Smooth Performance Concept for High-End Hardware: Fixed FPS with DLSS Frame Generation

SBSx9 · June 25, 2025, 12:18am

Update for NVIDIA driver 591.74

A simpler solution now appears possible thanks to improvements in recent NVIDIA drivers: limiting the FPS in the sim to 30 and enabling frame generation, without disabling G-Sync. This should provide the same benefit of an unsaturated main thread as described below, ensuring a stutter-free experience and perfect frame pacing.

The concept of the “airbag” and the underlying math remain valid—the difference is that previously, disabling G-Sync was necessary to achieve this effect. While the approach is still primarily aimed at RTX 50 GPUs, where it has been tested, it should now also work for RTX 40 users by limiting FPS in the sim to 30 and using 2x frame generation.

Once this change proves stable across multiple driver releases and setups, I will fully update the concept.

Hello everyone,

Let me share a concept that improved my MSFS 2024 experience to the point it feels like a completely new sim. I believe this can help especially those using RTX 5000 series GPUs, Frame Generation, and G-Sync monitors.

My system: Ryzen 9800X3D + RTX 5090 + 64GB RAM + LG 55" 120Hz OLED TV — and I can finally enjoy the benefits of this investment.

Three important parts of the concept:

Do not allow your FPS to drop below your monitor’s refresh rate — use Frame Generation (aim for 3x or 4x FG override on RTX 5000 series) to reach this goal and at the same time let the MSFS engine breathe. This is a crucial part of my concept. Once you drop below the target, the smoothness will break, as there won’t be a G-Sync ‘lifesaver’.
Enable V-Sync (you must do this in the NVIDIA App; in the sim it’s not possible if Frame Generation is enabled). You can enable it specifically for MSFS or globally.
Disable G-Sync specifically for MSFS. Keep G-Sync enabled for other games and disable it only for MSFS in the NVIDIA App. Note: this may not be necessary on some setups with NVIDIA driver 591.74, where capping FPS at 30 in the sim produces the same results – see update above.

Key Results:

Stable FPS, even at major airports in payware airliners (Fenix, ini A350, FSLabs A321neo).
A more efficient main thread, more immune to “shocks” in demanding scenarios.
Perfectly flat frame pacing — no feeling of “jerkiness” (some people are more sensitive to this than others).

The following screenshot at the end of a flight EDDL → LEBL in FSLabs A321neo demonstrates benefits of this setup:

One can see two important things there:

Perfectly flat frame pacing bar (on top of the frame counter) = zero micro-stutters.
MainThread executes in 15 ms, which is safely below the 25 ms budget (the aggregate time the MSFS engine is allowed to spend generating one frame). This difference is your “airbag” and gives the whole system much-needed breathing room.

Here is the face-to-face comparison with only G-Sync changed (UPDATE: NVIDIA driver 591.74 no longer appears to cause this issue, at least on some configurations. Please test on your setup to determine if disabling G-Sync is still necessary):

This concept completely transformed my MSFS 2024 experience — I’m enjoying flying again. Due to performance issues, I had started to feel skeptical about the sim’s direction, but now I see that it is capable of incredible smoothness — something I never expected to say. There are still other issues, but the most important one — performance — is currently solved for me.

See you in the skies,
Roman

Notes:

1. This concept may work differently — or not work at all — on different hardware.
2. The video that somebody posted below does not show the same method and will give different results.
3. If your sim is already working perfectly, simply enjoy it. This is meant for those who feel their hardware should be performing better.

Colonia1963 · June 25, 2025, 12:33am

Interesting, I will surely test it!

NorthlandAir · June 25, 2025, 2:15am

I think I am missing something here, 2024 will not allow me to have both frame gen and v-sync on at the same time, it is either one or the other. Am I missing a step? G-Sync is off in both the app and control panel from nvidia. Cheers.

SBSx9 · June 25, 2025, 2:40am

You can (and should) enable V-Sync in the NVIDIA App — just look for the option named “Vertical Sync” (see my screenshot).

There’s no G-Sync toggle in MSFS itself, but in the NVIDIA App it’s labeled “Monitor Technology”, and you should set it to “Fixed Refresh” to fully disable G-Sync for MSFS.

CloudDancer846 · June 25, 2025, 5:36am

Wow you were right! Its like a new computer! Thanks!

JustMicko · June 25, 2025, 7:27am

I have done it weeks ago, completely different behaviour. Here is video explaining the issue:

This man absolutely nailed it!

geloxo · June 25, 2025, 7:27am

Are you sure your fps readings are not showing the desktop instead game? They are two low and steady to reflect any GPU and CPU activity. Game needs a relevant effort at gates. In case you minimized game or clicked outside it before taking the screnshots, did you click back anywhere inside game afterwards? Game is borderless window so this is typical thing that can happen and leads to confusion.

