Faster loading | MSFS Tutorial 

Brilliant video Murph. I never thought about uninstalling things from inside the sim. I'll be right on that after work this evening as I never use the bush trips, etc. I've used the Add-on Linker app since it first came out and set it similarly to the way you have. It's a must have add-on for all MSFS users. For example I set up a Caribbean folder the other evening for the fly along to reduce loading times.

I have tried to explain this to others, but your visual examples are just excellent. I will be sharing this video!

Fantastic video sir! People complain about loading times (rightfully so) but there are indeed ways to help!! Brilliant!

Gsx is a loading time killer.

A converse and a little pedantic point. If there is an addon that you do use all the time and I mean 'every time' then leave it in your official community folder. Nothing more annoying than launching the sim with addons linker and then realising that you haven't selected your favourite 'use all the time' addon and have to restart the sim. Examples for me would be FlowPro, Navigraph and FSLTL.

Thank you for showing your folder structure for use with MSFS Addons Linker! That makes a lot of sense, and it's great inspiration to start organizing my folders.

Thank you so much for this tutorial! My loading time has dropped dramatically. I did not realise how many "extras" were included in updates and I was staggered to see how much unused/unwanted content I had in my installation. In future I will be checking exactly what gets installed in updates. Now to have a close look at my Community folder ...

Great advice in this video! Long story short, after watching, I was inspired to clean up my sim and I got my load time down from 7 mins to just 1 min! 🎉

Another home run Murph!!! Thanks so much, you just saved me at least 5 mins on every startup.

Great tip deleting bush trips, landing challenges, discovery flights, airports and lessons. POI might be risky to delete though, as you point out.

Just want to mention that enabling fast launch (i.e. bypassing the startup videos) is an option in the Addons Linker

This is true, I have MSFS2020 split across multiple SSD's. 1. Installing MSFS2020 onto a NVME Gen 4 SSD or above really helps and is quicker than a Gen 3 2.5 SATA SSD. 2. Don't uninstall anything ....Use MSFS ADDON linker manager and its profiles, to managethe load times for things in your community folder, as itbuses symbolic links and addon manager profiles. 2. Under the folders there a Store folder, wheee EVERYTHING which I use a BATCH script like Addon Manager does, creates symbolic links in this folder. 4 then all my Store, Scenary, purchases, Bush flights, training, and community folder contents have been all moved on to a different folder on my flight sim SSD or even a 2nd SSD and then simply using symbolic links to create links for what you need to load when I fly. ( addon manger may also help here)

97 seconds. I already had Addon Linker, but got rid of allot of crap. THanks!

I just did the internal cleanup. Removed all the cruft I don't use: Discovery Flights, most bushtrips, POI's, Aircraft and liveries (especially XBOX). Could not tell you how much space I reduced exactly, think it was close to 80+GB I'm not space constrained and I run the Sim and content on large FAST NVME SSD's, I just don't wanna wait ages for the sim to load. I reduced start time from an average 8:40 secs to an average 5 mins 10 secs. That is definitely a Win I'll take. I've been using ADDON Linker for a while now, I cannot recommend it enough. I will be retesting load times with skinned down Community content tonight.

Superb ideas. Will be giving these a go for sure! Especially sorting out the addons linker files!

As always, another very helpful video ... many users will benefit from taking your advice. To be honest, I have been onto this for a couple of years. It was after getting a new high-end PC when I started testing, tweaking and logging results. I only fly PMDG 737-800 & FBW A32NX in Europe so, I uninstalled all irrelevant WU's, and other content shown in your video. Bear in mind this was 2 years ago, I remember there was a very slight improvement (only a few seconds faster on a 2 minute load time) but, of course, we're now potentially dealing with so much more content so I would expect the results to be more significant. On reflection, it also makes sense to uninstall redundant aircraft ... something I didn't do... a job for later today, note to self, keep stock A320 (required for FBWA32NX). Fully endorse your comments re. MSFS Addons Linker (brilliant freeware program) ... will also try your 'fast launch' option... thanks again ... great job ... folks, smash that 'Like' button!

To save having to delete and reinstall DLC from the Community folder - I just move unused items into a Disabled folder on the same drive. Moving them back and forth from the Community folder to Disabled folder is fast and easy. Technique worked in X-Plane, P3D and works here as well while being simple to implement.

Well done cause it’s the first time that I see the emphasis on uninstalling stuff within the sim. One comment though, your shortcut at the end might be exactly what the add on linked fast start option does for you.

Wickiwonkywonktastic! Thank you for this, although now I'm not sure when I will have time to mow my lawn! 🙃 Last week I took the step of uninstalling Steam games I don't play, and got myself +40GB. I did it to make room for the Carribean update, thinking I was heading for 18GB of water masking. Silly me!!! Anyway great tips, and love your channel!!!

Ok ok i submit. 5 times youtube has sent you my way and im already hooked. My subscription is yours!!

A genuinely useful and informative video. Thanks.

How dare you try and shorten my loading times! My Doberman "Sparticus" would like a word with you as we use MSFS loading times as a period for us to take a short walk around the property. Very helpful 👍🏽given!

Thank you for this, I did not think of this; I have always kept everything installed and updated, and now I realise it does not make sense to do this. Thank you. I do use addons linker, but I also had everything loaded on it too. This is just common sense, actually. Thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!

thanks for your tips especially for selective uninstall which I wasn't aware it was possible.

Thank you. I was unaware of the detailed view and it is a revelation.

Great video! I’m now a subscriber! One question, using Adonis Linker, what about aircraft and scenery in the Official/Packages folder rather than the Community folder. I assume the only detriment would be if not checked, Content manager would not detect the aircraft’s for updates.

Great stuff, thanks so much.

