom of the window will tell you how much vram is being used at any point in time. I could literally watch this window and when vram filled up I’d almost immediately get stutters and my fps would be impacted.
Vram filling up typically occurs when using complex airports and scenery. Give it a try and see if this might be your issue.
We have very similar system (7800x3D, asus tuf B650, asus dual 4070, 2x16gb 5600). After latest windows and driver updates, my gpu’s core clock stucks at lower speeds. I need to do couple restarts to fix it. Try to install Msi Afterburner and enable all necessary OSD options to see ingame to see what is happening, like this one Imgur: The magic of the Internet . Windows 11 updated my gpu driver without asking me also, i found out about it after a pc restart… 560.94. I will be on a surgery on 19th and i am not touching my pc for now. You can get DDU and NVcleaninstall if you are experiencing the same issue like me, but dont forget to check your system stats while ingame with Msi Afterburner.
edit: and it is always great to check system. Create a .bat file and run as administrator.
This should be Stamped hard into anyone having issues that have the mentioned above. I’m amazed how many problems I’ve created by pushing things hard to the right and up, being uneducated thoroughly in hardware, and then looking for remedies everywhere to correct my lack of knowledge I have on some things. I’m a learning PC dummy and understand somewhat more of the working things now, moreso than ever in the last 4 yrs. I read tons. What I do know is,If your PC or console is not capable, there are no Magic pills you’ll find to make it more than it’s capable of from my 6000+ hrs flying. Playable? yes, but never without cost somewhere else. Horsepower is horsepower and getting above the max of that comes with cost and precisision. I’m finding it plays true with my PC components as well. Many frustrations later, I started new with defaults and a more capable new PC, MSFS minimums, til 100% satisfied, and only then would I move forward, upping the ant’e for visuals and performance. It has made my sim experience/performance more than expected stock, and my new capable PC/ hardware loves me for that. Peeps alway’s want the cheapest battery and complain when it doesn’t start in cold weather ay? I took Nvidias recommended settings after achieving stable barebone minimums with nothing added, and worked from there. Not perfect they were, the Nvidia settings, but it gave some reference for starters and a way to isolate numerous cranky issues I had before purchasing my new PC. It also lets you know what stock out the box will do, and the rest, well I guess it’s how hard I can push it to perform with my learning’s here in the forums beyond stock. THAT, I take blame for when it under performs and goes to ■■■■. 2020 is the best it’s been for me, problem anything wise, adhering to what my hardware is capable of with stock settings. And after making the above adjustment with VRam management, I can say it made for a better overall, stutter free experience, by moving 1 slider 1 notch. Thanks WingWarper1 I’ll be surprised if mine gets any better than current for my likings, but I’ll keep reading here everyday, even if satisfied like I was. You never know what you can find here. Hope you find your issues Trbsn, someone here will get you going, I’m sure of that. Happy flying all
Very well said, thank you for your words TogetherSpark69. I would say I have a basic technical understanding – which I definitely didn’t apply correctly here. I worked from the top down rather than, as you rightly described, from the bottom up. I’ll start with the Nvidia settings as a minimum and then gradually work my way through the possibilities of my hardware.
absolutely the same for ne- exactly as you described. Tried everything. Some days 50fps and sinetimes barely 30 with ssme settings and flight. very unacceptable.
So, the initial tests are complete, and I’ve made a few tweaks.
GPU Clock: Running at 2895 MHz
MSI Afterburner: Installed, and I ran the Overclock Scanner.
Batch File: Created and executed, as suggested.
I turned all settings to “low-end,” with no multiplayer, no AI, and no background programs except for Afterburner. The results are just over 35 to 40 FPS at EDDF (to be fair, it’s a demanding scenery, but the system should handle it in my opinion). With medium settings, I barely reach 35 FPS, and I encounter significant stuttering, especially with camera movement.
GPU Utilization: 60-70% (previously 95% with higher settings)
CPU Utilization: Most cores are running low, with one core handling most of the load, peaking at around 70% (typical for MSFS).
The MSFS Developer Tool shows the MainThread bottleneck as usual, but during the major stutters, there are spikes on both the GPU and CPU (visible as purple peaks in the performance graph).
The next step will be to completely uninstall and reinstall the GPU drivers.
Edit:
GPU Temperature: Holding steady at 68 to 70 degrees Celsius (around 158°F).
GPU Memory Usage: Approximately 8.5 GB out of the available 12 GB.
