Why Latency Matters
For X-Plane, temporal predictability matters more than raw throughput — a stable 35 FPS image looks smoother than one fluctuating between 25 and 50. Micro-stutters rarely stem from insufficient computing power but from latency: scheduling delays, CPU wake-up times from sleep states, interrupts at the wrong moment, and blocking memory operations. The tuning page presents two kernel profiles — the stock profile forces application priority, the Liquorix profile removes external disturbances — each tailored to the kernel's scheduling model. Applying the same parameters on the wrong kernel will degrade results.
The monitoring page provides the tools to verify every tuning measure: Is the governor actually active? Are interrupts landing on the protected cores? Is the NVMe causing wake-up latencies? Each tool — from turbostat to mpstat to ioping — maps to a specific tuning setting.
The theoretical foundations — why latency matters more than throughput and which system sources generate latency — are covered in the Latency and Predictability chapter.
- Tuning — Kernel parameters, CPU governor, interrupt affinity, NVMe tuning
- Monitoring — btop, turbostat, perf, mpstat and other analysis tools
Further Reading
| Topic | Page | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Kernel Tuning | Kernel Tuning | CPU governor, interrupt affinity, NVMe tuning |
| Monitoring | Monitoring | Verify tuning with turbostat, mpstat, ioping |
| Latency and Predictability | Latency and Predictability | Theoretical foundations of system latency |
| Liquorix Kernel | Liquorix Kernel | Low-latency kernel with PDS scheduler |
| Load Dimensions | Load Dimensions | CPU, GPU, IO — where bottlenecks form |