Landclass files

[martinlest 0]

I notice that some Aerosoft files which utilities such as Flightsim Manager show as being landclass files are contained in scenery folders which have texture folders alongside them. This is always reported as likely to lead to memory drainage of course.

Is it that these files are not really landclass files (example - Lukla FS9 scenery, MtEverest01.bgl) and can be left where they are? I can't imagine Aerosoft would contravene this well-known 'no no' by putting landclass files in scenery folders that have texture folders associated with them, but if there has been an oversight, am I advised to move them?

Thanks - and Happy New Year to all ...

Martin

[Aerosoft Team [Inactive Account] 51558]

I notice that some Aerosoft files which utilities such as Flightsim Manager show as being landclass files are contained in scenery folders which have texture folders alongside them. This is always reported as likely to lead to memory drainage of course.

Is it that these files are not really landclass files (example - Lukla FS9 scenery, MtEverest01.bgl) and can be left where they are? I can't imagine Aerosoft would contravene this well-known 'no no' by putting landclass files in scenery folders that have texture folders associated with them, but if there has been an oversight, am I advised to move them?

Thanks - and Happy New Year to all ...

Martin

We have never been able to see any memory leakage, though I know it has been written about a lot. We also never have been confronted by any user who complained about memory loss using any of these products, even though we sold thousands.

You should be able to move the files if you prefer of course.

[martinlest 0]

Hi Mathijs,

There are plenty of people complaining in FS forums & flightsim newsgroups about memory leakage - in general that is, not in relation to Aerosoft specifically, I hasten to add (I am a great fan of Aerosoft's products!!). Even Microsoft's own Knowledge Base has a page about it.

I don't think I see any worse falling off of fps etc. than anybody else, but certainly on long-haul flights my frame rates and performance generally are much worse than when I set off, especially landing at major airports like Heathrow. The 'proof of the pudding' (it seems to me) is that if I save a flight at that point, shut down FS9 and reload the same flight, say on approach to EGLL, my fps can be double of what I originally saw. If I reboot also, I can get even better performance gains.

Just wondered if all the landclass files that scenery designers put into the general scenery+texture setup (again, not implicating Aerosoft in particular - just that I have more Aerosoft payware scenery than any other I think) are contributing to my performance degradation over time. It is certainly spelled out all over FS forums not to have landclass files where there are texture folders, as you of course know well enough.

I may move all the indicated lc files (over 500 of them indicated in Flightsim Manager) and see what happens. (When my PC is back - a second crash again yesterday: waiting for Dell to come and replace the failed hardware! Awful being grounded: what a drug FS is...).

Regards,

Martin

[Keyno 0]

same here. i cntrl alt delete and i see fs2004 steadly going up and up over 800,000+, and around 1.500gigs my pc ram runs out of memory. and ive been looking for all the lc files, and not all landclass files are labeled lc.

[Holger_Sandmann 0]

Hi there,

a good diagnostic tool for causes of memory overflow is Filemon: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysintern...sk/Filemon.mspx

Set its filter to log everything but "successes" and the active drives ("volumes") to your FSX main and data drives.

Let FS load a flight then start the logging and watch for rapid repeats of read errors. Ground textures called by land class files have alphanumerical names such as 001b2wi4.bmp or 051c2wi0.bmp. Lots of read errors with those will get you into trouble (in FS9 only, not in FSX!) due to gradual memory overflow. This happens with land class files that have incomplete texture sets in a parallel texture subfolder. Note that it's not true that land class files should never have a texture subfolder; it's only files that don't provide complete sets of ground texture that create problems. Meaning: don't go on a wild chase to place all land class files in SceneryBasescenery or similar "collective" folders.

Other common causes of memory leaks and/or microstutters are missing effect files (.fx). Most of these are related to AI aircraft .cfg files that call these effects but don't provide the actual fx file. It can be tricky to hunt down the offenders.

You will probably see lots of file logs but can safely ignore most of them. Again, only those that show over and over again within minutes or seconds will be responsible for slow-downs or OOMs.

Another point about OOMs: it's not just memory availability but also fragmentation that can cause OOMs. If the sim tries to allocate a large contiguous block of RAM (e.g., large aircraft or object texture sheets) but can't find it it will crash as well. As far as I know there's no real solution for avoiding memory fragmentation during an ongoing FS session.

Cheers, Holger

[altstiff 28]

Thanks for the tip holger!

[martinlest 0]

Holger,

OK, I am testing FS9 with File Monitor. The first thing is that there are dozens of errors per second recorded: FS9 is looking for fx_strobex.fx in the Effects folder and also Effects.cab in the main FS2004 folder. I am perplexed. The default installation of FS9 does not put effects.cab into the main folder, and as far as I can see there is no such file in FS9 as fx_strobex.fx - only fx_strobe.fx and fx_strobeh.fx ...

It's now showing other missing fx files: found them at AVSIm and installed them. But nonplussed about the missing effects.cab file. Any ideas? (Not even started looking at the LC question yet).

Thanks,

Martin

[martinlest 0]

File Monitor isshowing some strange things Holger. I'd appreciate any comments you might have on this.

For instance, there are hundreds if not thousands of logged unsuccessful attempts to locate 737-400.gau, but FS is apparently looking in my FS main folder, not in the gauges folder, so no wonder it's not found. There are quite a number of examples of this, FS (according to File Monitor) looking in quite the wrong places for files - even on my root FS partitioon (G: here) rather than in FS folders.

I have the RFP 747-200 installed, but FS is looking for gauges for it in root G: instead of inside the RFP (let alone the FS9) main folder. It also looks for dozens of different .cab files, some also in root G: ...

Is all this normal or is this the kind of thing that's draining memory? If it is a problem, can I somehow direct FS9 to look in the proper place for all these 'not found' files?

Thank you,

Martin

[Holger_Sandmann 0]

Hi Martin,

looks like you're getting some issues resolved, like the missing .fx.

Some of the flags, especially the calls for .cab files, cannot be dealt with. It's just something that FS does. The key is to get rid of those error calls that are associated with third-party add-ons.

I suggest you write down each suspicious file and do a search in the forums; chances are this has been discussed before. For example, I searched for effects.cab in the AVSIM forums and came up with a bunch of hits, including this: http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...ing_type=search

Maybe try the same with "737-400.gau". Not sure why that file is called that often; doesn't happen for me.

Sometimes you can work with dummy or duplicate files, meaning placing a an empty or duplicate file being into a folder flagged by FileMon. However, it's always better to track down the file or cause first because placing files in other folders may lead to different problems down the line.

Cheers, Holger

[martinlest 0]

Will do, thanks. I already made one or two dummy effect files and of course this has put a stop to the messgaes, but I don't see why there should be a b737-400.gau file in the main FS folder. All very odd.

Will post back if I find anything else.

Martin