Microsoft’s required hardware to run the sim is a 300 Mhz Pentium system with 64 MB of system RAM and an 8 MB accelerated 3D video card. The truth is, you probably could get the program to load on such a system but it would be far from usable. If you really want to run this sim with reasonable performance you’ll need, at a minimum, a 1 Ghz system with 256 MB of system RAM and a 32 MB, GeForce 2 MX or better video card. If your system is not up to these requirements then you probably won’t be very happy with the program. The faster your hardware is the harder you'll be able to push the simulation towards the maximum it can provide. Fast hardware also gives you some breathing room for power hungry 3rd party add-ons like highly detailed airports, aircraft and high-resolution scenery. At this point in time there's no such thing as too much power as far as this program is concerned.

The first thing you’ll need to do is make sure that you have plenty of disk space. You’ll need at least 650 MB of free space for the basic installation however, if you plan on adding 3^rd party aircraft, scenery and utilities you’ll need a lot more. Most users end up expanding from between 2 to 5 gigabytes so it's a good idea to allow for this from the beginning.  You’ll also need at least 100 MB free in your root directory (most often C:\) for the swap file.

Now that you’ve verified that your hardware is up to the task and that you have enough disk space, you’ll want to make sure that you have the latest version of both Direct X and your video card drivers. Once all of that is verified or updated it’s time to defrag. You should defrag both your root partition (C:\ in most cases) and the partition where the program will be installed. This is a good practice when installing any major piece of software but is especially important for MSFS. Once defragging is complete, re-boot and install the software.

Once the software is up and running it's time to start tweaking for best performance. To get started, setup the default 172 at KLAX as your starting point. This is one of the toughest areas for frame rates so if you tune for smooth performance there, you’ll have it just about everywhere else.

The next step is to adjust your field of view. For some reason, Microsoft thinks that a slightly magnified view is best. While that can result in slightly higher frame rates it’s not very realistic and makes certain activities like holding the centerline during take off unreasonably difficult, much like trying to fly while looking through binoculars. Go to “Views” and then “View Options” and change the value to something more reasonable. I find that a setting of 0.70 is a good compromise between giving you a good field of view without reducing too much, the visual detail needed for landings. You'll need to reset this every time you start MSFS.

Once you're happy with your view out the windscreen go to "Options-Settings-Display" and click on the hardware tab. Make sure that "Enable Hardware Acceleration" is checked. Just above that check box you'll see a list of all the resolution and color depth combinations that are available for your video card. The best choice here will vary somewhat depending on the size of your monitor and the power of your hardware. Most users will find 1024x768x32 to be a good compromise. Panel detail suffers at lower resolutions and while higher settings do look better, they can really cut into your frame rates. While you're still in the Hardware section, note the check boxes on the right. In most cases mip-mapping, multi-texturing and bi-linear filtering will be checked, leave this as they are. Do make sure that anti- aliasing is not checked. That is only a reasonable option if you're running a GeForce 3 or better video card. In any case, leave it off for now. Lights should be set to the default or 3. Set the frame rate slider to maximum.

Now we move on to the meat of the matter, the scenery settings tab. This is were most of the action is for balancing visual detail with smooth performance and good frame rates. Here's a rundown of the starting settings:

Texture quality - high

Terrain mesh complexity - 60

Terrain texture size - high

Auto-gen density - normal

Scenery complexity - normal

Dynamic scenery - normal

Effects detail - high

Maximum visibility - 60 miles

Water effects - reflection

Cloud density - 35

Make sure all the check boxes are checked and click "Ok".

Before we start looking at frame rates we'll need to make a few more settings. Go to "Options-settings-ATC" and set traffic percentage to 0. Click "Ok" and then go to "World-weather" and set visibility to 20 miles, clouds to "scattered." You'll need to reset this every time you start MSFS. You might also want to go to "World-date and time" and set time to "day" in case the sim has set you up in the middle of the night.

Ok, now we're ready to find your base frame rate. Return to the cockpit and press shift+Z twice. That will bring up a frame rate display in the upper left hand corner of your screen. Watch the numbers for a while and try and determine what the average rate is. If the rate is less then 20 then you'll want to go back to the scenery settings and reduce the levels of the following settings:

Terrain mesh complexity

Auto-gen density

Scenery complexity

Water effects

These are the biggest frame rate hogs so reduce them until you see frame rates of at least 20. If you're getting rates over 40 you can start to increase these settings until you max them out or until your frame rate drops below 30. The last step in turning the sweet spot is to go back to your hardware tab and set your target frame rate to a value that's a few frames per second lower then the average value you observed. When you return to the cockpit the frame rate display should be almost constant and will indicate the locked speed in FPS. Go ahead and fly the pattern and keep an eye on the frame rate display. If it spends a lot of time below the locked value then reduce it by a few fps and try again. After one or two rounds you'll find the optimum setting. You can go all the way down to 20 FPS and still have a smooth looking display. Anything lower then 18 fps is going to start looking choppy and will also cut into the maximum gauge refresh rate. If that's the best you can do you can cut back further on the settings listed above. That will get you running but it also indicates that it's probably time to consider upgrading your hardware.

The final locked rate and settings that you used to achieve it should now become your standard setup for running MSFS2002. When your hardware or requirements change, simply re-run the test and you'll be good to go.