Guys, please dont kill me. I just wonder sometimes about these so-called Avsim reviews and just what is the individual interest (monetarily) these reviewers have to the interest marketing a product. For example, recently we have seen reviews for both REX Weather and Evolution. According to the reviewers, both get great marks.Problem is, neither works worth a hoot. Evolution, which I really thought would be awesome, based upon AS6, is a complete nightmare. Dont even get me started. REX on the other hand, while having (somewhat) nice textures (see the free cloud textures here in the library) a (HUGE) disappointment. I was so patient waiting for the last service pack and was astounded on how long it took for it to be released. Ridiculous. They kept saying the "so-called" beta testers had it and were soon to release. Two and 1/2 weeks later they did. Guess what? Nothing changed. Same old problem. Therefore most FS9 users using REX have "once again" gone back to AS6 for accurate weather depiction.My whole point to this thread is this:Read the doggone forums for a product before stuffing it down our throats as legitimate. Come on guys......Mitch

Hi, Mitch!Certainly everyone is fully entitled to her or his opion, so thank you for your precious input in our forums.Just a tiny detail I would like to note on this occasion:

Evolution, which I really thought would be awesome, based upon AS6, is a complete nightmare

REX (...) a (HUGE) disappointment.

If these addons were generally received like this, they wouldn't have so many satisfied customers, including me.I have been using both for some time and I neither find ASE to be a nightmare, nor think REX is a HUGE disappointment.So either there are some problems on your side, or it simply shows how different tastes we, simmers, have. :(

I agree with Rafal. Mitch, if you had read the forums, you would have seen how many people have almost literally fallen in love with REX. There are so many satisfied customers of both these products, that I can't do but wonder if you are not the one who wants to "stuff products down our throats as illegitimate". I take this thread very seriously, mostly because I am a reviewer for Avsim myself and I now about all the troubles involved in writing a review. No matter what you do as a reviewer, the review is always going to be subjective: we are all human beings and human beings can hardly not be subjective. Reviewers form an opinion on a product based on several to sometimes even tens or hundreds hours of testing a product (I'm not kidding! Some reviewers actually flew their review aircraft for over 100 hours!). Now, you see my point: you can have a very different opinion than the reviewer. It has already happened often that I found a Gamespot review about a certain game to be bull. Why? Because I really enjoyed the game and the Gamespot reviewer didn't. It can happen. That doesn't mean that the Gamespot reviewer is being paid by the game's developer, or that there is some plot against the buyer or whatever, it means he has a different opinion. It is funny you mention REX and ASE, you know. REX, of all products, is one of the single greatest successes in a long while in FS. This truly bothers me. No, i don't mean that it bothers me that REX is a success (I use it myself in FS2004 and FSX with immense pleasure), it bothers me that you find it a disappointment, then go on to conclude that everything thinks that way, and finally bang on the heads of the reviewers because of that, accusing them of not reading the forums, while it is hasn't been ever more obvious that you are the one that probably didn't read them. Go look around Avsim. You'll hardly find any ill words on REX. Even now, as we speak, there is a thread in which REX is almost constantly highly recommended! As Rafal said, everybody is entitled to his or her own opinion and so are you of course. But, before you form it, care to do some good research, yeah? Most of us reviewers do that too. Not all (and it shows in the reviews), but most of us do. In any case, don't barge in on us and say that WE are at fault, when it seems more than clear that the fault is with you, as Rafal rightly commented too. See, I don't care about your opinion, really. Whether you like or don't like REX is something that doesn't really bother me. I only care about you inappropriately accusing the reviewers of doing ill work just because they, together with and hundreds upon hundreds of other people, don't have the same opinion as you do.

My whole point to this thread is this:Read the doggone forums for a product before stuffing it down our throats as legitimate. Come on guys......

