HiI am interesting in this plane for FS9. May I ask a few thing:- overall fps and smoothness/stutters, considering there is only a VC and no 2D- start-up options: can you start with the engines running and the IRS/FMC aligned?- flight dynamics: realistic?- FMC: how much is it detailed: CI, pseudo-waypoints?- wing views?- compatibility with active camera- is the V3.5 (for NG and -900ER) much better?ThanksGhiom

It's very smooth on frame rates with no stutters for me. Actually there are 2D panels on the FS9 version, it is the FSX version which has only the FMC as a 2D panel, the FS9 one has numerous pop up 2D panels, although you don't really need them as the virtual cockpit is nice to fly from. But it is worth noting that the FS9 VC is not quite as functional as the FSX VC, for example, you can click the mouse or roll the mouse wheel to change dials on the FSX VC's Mode Control Paanel, but in the FS9 VC, it is mouse clicks only to alter those dials.Yes you can start with stuff aligned and running, but it tends to be better to start with it cold and crank it up from there.The flight dynamics are excellent. Keep in mind that this is just my opinion as I've only ever really flown much smaller aircraft in real life and never a Boeing 737, but I think the Ariane 737s come across as 'believable' in terms of flight dynamics.The FMC is not completely functional. It is not a 'lite' version of an FMC however, because you do have to use it properly with the functions it does have and there are not too many things missing, unless you want to do offset cruise tracks and drift down stuff. Which means it is entirely usable for normal operations in most respects. ACARS and DFDAU are non functional, as is the Fix page, although you can manually enter waypoints on it to use in lieu of fixes, but they will not be as flexible as a fix done in the manner of a real FMC because you cannot put range rings around them. Only about half the Airports in FS have SID/STAR data at present although that is set to change very soon, with Navigraph supporting Ariane's products. Again, until that happens you can manually program in SIDs and STARs as part of a flight plan to get around any missing SIDs whilst awaiting that Navigraph fix, but doing it that way is of course not as flexible as having a complete procedural database.The FS9 Ariane 737 does not have anything rearwards of the forward Galley modeled, so there is no cabin from which to have a wing view. You could of course manually place a camera on the wing in more or less that position, but there certainly is no menu preset view from the wing.I don't have Active Camera, so I have no idea whether it is compatible with it.V3.5 is something of an improvement, but it's not hugely different in terms of changes. Overall the Ariane FS9 737 is a nice add-on, probably amongst the best for FS9 since it is only 29 quid, and it has a lot of novel features such as a drivable pushback truck, windows that ice up if you don't set up the overhead properly. It's not as good as the more expensive FSX 737, but then again it is half the price of that.Some pics of the Ariane FS9 737-800:That last shot shows it dropping to around 30FPS with absolutely everything cranked up on ATI Catalyst and all the sliders to the right in FS9; that was on a single core Pentium P4 with 3 gigs of RAM.Al

Al you seem to be clued up about the Ariane fleet and have an unbiased veiw toward them so if you dont mind me asking a couple of questions Is it worth replacing the PMDG 737 with the Ariane version for FS9 ?I know PMDG are working on the new NGX , but it is not written in stone that it will be for FS9, and secondly if it is I doubt it will be for the same price Do they still operate the same "questionable" policy regarding repaints ?I dont want to start another discussion about Ariane in general, the search engine will supply enough opinions to last a lifetime , I am just curious about a comparison with what I already own .My apologies to the OP for posting my questions in your thread Mark

