Hi AllJust a thought, how many people here just fly FS9 straight from the box. In other words no add ons, no extra planes, no extra meshes, etc The reason I ask this is because I have no addons at all, well apart from FS NAvigator which I don't use all that much anyway. I find my flying experiences really good, I haven't even reinstalled my VFR UK photo scenery yet.Ok I've done a couple of tweaks, and added new Nvidia drivers just for fps performance but to be honest I can't really see any difference. Ok so I beefed up my PC after Xmas and new ram and a chip. The point of all this is this, is there not a slim chance that all the add ons etc actually make FS9 worse or better.I think what is required is some really good benchmark tests, eg a bare bones FS9 against sevral types of added onto FS9's.Then some good comparison charts could be developed and then simmers could make up their own minds on what to do.Wycliffe

The nature of this forum and the many others like it is that it attracts those who do add this, tweak that, alter the other, so I doubt many of us will have standard out of the box setups.I've never considered for a moment that FS9 would be `satisfactory` straight from the get-go. I've always regarded it as a starting point for modifications amendments and additions to help make the sim what I want it to be. My personal FS matures like a fine wine, with the occasional corked bottle just serving to make the experience fruitier, the taste more savoury.That's not to say that the vast majority of purchasers don't leave the game exactly as it comes out of the box, they must do otherwise these forums would have meberships of millions, not thousands!Allcott

>The point of all this is this, is there not a slim chance that>all the add ons etc actually make FS9 worse or better.I think there is more than a slim chance. IMO there are a lot of people who tweak their systems to goodness knows where and then complain that MS has screwed up on FS yet again. I have VFR Photographic Scenery, UK2000 Airports and Dreamfleet's Piper Archer installed and that's all. The only things I have tweaked are the sliders with in FS2004 itself, if you can call that tweaking. Other than that I have done nothing else at all to anything. For me FS2004 runs par excellence and my hat goes off to MS for delivering a superb product.>I think what is required is some really good benchmark tests,>eg a bare bones FS9 against sevral types of added onto FS9's.>>Then some good comparison charts could be developed and then>simmers could make up their own minds on what to do.Good idea, but there is an untold number of different hardware configurations out there which would make such comparisions difficult, if not meaningless.David

>IMO there are a lot of people who tweak their systems to goodness knows where and then complain that MS has screwed up on FS yet again

Interesting post. I probably flew my new sim for 2 1/2 minutes in virgin condition before adding in my Red Arrows and DC-3s to start testing and then, well .... off to the Avsim library and the rest is history. But over Christmas I ran FS2004 in out-of-the-box state again on my old man's computer in UK (better than playing Trivial Pursuit all night, you'll agree). Immediate differences:1. Loads immediately. Even with only a couple of hundred add-on aircraft, associated gauges and fifty or sixty add-on sceneries, my FS is already sluggish to wake up in the morning.2. AI aircraft aren't all parked on top of each other, LOL.3. Key default airports are far nicer than I might have expected, and a great improvement over FS2002. Of course I never saw half of them in this state on my own rig, having buried them in add-on textures, blah blah blah.4. Weather seemed to run fine. I have added this, changed that, lowered this, slid that and now my clouds look like Elizabeth Taylor's powder puffs. Default ain't so bad, guys.5. Need I mention FPS?You all know what I'm saying here ... but anyway, I'm not complaining. I swore I wouldn't download anywhere near as much stuff for FS2004 as I did for FS2002 ... all that is gathering dust, mostly .... but, well, is the Pope a Catholic? Does a duck float? I just can't resist it all.Freeware rules!Mark "Dark Moment" Beaumonthttp://www.swiremariners.com/newlogo.jpg

I think that Mark's comments above really put it in perspective- here we are virtually without exception incurable downloaders/tinkerers etc., all in a neverending search for the ever better scenery/aircraft/reality/performance or whatever.As someone further up the thread said - we wouldn't be here on this forum if we weren't tweakers of some kind."But over Christmas I ran FS2004 in out-of-the-box state again on my old man's computer in UK (better than playing Trivial Pursuit all night, you'll agree). Immediate differences:"A few days ago I had to do a reload due to some problems that had crept in(not with FS itself) .To guard against such problems I keep a "virgin" copy of the complete OS and all basic applications - including a basic ISP/FS9/Squawkbox/AVC setup as a Drive Image on a separate partition- the idea being that ,should disaster strike- I can rewrite the entire drive (about 6GB) in around 20 mins and start with a clean sheet.When I did the rewrite it was very noticeable how quickly the "unenhanced " version of FS started.Also noticeable was the fact that ,even without all the various scenery tweaks that had been made over the past few months - it still looked pretty good.The only thing lacking reality was - as ever in FS9- the water( Oceans FX and the improved water textures were the first addon put back in!!)There is no doubt in my mind that the basic FS9 - without any addons -is still a very impressive piece of work and(wait for the flak)that the vast majority of problems experienced by those who post here and elsewhere are due to either addon software,incompatable hardware or over enthusiastic tweaking of one kind or another.Critics of the statement I have just made please note that I said "the vast majority of problems ".I will agree that there are - and probably always will be - a small minority who suffer from unexplainable problems that just don't seem to be fixable.I have every sympathy with those people but I'm sure that ,with almost any software you care to mention somewhere you'll find someone for whom it just doesn't work.For proof of this ,go to ZDnet.com and look at the feedback from those who have d/l software there.Virtually any piece of software,even such well known and widely used apps as Winzip,MMJB,Winamp etc. get a small proportion of unhappy comments from users who have suffered all sorts unlikely problems after d/l or using them.Dave