Also pick a simple MSFS plane to your liking’s(Cessna 172 was mine) and nothing but MSFS stock( Dillingham in Hawaii for me) airport.I add nothing,and I mean 0 nothing. You’ll see your performance and settings this way, without even flying. If it’s bad before takeoff, it’ll not improve with flying. It’s a hard procedure for some, like myself, taking lots of patience for sure, to look in every corner BEFORE turning the page, but because of so many things to address with MSFS, I’ve found satisfaction I thought not possible with MSFS on a stock out the box PC, plug and play. What it came with has had nothing changed, notta, except for the mandatory download things and deletion of somethings I’ll never use. I start my day by updating the MS store and ck for driver/OS updates. I always shut down PC and restart after checking the above before launching for the day, and after changing ANY setting ANYWHERE. It’s provided me with the most accurate testing results after doing so. It’s timely kinda, but my test results are always better if I do so. Not just restart the flight, restart the sim and PC, every time, every change. I also believe that if it was fine when I last used it and shut down, and I changed nothing since? It corrects itself somehow, with a later start-up, and it makes for utter confusion then for me. I feel Servers play into more problems than we know kinda. It’s then some simple PC browsing to see who did change what. I sure didn’t lol. A wise old pilot irl once told me that “no one” holds the “patience” of a good old pilot, and to never “complicate” your flight, or in this case sim.You’ll find your settings I’m sure. And the goody , the PC gurus here like the challenges we face, some should have billed me for their expertise. Some bright minds for sure round here! I can’t wait for your post on the fix, and that it’s everything you expected. I’m using the 58003d and 4070 super and it runs 2020 at 4k 2d on a 100in screen with BenQ projector very well on high settings almost everywhere I fly, except when I add some demanding planes and scenery’s from 3rd party’s, some more so than others, but some have 0 effect on performance I find. My numbers are close to yours posted on the GPU/CPU Vram and temp. I maintain 60fps avg, with no frame gen, all settings on high, unless I go to Honolulu,or LA or NY where I’ve bought everything you can get, drops 45 to 50 but flight is still good. Check your monitor settings as well, I had a problem with tearing that was in HDMI settings with my Sony 7.1 receiver. I’d decided to live with. 2 yrs later it’s fixed by browsing the manual for something else, and it fixed a MSFS tearing issue I’d given up on. Go figure lol. I still don’t know how exactly, but I’ll take it. MsRon led me there with a post on HDR something, can’t remember. I can already see your skills are way above my rookie knowledge. lol Hang in there like a Bulldog! No question you’ll find it. I’ll be looking here for the fix and taking notes helping with my PC training classes Happy flying
For everyone who looks in here searching for a solution, read this and follow the steps above. I will keep this thread updated with my try-and-errors and maybe with a fix.
That’s a gross generalisation spoken from a pulpit of misknowledge (Dep. Frank Sloup) .
Performance problems can have multiple causes including wrong GPU settings as well as RAM or CPU bottlenecks. And yes the problem can also be server-side or with your ISP. Just because your router shows you a high internet bitrate connection, doesn’t mean it is a stable one, etc.
Indeed. HOWEVER, if everything was fine tuned to a nicety and absolutely nothing was changed in the game or PC settings then one can infer that the problem must be on the other side.
If I wait a while, I get my performance back…later I’ll lose it again…
Been through this for a few years so I think I know the culprit by now.
Ok that’s quite a likely scenario.
Provided that you are using the same aircraft and didn’t change any other mods in the Community folder. There are some that can really kill performance and cause hiccups
I can share what I have seen during the past years, in case it helps. The behaviour you describe looks like the ancient memory release issue that has been partially fixed after multiple patches but is not yet fully resolved. The indicators to me, based on your first post, are two: fps dropping to 20fps (or below) and the purple spikes in main thread that mean virtual freezing of the thread.
I have 64GB RAM and 24 GB on GPU, so under normal conditions my memory is never going above 50% usage, with maybe 65% usage on dense areas. However I also see freezes or fps drops as you, where they shouldn´t happen, even at regular areas with not very dense scenery and far away from dense areas. I also see that behaviour while still having quite high fps on dense areas. In all cases this is followed by a RAM release of about 2-3 GB. This is what appears to block main thread as latency goes crazy until the release is finished.
Game normally releases memory in the following situations, as far as I have seen:
Periodically, as new scenery is loaded and old one is not needed anymore
After returning to main menu (but not instantly, it takes some time to do it)
When a memory usage threshold is overpassed (this is what appears to change from patch to patch)
The first two triggers above work quite well, they release smaller amounts of memory without big impact on main thread. However the third is the one that kills performance and results in that virtual freezing.
My understanding of those results is that Asobo implemented a threshold (in the range of 10-12 GB), most likely to ensure less powerfull systems never run out of RAM. This forces a release even if it´s not really needed in your system. GPU memory does not appear to be the issue here, but standard RAM. As soon as your system sits several GB above that threshold you can easily face that 2-3 GB cleaning I explained.
In fact reducing the quality is not helping to prevent that, only delays the moment where your system will overpass the threshold. On the other hand restarting the flight triggers the release which is performed at main menu (the second on the previous list). This also matches with the behaviour you explained (several restarts are needed, most likely because you didn´t wait enough for the clearing to happen).
One thing that might help is the new NVIDIA app. It has three performance related menus. One part runs tests on your system and creates a performance profile containing overclock, voltages, and other information. The second section is the replacement for the Windows NVIDIA Control Panel. The third part optimizes settings for each installed supported app/game. The settings can be tuned for better performance or better graphics quality. It also keeps a backup of settings for easy revision back to the previous settings. I use this because I have four other graphics games and apps that have settings that need optimization. There are a number of other things to explore within the app.
I haven’t checked the MS2024 settings yet. I expect the NVIDIA app to optimize the settings.
, the PC gurus here like the challenges we face, some should have billed me for their expertise. Some bright minds for sure round here! I can’t wait for your post on the fix, and that it’s everything you expected. I’m using the 58003d and 4070 super and it runs 2020 at 4k 2d on a 100in screen with BenQ projector very well on high settings almost everywhere I fly, except when I add some demanding planes and scenery’s from 3rd party’s, some more so than others, but some have 0 effect on performance I find. My numbers are close to yours posted on the GPU/CPU Vram and temp. I maintain 60fps avg, with no frame gen, all settings on high, unless I go to Honolulu,or LA or NY 
where I’ve bought everything you can get, drops 45 to 50 but flight is still good. Check your monitor settings as well, I had a problem with tearing that was in HDMI settings with my Sony 7.1 receiver. I’d decided to live with. 2 yrs later it’s fixed by browsing the manual for something else, and it fixed a MSFS tearing issue I’d given up on. Go figure lol. I still don’t know how exactly, but I’ll take it. MsRon led me there with a post on HDR something, can’t remember. I can already see your skills are way above my rookie knowledge. lol Hang in there like a Bulldog! No question you’ll find it. I’ll be looking here for the fix and taking notes helping with my PC training classes Happy flying