I personally prefer the Ariane 737-800 which I have for FS9 to the PMDG 737-600/700 I have for FS9. Not everyone would agree with my reasons for that however, so don't take that at purely face value. The main reason is that the PMDG 737's VC is not that great. It was at the time it came out, but it's a bit long in the tooth these days and whilst it is certainly still a usable aircraft, it pays the price for having been the innovator when things come along later that push to envelope a bit more.Having said that, the PMDG 737's FMC is more akin to the real thing than the Ariane's FMC, so the choice kind of comes down to exactly how much of a 'rivet counter' you are in terms of what you like to do in FS. The Ariane's FMC will let you do most things that a fairly hard core simmer likes to indulge in, but the PMDG's FMC will let you do a little more, plus it has a larger database of procedural stuff. As noted in the above post, you can work around that with the Ariane 737 if you are not a stickler for absolute realism, and if you are of that ilk, then you will be driving something which has a prettier and more usable virtual cockpit.That's the gist of why I prefer the Ariane FS9 737 to the PMDG one, but it's not the only thing to consider...Here's where the decision gets a bit trickier: Ariane do indeed still offer only limited paint jobs in their base packages, and that I am not a fan of. They get a lot of stick from people for that as you probably know, and whilst I'm no fan of it, I recognise that it is their choice to do that, so even though I'm not a fan of that approach, I won't have a dig at them for it other than to say it's not what I would do.But on a practical note, it does swing things back PMDG's way in terms of choice, since you can cheerfully find repaints aplenty for their aircraft and there are in fact a lot of them on the disk you get the original PMDG 737 with. But the reason I still favour the Ariane is because I am perfectly happy to reverse engineer their textures for my own personal use to create my own 'paint kit', thus being able to paint the things up for myself, so the lack of liveries is less of a stumbling block for me than it would be for many others who do not indulge in repainting. This is why in my forthcoming review of Ariane's FSX 737, I mark that as a minus point, because when reviewing something, one has to consider the 'everyman' point of view as well as one's own.Incidentally, I think the Ariane has a better flight model than the PMDG, but that's a personal view too, and I'll admit that there is not a lot in it between the two. For 29 quid I think it is worth a punt if you are prepared to accept the FMC limitations, since there are a lot of things it can do which the PMDG one cannot, so it is not all 'downhill' in terms of functionality over pretty VCs. But keep in mind that if you don't indulge in repainting, you might be getting your hand in your pocket again, which makes that 29 quid price tag not quite so attractive as it at first might appear.Al

Cheers AlI would'nt describe myself as a rivet counter , and to be honest as real as it gets as far as I am concerned ,is being on a flight deck back in the day when all you had to do was ask the pretty ladies :( Repainting is not a concern as such , I have been known to dabble .I am like most simmers in as much as I like to fly the aircraft with the livery of my choice, usually made easy by a supplied paintkit , but as you say that is a limitation that I am now aware of should I choose to buy .Again the flight model is something I am hardly in a position to comment about , unless it is a passengers point of view , but I think it is fair to presume that PMDG would not be too far off the mark.I have used the PMDG 737 for a few years now and to be honest your comments about the VC are valid, I suppose that is one of the reasons why I proposed my questions in the first place.Guess I am left with two choices really , either wait for the PMDG 737 and hope it is released for FS9, or take a chance on Ariane and make my own mind up .And to be fair 29 quid wont buy you a decent hangover any more :( Mark

Thank you very much for this feedback.Too bad the VC texture quality is very poor according to my criterias...Ghiom

Thank you very much for this feedback.Too bad the VC texture quality is very poor according to my criterias...Ghiom

No way! The Ariane VC textures are without a doubt one of the best around!Wolfgang

Don't you feel that the VC gauge refresh rate is unbearably low? That's what I gathered from the available youtube videos.

It's not what I would call unbearably low in my opinion. It is true the gauges don't refresh as well as the ones in the FSX version, but they are perfectly usable on my computer. Others may disagree with that and they are free to do so, but frankly I find that you can pretty much throw anything at FS9 and it will still keep kicking out high FPS.As an aside, I think it is always risky forming opinions from Youtube videos; anyone who has ever used FRAPs to capture a video of a 3D app will tell you that it plays havoc with frame rates and can easily create the impression that something runs a lot slower than it does when not writing a huge FRAPs file (and they are huge).I like the Ariane FS9 737 and as Mark points out in the above post, it can be had for less than the price of a night in the pub. But I'm not forcing anyone else to like it for the reasons I do, it's entirely up to them. Al

Don't you feel that the VC gauge refresh rate is unbearably low? That's what I gathered from the available youtube videos.