Rarely comment on vids but this is excelent stuff especialy about msfs linker

Do use fastlaunch in steam version: 1. Right-click on the game title under the Library in Steam and select Properties. 2. Under the General tab click the Set launch options... button. Enter the following : '-FastLaunch' (without the quotes) 3. Close the game's Properties window and launch the game.

Thanks! Now I need a tutorial what useful things to do with the saved time or I'll have my wife do it for me!!!

Thank you thank you thank you sir ! I reinstall my sim on a new pc so i won't install discoveries, landing challenge, bush trips and training files. Thks sir

Thanks for another great video. Your content is very useful. Please keep up the wonderful work.

Very useful'and well made explanations, thank you.

you are STAR, Very helpful and informative video, Really appreciate. Thank you so much...

Thnks for good informative video mate

Your some man for one man

I wish Asobo could track how much a particular aircraft is used in a system for usage. I know the data exists in the users logbook. It would be nice to see it in the content manager.

Very useful video for MSFS users. The Fast Launch you have given in the description of your video is not for Steam Version. Am I right?. Do you have any code for Steam Version users please?

Great stuff as always! NVME drives too can make a massive difference to load times too on the HW side. Noticed you don’t use Stripr anymore - did that help or hinder loading?

this is insane, I reduced my time by 50% this is insane

Oh my Murph! 👏👏👏👏👏 Thank you fine sir!

I do have a question. When you are in the content manager how do you disable the POI's, aircraft, bush trips and etc? In my case most of them are not installed but appear in the content manager. Thank you!

It takes around the same time as a flight from the US to New Zealand.

Just be aware when you remove official content that MSFS sometimes gets the idea stuck in it's head that an airport or aircraft is a Mandatory Update. The other day I removed the Juliana Airport from the Content Manager because I already had a 3rd party scenery and on the next launch MSFS made me redownload the whole thing at 2Mbit/sec before I could even get back in the sim again. Now imagine that happens with deleted content in the weight class of 50+ GB ... talk about a loading time of a couple of days. 😅

Great video, and yes, the long loding time is a real pita (7min in my case). One thing you did not touch upon: is there a possibility to put stuff I bought in the Marketplace into my AddOn Linker folder? That would be the best of both worlds, because I would not have to delete from the sim what I don‘t use today, only to download it again tomorrow, because I decided I do want to fly in xyz location (download at 2,2 mbs, that is…). Have you looked into this?

I have a 4tb m2 so space is not an issue I have installed everything and my msfs startup is 2mins yes I have a top machine but I like everything

Sounds good, however, MS need to sort out the distribution servers, if i want to reinstall a package i need to start downloading 2 days before i need it.

thanks, it does make a difference.

Can you delete unused default aircraft as well? ie. Asobo 747. I have heard that it tries to reinstall next time you start the sim

Hello sir from France, question please : If i only use freeware and payware airports, do i need POI ?

Good man, thanks for that

So just to be clear, when talking of 'uninstalling' the POIs etc. They're not actually being uninstalled as in freeing up disk space, they're just being deactivated from being loaded at startup, right?

Great video, how do you deal with updates for the airports from e.g ORBX? I had them sorted like you, but I found I had to put them all in one ORBX folder so they could be updated.

Thank s for the video! dDo we have any issue when an update pops up? I had done this but the moment a mandatoy update surges it made me reinstall everything again

I have a community folder full of sometimes filenames of which you cannot tell if it is a livery or scenery etc. That gives a problem when putting it all in correct adding linker folders. Any tip how to solve this? How can you deduct what a certain file is? Eg scenery etc. Thanks for this video, very good and clear

Just tried it, and it went from about 5 minutes to 1 minute just from the in game uninstalls

About the POIs: if I remove all of them, Am I removing only the map marks and the text while in sim or Am I deleting the scenery items like the castles, bridges and etc? Thanks ind advance.

I can hardly hear what you're saying because of the bloody row in the background/foreground.

My god really? I just be lucky. I’ve never had to wait for more than 1.30 minutes.

mine takes around 2 min sometimes 1 min i have msfs installed on external drive

@03:50 Anyway, "Core Content" cannot be removed -- no point to even discuss it.

on the default install of the sim it loads in 37 sec but is on an M.2 drive.

I’m surprised you missed the model and material .bgl repair tool within addons linker

1 min 54 sec now... before more than 6 min

i wait 30 mins

So I didn't need to install all that scenery?? 😂😂

I have a "Community" folder and also created a sibling folder named "Community.Backup". before starting MSFS I take a look at those 2 folders: - if I do not want to use a mod-folder (aircraft or scenery) I move it into COMMUNITY.BACKUP - otherwise - if I want to use a mod-folder I leave it in the COMMUNITY folder it only takes me seconds to do so. it seems that add-on does only this with a sassy front-end ... I cannot justify the code my own add-on to do the same as it is quicker to do it manually and cannot justify the coding time, unles I wanted to sell it to less savvy users. As to first part: optimising with MSFS Content Manager - I did not find anything which I am not already doing. - using an SSD - you did not mention about NOT using the Windows 10 system drive at the time of installation. - buy a real internal SSD (avoid HDDs) - I am considering upgrading my 1 TB internal SSD (data drive) for a faster 2 TB SSD and dedicate itt for FlightSim (MSFS + X-Plane 12, etc.) - I am looking around for best performance / price.

@twotonemurphy, At time frame 1;32, YOU recommended putting MSFS 2020, on a SSD drive, and the community folder, keeps, re-installing it on my "C" drive, not matter what I do, I tried many times, and it will not allow me to put the Community folder, on a seperate SSD drive, please explain how it is done, or a tutorial on how to do it, Thanks, in advance