390: AffinityMask Revisited

There are lots of comments on the Internet saying that the AffinityMask is no longer required in Prepar3D for a smooth flight.   Is it true?

The answer is both a YES and a NO, mainly depending on whether additional hardware are included.

During the recent clean re-installation of the just released Prepar3D version 3.4, I must say that I was very impressed with its overall performance under the factory settings in the beginning.   But the thrill only lasted UNTIL my Saitek’s Flight Instrument Panels (a notorious performance hitter) were added to the system, no matter running under the Saitek or the SPAD.neXt driver.

Framerates dropped about 8 to 10 frames and displays got stutters.   In the end, I had to put back the AffinityMask to the configuration file in order to reclaim the smoothness.

Obviously, AffinityMask is still an unquestionable critical element to better distribute CPU power to off-load extra hardware burdens in a single FSX/Prepar3D computer environment.  And it is also the most likely answer to those who are looking for a solution to cure the performance drop in their systems after FIPs are added or due to various other reasons.

Today, dealing with the Prepar3D configuration file for optimized results is far more simpler than with the FSX’s one in the past.   Here’s my latest Prepar3D.cfg for version 3.4 to those who are interested.   Modifications (in red color) are minimal.   Critical changes are in bold-red.

Following is the video showing a general flight performance with the minimal changed configuration file.

One more note, AffinityMask never does any harm to my system so far with or without external hardware.