The VC gauge refresh rates are terrible (at least with the version I had for FS9, I have no use for FSX). I was once one of the one's who praised this add-on when I had my old machine and couldn't run the PMDG 737 in VC mode. After getting my new machine it was clear who the winner was. My biggest gripe before recently was the VC gauge refresh rate. You can really see the problem on today's faster machines. After flying in the real bird a couple of weeks ago I made it a point to go in the cockpit and site down and really take everything in. Surprisingly PMDG nailed the VC hands down over Ariane. Everything from the color of the panel to the thickness of the window beams is very accurate. When you site in the real bird it's pretty much what PMDG delivered. Ariane's VC is too light in color, big in your face forward panel, and looking around it more so reminds me of a cross between the -300 series and the NG series. Even the older 737's aren't as light as what's portrayed in Ariane's model. Now I will say the seats in the PMDG model are a little small and site a bit too low but adjusting the eyepoint properly gives one an accurate portrayal of the real bird (only possible in the PMDG VC).The biggest gripe with PMDG's birds I have was the engines don't have the proper power they should. The values were correct but the in sim performance was lacking to say the least. Getting out of KMDW almost had me out of usable runway and I'm pretty sure I hit the blast fence with my wheels upon liftoff. NG's fly from KMDW as far as KSAN so I knew this wasn't right. We had a full load from KMSP to KMCO and climbed all the way to 41,000ft without issue on an Airtran flight a couple of weeks ago. The real 737's are very efficient performers especially the NG series and they have no problem taking off from fields like KMDW with full tanks. The straw that broke the camel's back for me with Ariane (despite all I've wrote here I would have still used the BBJ as there were no other options out there) was their reactivation process. No matter what if you need to reinstall your product for whatever reason it's going to cost you a fee. My installation got corrupted on my new box requiring me to reinstall most of my planes. Ariane asked for another fee outside of what I had just paid when I got my new computer leaving me cold on the add-on and the company behind it. Activation was already a problem but a fee with every reinstall where they take a few days to get back to you was too much.Ariane has a flawed product that at the least would be better served if they updated the VC gauge refresh rate. Visually the VC is inaccurate based on the real bird and the external model is not totally right itself. I'm looking forward to the NGX with bending wings because if you've ever seen Posky's NG series in flight you really see how beautiful these birds are to look at. The 737-800/900 are the most awesome to see in the real world with their bending wings which is not present on the Ariane model. PMDG hit the nail on the head with their offering especially when you look at when it was released. My advice to anyone is to save their money concerning Ariane. If anything they should fix the VC gauge refresh rate then the add-on would at least be usable. I wouldn't touch it with slide show gauge performance as that's a huge show stopper for me... :(

As an aside, I think it is always risky forming opinions from Youtube videos; anyone who has ever used FRAPs to capture a video of a 3D app will tell you that it plays havoc with frame rates and can easily create the impression that something runs a lot slower than it does when not writing a huge FRAPs file (and they are huge).Al

I wish this were true but Ariane's gauge performance is that terrible for real... :(

If the thing ran terribly on my computer, I would have said so, just as you have reported it does not perform well on yours. Both are valid opinions based on user experiences, but you don't see me quoting parts of your post and adding 'talk to the hand' emoticons after my comments, intimating that what is being said is untrue, do you?Feel free to express your opinions and experiences, but please don't stamp all over mine as though they are of no consequence in comparison to your own.Al

This thread i feel is going to go down the same tired line of detractors and advocates of Ariane.I personally asked for Al's opinion because , having read his previous coments about Ariane and other products, he at least tries to give a balanced view of the product in question.The sad thing is with Ariane products they always seem to generate the same type of thread.DillonThe subject you raised about reactivation is another thing that I suppose someone like me should consider when thinking about purchasing , and to be honest between that and the fact that there is no paintkit available ,to me are two major reasons not to purchase.As for the VC guage refresh rate , well I am never going to know untill i try , and lets be honest , no to PC's are the same .I have always tried to research my purchaces before commiting , especially considering I went head first and bought the Abacus A380 (lesson learnt).But Ariane , Man !!I really am still sitting on the fence about this one , I have probably spent as much in bandwidth reading about this aircraft as what it would to just buy the thing.I suppose the best thing I can do is either grab a cushion and go and park my a@*e back on the garden gate or just buy and try Mark *stuck on a fence*

If you are undecided then it is worth considering that there is another option besides the Ariane or PMDG if you want an NG for FS9. You can take either the default FS 737-400, the Fifty North 737, or perhaps the Wilco/PIC one and 'soup it up'. The 737-800 is essentially a modernised 737-400 and apart from the beefed up landing gear it is much the same externally (not identical, but close enough to suffice). Not certain, but I think there may be a POSKY NG you could tart up too.There are a few add-on instrument packages kicking around that would enable you to create such a thing, or, you could get hold of FS Panel Studio (which is about the same price as the Ariane 737 for FS9) and use that to create an NG panel. Alternatively, you could get a freeware NG panel (I think there are one or two kicking about). For most if not all of those options you would probably be in the realms of 2D stuff, but it would at least let you make something that had everything you particularly wanted in terms of instrumentation.Al

