>Give up, people. No harm done in throwing dice, study birds routes or tea leaves, taking bets or doing other weird things to estimate arrival of PMDG's 747. ;-)Michael J.WinXP-Home SP2,AMD64 3500+,Abit AV8,Radeon X800Pro,36GB Raptor,1GB PC3200,Audigy 2

>No harm done in throwing dice, study birds routes or tea>leaves, taking bets or doing other weird things to estimate>arrival of PMDG's 747. ;-)For sure! We're just having fun while waiting patiently! :)So at least tell us if it will be in a leap year or not?;-)Armen at EGLLwww.veryquiet.com

Okay, given this all in good-homour, what does "BETA" mean?I'm assuming that this is part of the process in "building" the plane for release, and I'm also assuming that when BETA is announced, it will be that much closer...But for the unintiated, a (simple) explanation would be appreciated.CheersTim

Right now they are in ALPHA. BETA means product is ready for general testing outside of the group of original developers. BETA can be very short or very long depending on the maturity of the product when it is declared BETA - ready.Michael J.WinXP-Home SP2,AMD64 3500+,Abit AV8,Radeon X800Pro,36GB Raptor,1GB PC3200,Audigy 2

You knows what I hate in these companies who manufacture airplanes? (PMDG, LEVELD). It is to say that they are with a new product, still in production and that it does not have date to launch! There I ask, then because they leave in the expectation? The great question is, WHY they do not inform when the airplane is ready? Nobody would be in this anxiety. I find this a lack of respect with the customers, exactly because we are who we pay for the product. Nothing it is of favour.Sorry my english!Mauricio - SBSP - Brazil.

Cool - thanks for that.Tim

WHY they do not inform when the airplane is ready? Nobody would be in this anxiety.Nice in theory, Mauricio, but folks will still ask "What will your next product be?" Would you believe PMDG if they said "We are not going to produce another product"?People ask questions and become impatient whatever developers do ;-)As previously mentioned, there are also commercial considerations. If you make an announcement about a future product, people will come to your website to ask about its progress. With occasional updates on progress, you can maintain customer interest in your product... Otherwise the customer might buy something else.Even rival developers benefit from PMDG or Level-D announcing a future product. When PMDG or Level-D announce a new product, the other companies know they would find it impossible to match the quality of these products, so the rival companies probably won't waste their time trying to make the same aircraft ;-)Hope this makes sense? (Sorry, I don't speak Brazilian).Cheers.Ian.

Perhaps you have reason in your words, then why the companies (PMDG, LEVEL-D), more do not leave its informed customers of the stage of the production of its aircraft? At least we customers would have the possibility to know where period of stage the product is. But not, they prefer to been silent and they are not if mattering with us.Again sorry my english.Mauricio - SBSP - Brazil.

Gentlemen, Gentlemen.....I'm never certain why these threads always seem to end with grown men bashing one another on the head- but they do....A few have posted guesses as to how/why we do not post release dates. They are all interesting, but largely unrelated to PMDG's decision making process.I have already given you the answer and it was already quoted here in this thread... The answer is found in the FAQ for this forum:"14) PMDG does not announce or discuss release dates for products currently in development. In our experience we have found that it is better to release a product when it is completed, without concern for reaching a "projected release date." This minimizes pressure on the development team- and results in a higher quality final product!"As a developer, we do our best to "learn by doing." A few of our early projects in 1999 and 2000 had firm release dates. We were not even close to reaching them and this created tremendous friction on the development team, and even greater friction in this forum.The reality when modeling something as massively complicated as a civilian airliner is this: Nobody knows a release date or month until the project is nearly finished. Any developer who tells you otherwise is misleading you.Sure- we work with "estimated guidelines" during development, but these guidelines change as progress changes- so in the end they are about as accurate as "watching birg migratory patterns or reading tea leaves." If we'd published our estimated guidelines on the 744, we'd have missed two release dates already by a large margin.Why? Because 4 it is important to us that this 747-400 release reach the market with a greatt mix of capability and new features to take your sim flying to an all new level of realism and immersion.That takes time....It will be no secret when the PMDG 747-400 is nearing release. As with all of our previous titles, you'll see quite a bit more of the nearly finished product when she's nearing the finish line....It won't be easy to miss- and it won't be too far off, either....

I would like to know ONLY the month lauching the 747 and the MD-11.Thank

You know what? What if they won't even announce a beta. They may just keep developing until it is done or keep the beta announcement among themselves and then one day spring the completed product on us.Just a thoughtRegardsGoran

And that was our weekly Soma release from Robert S. RandazzoTune in next week were we turn into lord of the flies again!

You know what? What if they won't even announce a beta. They may just keep developing until it is done or keep the beta announcement among themselves and then one day spring the completed product on us.I wouldn't mind them not telling us it went BETA as long as they do tell us when we can get it (which, thanks to the nature of the business, they CERTAINLY will do). :)Daniel P.http://www.precisionmanuals.com/images/forum/ng_driver.jpgMember of SJU Photography. [A HREF=http://www.jetphotos.net/showphotos.php?userid=9004]Click Here[/A] to view my aircraft photos at JetPhotos.Net!The official psychotic AA painter. :)

Untill you are a developer yourself, you probably will never really understand why release dates arn't released,You will think to yourself "Why? Its really easy to create one".Well, put it simply: Its not.As people have said the aircraft(s) arn't even in Beta.I can't express to you enough how time consuming Aircraft Developing is.When an aircraft is still being developed its very hard to make an estimation when its going to be complete. Complications can arise, Family troubles etc.., This is ESPECIALLY true with complex aircraft such as PMDG.Once its developed and In beta, its easier to tell when its going to be complete, but definately not so acurate as its safe to release to the public.So, Go ahead, Don't be satisfied with release dates, keep on asking, ready to hear the answer 'no'. Keep feeling let-down by not being told. When or IF you ever are a developer, Read this post again, You will understand quite clearly now why Release dates arn't given.(If you allready are a developer then you would know not to ask these questions)

I never have understood why people are so impatient these days. Oh, I am dying to have the 747 too but I just can not see why people have to post here all of the time begging for information. Don't get me wrong I am not putting those people down, I just find it curious that so many have fallen into this instant gratifacation thing, if they can't have it right away they get upset about it. I would love to see when the 747 is complete an actual accounting of just how many thousands of man hours went into producing this thing. On top of all of those hours the team had to work on other projects as well and do customer support, take care of orders, etc, etc. I can promise you that if any company could whip out airplanes the quality of PMDG's in a very short time they would have to have a huge staff, and I mean huge! Relax people, just like wine, the best things come with time and this is worth the wait. Now Robert I do have a suggestion for you, given that so many are demanding a time of release you should give them just that, right now. I have seen in this thread mentions of giving the year of release, the season, month or day, how about you go ahead and give them the hour of release. Tell everyone that you will be releasing the 747 at midnight, or whatever, on a later to be disclosed date, that way you have given them some information and everyone will then be happy! :-lolAll the best everyone!Philip OlsonI'm the luckiest man in the world, my girl friend has a yoke and rudder pedals! Eat your hearts out!http://www.precisionmanuals.com/images/forum/supporter.jpg