I’ve been working on this tonight. I am surprised by how much I could get working fairly quickly.
I use Simionic G1000 units and I usually fly GA aircraft with the G1000 in, but I wanted to have a go at the WT CJ4 as an aircraft with a better-than-average systems simulation. I didn’t want to swap out my G1000 units for normal screens (I have the screens for it, but that would mean 5 screens on the 1 PC which would mean I’d need an extra GPU and that’s too much pain for right now), so I installed SpaceDesk to be able to extend my Windows desktop onto the iPads in the Simionic units.
Then I downloaded the fantastic Simstrumentation CJ4 instruments for Air Manager, and spread them out across my monitors.
Finally, I download the MSFS Pop-Out Panel Manager. This was new to me and it took a bit of getting used to. It crashed a bit until I finally got it to recognise the PFD, MFD and FMS and then finally I positioned them where I wanted them and removed the title bars.
I’ve also been able to set up my OpenCockpits MCP to control the autopilot via Spad.neXt (though I think that needs some fixing).
I had to tweak my settings a little to get acceptable FPS at London City (my usual FPS-killer airport for testing) and I can get a nearly stable 30FPS there, so I’m happy.
It all just about works. Given how much I’ve moaned about the sim not being ready for home cockpit use, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I could do in a short time, and I’m looking forward to flying the CJ4 once I learn the systems. I still need to do some more tweaks, and I’m thinking about swapping out my iPads for monitors and using an Intel NUC I have lying around to connect them using SpaceDesk to get around the 2-GPU issue. But that’s an experiment for another day.
Now just give me multi-view support so I can go back to projectors and a wrapround screen, and I might finally be a happy man…
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An update… I decided to take the plunge and build a new sim rig based around an i9 12900K. Sadly,
since the launch of the i9 12900KS it’s no longer the fastest single-threaded CPU in the world… but it’s only a hair’s breadth behind it, and it’s £200 cheaper. With the savings I added 32GB of DDR5-6200 (!) RAM to remove any bottlenecks from my old DDR4. I moved my existing RTX 3080 Ti and 2TB NVMe drive into the new machine.
I wasn’t expecting that much of a performance uplift, but I’ve been impressed. I’ve got stable 30FPS vsync in and around London on mostly Ultra settings at 4K with multiple panels popped out in DX11. With vsync off and panels not popped out I can get 50 FPS on the ground at Orbx EGLC and 45+ FPS in the air over London. My previous 9th-gen i9 rig could only manage high-20s in the same situation.
Of course, I know there are people who say ‘60 FPS or die’ but 30 is fine for me on a 60hz monitor. Having some headroom with vsync on is a good thing. I defy anyone to get stable 60 FPS over central London on Ultra presets in 4K no matter how good their hardware is.
I figure, if it’s this good in London, one of the most notorious FPS killers in the game, then it should be pretty good everywhere, even with multiple panels popped out. So I’m happy with the investment, although it definitely hurt to click ‘buy’ at the time.
Now I’m just waiting for multi-monitor to finally arrive and slash the FPS in half like it used to in FSX back in the day… maybe the final DX12 build will surprise us, though.
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I’m always impressed to see how people use these instruments in their setups, even ones that aren’t quite as intuitive (like a G1000 based cockpit). Good job! Glad you’re enjoying these instruments. I’m sure you’ll enjoy the plane as well. It’s one of my favourites.
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Yes, I’m enjoying it, although I won’t say I have mastered it yet! Thanks to you and all your collaborators who work on these instruments, they are amazing. I’d love to see a set for the Latitude, but the G3000 touch screens would be a problem. I have yet to explore any of the big iron like the Fenix or PMDG.
I’m considering swapping out the Simionic units for my touchscreens that go in the same space. This will give me more physical screen room for the instruments. I used to swap back-and-forth in my old sim depending on what I was flying. It will be a bit of a hassle though, so I have to be committed to staying in the CJ4 for a while, because it will be a pain swapping back.
That’s a very nice setup; very cool!
The CJ4 with the Working Title mods is one of my favorite planes. Until recently, I spent most of my time flying it.
I just recently upgraded to an i7 12700k, 32GB, but stayed with DDR4. The performance increase was awesome and I’m totally fine with being locked in at 30 fps since it is very smooth with only a rare stutter.
I’m using an X-touch mini for an input device with excellent results. Amazing value there!
Let’s hope multiple monitor support is working well in SU 10😊
Thing is, multiple screens will affect performance. Especially multiple 4K screens. There are tricks to improve performance, single-pass rendering being one of them, and DX12 should reduce the basic overhead of having multiple displays in play, but I still expect a significant FPS drop. We might end up back in the territory of <20FPS in complex areas without turning settings down a lot.
