Jump to content
Sign in to follow this  
FLEX1978

Not another FSX thread.......

Recommended Posts

Ok, Firstly this is not about what sim is better etc etc, I would just like some honest feedback from people that have used both sims (Heavily modded)I own FS9 & FSX but 99.9% of my time is flying the PMDG MD11 in FS9, everything is tweaked perfectly, I have my sim networked over three machines with a huge amount of add-ons and I have been very happy with my current setup I7 over clocked to 4ghz only 3gig of ram as I am on XP 32bit ATI 4870 512m.It's rare when it happens but last night after spending two hours in preflight and an hour into cruise Bam! the system OOMS on me. So I've been thinking I have been putting it off long enough and I should move to Windows 7 64 bit so I can upgrade with more ram and video memory. As you can imagine it's going to be a huge task getting the sim up and running after the upgrade. I am now seriously considering making a permanent switch and flying the MD11 in FSX.I have only used FSX with the default aircraft and not bothered to use any addons. So my question is what are the 'technical' advantages to moving to FSX (I dont mean eye candy) I have also read posts about issues with Active Sky (S turns etc) I have heard suggestions to turn off turbulence and other things that seem to be a step back from past simulators.So what non eye candy benefits will I gain eg flight dynamics systems etcAny input from PMDG would also be appreciated considering I will have to buy the same aircraft again.I personally wanted to wait for a FSX only Heavy jet that would force me to move, but since I am going to upgrade anyway this week any input on which way to go would be a great helpThanks


Rob Prest

 

Share this post


Link to post
As you can imagine it's going to be a huge task getting the sim up and running after the upgrade.
No I can't imagine that ;)I have the same FS2004 instalation for several years, I've changed computers and OS'es during that time and it still works. Before system reinstall backup %appdata%\Microsoft\FS9 folder, after installation set up your system so FS9 stays on the same partition letter as before, and run Flight1 registry repair tool that will restore paths in the registry. Anyway, some addons that are bound to PC configuration or made entries in registry may require reinstallation.The procedure for FSX is a bit longer, but still possible.

Mike Krawczyk

A2A Simulations

Share this post


Link to post

Personally I find it funny how many people use the term "Eye candy" and often it is the same people that have 20 addon airports that are nothing more "Technically" than eye candy. Having the need for the amount of addons will vary for you as well. Some people as mentioned have tons of AC and AP's but the default in FSX of both often replace the need for them. Some addons are great for added realism as you know using things like Topcat, but most improvements I would list would most likely get poorly recategorized as either eye or ear "Sweetener". The fact of the matter is, having say, a moving jetway can add to your experience when your FSPassengers board, making it feel more simulated and add to the overall experience, but again, the jetway thing has often been said to be nothing more than "eye candy". One thing that I do prefer in fsx is the way the shaders work. It gives a much more realistic look and feel to everything in general. When landing for example, there is a much improved depth to it. The way addon developers can implement things in FSX not able to do in FS9 also would just get put into the wrong category of eye candy as well. As far as flight dynamics, I'll yeild the floor to the more knowledgable like Ryan, Vin or Markus to maybe touch base on that.Personally, I am getting my delivery today for XP64 (downgrading from Vista64 Ult), I run several addons in fsx and am one of many that have disappearing textures seen by several vista/win7 users, so keep that in mind if you run into those problems moving forward. But regardless of your choice of flightsim, I would recommend installing it in a different directory other than default on Vista or Win7 and if possible on it's own drive. Having the networked rigs like you do will be a plus as well as you've already probably seen, but moreso since they are not in the default Program Files (x86) directory. Good luck Rob,


i9 10920x @ 4.8 ~ MSI Creator x299 ~ 256 Gb 3600 G.Skill Trident Z Royal ~ EVGA RTX 3090ti ~ Sim drive = M.2  2-TB ~ OS drive = M.2 is 512-gb ~ 5 other Samsung Pro/Evo mix SSD's ~ EVGA 1600w ~ Win 10 Pro

