Tuesday, October 15th 2024
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 Uses up to 180 Mbit/s of Internet Bandwidth in Flight
Microsoft's Flight Simulator 2024 is shaping up to be a pretty demanding title. From the very high-performance system needed for ideal system specifications, the game now uses up to 180 Mbit/s of internet bandwidth while the user is in flight and the terrain is loading. This is equivalent to as much as 81 GB per hour of internet data, which is a nightmare for users with a data cap. Data caps are often standard in US homes, with internet providers imposing their own rules on up to 1 TB of uncapped traffic, which considerably slows down after that. The new Flight Simulator 2024 may be a bit much for users who don't have powerful systems and data plans.
The Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 requires 30 GB of storage for the game. The alpha version comes in at only 9 GB, meaning that it is pulling much of its resources from Microsoft's servers, thus requiring this massive bandwidth to operate smoothly. Microsoft recommends a 50 Mbit/s internet connection for the final game, meaning that the final 30 GB install will pack more textures, thus lowering the massive load on Microsoft's servers. Of course, the 180 Mbit/s is the peak load, and the lowest measured load is around 10 Mbit/s. The game typically runs below 50 Mb/s, but this peak value is quite noticeable.
Sources:
Compusemble (YouTube), via Tom's Hardware
The Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 requires 30 GB of storage for the game. The alpha version comes in at only 9 GB, meaning that it is pulling much of its resources from Microsoft's servers, thus requiring this massive bandwidth to operate smoothly. Microsoft recommends a 50 Mbit/s internet connection for the final game, meaning that the final 30 GB install will pack more textures, thus lowering the massive load on Microsoft's servers. Of course, the 180 Mbit/s is the peak load, and the lowest measured load is around 10 Mbit/s. The game typically runs below 50 Mb/s, but this peak value is quite noticeable.
25 Comments on Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 Uses up to 180 Mbit/s of Internet Bandwidth in Flight
Are you sure it is 180 MegaBytes per second not Megabits? 180MB/s is more than 1 Gbps LAN cat. 5e capability. Also 81 GB per hour is about 23 MB/s average or 184 Mb/s.
Kind regards
180MB/s is more than a gigabit LAN can provide; what are the devs smoking?
I will just say that FSX with top-line scenery addons looked almost as good without needing a gigabit Internet connection, but then that sounded a bit luddite.
Better have some good NIC with CPU off-load capabilities.
It would probably use less energy and infrastructure than either.
Seems not well thought out though, some people have data caps, others have very slow internet, and some even both.
:laugh:Actual bandwidth consumption is -I'd wager- a function of the quality settings. Lesser config would fetch coarser tiles. 81GB/h is no more a requirement than running it at 4k with DXR.
Minimum requirement for the game demands a 10mb connection. Average consumption will definitely be lower than that.Doubtful. At least, not to any useful extent.
A sane design would use a cache, yes. But when your scope is the whole globe, caching everything is practically impossible on a personal computer. At >80gb for a session? Unless the player flies the same route, newer data will surely be overwriting the older one continuously.
Since the client is only 9 GB in size, what is that storage requirement then for?
Also, storage requirement does not scale with graphical settings, which tells me that's a crucial engine requirement.
www.flightsimulator.com/microsoft-flight-simulator-2024-faq/
Edit: Where is all that data going, though? It surely can't be very nice on your SSD longevity.
Edit 2: All things considered, it would be a nice option to download offline maps onto a HDD.
The client is 9GB in the alpha right now. Final client will be ~30GB as stated in the news piece.
Also, even Microsoft calls it "data streaming" and shouldn't hammer your SSD. It doesn't make sense for it to set foot on your storage.
otherwise it’s a huge implementation mistake
Things like weather data, traffic may be streamed continuously because they are lightweight but impossible for a game to use RAM-only cache AND be that bandwidth-intensive,.. it’d be a huge miscalculation from MS and Asobo
mybroadband.co.za/news/fibre/458413-the-693tb-man-south-africas-biggest-bandwidth-hog.html
Another article shows a single person averaging around 127TB per month for nearly a year:
mybroadband.co.za/news/fibre/519029-the-1-4-petabyte-man-south-africas-biggest-data-hogs.html
Our FNOs actually use this as a marketing gimmick to show what their networks are capable of, rather than punishing (ab)users.