If the thing ran terribly on my computer, I would have said so, just as you have reported it does not perform well on yours. Both are valid opinions based on user experiences, but you don't see me quoting parts of your post and adding 'talk to the hand' emoticons after my comments, intimating that what is being said is untrue, do you?Feel free to express your opinions and experiences, but please don't stamp all over mine as though they are of no consequence in comparison to your own.Al

Al I meant no offense. The only reason I used that emoticon was I couldn't find anything else that expressed what I was trying to say. 'Talk to the Hand' wasn't what I was going for it was more so the expression on the emoticon's face. Anyway I was just commenting on what you were stating and offering up my experiences nothing more... Speaking of performance on both computers I actually spoke with Ariane on the gauge issue and they stated they purposely developed the add-on to function that way. This has nothing to do with differences in computers. This add-on came out when FS9 was new on the market. They wanted this product to work not only on high end machines but also low end machines of the time. Problem is they never included a utility that allowed the user to adjust the gauges as hardware got faster and could handle the load. So no matter if you have a computer that's old as FS9 or a newer one the gauges are going to perform the same. Now it becomes a case of all of our tolerance levels. I for one can't stand it... Ariane I guess didn't want what I found to be a problem on my older computer. PMDG's NG couldn't run well in the VC on my original FS9 rig without problems. It wasn't until a PC I bought a little over a year ago allowed me to finally enjoy PMDG's 737. Later work like PMDG's 744 seemed a little better in performance on my old rig but the NG was a beast. Ariane was my option on my older PC and I was looking forward to fully enjoying it as well when I got my new rig. I didn't expect to see the same gauge performance geared to my old hardware. I look at options like Feelthere who offered a tool to adjust the gauge refresh rates (PMDG did the same thing now that I think of it although nothing helped me on my old box) which allowed the add-on to be scalable with on going advances in hardware. Ariane flat out refused to add a similar tool to their product so here we are. It was mentioned to them... Like I stated everyone has their tolerance levels. The Ariane NG is useless to me in it's current condition in FS9. You put that on top of the fact it doesn't have a realistic look in the VC, it's a no go option. I do like some aspects of it and would in some ways recommend it as an alternative but the gauge refresh rate kills it right at the hanger door (also remember support from Ariane is horrible and everything is usually your fault)...

I have the FS9 737-700, not the 737-800, but since they are probably more or less the same, my two cents:Concerning the VC, I found the VC textures below my standard. Patches were blurry, and although it was readable, it was not nice to look at. The gauges' refresh rate is quite bad in my system, but I have to admit my FS9 is growing big and old and if ollaing apart, so I'm not sure performace on my system is really to be trusted.Concerning view points: The 737-700 I have has this amazing thing called "Dynamic eyepoint". It gives you a menu of camera postion options, and with that you can choose where you want the camera to be: thic includes views such as wingviews, but also a view from just behind the main landing gear. It really is awesome and it works very well. By the way, on the website it's noted that the download version doesn't include sounds: IT DOES. There is absolutely no need to buy a separate set of sounds from Ariane! Honestly, these are the best sounds I ever heard, and it is an exhilerating experience to hear the engines spool up with these sounds.I'm sold to the Ariane now. The PMDG 737 is below the Ariane in many respects, in my opinion. Not just in system completeness, but also in accuracy of the model and inovatory features, such as the possibility to take control of the pushback tug and push your own plane out of the gate.All of that aside, I'll probab ly buy the PMDG NG 2.0 when it comes out, provided it has a FS9 version. The Ariane lacks something I want it to have: a way to save and load panel states. The PMDG 737NG 2.0 will that, making it the perfect plane for the longer 737 flights. Of course, Ariane will stay for the shorter 737 flights.I think it's rather funny: i used to be all against Ariane, because I heard so many bad things about them. Now, not only I have one of their planes, it's also one of my favorites and I wrote an article for FlightsimulatorXWorld detailing why I think Ariane is a lot better than most people think.Al: as a side note, I noticed an Air Holland aircraft taxiing around on one of your screenshots. That airline has been dead for god knows how many years. Aah, nostalgia :-)