Dan Prunier

Share this post


Link to post

Thanks for the replies,Specifically what I am curious about is does the FSX version of the PMDG aircraft provide more functions eg better keyboard mapping for hardware, better support for Home cockpits, Multiple monitors & undocking screens etc. Has anyone flown the FS9 & FSX version? are there improvements or extra parameters for the Flight dynamics guys to work on? Getting my addons up and running shouldn't be a problem, what I find time consuming is getting my goflight panels, TRACKIR, display drivers, custom key mapping and general tweaks working the same as before, it never goes smoothly. Cheers


Rob Prest

 

Share this post


Link to post
Specifically what I am curious about is does the FSX version of the PMDG aircraft provide more functions eg better keyboard mapping for hardware, better support for Home cockpits, Multiple monitors & undocking screens etc. Has anyone flown the FS9 & FSX version? are there improvements or extra parameters for the Flight dynamics guys to work on? Cheers
Funny you should mention that. I have looked for hours in the forum for posts I know I once saw here to explain the differences of the MD-11. You may have noticed in my FSX+FS9 thread that I recently bought FS9 and a handful of addons including the MD-11 so now have it on both platforms. So far, I have not noticed any differences between the two as far as systems perform and interact with my experience. I was quite impressed actually and expected to see huge differences in logic, but can't pinpoint anything specific. Maybe it was the wing Flex, but am not at my home comps to test at the moment.Edit: I think the thread I was looking for was something actually about the cargo doors opening for FSX and not for the FS9 744f version, but I could be wrong.

i9 10920x @ 4.8 ~ MSI Creator x299 ~ 256 Gb 3600 G.Skill Trident Z Royal ~ EVGA RTX 3090ti ~ Sim drive = M.2  2-TB ~ OS drive = M.2 is 512-gb ~ 5 other Samsung Pro/Evo mix SSD's ~ EVGA 1600w ~ Win 10 Pro

Dan Prunier

Share this post


Link to post
Thanks for the replies,Specifically what I am curious about is does the FSX version of the PMDG aircraft provide more functions eg better keyboard mapping for hardware, better support for Home cockpits, Multiple monitors & undocking screens etc. Has anyone flown the FS9 & FSX version? are there improvements or extra parameters for the Flight dynamics guys to work on? Getting my addons up and running shouldn't be a problem, what I find time consuming is getting my goflight panels, TRACKIR, display drivers, custom key mapping and general tweaks working the same as before, it never goes smoothly. Cheers
A year ago, I collaborated on a project to set up triple monitors - triple views in FSX. It worked out OK but I had the distinct impression FSX was considerably more difficult/awkward than FS9 in setting up and especially, in alignment/integration of multiple views- ie compensating for bezel separation. There also was more attention needed to get acceptable performance- but in fairness, the hardware was not up to recent PC performance capabilities.Alex Reid

Share this post


Link to post
A year ago, I collaborated on a project to set up triple monitors - triple views in FSX. It worked out OK but I had the distinct impression FSX was considerably more difficult/awkward than FS9 in setting up and especially, in alignment/integration of multiple views- ie compensating for bezel separation. There also was more attention needed to get acceptable performance- but in fairness, the hardware was not up to recent PC performance capabilities.Alex Reid
Hi Alex, I use FSX and also have TripleHead2Go by Matrox. It is the best new toy I added to my arsenal ever. It has bezel management that helps me line up things perfectly. Infact I am waiting on a new monitor to be delivered as I type. I got 2 of the 3 yesterday, but in a couple hours should be running these three in 5040x1050 @ 57hz. My current set up is with one 26" and one 22" and I run them both thru it with 0 fps decrease. Of course it has it's own bugs, but nothing at all that makes it not worth having. Best FSX/FS9 purchase I have ever done. The firmware is rumored to be getting an update as well making higher resolution available, of course that would depend on your card, but finally something that makes having SLI for FSX something worth having.Edit: The three new monitors are 23" Asus thin, LED backlight LCD's "LCD 23" 2MS MS238H RT"Here is a cool video of someone with a similar setup

i9 10920x @ 4.8 ~ MSI Creator x299 ~ 256 Gb 3600 G.Skill Trident Z Royal ~ EVGA RTX 3090ti ~ Sim drive = M.2  2-TB ~ OS drive = M.2 is 512-gb ~ 5 other Samsung Pro/Evo mix SSD's ~ EVGA 1600w ~ Win 10 Pro