I'm not sure that is the answer, either.I once wrote a mini-appraisal on a forum to help somebody decide whether a product was worthwhile. I highlighted the good points and the bad points (all but one as "good" actually). Even if I was wrong, I felt entitled to my opinion but apparently not so. The developer came on and slammed me hard. Others made it clear to me that on forums negative comments on software are generally unwelcome. Hence if you read opinions on forums, you may still get an unbalanced view.Additionally, be aware that one or two developers lurk on forums with cover names and if anybody comes on discussing a rival product they chip in with "I'd recommend xxxx, it is much better" which is really a sad way to promote a product.Just my three-pennyworth . . .John

I'm not sure that is the answer, either.I once wrote a mini-appraisal on a forum to help somebody decide whether a product was worthwhile. I highlighted the good points and the bad points (all but one as "good" actually). Even if I was wrong, I felt entitled to my opinion but apparently not so. The developer came on and slammed me hard. Others made it clear to me that on forums negative comments on software are generally unwelcome. Hence if you read opinions on forums, you may still get an unbalanced view.Additionally, be aware that one or two developers lurk on forums with cover names and if anybody comes on discussing a rival product they chip in with "I'd recommend xxxx, it is much better" which is really a sad way to promote a product.Just my three-pennyworth . . .John

Good points John. Though I don't think generalizations about "reviewers" are fair or very helpful, it is true that expressing opinions or even asking some questions on the forums can get a pretty hostile response from a developer. Funnily enough, I had it happen this weekend. Though the response was helpful, it was also couched in a very unfriendly way and when I did log on to the forum the person pointed me to, I got a very frosty reception from the same individual. Again, helpful but also on the fringe of being downright rude.

Guys, please dont kill me. I just wonder sometimes about these so-called Avsim reviews and just what is the individual interest (monetarily) these reviewers have to the interest marketing a product. For example, recently we have seen reviews for both REX Weather and Evolution. According to the reviewers, both get great marks.Mitch

Well, the 'so called review' is like every other so called review for Avsim, that is to say, it is the reviewer's opinion (mine in the case of Active Sky Evolution). But it is worth noting a few things in regard to that opinion, and how it was formed, and the best way to do that, is to explain the process...First up, the subject of monetary interest for the reviewer: That's actually the complete opposite of what happens in reality. It is true that you get the review copy for free when writing a review, but whilst on the face of it that sounds like a great deal, in practice it is a very poor exchange when one considers the costs to the reviewer in several other ways. For one thing, it takes a lot of time to review a product, often the product undergoes several installs and uninstalls to check the product installer's robustness, and if you think installing FSX once is a pain in the &@($*, then try that LOL.Next up, there is the expense of equipment, in that one is best to have a clean install of FS on a separate hard drive in order to ensure that the product is not clashing with others. Not always true, but sometimes a necessity. Then you have to install those other products to check if they would have caused an issue. This is all before you've even got to looking at the features and playing around with the product, and don't forget that ASE works with FS9 as well as FSX, so I had to do all that with both programs, in patched and unpatched versions to see if that caused a problem as well. So we are talking about a lot of installing and uninstalling here before even looking at the product. It can be tedious, but in a review, that lengthy process takes up one sentence if it is found to be no issue.Having done all that initial install testing, it's then time to try the product out, and in the case of Active Sky Evolution, that involved trying it with both the registered and unregistered versions of FSUIPC (more installing fun), then with the standard cloud set for FSX, then with REX, then with FS Elemental, in both FSX and FS9 (none of these things were free by the way, I bought REX, bought FS Elemental, bought FSUIPC etc). So, I eventually get to try the product out, which again involves many hours of trying different weather downloads, researching weather (I bought a book on clouds for that by the way, more expense and time spent reading it). At this point I had to investigate the fact that there could be issues with some PMDG aircraft or other high-end add-ons where FSUIPC and ASE are concerned (since that is mentioned in the manual), and unlike most other people, reviewers actually do have to thoroughly read the manual, which involves more time and study. So it was time to install the PMDG 747, the Level-D 767, the Captain Sim 757, the iFly 737, the Ariane 737, the Wilco 737, the Flight 1 ATR-72, the Aerosoft Discus Glider, and a few other fancier add-ons besides that, just to be sure about that potential issue (guess what? I bought all of those too, none of those were freebies). Did I mention that I did all this on two different computers with two different operating systems as well, just in case that might have an effect? That being Vista and XP on a desktop and a laptop, and with both a PCI card and built-in graphics to see if that has a bearing on stability. Next up, there followed several flights with all of those aircraft to see if there were problems, which also takes time. Then, having made a thorough study of how the program works and seeing if the manual was helpful and whether the forum support was any good, testing it over literally weeks on end. That done, I have to gather suitable screenshots for the review and then write it so that it is not only informative, but concise and hopefully entertaining too. then zip it all up and send it off. at which point more work ensues for the editor and the people who do all the web stuff.Now, when you add all that up, does that sound like the amount of work you would like to do and be paid less than 50 bucks for? Which is the cost of the supposedly 'free' copy of ASE I got. So the point here is that I, and indeed none of the other reviewers of Avsim are in it for the money, because if we were, it would be a very crappy deal we'd negotiated for ourselves.Now I can't speak for the motivation of every other reviewer on Avsim, but I can promise you that the reason I actually bother to do all that for reviews, is so that I can make a contribution to the flight sim community by giving the time and study it takes to do such reviews. For the record, there is never any requirement of a reviewer to be anything less than honest in their opinion of a review product, nor ever any pressure to butter developers up or mislead people into buying stuff you really think is crap.So if I write that a product is good, it is because I have found it to be so after a good deal of testing, and specifically in the case of Active Sky Evolution, the reason I recommended it to Robert Whitwell (the Avsim reviews editor) for an award, is because I was particularly impressed with the graphical user interface, which I think is both innovative and clever. It's not the only good point about the program of course, but in combination with all the other plusses it was that which swung it for me. So an award recommendation is never arbitrarily plucked out of the air for no reason, it always has a strong justification if such a recommendation is made.Moreov3er, even that is not the final hurdle for a product under review, because it is also worth noting that when a reviewer recommends a product for an award, it is not automatically given, you have to make a case for it when submitting the review, and the editor has to agree, because it is Robert's final decision based on his assessment of the product and your recommendation.So if you have found that neither REX nor ASE works very well, that is unfortunate, but I can assure you that in a fairly rigorous testing process, I've found that not the case for me and so I wrote about it in the review. Maybe you should reinstall FS and try that, after all, only having to do so once is no big deal compared to what I had to put up with!Oh, and welcome to the forums by the way Mitch. I've no intention of 'killing you' for having an opinion, you are entitled to one just as much as everyone else, and I welcome opinions on anything, so I hope that my post has cleared up where at least this reviewer is coming from.Al

