Im not saying DONT model modern airliners, I was just saying that as the modern airliner becomes more of a armchair operation, with 99% automated systems, it becomes a little pointless to simulate them.Project this forward to the day were there is no pilot. The computer flies the plane and 1 or 2 monkeys make sure everything stays working so the computer can fly. We aint that far off today really and a few companies I have heard of are already taking the pilot out of the loop in R&D projects, many more are putting the pilot on the ground, in control of more than one plane. The pilots cost a lot. Ok, so a lot of this research is the military who have reasons for not sending pilots into battle zones.What will PMDG's latest model be then? A plane where you are no more than dispatch center and a passenger. It would get quite boring and the civil/commercial avaiation sim market would move to more the like of "Premiership Manager" type games rather than sim flying, where you are the dispatcher for an airliner model.Another compelling reason to simulate old birds is because otherwise they become nothing more than stuffed mounted museam pieces flown only rarely (if even) at airshows by ole-boys.To say that a 3 crew plane with all the systems implemented would be impossible to fly single handed on a sim, is at all true. For one you dont have to get up and walk to the engineers station to flick a fuel transfer switch. Second, you dont have to fly 2, 3, 4 or more sectors 4 days a week with 100s of lives at risk. The 3 crew is choosen for those reasons, practicallity, and workload sharing. Altitude Concorde implements nearly 100% of the pilot and FO guages and central console and over heads. About 50% of the engineers station is full implemented, leaving only Pressurisation, Air Bleeds, a few engine management controls and standby back up electrics as texture only panels. It's a handful all right, but perfectly doable with practice. I think if all the engineers systems were implemented it would still be doable after some practice. More importantly it's a challenge.Flying the 737NG is more about learning to teach the plane to fly and once you have that mastered you generally type in your FP, push a few buttons and sit back. Watch the show.I'd just like to see more planes from the days when flying was still aviating, not computer systems management.RANT release armed.RANT released.CHECK!

Hello,I

I understand you "What if something goes wrong", say on the engineers panel, but "usually" they trigger an MWS light and gong too so the pilot is made aware of it, even if it's the engineers job to fix it.And you can monitor the engineers panel with Shift 3, 8 etc. ;)Besides, possibly luckily, there isn't much to do during the approach for the engineer as everything should be set up for landing anyway, unless your late on a fuel transfer, in which case you either multi-task or ask to ATC to put you in the hold for a while.OK, I agree that flicking back and forward between duties when things get a bit hairy is possible dangerous and prone to lapse of concentration or forgetting to capture an ALT or heading, but the people aren't really back there, it's a game. If you remove the challenge from the flying and systems management you have a train set. Nothing more. Watching the pretty plane fly.

Paul,>I'd just like to see more planes from the days when flying was>still aviating, not computer systems management.>>RANT release armed.>RANT released.>CHECK!Have you tried the Captain Sim line of aircrafts? They are supposed to be the old steam gauge airliners you're looking for. Oh, and while I'm at it I may as well put in a plug for the most realistic freeware panel I'm aware off. The DC-9 from Stellan Hilmerby, himself a DC-9 driver for SAS and an avid simmer. He has now been transfered to the MD-80 series as the niner was taken out of operations at SAS two and a half years ago or so. You can find it here, together with manuals and a forum for help. www.hilmerby.comHope it helps

Just because there is a certain way these airplanes are flown in real life doesn't mean you have to follow their exact guidelines when flying yourself. Do I use the FMC or even touch the autopilot controls? Not in the 737, Ready for pushback 742, and the beautiful new md-11 freeware from simmersky, etc. So no, you don't have to sit back and watch the computer fly you anywhere, you have the opportunity to pilot yourself the most advanced and beautiful airplanes in the sky to do whatever you want with them! (even using GPS as a reference) thats the beauty of a sim!

>To make it short: The MD11 is a unique airplane reagrding its>avionics and systems. You will see next year what I am talking>about. It is completely different to Airbus and Boeing...As i said before: an MD11 has never been realized so i don't know how is it like :)Thanks for your explanations!

>Being the realist I am, I find extensive time and effort>devoted to modeling old, retired, non-flying planes kind of>silly. Note, not absolutely silly... I understand there's a>demand for them and others are interested.Retired and non-flying?I would agree shouldn't it be for the fact that 737,747,777 and MD11 are all but retired...>It just appears that there are an awful lot of>real-life, highly-used airline transport planes that are>continually overlooked for development by the quality>manufacturers.Agreed, here in italy we have a lot of 734, many 732, hundreds of md87/88/90, hundreds of a32x, tens of atr and dorniers, and believe it or not ERJ135 and 170 (in quantities).Plus the long-ranges.Now i think that the ground on which people desire the plane to fly is similar to why they dream of driving a ferrari instead then a ford mondeo.Are you complaining that programmers do not make a car game in which to drive a mondeo, a golf or whatever? (fiat panda anybody?)I'm sure not.Everybody does fly on the planes listed above, much less do fly on bigger crafts like the 744 (many 200 are still around), the new 737ng, the beast 777 or the old lady the MD11.So i find in this, the logic behind the common desire of these models instead of some crj or whatever (why nobody ever asks for a fokker? or a bae?).That said, a PMDG MD87/88/90 would be a dream :)

My apologies for the title... no offense intended. Just an exasperate adjective for my feelings at the time.~Nate

I have "Ready for Pushback", dont see it advertised anymore. They stopped development on RFP 2nd gen., very realistic, so much so that you had better be able to spend a great deal of time with it. I mean like an hour to get it fired up and to get the old Delco Carousel inertial systems programed to go, then wait 15 minutes for alignment. One screwup with the start procedure and you start all over again. It,s a 747-200 and a nice aircraft with more buttons and switches then most guy,s can stand, you are indeed the Pilot in command and the FO and the Flight Engineer/ Navigator. Not sure if you can still buy it, they were supposed to stop development and shut the website down at some point, maybe it,s still up. Google it.I dont fly it much anymore unless I have the whole weekend, I liked it for the long hauls. For short hauls you will find yourself on the ground 60% of the time.I eagerly await PMDG,s 744, at least you spend more time in the air.Hey, to each his own!Regards

I hear you there, but I doubt we will see another one done.I'm actually building an Avro cockpit, but I doubt we will see another payware Avro/BaeLaurence