Dan Prunier

Share this post


Link to post
Hi Alex, I use FSX and also have TripleHead2Go by Matrox. . It has bezel management that helps me line up things perfectly. Infact I am waiting on a new monitor to be delivered as I type. I got 2 of the 3 yesterday, but in a couple hours should be running these three in 5040x1050 @ 57hz. My current set up is with one 26" and one 22" and I run them both thru it with 0 fps decrease. Of course it has it's own bugs, but nothing at all that makes it not worth having. Best FSX/FS9 purchase I have ever done. The firmware is rumored to be getting an update as well making higher resolution available, of course that would depend on your card, but finally something that makes having SLI for FSX something worth having.Edit: The three new monitors are 23" Asus thin, LED backlight LCD's "LCD 23" 2MS MS238H RT"Here is a cool video of someone with a similar setup
Dan- your quote- "It is the best new toy I added to my arsenal ever". That's what I've been telling simmers for several years. I rate triple FS views as THE #1 Add On! It changes the way you Fly!----------I use only a second video card rather than TH2Go. This allows very precise integration of the views LF,F,RF. Am I correct that TH2Go uses a standard bezel correction rather than tailored to the actual monitors being used?Either way, triple views is a winner!!!!!!!! Thanks for posting.Alex Reid

Share this post


Link to post
Specifically what I am curious about is does the FSX version of the PMDG aircraft provide more functions eg better keyboard mapping for hardware, better support for Home cockpits, Multiple monitors & undocking screens etc. Has anyone flown the FS9 & FSX version? are there improvements or extra parameters for the Flight dynamics guys to work on?
I don't have the FS9 versions of PMDG planes, but from what I understand, the differences between them and FSX variants are minor. Something about better night lightning, wingviews and real time payload manager in FSX MD-11. PMDG put much effort to make the FS9 MD-11 as functional as possible given the old sim limitations. If you are interested in modern heavy airliners and not intrested in visual improvements, then FSX addons doesn't offer more than FS2004. So far.Most of them are developed for both platforms anyway, so they have to be scaled down to limitations of FS2004.
Dan- your quote- "It is the best new toy I added to my arsenal ever". That's what I've been telling simmers for several years. I rate triple FS views as THE #1 Add On!
Really hard to miss that :(

Mike Krawczyk

A2A Simulations

Share this post


Link to post

Well I have been using fsx for awhile now and to be honest the only thing that is an improvement is the graphic's, and thats only if you have GEX, REX and Ultimate terrain, other then that not much change at all, and in some cases like weather FSX is worse. You will defiantly need fsuipc for wind smoothing. My advice is do what I do, I use both fs9 and fsx, its alot of work getting both sims set up but IMHO you can't go wrong having both, and switching to a 64 bit OS has cured all my OOM errors.


 

 

Share this post


Link to post
No I can't imagine that ;)I have the same FS2004 instalation for several years, I've changed computers and OS'es during that time and it still works. Before system reinstall backup %appdata%\Microsoft\FS9 folder, after installation set up your system so FS9 stays on the same partition letter as before, and run Flight1 registry repair tool that will restore paths in the registry. Anyway, some addons that are bound to PC configuration or made entries in registry may require reinstallation.The procedure for FSX is a bit longer, but still possible.
This does NOT work. There are far more registry entries for FS than what Flight 1's tool places there (which is just the exe path key). The sim needs to be installed from scratch, a lot of the registry entries are system specific and get created during the install and first run.