On the other hand there´s an issue with game I have noticed after SU1 and persisting in SU2: rendering focus is randomly lost. I share this because I have also seen steady 120fps readings with G-sync enabled while playing and that´s because game processing went to background while it´s window was still in the foreground and Windows mouse pointer appeared on top of game. To detect this behaviour I changed my Windows mouse pointer to orange (game´s pointer is white), so that I can quickly notice when game or Windows desktop are taking the rendering priority.

G-sync has nothing to do with game nor performance, meaning that it´s not managed by game and it has the same impact in fps readings as V-sync. Enabling or disabling it afects in the same way: frames are wasted or are synchronized with monitor refresh and tearing can happen or not.

Cheers

geloxo · June 25, 2025, 8:17am

I have tested the solution shown in video (disabling G-sync and enabling V-sync). Indeed, opposite to the expected results you would imagine, this combination effectively results in a complete disabling of V-sync and tearing starts to appear. However it´s barely noticeable because the fps figures are still high. That´s why the fps and latency readings appear to improve dramatically but this is just placebo.

To completely disable G-sync you need to do it at monitor configuration via its OSD. This is another Windows 11 bug, like the one that requires both G-sync and V-sync enabled globally to have G-sync working under Windows 11. In Windows 10 for instance you just need to enable G-sync alone to make it work.

On the other hand, as soon as you have any synchronization activated (V-sync or G-sync) your fps can´t go above selected monitor refresh rate because one of the purposes of that synchronization is indeed to match the frames with the refresh, either in a fixed step (V-sync) or continuously (G-sync). On the other hand frame generation can´t result in fps above your monitor refresh unless that synchronization is disabled. When synchronization is enabled the extra frames above your refresh are simply wasted. So basically, for an example of 120Hz refresh, you will never get more than 120 fps, no matter the frame generation factor you used. Frames resulting in more than 120 fps are just discarded.

So basically, no matter the tweaks people can share or discover. Whenever you see game producing fps above your selected monitor refresh that´s because the synchronization is effectively disabled. So, in plain words, game will be running under unlimitted frames conditions and that will result in better latency but also in tearing.

As a long term G-sync user I can share that there´s nothing wrong with that technology. It simply works and it helps. I never saw it producing adverse results and definitely it does not impact performance because it´s not managed by games directly. Applications can only request to activate synchronization (the typical “enable V-sync” settings we see in all graphical options) but that´s all. The performance impacts you see in applications are just caused by the nature of synchronization itself not by the synchronization method that is used.

The problem in FS2024 is FS2024 itself. The main thread latency is high because it´s under heavy load everytime. On the other hand, as I commented in my previous post, the game is not a true fullscreen but a borderless window one. It´s also losing rendering focus randomly and this can happen indeed under stress conditions. If you don´t detect it (the orange mouse pointer trick) you will be running game but giving rendering priority to desktop, with horrible performance results in game therefore.

Cheers

johnwhite92 · June 25, 2025, 9:02am

Gsync has also a minimum operating frequency.
Check your monitor’s documentation on the manufacturer’s website: the gsync operating range of your monitor should be indicated.
For example, for my monitor, it is 48hz to 144hz. This means that the monitor will activate Gsync if it receives between 48 fps minimum and 144 fps maximum. If the graphics card sends less than 48 fps or more than 144 fps, the monitor will not activate Gsync and there will probably be tearing and/or stutters.

So if you want to activate Gsync, make sure that the graphics card sends at least the minimum number of fps required. With Msfs 2024 this is not always the case, especially in complex or poorly optimized areas.

geloxo · June 25, 2025, 9:16am

Yes! This is very important and it usually leads to frequent confusion

However this is only applicable for the so called “G-sync compatible” monitors. The true G-sync monitors are full range, so G-sync works on the 1Hz - 144Hz range (or whatever your monitor max refresh value), so even at 1 fps your monitor will still match its refresh.

There´s yet one more classification, the G-sync Ultimate monitors, that in addition support advanced HDR. So, from lowest to highest capabilities (and price) we have:

G-sync compatible (have a lower limit working frequency: typically 30Hz, 48Hz or 60Hz)
G-sync (full range working frequency, from 1Hz to max monitor frequency and can also include standard HDR)
G-sync ultimate (full range with advanced HDR as well)

Official monitors list:

Cheers

Colonia1963 · June 25, 2025, 11:48am

I did it and WOW!!! Simulator is smooth as silk and also scenery loads faster! Thank you

By the way I think if one does need rtx 5000 gpu with MFG and flip metering (hardware frame timing system exclusive to new Blackwell cards) for this to work.

johnwhite92 · June 25, 2025, 12:46pm

Same logic for AMD FreeSync monitors : there is a range of working frequency

https://www.amd.com/fr/products/graphics/technologies/freesync/monitors.html

GustavTFox · June 25, 2025, 1:09pm

This completely eliminated any stutters for me too. 4090 and GYSNC compatible 144Hz monitor. Thanks for the tip!

