B4 I give up on PMDG747X, any fast way to load MS FSX Flight Plans?

[lensman 0]

Hi all,I *really* like the PMDG747X, but I cannot get a flight plan loaded into the FMU before MS FSX freezes. Strangely, the defaultB747w/FS2Crew doesn't have the same freeze.So, is there a simple way to load a MS FSX-generate flight plan into the PMDG FMU in less than geologic time?Thanks,dan davison

[Tabs 2,790]

Dan,Our FMC doesn't support loading FSX flightplans directly - how are you going about what you're doing? Need a bit more info to come up with any ideas on what's going on.

[lensman 0]

Hi!Regarding the flight plans:I make a flight plan using FSX Deluxe's built-in flight planner. I then print the "Navigation Log", and enter the jetways and VOR/wpts by hand into the FMU Route. There are usually a few jetways unrecognized by the 747 FMU so I just "direct" over the unknown ones. I tried looking at the flight plans in Microsoft FSX/PMDG/Flightplans with a hexadecimal editor but didn't spend much time with it.Regarding the freezing:FSX freezes pretty much after 20 minutes from clicking on "Free Flight" when I pick any of the 747-400X or 747-400XF versions. If I'm *not* in flight by 20 minutes, clicking on pretty much anything will cause a freeze. Then I go get a cup of tea and when I'm back the "FSX has suffered a serious error" dialog box finally shows up and I usually click "Send". If I've been entering a flight plan, it always dies in the same thread and the same DLL (but I don't remember what it is...sorry.Alternately, if I click on the menu bar (or press "alt" to bring up the menu bar) FSX will immediately freeze. I've had some experience debugging the Windows kernel so last night I downloaded the latest windows debugger and symbol server link and made sure it all works. So, the next time I get a hang I will go looking carefully at where it is hanging.Out of the 20 to 25 hangs, when I look at the "what information is being sent to Microsoft", the hang is most often in ntosknl.dll (may not have the spelling right, sorry, I'm on a Mac at the moment). 60% of the time the other hangs are in either FSX dlls or (apparently) PMDG dlls. On one occasion the hang was in the graphics card driver. I fixed that one (5 or so days ago) by downloading and installing the latest nVidia driver. ----------------So - I'd still like to know if there is a way to build PMDG "flightplan" files or the PMDG file format (unless proprietary) andI'll write a Perl or Windows script to convert FSXflight plans into PMDG's format(*). For the freezing problem, I *suspect* it's a FSX-based error, not a PMDG based error, but that's why I updated the debugger and symbols. As I accumulate *useful* information, I'll send that to you separately. If you have a chance, let me know what level of infoyou want - the full corefile, the full dll trace, the debuggeroutput around where FSX froze, or only that info for PMDG dlls. Or,of course, if you do not want any of that. Perhaps something funky is happening with simconnect.dll - I'll check version numbers. I recently upgraded from FSX to FSX Deluxe. I did a full remove, cleaned the registry (with a utility and by hand), defragged thedisk, did several rounds of chkdsk, then installed FSX Deluxe and the SDK (*).Thanks very much for your help,dan "very grey lensman" davison(*) Can you tell I've been debugging Un*x kernels for more than 25 years?

[johndrago 4]

>>So - I'd still like to know if there is a way to build PMDG>"flightplan" files or the PMDG file format (unless>proprietary)Hi Dan,Your best bet would be to purchase FSBUILD (www.fsbuild.com), that will produce real world flight plans, and export them to PMDG format.Check it out...- John

[rsrandazzo 6,353]

Dan-If you are having problems with FSX freezing, getting your flight plan entered more quickly isn't going to solve your problem. (Trust me- we know these things!)All you will do is postpone the inevitable.If you are sitting on the ground with lots of airport ground traffic, and lots of road traffic running- you are basically living a time-bomb. Ground traffic in FSX is a known problem- and it is our opinion that it was not adequately fixed in FSX. We recommend turning road traffic OFF.Autogen density is an issue with FSX as well. We put together a pretty good list of recommendations for users on our PMDG Ops system- I'd strongly encourage you read through it- as it will help your FSX operations not only with PMDG, but across the board.You can find the article on PMDG Ops here: http://ops.precisionmanuals.com/wiki/747-4...%26_Performance

[lensman 0]

Rob,quick question - does "road traffic" also include "airport vehicles"?I'll give the wiki page a careful going-over, although I thought I had gone through all the Ops material. Obviously not. thanks,dan

[johndrago 4]

>Rob,>>quick question - does "road traffic" also include "airport>vehicles"?>>I'll give the wiki page a careful going-over, although I>thought I had gone through all the Ops material. Obviously>not. >>thanks,>dan>In FSX, they are two different settings.- John