Ryan Maziarz
devteam.jpg

For fastest support, please submit a ticket at http://support.precisionmanuals.com

Share this post


Link to post

Apparently some of you don't care what the sim looks like, but yes, graphical improvements are the primary thing - I find that FSX looks much more realistic, (especially at high altitude with REX2). FS9 has that ugly cross-shaped limit on where the detailed texture area is, which is highly visible up at altitude, and the distance hazing and such is MUCH better done in FSX and looks far closer to what you see in an actual airplane looking down at the Earth through all the particulate matter in the atmosphere. The terrain texture quality and resolution is hugely better in FSX too (especially with GEX) and I can't stand how low-res the terrain in FS9 looks now compared to it. There's also a ton of improvements for the aircraft models themselves ranging from texture resolution to smooth animation support, higher poly models etc.I run my FSX install with four major addons that improve the general look of the sim - UTX, GEX, FS Genesis's 10m mesh, and REX2. It looks far better than anything you see in FS9 with similar addons.You can say graphics don't matter, but if that's the case, why bother even trying to progress? Why not just go back to FS98 and stay there? I think graphics do matter, they get us closer to simulating the actual experience of flight, which is ultimately what this is all about.


Ryan Maziarz
devteam.jpg

For fastest support, please submit a ticket at http://support.precisionmanuals.com

Share this post


Link to post
I think graphics do matter ..
Ryan, I do too. I can't imagine someone would say that "only graphics" changed - as if it were an insignificant part. I recently moved up from my old 17-year old TV to a brand new HD LCD unit. 1,000,000 times wow, what a difference!!! And the "only" thing that changed was graphics.I would say that moving from FS9 to FSX is comparable to what I experienced with my TV transition. If some can't see it I can only wonder either how they run FSX or where their eyesight is ...

Share this post


Link to post

Nobody said that graphics is unimportant, but the original question was about improvements in FSX apart from eye candy stuff. I use FSX mainly because of better graphics and more possibilities this platform gives for developers. But when I compare current addons for FS9 and FSX, then apart from better graphics, they are very similar. I'm talking now about modern airliners, with other aircraft types FSX is way ahead.

This does NOT work. There are far more registry entries for FS than what Flight 1's tool places there (which is just the exe path key). The sim needs to be installed from scratch, a lot of the registry entries are system specific and get created during the install and first run.
Apparently these extra registry setting you are writing about are not needed on my PC because it DOES work for me :( I know what Flight1's tool does, it's there mainly to help addons which get lost without this registry entry (like PMDG MD-11).

Mike Krawczyk

A2A Simulations

Share this post


Link to post

For me, one on the biggest improvements in FSX over FS9 is in its behaviour when pushing the limits. When things get busy in FS9, responsiveness drops to maintain frame rates, this means it might look pretty, but it becomes unflyable. In FSX in the same situation, the frame rates are dropped first, which keeps the aircraft smooth and responsive and so flyable, even if not quite as pretty. If all your time is spent in airliners with the AP engaged or if you have great hardware, then this wont matter to you and the FS9/FSX choice is simply which looks prettiest where you want to fly. (With REX2, UTX, etc, I have to give the nod to FSX for looks but accept others have different opinions.) If, however, you like to hand-fly and don't have an i7 rig, or if you prefer the feel of the plane to the looks, then I have to say FSX gives a better 'feel' and a greater sense of 'being there'.

Share this post


Link to post

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
Sign in to follow this  
  • Tom Allensworth,
    Founder of AVSIM Online


  • Flight Simulation's Premier Resource!

    AVSIM is a free service to the flight simulation community. AVSIM is staffed completely by volunteers and all funds donated to AVSIM go directly back to supporting the community. Your donation here helps to pay our bandwidth costs, emergency funding, and other general costs that crop up from time to time. Thank you for your support!

    Click here for more information and to see all donations year to date.
×
×
  • Create New...