I want to tell you that your answer is not helpful
The answer was answering just what the affinity mask is doing and what the best setting would be.
and has upset me a bit
How an explanation of the affinity mask can be "upsetting", is really a mistery.
about the wonderful new features of the Virtuali add-on manager
That page is there since several years so, it's hardly a "new feature". And, they aren't "Addon Manager features", they are standard FSX.CFG settings, the Addon Manager is not doing ANYTHING, except let editing them without having the open the FSX.CFG file with notepad and having to look for them. That's it.
The Addon Manager is ONLY replacing Notepad. It's not doing ANYTHING on its own to touch those settings.
better yet, is there a way that it could be 'completely disabled'?
If you prefer to edit them by hand, just use Notepad and pretend that page doesn't exist.
Speaking candidly - I couldn't find any mention of these great new features where a user can make edits to their FSX.cfg file from within Virtuali Add-on Manager -
Since they are standard FSX.CFG tweaks and their meaning is explained elsewhere, there's no need to repeat the explanation in the Addon Manager. I'll repeat it again, the Addon Manager is not doing ANYTHING to your FSX.CFG, is ONLY offering you a way to edit that file more easily than with Notepad.
and I'm disturbed that your "default" settings have NO RELATIONSHIP to the end-user's system hardware - speaking bluntly - your 'improved interface' may not be any HELP but might HURT user performance, no?
No, you got it all wrong: it's precisely BECAUSE it's not assuming ANYTHING about the system, that is NOT causing any performance problem. It's not an automatic optimizer, it's just an EDITOR. YOU are responsible to put values, just the same as if you were editing the FSX.CFG file manually.
Your answer about "bitmask and not a linear value" is unresponsive and CONFUSING. You never DID say what value would be correct for an i2600k quad-core Intel processor in YOUR program - you just talked about BITMASK?
My answer is neither unresponsive nor confusing and, again, you are missing the point entirely: it's NOT a setting in "OUR" program, it's a standard FSX.CFG tweak, its meaning (not being a linear value but a bitmaks) it's IDENTICAL and its effect would be exactly the same as if you edited it by hand with Notepad, the ONLY difference the Addon Manager does, is that you edit it with a SLIDER, instead than manually writing the value by hand but, in BOTH cases YOU are supposed to know which value to put it.
Again, the Addon Manager is ONLY a different interface to the same values.
In my view, the 'add-on manager' Virtuali settings are DANGEROUS, not properly explained, and the "default settings" are completely misleading and confusing!
The default values are exactly what the word says: values that are default in the FSX.CFG and the "Default Settings" button can be helpful you if you wanted to reset ONLY those tweaks, to restore default values WITHOUT having to reset the WHOLE FSX.CFG, losing other settings you might not want to lose.
Because, resetting the FSX.CFG entirely, would be the only way to get default values back, if there wasn't that Addon Manager option, which resets ONLY those tweaks.
Your mistake is to assume that "Default settings" could mean "Optimized settings", which is not. If we intended to say that, that button would read "Optimized settings". Default simply means "restore to FSX defaults". Again, this is easier and LESS destructive than the usual way of resetting tweaks, which would mean remove the FSX.CFG and let FSX rebuild a new one, but that would reset *everything*, here you can reset ONLY those tweaks.
To put it plainly, I wish this feature was NOT THERE, or at least could be permanently DISABLED and HIDDEN for those who might want to do their FSX.cfg edits some other place and with full understanding of what is occurring?
And you are wrong again because, as was explained many times already on the forum:
- The Addon Manager DOES NOT change your existing settings: it READS what you ALREADY had.
- The "Default Settings" doesn't do ANYTHING, if you press it by mistake, for example.
- The only way to make an actual change to your FSX.CFG, is to MAKE a change AND also press the "Save Settings" button.
So no, you should be fairly motivated to do a change because, resetting those tweaks to default, would require TWO button clicks in a row, first you would need to press "Default Settings" and THEN "Save Settings.
I just want to share that end-users may not fully understand the new features being offered by Virtuali Add-on Manager
As I've said, they are not "new" features, it's just an interface to tweak existing settings more easily than hand-editing the FSX.CFG file, and that's it.
- and for those people alone, some sort of protection needs to be put in place to avoid end-user creating PROBLEMS by improper edits to their FSX.cfg file which don't agree with their actual system hardware!
The protection is obviously there, and it's the "Save Settings" button. If you don't CHANGE a setting first AND press the "Save Setting" button then, NOTHING will be written on file.
If you change a setting and exit that page, nothing will happen and nothing will be written.
I'll repeat it again:
1) Settings are not coming FROM the Addon Manager, at all. The first time you open that page, settings are READ from your own
existing FSX.CFG. The Addon Manager DOES NOT change ANYTHING on its own.
2) You can play with sliders as long as you want, no change will be made
3) To change your file, you need to "Save Settings"
So what is the proper bitmask value (Affinity Setting) for a Quad Core i2600k CPU with HYPERTHREADING turned OFF in the bios?
14, as I've said twice already.
My comment about this not being a linear value, was only in reply to your comment that you seemed to be not entirely convinced that you should go down, as if you were expecting "higher is better" or something like that.
The slider goes very far, because with systems with more than 4 cores, you need to go up to 255.
The default value of the Addon Manager, if you press the "Default Settings", it's 255, NOT 125. 255 means "use all cores", which is exactly what FSX does BY DEFAULT, even if that tweak is not there, so it's a correct value for a default setting button.
If you had 125, it means THAT was the value you ALREADY had in your FSX.CFG regardless of the Addon Manager, which only read it as it were and presented it to you to edit it.