I recently found my old copy of JF-18 and it worked right of the box.
WinXP, DX90c, nVidia Forceware 77.72 drivers. I play with 2xQ FSAA enabled and have no water gridlines nor AA master mod stuttering.
I wish the engine sounds are better in the game, are there some replacement sounds on the web?

Only problem now: the hud fonts are unreadable, hopefully TSH finishes their font mod soon, the beta mod doesnt work for me.

BTW going from 4x to 2xQ FSAA also fixed the "no-mouse-in-cockpit" problem for F4:AF. With 4x FSAA falcon doesnt even start.