Would like to know the pros and cons at this point.Thanks!Barry

Hello,Sim pilot only response!I have been flying sim for about 1 year. I have gotten pretty good at GA and now even 737 and Airbus flying. I switched fully to FS2004 about one month ago (tanked my beloved FS2002) and hated the weather system. I used other weather programs like the AS2004 little brother and FSMETEO.So far - about 10 flights, this is the best rendition of real weather I have found. I flew from KSEA to KSFO this morning after checking the real weather on the web. The AS2004 rendition seemed right on - rain and other things in the right places. The weather radar also worked OK. BUT - it puts a big hit on FPS and I'm running a pretty good Dell 8200 with a reasonably sound display and memory system. I run XP and must say that you had better get ready to find as many posts in their forum for "low hit" textures for clouds Etc. I got most of them from their forum and I'm OK for now.I'm not sure but I'm a little concerned about ALL new products and the FSUIPC upgrade slide. I have gone back to an older version of FSUIPC (something like 3.1.2.0 (Nov 2003) to stabalize my new "toys" like the PMDG 737NG update , SSW airbus and the AS2004.I think they will need a Service Update to deal with some issues but for now I like it. Also Beware - If you use or used Weather Center 2 - get ALL of it out of your machine - it froze mine until I found a post that led me as to its "non-coexistance" with AS2004.Happy flying -Ron [email protected] near KCHS

I think it was explained that AS2004 by itself has no effect on performance but since the weather it creates is much more complex (to reflect real world) this may carry a performance penalty.Michael J.http://www.reality-xp.com/community/nr/rsc/rxp-higher.jpg

What about the WideFS issue? Any rolutions yet?Barry

I have already replaced my Cloud Textures with the FPS friendly ones from FSW.Anyone using FSW cloud replacement textures and AS FS 2004, can you please comment on FPS performance hit?Thanks!Barry

Hello,I am using the FPS friendly ones with the AS2004 - I still have FPS problems but I also am flying either the PMDG 737 or the SSW Airbus 310. When I just fly a regular GA airplane the system looks fine - when I switch to a "processor killer" like the 737 or the SSW airbus the system will "halt" for short periods (about 1 sec) to load scenery. I am also sorting through what to NOT USE - I have a lot of Simflyer airports and FSGENESIS textures.As of now, I'm quite pleased to run as I am and have as much as I can in realism.Ron Sagel

I'm also thinking about getting the new AS version. There's a lot of information on performance problems and possible solutions on the ActiveSky forum here at AVSIM - just wanted to mention it in case somebody has not been there already. It seems to me that Damian (AS developer) has no problem dealing with negative posts, he's very friendly and tries to help as much as possible. AS2004 seems to be highly configurable, and the defaults might not be perfect for every system. Modified textures like the ones by FSW seem to help.VOlker :]

AS2004 definitely looks more realistic and complex without a doubt, but by the time you . . .1. install 32 bit FPS friendly textures 2. lower the Cloud Coverage Density to LOW3. Limit cloud layers to 2 or 3 4. lower cloud draw distance to 40 or 30you begin to realize you have had to sacrifice some other serious positive attributes towards creating a believeable environment. I haven't been able to create a good compromise between lost detail and added complextity, but from the sound of so many other users AS2004 seems to be all it was intended to be. So I will continue tweaking until I reached the Promised Land!My current settings using Default or FSMeteo weather: Cloud Textures: I use default FS high densityCloud Coverage Density: Medium to High, depending on the situationCloud Draw Distance: 80With the above settings in FS9 default weather, I get better perf than with AS2004 with the settings at the top of this page. Take that as you may, but it is factual.Cheers,Noel

Here is an example of how configurable Active Sky 2004 is. There is a switch called "Overcast Enhancement". Overcast skies with default weather, and with this switch off, just draws one layer of overcast clouds. With this switch on, I believe two layers are drawn. This Active Sky enhancement makes flying above the clouds look much more believable. Yet as you draw more cloud layers, your FPS drops.So I turned off "Render To Texture", and downloaded the 32 bit clouds from FSW. Now I can keep my same weather settings as before Active Sky, but have this more realistic cloud effect. Like anything else in FS2004, you have to make decisions between frame rates and visual quality. There probably does not even exist a system fast enough yet to render all of the Active Sky switches, have all of the FS sliders maxed, and use the less FPS friendly clouds.- PapaTango

I use the FSW clouds and AS2004 and there was no negative performance impact.I guess much of the FPS problems come from graphic cards with less than 128 MByte memory.But I'm normally flying only low and slow, so my max fps is set to 18 and everything above 10 is good enough to fly the slow planes. A frame rate of below 10 normaly is enough to land.So on busy airports, I use Ultimate Traffic too, with heavy cloud layers I run at 7-10 fps without problem.My PC is Pentium 4 2.4 GHz, 1 GByte Ram, Radeon 9800 with 128 MByte and fast Raid Level 0 Swap file.The settings in FS9 are all very High, 100% 3D clouds at 80 miles visibility and so on. The only thing I turned off are the shadows (ground and plane) because they have a big fps hit and didn't loock very good.

