A Very Important Question for Beta Testers

[GSalden 4,720]

Just one small comparison of detail : look at the compass at the top of the windscreen from both aircraft.Which one looks more real ?.....

[Nyxx 6,994]

I have the PMDG MD-11, 747 8i and JS41. All very good ofc.I bought the iFly 737 for a few reasons, the main one being I was ...well lets say a little feed up with the hints of PMDG 737 going to beta on Monday, and "don't plan any short term vacations etc", needless to say any hints are taken with a large amount of salt. I will say no more. Apart from I hope PMDG just give the updates but without any "hints" at all the next time round.The other reason I bought the iFly was because it was and still is the best 737 you and I can fly now. So I have use the iFly to learn the 737 and to get a good feel for it. I don't like people knocking it because up until the PMDG comes out imo it's the best 737 you can fly today.This week I deleted the iFly 737 of my SSD as the job is done for me, to make way for what will be the ultimate 737ng by a long way. As a matter of fact I deleted the MD-11, 747-8i and JS41 because I feel nothing will come close to the land mark sim aircraft that will be..... The PMDG 737NGX

[killerbee1958 0]

RobertPolite and Policitally correct answer but i think this can easily be handled by a pure factual, technical list of items that are in NGX (and perhaps, but i would probably not do i, the comparision against ifly's 737).This kind of comparision lists are non political and should be perceived as non bashing.On the other hand i agree it would be even more convincing if a "non pmdg" reporter would make this up and i am sure this kind of comparisions will show up very soon after release of the ngx. So people not just convinced (and that is NOT me) just postpone their buying decision until two or three months afer release. (makes the load on the download servers maybe a bit more acceptable for me :( )Fred Koch

[jc_150 3]

Hi allThis is my take on the topic. In the UK we say "courses for horses" and this is a typical situation. I am one of those nerds that just love the technicalities of flying. I enjoy the starting up from cold and dark in the correct sequence with no check list missed. I enjoy all the preperation of the navigation of my chosen flight, the monitoring of the systems in flat and level flight, and of course the landing and shut down. The more technical detail the more i enjoy it. I also believe in being loyal to a company that for the money I have given them in support of my hobby, they in turn return with a better model to purchase. I think it was a little unfair to ask a beta tester to compare two competitors products. I doubt you would write to Ford and ask them to list the differences between one of their models and say a Fiat. I unfortunately do not always have the time to do what I have explained above, so I have several "kick the tyres and go" type aircraft just to get in the air and fly around. There is in my opinion a time and a place for every variant on the way we all like to fly. I have no interest in the outside look, but thats just me, and I am sure that there are just as many folks here that enjoy the animations of the outside view as much as I enjoy learning the next intricacy of the FMC that I did not know before. So I for one am so looking forward to the learning curve of the next level of my flight knowledge through the NGX.Kind RegardsJohn Calleja (armchair pilot)

[NGXfanatic 85]

I have the ifly 737 NG (have had it since the FS2004 version was released) and I find it an excellent simulation of a 737 NG, and its getting better all the time, with the upcoming feature pack in the works. Having said that, I WILL be buying the NGX, not only because its a PMDG product and therefore quality is assured! But, also because it will be a landmark release in terms of making FSX 'As Real As It Gets' some of the things that we already know about that PMDG have put into the NGX defy belief, such as the sun on the windows affecting the cabin temp etc!If you bought the iFly, you will not be disappointed, but I think the NGX is a must buy for any serious simmer.

I'm going to echo Ayster's sentiments here. I knew that the PMDG NGX is going to beat the iFLY in every conceivable way and that it's a no brainer that I would purchase it, but I still bought the iFLY for FSX the minute it was released because I was getting impatient waiting for the NGX, and wanted to get in some practice time getting used to the NG's systems and flight characteristics, since most of my simming experience is with long haul wide bodies. It's not a bad plane at all, and in fact it's amazing what they were able to accomplish since they don't have the resources and experience of PMDG. Sure, it has some quirks, some that have been addressed very recently with a service pack, but unlike some other addons, I have never had one CTD nor have I noticed any blatantly inaccurate flight behavior characteristics. As far as systems accuracy is concerned, I am able to apply most of what I learned from studying the PMDG NGX printed manuals to the iFLY. But that all changes pretty soon when at last the NGX will be on my hard drive! It will be interesting to compare the two, I may even do some comparison images of the two addons to appreciate the added visual model details/higher resolution texture of the PMDG vs the iFLY.

