I’ve done dual-GPU and also GPU + iGPU (motherboard GPU) and in both case I could use both to display sim content including pop-outs without any significant FPS impact. In fact, the FPS impact I do get comes from turning on the avionics and happens whether I have them popped out or not.
AFAIK there is still an FPS penalty when popping out - regardless of where you put the pop-out and on which display / adapter it is - in DX11. I haven’t used DX11 since SU9 so I can’t say. In DX12 I have no penalty but others do so YMMV.
USB video adapters have historically had the worst performance because of the bandwidth vs PCI, but USB3 basically fixed that.
As Sling said, the hard limit of 4 monitors on consumer-grade cards is enforced by AMD and nVidia. It’s not a Windows limitation. In order to get more outputs on a single card, you need to move to a professional level card like a Quadro at 5x the price.
And as Sling also said, if your CPU has an iGPU, you can enable that. It will give you 1-2 more video outs from your motherboard.
And of course, there’s the option of a secondary GPU. I ultimately went this route, adding a cheap, used Quadro P600 ($65US on eBay) to add 4 mini-DP ports to my system. It cuts my main GPU down to 8x, but considering GPUs can’t even saturate 50% of the PCIe bandwidth on a 16x slot, it makes no real difference to frame rate.
The other option (which I used to use) is USB3 to HDMI adapters. These work well as long as you’re displaying popouts only.
Regardless what option you choose, it makes no difference in terms of performance. You still lose the fps popping out your windows. It’s no better or worse.
That’s not universal, though. I don’t get an FPS drop with pop-outs (in DX12) and I haven’t since SU10. I do get an FPS drop due to heavy avionics running in a pop-out but I see that happen as soon as I turn them on, popping them out afterwards doesn’t make it any worse. It seems like the only way to know how it’ll affect a given setup is to try it. Though a universal solution to that problem is very overdue.
It should have been on it long ago, as it had way more votes than many of the bugs appearing on the list. The bug report thread has been tagged as bug-logged for quite a long time with nothing being done about it. I’m not optimistic that this will be fixed any time soon, but at least it’s being acknowledged.
Who knows? I could be wrong and this will finally get taken care of. They did change the popout behaviour in SU12. So maybe they’re actually looking into this.
For those able to use DX12, this has always been the case since DX12 Beta was first introduced. Minimal / insignificant fps loss when using popouts. Only the vast majority of folks have nVidia GPUs with 8GB of VRAM or less. Due to the VRAM overprovisioning bug, that absolutely kills GPU performance using DX12, with or without popouts. So we’re back in the same position.
For me, at my local airport, I’m hovering about 50-55 fps using DX11 without popouts. In the air, I can hit close to 70 fps. With popouts, I’m 25-30 fps on the ground, and 35-ish in the air.
With DX12, I’m bouncing around from 15 to 50 fps just sitting on the ground because the sim is trying to use up 10+ GB of VRAM on my 8GB 3070Ti. It’s not terrible if I’m looking straight ahead and not changing my view. Frame rates are more stable. But I use TrackIR. So that tanks fps when I look around.
Hi folks, sorry, I’m new to POPM. I am using it with the Citation Longitude and popped out the touch panels on a touch screen. In cockpit view, touch works fine as long as I don’t open the VFR map window. If I undock the VFR map window, touch works again. I am using the VFR map only to check the flightplan prior take off, so no biggy.
However, in chase view, which I love to use a lot, touch doesn’t work at all.
Am I doing something wrong? Is there a chance to get touch functionality while the main screen is in chase view?
Unfortunately, as of SU12 and in chase view, all pop out operations (mouse clicks) are disabled by the game. This means POPM won’t be able to simulate mouse click to touch either. Hopefully Asobo will fix this future SU.
I don’t seem to be getting the refocus back to the MSFS window after clicking on my tablet touchscreen. I am popping out a G1000 MFD touch panel. The touch seems to work properly to control the pop out window but the cursor remains with the pop out panel. I cannot select any cockpit controls or receive joystick inputs without using the mouse to click on the MSFS window.
I am using POPM v3.4.6.0321
I am connecting to an Android tablet via Spacedesk.
Any ideas? instructions? troubleshooting steps?
I’ll be happy to post any additional info needed.
Would you please try changing the refocus setting in POPM preferences to a higher value (1500ms or higher)? You can find the setting in Preferences => Touch settings => Refocus Game Window.
I’ve run into this issue where in SU12, the code on MSFS seems to perform slower than previous SUs and POPM refocuses too early before MSFS has completed the click event.
Tried a test matrix of 500, 1000, 1500, 2000, 5000, & 10000 refocus times along with touch delays of 0, 25, & 50.
Restarted the flight between each test.
I think I missed some detail in your previous post. You said you pop out the G1000 MFD for touch but since this instrumentation is not touch enabled by MSFS (display only), are your talking about the bezel buttons with Air Manager G1000 template? If so, touching the buttons in Air Manager template should not interfere with aircraft control in the game. If you have accidentally touch the G1000 panel screen, then you could inadvertently disable aircraft control. To fix this, you will need to check “Touch Enabled” checkbox in POPM panel configuration to allow refocus to work.
AccessRadioDJ, I’ve tested G3000 touch on KingAir using Spacedesk on the following 3 devices to see if tablet processor speed could be causing your issue but unfortunately I’m not able to reproduce it:
IPad Pro (pretty new)
Galaxy Tab A8 (pretty new)
Amazon Fire HD10 (old)
Off the top of my head, I don’t know what could be causing your refocus issue since mouse click emulation works (your Windows OS is not blocking it). It is just when POPM tries to redirect the mouse to your main game window that it is not doing performing the click.
Last thing to try, are your having issue running the game in window mode or full screen? Please try the other mode and see if you’re having the issue.
I’m going to strip down my MSFS install later today and retry some tests.
I also have access to a new Fire HD8 (I am using an old HD6) so I will see if anything changes making a swap. I’ll follow up with a post with the results.
Tearing down my install I discovered that the issue was somewhere in the Spacedesk install. After uninstalling/reinstalling Spacedesk everything worked just fine with POPM.