I have a medium power system (in my sig, but briefly P4-2.26 533 FSB, 768MB ram, Gf4 ti4600 128 w det53.03s). I have posted many screen shots in the ActiveSky forum, and in the screen shots forum using Active Sky 2004 (do a quick extended search for Gridley as author - sorry I didn't post links). I have my cloud layers restricted to TEN. I have all the cloud sliders full right. I have installed Chris' Highest FPS set. I fly almost only the meridian, which is not an FPS hog like the PMDG bird, but it's not the default cessna either - this plane had complex avionics. In rare situations, the weather will be complicated enough that I actually notice my FPS in the teens (I fly new england, between KBOS and KBTV - no FPS issues there to start with). Better than 90% of the time I have FPS locked and staying at 20 fps. Notice also in my shots that I have a ton of AI (100% ultimate traffic in fact). Also, Chris' clouds still look awesome imo despite the reduced texture size. Just my experience - I hope everyone else's is similar, because I am having a great time with AS2004!Best,sg

>What about the WideFS issue? Any rolutions yet?>>Barry>Barry,I couldn't get it to work but after reading the install notes again, and Damian's post in the forum, plus those from users I now have it working.Because i have had a few attempts at it I'm not fully sure what the answer is but I think it is down to choosing the correct folder for the radar connector.Try this.Remove everything related to AS from your FS PC. Leave the main AS installation alone on the WideFS PC.On the FS PC map a drive to the main AS2004 directory on the WideFS PC. I installed mine to a directory called ActiveSky 2 so my mapped drive looks like thisZ:ActiveSky2Now on the FS PC go to Z: drive and drill down to modulesActiveSky2004, locate the radar connector there and run it.When it asks for the path (its default is F:???) point it toZ:ActiveSky2modulesActiveSky2004 (That is of course using my setup).Once it has finished the installation copy FSUIPC.dll, ActiveRadar.dll and ActiveRadar folder to FSmodulesThe radar screen should now work.Don't forget to have Widefs and AS2 running and ideally go to somewhere where there is plenty of rain, ServInfo helps with this.I only got mine running a couple of hours ago and have not had chance to fly with it yet so have no idea what impact it has on FPS.HTH

Vulcan, Glad you got it working, but I'm still confused. If you in fact remove everything related to AS from your FS PC, how do you: "on the FS PC go to Z: drive and drill down to modulesActiveSky2004, locate the radar connector there and run it."?? How did the folder get there if AS was removed? Whenever I use the remote connector on the FS PC to try to point to the AS directory on the WideFS enabled client, I get an error...the error occurs if I try to install to F or to the drive I actually mappped...Z:AS2004. It won't even let me choose a directory other than F and the install routine terminates. That is what seems to be confusing so many people. I was able to go into the HKEY registry on the server (FS 9) machine and change the path to AS2004 to Z (the mapped drive on the client). I can run over WideFs now, but the radar doesn't work. Anyway, I'm glad you were successful. I'm waiting on Damian's new connector.exe.regards,

Sorry Chris I did not make it clearer what to remove from the FS PC.Remove the radar.dll and radar folder from the FS folder but leave the mapped drive there.So if starting from new you first install AS2 on the wideclient PC, lets say you install to a directory called AS2 on C: drive, that would look like C:AS2ModulesChilkatZp.dllYou need to set permissions on this directory to allow other network users access.On the PC running FS map a drive (lets say Z:) to C:AS2 on the wideclient PC.Still on the FS PC go to Z: and drill down into the modules directory and then into the ActiveSky2004 directory. Run the radar connector from there. When it asks for the remote AS2004 folder and offers F:AS2004 there should be a 'change' button at the side of 'F:AS2004', click it.You can now select Z:AS2ModulesActiveSky2004Note that the installer says 'Select your remote AS2004 folder (where ActiveRadar.dll resides)', this is not true, the DLL file does not reside in the AS2004 but that IS the directory you need.Once the installer has finished just copy the radar DLL and folder to FSmodules as explained by Damian's post.HTH, at least it works for me after about the third attempt with different target folders.

I would be interested in knowing how the "enhanced wind smoothing between stations" is in AS04. Since upgrading to FS9, I have been appalled at how badly FS interpolates wind speed and direction between local wx stations.