What do you think the best one or two GA payware a/c are, and why?

Try anything from FSD:http://www.fsd-international.com/they have great single and twin engine GA planesand Real Air's Sf260http://www.realairsimulations.com/The sf260 has perhaps one of the best flight models for a single engine aircraft.Why? Both have excellent flight models, great panels and excellent visual models.

The SF.260 by RealAir Simulations is my absolute favourite! Perfect handling, perfect visuals, and the bubble canopy offers a great view of the landscape around you. I've spent more time in this plane than in any other.Number 2 and 3 on my personal list are Dreamfleet's Piper Archer II and Cessna 177 Cardinal. Both wonderful planes, and they seem to be close to the real thing. 2D and 3D cockpits are a pleasure to use, and both are fine looking birds. I also love their forum, because there is quite some talk on real world flying.The only FSD plane I own is the Super Cub, and that's a great one as well. The virtual cockpit is sharp like a knife, a work of art!These four planes have in common what a great GA plane needs in my oppinione: outstanding virtual cockpit (needed for VFR), extremely good handling, and a matching exterior just for the pleasure of looking at it.Just my 2c (EUR),VOlker :]

Along with the excellent planes already mentioned above, if you're into modern avionics and high performance: take a good look at the Flight1 Meridian. Single engine Turboprop with a set of highly advanced, well-integrated avionics. As with any such complex add-ons, it does require a quite a hefty system, though.Edit: http://www.flight1.com/esd-products.asp?product=esdmer

For the why, it comes down to quality of aircraft, flight dynamics etc.For the list (in no particular order):Anything by FSDAnything by DreamFleetFlight1 C421 and MeridianRealAir Simulations SF260Of these the DF Archer and Cessna 421C are ahead by a hair, but there's not much in it, so I can't limit it to two choices. Any and all are worth every penny/cent.Alastair

The Carenado Piper Dakota belongs on this list.

I have the FSD 115TC, the FSD 421C, the SF.260, and the new Flight1 Meridian. All are great airplanes; I don't fly the 115TC much anymore but I definitely got my $'s worth out of it (it was my first payware airplane purchase). Lately all I've been flying is the Meridian - I love all the toys in the cockpit and also the flight model. The SF.260 has great panels and externals, and as noted elsewhere is apparently the only FS airplane that can do reasonably authentic spins. I used it a lot late last year for practice when I was working on my instrument rating. The 421's virtual cockpit work of art... Heck all of these airplanes are works of art, and it probably boils down to what you want to experience. Lately I have been tending toward the higher-performance singles, since I have some chance of getting to fly them IRL someday. I also like highly accurate avionics, which is of course where the Meridian shines - almost every instrument in it is custom-made for the airplane (exceptions being the ADF and, um, I think it's the DME that's the other exception) and interoperates beautifully, far exceeding any GA airplane's avionics that I've seen in FS so far.Good luck,Dave Blevins

On which ones of those would my computer(733mHz, 512SDRAM, GeForce 4 MX 64mb PCI, Windows ME) get OK frame rates on?

For VFR "hop in and go for a flight".. I like the Cardinal, Piper Archer, and SF260 Marchetti. Each of them have flawless cockpits and realistic and benign flight performance. For cross country traditional IFR, the Marchetti, with nicely readable instruments in both 2d and VC cockpits and a little more cruising speed. And you can do some aerobatics en route if you feel in the mood..For "state of the art" avionics, including moving map GPS.. the Meridian is the one to have.. glass cockpit, turboprop engine, a true $2M toy.. This one will keep you busy a long time, especially if you have already mastered traditional VOR to VOR navigation and are ready for the next challenge..

Flight1 MeridianAnything made by DreamfleetRealAir SF.260

I'd like to add the Globe Swift, by Bill Lyons Golden Eagles. The standard model is rather antique wich is what I love about it and is pretty well as it would have been around 1946. Theres also an "updated" version with modern avionics and a souped up engine. The part of this plane in my opnion is the amount of personality it has and its unique character. There is nothing elkse quite like this.The panels are a bit spartin, but not to a disservice, its perfect the way it is, as simple or as complicated as youd like to have it. The DVC is better than I've seen else where, made by the guy who pretty much invented the DVC, I remember freware Pipers for FS2000 and fs98 with moving gauges and yokes by Bill Lyons. give it a lookHaving funGrey_Wolf

I have a 1000 MHz Duron with 512 MB RAM and a GeForce3 Ti200, and both the SF.260 and the Dreamfleet planes are very friendly to my framerates. The Cessna 421 (Flight1) produces noticeable slowdowns, and it seems that my system is about the slowest that could run the Meridian, with some tweaking - although I haven't tried it yet.Just my 2c (EUR),VOlker :]

All of Bill Lyons Clasic Customs packages!!WhyAbout the most bang for your dollar that you can get!!http://www.enter.net/photoalbum/data/reddog/551867.jpgSceenshots and Pics athttp://community.webshots.com/user/reddog18951USMC Retired

My favorite GA aircraft is the FSD International Cheyenne 400 LS. It is a twin, but a sweet flying aircraft. Steve Small and company truely know how to build aircraft for FS 2002 in terms of flight dynamics and visuals...Stay away from the Twin Otter from LAGO. I didn't like it. It is a hog on resources and the aircraft is a dog in my opinion.It doesn't have a water rudder. (Which that is way it is in real life). No retractable gear. It is hard to manuever in the water compared to the Cessna Caravan and John Woodwards Lake Renegade (Which is a sweet airplane and is FREE) I think you can do just as good with FreeWare on this one..I wish you could fly Payware aircraft before plunking down the $15 - 20.Barry

The FSD Seneca gets my vote for the best GA FS plane. IMO it is about as close to flying the real one as is possible to make for a home Computer. Awe inspiring handling, beautiful Exterior and Panel, and the DDMP (digital data monitoring panel) is great for setting power. The accurate single engine performance makes it possible to practice realistic single engine work.Next would be the FSD Cheyenne. Superb flying qualities, very fast, excellent panel layout and readability and absolutely no flaws in this aircraft, none at all!I have the 421C but have a hard time reading the guages on the main panel on my 17" monitor and the pop up set makes the panel look like a cartoon with everything out of scale in size. But it flies great and looks excellent, This is then relegated to third on my list.Ken