Hello there, AVSIM.I'm planning to get back into Flight Sim after a long absence (haven't played for about six years, with FS2004) and am wondering what the 'essential addons' are for FSX.FSX seems like a much more solid 'base' than FS2004, but I can't believe that an MSFS doesn't need a fair ammount of third party stuff to get it up to standard. I'm looking for general updates (texture updates, utilities, AI, etc) rather than things like scenery packs for specific areas. So far my shopping list is;FSX GoldFS Global 2008Aerosoft Flightsim Commander XWould you guys suggest anything else (freeware or payware) to add to this?I'm also looking for a plane or two, ranging from light twin to twin-engined turboprop/jet airliners (preferably ones at the smaller end of the scale). I'm looking at;The RealAir Duke B60 which everyone seems to rate as excellent, but is a little smaller than what I was hoping for, and;Flight1's ATR 72-500 which appears excellently researched, but I can't find much in the way of opinions on it.Any help would be very much welcome.Cheers,Jon

If you like turboprops, take a look at PMDG's Bae J4100...a very good (and small) airliner.Other "essentials" include REX (for clouds, sky, weather, and certain ground textures), GEX (for terrain textures), and UTX (for further landscape enhancements).

Fantastic! Thanks, Rudi - that plane's exactly the sort of thing I'm looking for. REX, GEX and UTX look pretty good too, will take a good look at them.

Radar Contact canned ATC. I concur with REX. Aerosoft's Flight Keeper is useful, but not quite in the can't live without category.

Hardware, hardware, hardware. Today's best add-ons are brought to their knees with low-end controls. Essential to FSX: a good joystick or yoke with throttle and rudder pedals. Yes you can fly without them, but you end up being limited. I also reccommend the TrackIR or whatever headtracking device you prefer. Granted, it's not for everyone, but it's worth the try-out.Freeware essential: AISmooth and FSUIPC. Jeff ShylukSenior Staff ReviewerAVSIM

Take FS Global 2010 instead of FS Global 2008.Check ORBX / FTX sceneries. This is the best scenery technology you can get nowadays.

I'd recommend the Flight1/Digital Aviation Fokker 70/100In my 'umble opinion it's the best little jet you can get for FSX. Ian

Woohoo I love these posts: spend other people's money hahaRealAir DukeFlight1 Citation MustangPMDG J41those are all extremely high quality addons... the J41 and Mustang don't go very fast and cruise in the lower flight levels. The Duke can go pretty high with a pressurized cabin but probably only 240ktas up there.One of the best aircraft released to date is the Lotus L39 - incredible systems modeling, great FPS, and awesome night lighting effectshttp://lotussim.com/features-intro.htmlAs far as general scenery addons go, I'd look at Ultimate Terrain X, and Ground Environment Xhttp://www.flight1.com/products.asp?product=FL1-UXU-001http://www.flight1.com/products.asp?product=FL1-GEX-001For weather generators and textures, ASX and FEXhttp://www2.hifisim.com/node/4http://www.flight1.com/products.asp?product=flt1fexFor AI traffic there is "do it yourself" freeware, World of AI, or payware - Ultimate Traffic II or Mytraffic 2010

Joystick/yoke, rudder pedals and hardware throttles - and FSUIPC to be able to calibrate them properly.

FSUIPC registered is an absolute must in my book to be able to manage input devices tied to aircraft type, and then the extras such as macros and ability to send data to gauges.It's a swiss army knife for FSX.

There's great freeware aircraft out there too. Here's what in my hangar:- Dreamwings EMB170 (US Airways, Jet Blue) and Dash 8 (US Airways)- ProjectOpensky and Kitty Hawk 737's are all good.- IFDG's Airbus A319 and A320 (US Airways)- SGA/Vistaliner MD80 (American)- HJG/Vistaliner 727 (American)- FFX/SGA 737-300 (US Airways)This site (http://www.flightsimulatorguide.com/reviews/aircraft/index.php) reviews many freeware and payware, but if you use it as a guide you can download files that loop directly back to Avsim's site. Just find the Aircraft manufacturer you want, then the aircraft model, and download.Hope that helps!

