Hi allHere are my views on programs listed below.Tile proxy brilliant- but over time will drive you round the bend,never remains stable from one week to the nextORBX-PNW-Cannot understand what all the fuss is about,not impressed! Megascenery earth-some good ,others bad ,you might just get the lot if you win a lotterySIM SAVVY-i cannot understand why such a good deal that this is hasn't recieved much recognition on the forumsif you dont get this your missing out bigtime on quality scenery, price, and quantity,34 us states.Ijust want to give sim savvy the recognition it deserves i am thrilled with it.I have bought and viewed all of the above -just my opinionDon

Thanks for your opinion :(

So, the only conclusion i can come to is you love photo scenery. I gave up on photo scenery a long time ago, has anything changed in the last couple of years? Flying at 800' AGL was always a blurry mess (in fact it never looked good below 3-4000' AGL ) no autogen completely killed any immersion, the novelty wore off very quickly. No atmosphere whatsoever. What's different now? I checked out some screenshots and it looks like the same old story but with higher resolutions. I prefer the sort of thing ORBX are doing by a long way, you can get totally immersed in the scenery at any altitude. It's not like you're just flying over a picture. Feel free to correct my ignorance but i don't see the appeal of photoscenery for the low and slow crowd.

I appreciate your opinion Don, but I've never seen Tile Proxy or Sim Savvy scenery look good below a few thousand feet AGL. Plus, I tried flying without autogen when FSX first came out, and I just couldn't do it. So much immersion and realism lost. That's only my opinion, of course, and yours is just as relevant as mine.

I don't own ORBX PNW yet, but I would sure say that is looks better than any other available options, MegaSceneryEarth included, but MSE would be my next choice if PNW wasn't available.I agree that MegaSceneryEarth is pretty hit or miss. My first two purchases were 2 South Florida tiles and they didn't look good at all. It took me a while before I tried any others, but some of their work isn't too bad for the money. As far as Sim Savvy goes, I agree that it is a good deal for what you get, however I dont buy it because of three things: No night textures, no autogen, not the highest resolution possible. I would be willing to give it a shot if it included night textures, but I do a lot of flights that start at dusk and go into the night, so I need to have scenery that works in both night and day.Since your from Australia, have you tried the ORBX products for your area? And if so, were you impressed with it?

Personally, I think that default autogen is overrated. Combine that with the rubbish default urban textures, and you have the biggest immersion killer of the lot. Decent photographic scenery like Horizon VFR Generation X Version 2 England and Wales (1.2m per pixel texture resolution, and 5 metre mesh) looks good right down to 250 metres, and the view higher than that can be breathtaking.Seriously, the repeating pattern of generic terrain textures is the best way of letting your brain know that what you are seeing is NOT real. Add a few cardboard boxes that appear to be scattered haphazardly across the landscape, and the illusion of realism is killed stone dead.

I agree Christopher. I buy most sceneries available, including all the Orbx stuff and the megascenery and SimSavvy. Each has their plus points. I do agree with greengrass about Sim Savvy stuff though, its fantastic value for money, less than $18 per state. I think he is even going to include the east coast in the price as well...However, Orbx stuff looks just as bad as good photoscenery close up, unless you are at the small and expensive airports using 7cm textures. The other thing I cant understand is why so many people love autogen so much. Nearly all the buildings are misplaced, out of scale and cartoony looking, ditto the trees. This is just a complete killer of the illusion for me. My photosceneries look virtually real as I fly around, and thats what I want, I dont want repeating textures and pop up buildings, so I turn my autogen off. No matter how good the scenery, even the best does not look real close up. 99% of the flight is at more than 1500AGL and at that distance, I can tell you that my photoscnery beats all other stuff hands down. I have no axe to grind, unlike you guys who only use one type and poo poo the other, I have and fly both and I know what looks best for me. All of the above is only my personal opinion of course and we all fly our sims how we like. I think Orbx technology is the way forward, and look forward to what they produce, but most nights when I sit down and decide where I usually end up choosing photoscenery areas.....Cheers, Mark

I used to fly only photoscenery for some of the reasons mentioned here. What I found frustrating though was there were just relatively "small" areas available, or Tileproxy with the internet connections and often speed restrictions.I am enthusiastic about Sim Savvy-the whole US for a reasonable price-and it is all there. There are some areas of the scenery that are not great, and water is hit an miss. Where it is good though-it is extremely good-and with the whole US(eventually and almost now) there is much of the good to explore-and it is no fuss. For flying at night the generics are fine-I just use them if night flying is required.As for Orbx Pnw-for me this is the ultimate future. I always thought the autogen looked cartoony and fake in the past-but finally the buildings, houses and trees have a look of reality,placement, and for the first time I enjoy autogen. Also the seasons look realistic (I always before only flew the sim in summer as that looked the most real to me-no longer in pnw). It also uses photoscenery for important stuff so you get the best of both worlds. I find it looks very sharp down low-does everyone have their texture settings turned up? The remaining issue for me in all sceneries is runways-they are not shiny and neon in rw like they are presented in the sim. I look forward to the day runways are done with photoscenery instead with all their different and individual pecularities..