MoMedia1 · June 25, 2025, 10:24pm

Holly ■■■■!! This is insane! I stopped playing because I was losing the will to live with all the nasty stutters, now all gone!!

DizzyBasket7278 · June 25, 2025, 11:47pm

I’ve been suggesting this type of solution for ages, but everyone seems to insist on v-sync off and striving for higher sporadic FPS which is not always the solution to jitter.

v-sync is our best friend, and gives us Interframe Timing Consistency which is more important than raw FPS.

v-sync with framegen is giving the GPU lots of frames to more closely match the refresh timing of the display.

Incredible smoothness is the result.

With this approach in mind, I am still getting excellent performance out of my 5 year old triple screen 2080ti albeit at a rock solid, jitter free 30fps with Ultra presets.

One thing that I do in addition to your approach (which probably applies to older systems like mine), is to set the desktop hz to 60hz. Enabling v-sync then locks the output to an even division of 60 fps which gives the CPU the time it needs to load textures etc between frame updates.

I enable v-sync (in my case, 1/2 refreshrate) externally from the sim so v-sync is applied after the GPU produces the extra frames.

This image illustrates why raw FPS can introduce jitter.

Below is my post on a similar subject (with example videos)…

Surprising performance on older hardware. All Ultra Settings - User Support Hub / Install, Performance & Graphics - Microsoft Flight Simulator Forums

SBSx9 · June 26, 2025, 7:21am

Just a quick note—this thread is specifically about switching off G-Sync and using NVIDIA Frame Generation. Please try not to derail the topic with different performance tweaks. Let’s keep the focus so others looking for info on this exact issue can benefit too. Thanks!

sanins192 · June 26, 2025, 9:54am

Hi geloxo,

Do you have GSX Pro installed? I used to have the exact same issue with MSFS2024 randomly losing focus, and after a lot of hair pulling traced it to GSX Pro. It seems whenever couatl crashes and restarts itself it steals focus from the game, eliminating any frame gen and requiring to click back on the game window. Disabling GSX fixed the issue, but now it means I can’t use GSX for 2024… hopefully SU3 will fix this.

sanins192 · June 26, 2025, 10:01am

I’ve not had change yet to try turning off GSync, but one thing that ‘fixed’ the micro-stutters was setting an in-game FPS limit rather than letting GSync or a third party frame rate limiter (RTSS) take control.

For instance, in MSFS 2020 I set FG to 3x through the Nvidia app, and then use RTSS to limit my FPS to 135. The result is an incredibly smooth sim pegged at 135fps (sim is rendering at 45fps and frame gen is bumping up to 135fps), and if it dips below this G-Sync kicks in and the image remains very smooth.

If you apply the same settings to MSFS 2024, there are constant micro-stutters even though the frame rate is sitting at 135fps. I found the solution:

Set an in-game FPS cap to 45fps (this currently needs to be done through the user.cfg file, but SU3 will add an in-game slider to set this)
Force 3x FG through the Nvidia app
Disable any other frame limiting app such as RTSS

This solution results in a very smooth 2024 on par with 2020, but still allows the use of GSync for the times when fps dip slightly.

sanins192 · June 26, 2025, 10:13am

Just to clear up some confusion above, Gsync can work below 48Hz on GSync compatible monitors through something called LFC (Low Framerate Compensation). In simplest explanation, if you are outputting 47FPS, GSync will still kick in and force the monitor to run at 94Hz, showing the same frame for 2 repeat refreshes of the monitor.

Full GSync monitors also have a lower limit of refresh rate (although this is typically not disclosed on spec sheets, but typically much lower than 48Hz, around 20-30Hz) and they will apply the low framerate doubling, tripling, or even higher when you fall below this.

Falling below the minimum refresh rate of the monitor can show artefacting with GSync compatible monitors, especially VA or OLED panels which display different brightness at different refresh rates. So if you are hovering around 48FPS and LFC keeps kicking in, you will end up with perceived flickering of the monitor. The solution for this is to buy a full GSync monitor, an IPS GSync compatible monitor, or force a higher FG of 3x or 4x to make sure you are running close to the monitors max refresh rate.

Colonia1963 · June 26, 2025, 10:28am

Guys do not discuss all million other tips here, gsx stuff etc. Just try exactly what this topic proposes and report. Because as I already reported in my case it works and really changes MSFS24 to MSFS25