Brilliant, thanks a lot guys. I'm sure you get a lot of n00b posts like this around here and it's great that you take the time to answer them. Once I know my way around FSX (when I get hold of it) I'll be sure to do my best to help others out in future.OK, so this is starting to stretch my budget. ;) For the moment I'm going to have to skimp on the hardware side of it - TrackIR and seperate controls are something I'm going to have to get later on. For the moment, I was thinking of one of those all-in-one HOTAS setups with the rudder on the throttle rather than the twist-grip - either the Thrustmaster HOTAS setup or this 'Black Widow' thing (looks fairly robust). If anyone's got any experience with either of them, let us know.So, in terms of a new weather system, the options are REX2 or Active Sky X - I was considering going for REX simply 'cos it has a built-in flight planner and would mean I could hold of getting a dedicated one (like Flight Commander X). Does that seem reasonable, or is the REX planner not robust enough?Radar Contact ATC's definitely going on the list. For scenery I think I'm going to get hold of UTX Europe - if I've got one scenery area (the one I'm most familiar with) in high detail I guess I don't need something like FS Global 10 or GEX for the time being.Thanks again for all the help,Jon

Brilliant, thanks a lot guys. I'm sure you get a lot of n00b posts like this around here and it's great that you take the time to answer them. Once I know my way around FSX (when I get hold of it) I'll be sure to do my best to help others out in future.OK, so this is starting to stretch my budget. ;) For the moment I'm going to have to skimp on the hardware side of it - TrackIR and seperate controls are something I'm going to have to get later on. For the moment, I was thinking of one of those all-in-one HOTAS setups with the rudder on the throttle rather than the twist-grip - either the Thrustmaster HOTAS setup or this 'Black Widow' thing (looks fairly robust). If anyone's got any experience with either of them, let us know.So, in terms of a new weather system, the options are REX2 or Active Sky X - I was considering going for REX simply 'cos it has a built-in flight planner and would mean I could hold of getting a dedicated one (like Flight Commander X). Does that seem reasonable, or is the REX planner not robust enough?Radar Contact ATC's definitely going on the list. For scenery I think I'm going to get hold of UTX Europe - if I've got one scenery area (the one I'm most familiar with) in high detail I guess I don't need something like FS Global 10 or GEX for the time being.Thanks again for all the help,Jon

For an alternative to Radar Contact you could also try Pro Flight Emulator http://www.oncourse-software.co.uk/Bryan.

Remember UTX/GEX/FTX are location specific so you have to plan to spend sim time in the areas covered before they do any good. I spend a lot of time in Asia, and there isn't much in the way of addons for FSX there. Freeware pretty much rules.scott s..

I cannot recommend REX highly enough. Great textures to really enhance FSX.Then I say get both UTX and GEX. They work great together and really make the ground look great.Then get Radar Contact to replace the horrible default ATC. This is probably the most important thing, since the default ATC is just dreadful.Find the free-ware program AI Smooth to help solve some issues when you have a high traffic setup.REX comes with a weather generator, but if you want something a bit more, try Active Sky. ASX works fine. ASA is the new version, and has some issues with it.If you want realistic flight planning, then Flightsim Commander is great. Especially if you get a subscription with Navigraph. FS Build is an alternative, produces a nice Flight Plan nav log, and works with Acitve Sky to give you weather reports, but is very hard to use and not easy to update the data. The REX flight planner is very sub-par in my opinion. Worse than the default one. Go with FSC over REX for flightplanning, for sure.Then if you want aircraft, you can't go wrong with PMDG or Level-D. They are quality, and have wide support. If you fly these birds, then I highly recommend getting a navigraph subscription to keep the FMCs up to date, or at least buy one FMC update from them. Also give Topcat a look. It is a great tool to set up loadsheets, flight reports, landing and takeoff data. I cannot recommend Topcat enough.Happy flying!