I'm with Christopher and Mark on this. The Horizon UK photoscenery gives me the best sense of immersion. As for other areas, I often do without autogen, both for the performance boost and the fact that it often just irritates - all those fir trees in London, for one! I've been thinking of FS Altitude as well, but i've only ever seen one rather mixed review of it. Does anyone here have any experience of this product?Ian

I used to fly only photoscenery for some of the reasons mentioned here. What I found frustrating though was there were just relatively "small" areas available, or Tileproxy with the internet connections and often speed restrictions.I am enthusiastic about Sim Savvy-the whole US for a reasonable price-and it is all there. There are some areas of the scenery that are not great, and water is hit an miss. Where it is good though-it is extremely good-and with the whole US(eventually and almost now) there is much of the good to explore-and it is no fuss. For flying at night the generics are fine-I just use them if night flying is required.As for Orbx Pnw-for me this is the ultimate future. I always thought the autogen looked cartoony and fake in the past-but finally the buildings, houses and trees have a look of reality,placement, and for the first time I enjoy autogen. Also the seasons look realistic (I always before only flew the sim in summer as that looked the most real to me-no longer in pnw). It also uses photoscenery for important stuff so you get the best of both worlds. I find it looks very sharp down low-does everyone have their texture settings turned up? The remaining issue for me in all sceneries is runways-they are not shiny and neon in rw like they are presented in the sim. I look forward to the day runways are done with photoscenery instead with all their different and individual pecularities..

I agree with you 100 pct. on Orbx, just based on looking at the demo. I cannot stand the default autogen. Yes, it makes the sim more immersive in some senses, but when my entire home urban area is populated with low and mid rise buildings when that is not the case IRL, it is distracting. It's obvious from looking at Orbx that great care was taken to address that. Even outside the airports I saw great texture resolution, far better than the FSX default. Just look at my recent thread in the screenshots forum.But I will also never tire of Tileproxy. I've had no problems with stability and have flown far and wide over the scenery it generates. Over two or three thousand feet AGL, the scenery is more immersive to me than the standard MSFS model of artificial textures overlaid with Autogen. Whether I am recreating a flight flown as a passenger in the Flight Levels or a flight I've made in a Microlight, Tileproxy has been fantastic.I've never felt more positive about the hobby, there are a lot of choices for how to enjoy the sim, more than ever before. -John

I don't own ORBX PNW yet, but I would sure say that is looks better than any other available options, MegaSceneryEarth included, but MSE would be my next choice if PNW wasn't available.I agree that MegaSceneryEarth is pretty hit or miss. My first two purchases were 2 South Florida tiles and they didn't look good at all. It took me a while before I tried any others, but some of their work isn't too bad for the money. As far as Sim Savvy goes, I agree that it is a good deal for what you get, however I dont buy it because of three things: No night textures, no autogen, not the highest resolution possible. I would be willing to give it a shot if it included night textures, but I do a lot of flights that start at dusk and go into the night, so I need to have scenery that works in both night and day.Since your from Australia, have you tried the ORBX products for your area? And if so, were you impressed with it?

Yes i own ORBX australia and was impressed,but it doesnt compare with photo scenery , i am afraid photo scenery has spoilt me anything else looks ,and is ,artificial .Idont have any axe to grind with the products mentioned,i just think i have something better and am passing it on everyone to his own have a good day Don

I've tried 2 Megascenerys and I'm not impressed.Dallas, Tx is not a brown desert.It doesn't snow in Oakland, Ca.I like lot's of autogen and it just doesn't look right in photoscenery.

Yes i own ORBX australia and was impressed,but it doesnt compare with photo scenery , i am afraid photo scenery has spoilt me anything else looks ,and is ,artificial .Idont have any axe to grind with the products mentioned,i just think i have something better and am passing it on everyone to his own have a good day Don

I never fly at night there's nothing to see anyhow",so i thought ",so i just tried las vegas at night and was pleasantly suprisedit looks beautifull lit up like an xmas tree

Quote: 'ORBX-PNW-Cannot understand what all the fuss is about,not impressed!' Well I can understand how you might have formed this opinion. FSX was developed in the US and was clearly aimed at the US market. Not surprisingly, FSX does a better job of representing the North American landscape than it does for other continents. The improvement in realism that Orbx was able to provide for Australia was dramatic compared with that available for PNW. That said, the combination of photoreal textures blended with custom tiles, the detail provided by 5 m mesh and the custom autogen, IMHO provide an overall environment that is significantly better than anything previously available for FSX. The difference in textures may be more subtle but the improvement in realism isn't. In fact it is so good, I'm a little concerned about the viability of other developers. Orbx is renowned for bringing together groups of 6 or more devs covering a wide range of skills, allowing them to produce complete landscapes. Smaller organisations are going to struggle to put together teams with comparable size and breadth of skills. Publishers and sales groups that don't have Orbx products in their line-ups may well be feeling the pinch as more mundane FSX products are ignored in the market place. I could speculate on the consequences for FSX but I'll leave it there.Cheers,Noel.

Yes i own ORBX australia and was impressed,but it doesnt compare with photo scenery , i am afraid photo scenery has spoilt me anything else looks ,and is ,artificial .

Yes I own ORBX Australia and am impressed, and it is far better than any photo scenery. I am afraid orbx has spoiled me.Anything else looks, and is, artificial.:(