Well, the 'so called review' is like every other so called review for Avsim, that is to say, it is the reviewer's opinion (mine in the case of Active Sky Evolution). But it is worth noting a few things in regard to that opinion, and how it was formed, and the best way to do that, is to explain the process...First up, the subject of monetary interest for the reviewer: That's actually the complete opposite of what happens in reality. It is true that you get the review copy for free when writing a review, but whilst on the face of it that sounds like a great deal, in practice it is a very poor exchange when one considers the costs to the reviewer in several other ways. For one thing, it takes a lot of time to review a product, often the product undergoes several installs and uninstalls to check the product installer's robustness, and if you think installing FSX once is a pain in the &@($*, then try that LOL.Next up, there is the expense of equipment, in that one is best to have a clean install of FS on a separate hard drive in order to ensure that the product is not clashing with others. Not always true, but sometimes a necessity. Then you have to install those other products to check if they would have caused an issue. This is all before you've even got to looking at the features and playing around with the product, and don't forget that ASE works with FS9 as well as FSX, so I had to do all that with both programs, in patched and unpatched versions to see if that caused a problem as well. So we are talking about a lot of installing and uninstalling here before even looking at the product. It can be tedious, but in a review, that lengthy process takes up one sentence if it is found to be no issue.Having done all that initial install testing, it's then time to try the product out, and in the case of Active Sky Evolution, that involved trying it with both the registered and unregistered versions of FSUIPC (more installing fun), then with the standard cloud set for FSX, then with REX, then with FS Elemental, in both FSX and FS9 (none of these things were free by the way, I bought REX, bought FS Elemental, bought FSUIPC etc). So, I eventually get to try the product out, which again involves many hours of trying different weather downloads, researching weather (I bought a book on clouds for that by the way, more expense and time spent reading it). At this point I had to investigate the fact that there could be issues with some PMDG aircraft or other high-end add-ons where FSUIPC and ASE are concerned (since that is mentioned in the manual), and unlike most other people, reviewers actually do have to thoroughly read the manual, which involves more time and study. So it was time to install the PMDG 747, the Level-D 767, the Captain Sim 757, the iFly 737, the Ariane 737, the Wilco 737, the Flight 1 ATR-72, the Aerosoft Discus Glider, and a few other fancier add-ons besides that, just to be sure about that potential issue (guess what? I bought all of those too, none of those were freebies). Did I mention that I did all this on two different computers with two different operating systems as well, just in case that might have an effect? That being Vista and XP on a desktop and a laptop, and with both a PCI card and built-in graphics to see if that has a bearing on stability. Next up, there followed several flights with all of those aircraft to see if there were problems, which also takes time. Then, having made a thorough study of how the program works and seeing if the manual was helpful and whether the forum support was any good, testing it over literally weeks on end. That done, I have to gather suitable screenshots for the review and then write it so that it is not only informative, but concise and hopefully entertaining too. then zip it all up and send it off. at which point more work ensues for the editor and the people who do all the web stuff.Now, when you add all that up, does that sound like the amount of work you would like to do and be paid less than 50 bucks for? Which is the cost of the supposedly 'free' copy of ASE I got. So the point here is that I, and indeed none of the other reviewers of Avsim are in it for the money, because if we were, it would be a very crappy deal we'd negotiated for ourselves.Now I can't speak for the motivation of every other reviewer on Avsim, but I can promise you that the reason I actually bother to do all that for reviews, is so that I can make a contribution to the flight sim community by giving the time and study it takes to do such reviews. For the record, there is never any requirement of a reviewer to be anything less than honest in their opinion of a review product, nor ever any pressure to butter developers up or mislead people into buying stuff you really think is crap.So if I write that a product is good, it is because I have found it to be so after a good deal of testing, and specifically in the case of Active Sky Evolution, the reason I recommended it to Robert Whitwell (the Avsim reviews editor) for an award, is because I was particularly impressed with the graphical user interface, which I think is both innovative and clever. It's not the only good point about the program of course, but in combination with all the other plusses it was that which swung it for me. So an award recommendation is never arbitrarily plucked out of the air for no reason, it always has a strong justification if such a recommendation is made.Moreov3er, even that is not the final hurdle for a product under review, because it is also worth noting that when a reviewer recommends a product for an award, it is not automatically given, you have to make a case for it when submitting the review, and the editor has to agree, because it is Robert's final decision based on his assessment of the product and your recommendation.So if you have found that neither REX nor ASE works very well, that is unfortunate, but I can assure you that in a fairly rigorous testing process, I've found that not the case for me and so I wrote about it in the review. Maybe you should reinstall FS and try that, after all, only having to do so once is no big deal compared to what I had to put up with!Oh, and welcome to the forums by the way Mitch. I've no intention of 'killing you' for having an opinion, you are entitled to one just as much as everyone else, and I welcome opinions on anything, so I hope that my post has cleared up where at least this reviewer is coming from.Al