[NGXfanatic 85]

I have the ifly 737 NG (have had it since the FS2004 version was released) and I find it an excellent simulation of a 737 NG, and its getting better all the time, with the upcoming feature pack in the works. Having said that, I WILL be buying the NGX, not only because its a PMDG product and therefore quality is assured! But, also because it will be a landmark release in terms of making FSX 'As Real As It Gets' some of the things that we already know about that PMDG have put into the NGX defy belief, such as the sun on the windows affecting the cabin temp etc!If you bought the iFly, you will not be disappointed, but I think the NGX is a must buy for any serious simmer.

I'm going to echo Ayster's sentiments here. I knew that the PMDG NGX is going to beat the iFLY in every conceivable way and that it's a no brainer that I would purchase it, but I still bought the iFLY for FSX the minute it was released because I was getting impatient waiting for the NGX, and wanted to get in some practice time getting used to the NG's systems and flight characteristics, since most of my simming experience is with long haul wide bodies. It's not a bad plane at all, and in fact it's amazing what they were able to accomplish since they don't have the resources and experience of PMDG. Sure, it has some quirks, some that have been addressed very recently with a service pack, but unlike some other addons, I have never had one CTD nor have I noticed any blatantly inaccurate flight behavior characteristics. As far as systems accuracy is concerned, I am able to apply most of what I learned from studying the PMDG NGX printed manuals to the iFLY. But that all changes pretty soon when at last the NGX will be on my hard drive! It will be interesting to compare the two, I may even do some comparison images of the two addons to appreciate the added visual model details/higher resolution texture of the PMDG vs the iFLY.

[aceridgey 330]

I was a little sceptical about answering here with the outrageous topic title and question, ;)But I should think everything that has been "previewed" will be enough for you to make your mind up.. Honestly it depends what YOU want as a end user..Personally the only thing that could possibly upset me on this project, is the performance, I would hope for a breakthrough in visual and system depth, but also on new techniques to make performance amazing..I have seen people get very poor performance with the ifly,

[markadeane 274]

The NGX is WAY better.......than the original PMDG 737NG :(

[oldbear 33]

Personally the only thing that could possibly upset me on this project, is the performance, I would hope for a breakthrough in visual and system depth, but also on new techniques to make performance amazing..

I agree. But I'm sure the performance will be fine for most people. I've learnt to make do without autogen and limited traffic on my well-out-of-date system, and I'm very happy with how FSX runs with complex add-ons. I'm hoping the NGX will slot in without fuss.Though the 737 isn't one of my favourite aircraft by a long chalk, there's really no way I want to be sitting on the touchlines for this one. I'm sure it's going to be quite something. I'm afraid to say I'd have preferred it to have been an A320 (take cover...) but maybe that too will happen one day. So, I'm going to beg, borrow or steal.. well, beg or borrow to get this one! :( Ian

[Islam 0]

I am a real life 737 engineer, and I have the iFly, along with several other airplanes from PMDG and other developers. What makes feel the great difference between PMDG and others, is the EFFICIENCY. Efficiency here means putting the highest possible quality in a certain simulated feature, regardless of the quantity of simulated features. I can conceive that deciding to simulate a certain system or a certain feature would directly mean that you have to invest MORE lines of programming, MORE graphics, along with more time to study the real airplane to know how these things should actually work. So when you decide to simulate more features, you basically are using more fuel to generate more power. But efficiency is something else. Efficiency would mean to invest just more logic and time to think well, so that the simulated system/feature would work as close to reality as possible.When I get to use airplanes other than PMDG's, I usually feel very irritated by coming across systems or features that behave improperly, while it looks like they are fully simulated and do not need more than a little bit of a fine tuning! I will list down here some of these observations on the iFly as examples:1. The brake accumulator pressure indicator is functional in the iFly. When the accumulator is charged and no hydraulic power is available, the gauge reads fine. Happily I can see that the reading drops gradually as I set and release the parking brake several times. But despite that nice feature, the gauge reading would not change if I use the normal brakes! I can feel that it was very easy to include such a small detail, but it wasn't there unfortunately!2. For some not understandable reason, the aspect ratio of the 2D main panel is in correct. It is slightly wider than normal... very slightly but quiet enough to destroy the realistic look of the panel.3. The sound of starting the engines makes me REALLY irritated. The engine roars nicely and gradually up during start, but instead of having this roar steady as the engine reaches idle, it just gradually fades away as if the engine is suffering hung start, when it doesn't! It starts becoming live gradually and nice again when we start pushing the throttles high enough. 4. The exterior model alpha channels do not seem to be correct. The shadow/reflection/color tones look very unrealistic.All of the above small examples do not approach the issue of how many systems or features are simulated, but they address the problem of how to extract the best out of the already existing resources.But including the functionality of more systems and features is something else that PMDG excels at, in addition. This would include features like the functional yaw damper indicator, lighting switches, and exterior model quality details.