Hey chock. You made so many big letters. I am sure you are tired :)

Hey chock. You made so many big letters. I am sure you are tired :)

Dont we have a rule that all posts need to be signed?Cheers John

Dont we have a rule that all posts need to be signed?Cheers John

No, not on the normal Avsim forums. Developers such as PMDG, who have their own subforums on the Avsim forums, can instate such rules. Avsim itself doesn't have that rule, though.

Hey chock.You made so many big letters. I am sure you are tired :)

And your signature is too big, I am sure you didn't read the rules.http://forums1.avsim.net/topic/246645-signatures-and-signature-image/

Guys, please dont kill me. I just wonder sometimes about these so-called Avsim reviews and just what is the individual interest (monetarily) these reviewers have to the interest marketing a product. For example, recently we have seen reviews for both REX Weather and Evolution. According to the reviewers, both get great marks.Problem is, neither works worth a hoot. Evolution, which I really thought would be awesome, based upon AS6, is a complete nightmare. Dont even get me started. REX on the other hand, while having (somewhat) nice textures (see the free cloud textures here in the library) a (HUGE) disappointment. I was so patient waiting for the last service pack and was astounded on how long it took for it to be released. Ridiculous. They kept saying the "so-called" beta testers had it and were soon to release. Two and 1/2 weeks later they did. Guess what? Nothing changed. Same old problem. Therefore most FS9 users using REX have "once again" gone back to AS6 for accurate weather depiction.My whole point to this thread is this:Read the doggone forums for a product before stuffing it down our throats as legitimate. Come on guys......Mitch

Surely an asinine post is one that condemns products using words like "neither works worth a hoot", "is a complete nightmare", "Dont even get me started", and " a (HUGE) disappointment" without explainiing what is actually wrong with them?

Surely an asinine post is one that condemns products using words like "neither works worth a hoot", "is a complete nightmare", "Dont even get me started", and " a (HUGE) disappointment" without explainiing what is actually wrong with them?

Yes, OP should read the dictionary before posting:asinine: foolish, unintelligent, or silly; stupid