I fly straight out the box until certian updates are made available. I dont go trying to put something into FS9 unlesss its made for, has been updated for or is stated as being FS9 useable. Honestly my addons are slimming down with every new version. There are manditories that I feel should be part of FS like FS Camera, FSFailure and FS Flight Tracker. Also AI seems point less without UT. Now when I land at an airport (smaller ones not internationals) I find interest in seeing what carriers service it. There is one addon that to me is a must and that the Boston Logan High Detail airport that was made in Dec 03. Unless MS announces that they are completely redoing the ATC engine for the next release which will offer 100% ture air controlling via holds, DPs, STARS, speed restrictions, proper spacing of a/c, more options (able to open&close a VFR flight with FSS/ request wind check from tower/ the ability to cancel IFR and keep the code for traffic advisories/ some way for VFR flights to let the controller know where you plan to land if a VFR FP is filed or an IFR FP that gets cancelled so that you get handed off to TWR once in or near there airspace/ sometimes in place of the normal wy TWR clears you to land have tower make you report inbound like mid-field, on a so many mile base or even over a land mark which then ATC will clear you to land/ able to request fuel on Unicom), more controllers like FSS, able to request airspace once 5miles to Class D, 10 miles to Class C and 15 miles Class B near it instead of once you enter it, Traffic advisory is done in priority like IFR then VFR and only so many can be controlled others will get the unavialable and no more traffic calls of a/c that either in MCI or no factor. Without the idea that ATC will become as real as it gets in this area then I probably wont upgrade to the next version until at least the addons I'm using now is made and ready for the next.NP

I

I run FS2004 pretty much without addons or tweaks. I have a few addon aircraft and replacement bump/gloss maps for water reflections.Except for the Autogen framerate bug, I don't experience any problems with FS2004.

Hi Gang just got home after watching Tom Cruise in Last Samurai, a good film. Anyway I've caught up with the thread and clearly I'm not the minority of one that I thought I was. This is really quite interesting.I think what we should do is start a campaign for getting back to basics, if only for a trial period of a month say.We get all the simmers who come in here to sign up to a month of Add on free flying and then generate some constructive comments or criticisms from everyone. Then send them all off to Billionaire Bill and lets see what happens then from the Mighty Microsoft Village in Seattle.Certainly listening to some of the comments above gives rise to consider that I might be just part way right with my first assertion.Wycliffe

Have Fs9 happliy running with lots of mesh, landclass etc. but recently got tired of so much downloading on a dial-up (was doing a tour to Alaska) so loaded up fs98 on my PII non-Fs9 computer. Man, that's still great. I guess flight simming can be great whatever...Anyway, better get back to my Atari ST emulator and Fs3 or whatever it was...Pierre

Yup, I'm doing straight out of the box too.My PC is only 600mhz and 128Ram so with lots of compromises in the settings area I've got it just about playable.I'm buying a new desktop next month, and it will be a screamer, so looking to see the sim improve somewhat....As for add-on's etc, maybe in time. Presently I have neither the knowledge or patience to download add-on's, nor the inclination to try and fix my machine when it all turns to custard if I do it wrong.Straight out of the box may be boring to some, but for the equivalent of US$50.00 I reckon it's brilliant, and a big thank-you to Microsoft for giving me the pleasure of this sim.CheersTimbo

I largely run like you.I found the 56.12 drivers with VFR South England, actuallyran Heathrow with better frames than did the default Heathrow.Peter Sydney AustraliaP4 3.0 GF4 ti4200 XP Home

Great post indeed, while not straight out of the box, I have a lean setup on the flying rig and all the addons that I am interested in trying on the design rig. I agree that all the addons do impair the performance. I was amazed when FS9 came out and you would see the posts going "I don't understand why my framerates are so bad, I only have all the simflyers airports, Wilco, every mesh and landclass available, mega scenery and I only fly the captain sim 727!"................ DUH! LOLI am still amazed at how detailed TNCM is now, yet how good the framerates are there.I wonder if they will finally change the game engine and the code for the next version, like they had talked about for this one. Wouldn't it be nice to finally have a sim that you can run maxed on a high end system, with every addon known to man, in full weather and still get over 50 fps. just imagine how great FS9 will be with the hardware of 2 years from now! LOL Maybe they will even fix Jimmie's autogen bug ;-) Regards, MichaelKDFWhttp://mysite.verizon.net/res052cd/mybannercva1.jpgCalVirAir International VACougar Mountain Helicopters & Aviation[link:www.cgrmthelos.com]Cougar Mountain Helicopters

I have always run FS very close to it's out of the box state. In the event I make any changes or include add-ons, I always make sure they are either subtle changes and within the essetential "character" of the boxed sim.In this particular version of FS, I have made a few small changes to the stock aircraft.cfg and air files of the default aircraft I fly (mainly the Comet and Trimotor) and I have added a golf course landclass I created. I will also be adding some MS library objects here and there, such as masts and water tanks so as to reconcile with my VFR charts, but otherwise nothing dramatic.However, outside of the sim itself, I make pretty extensive use of real world flight planning software and charts and I use hard copies of the charts and real world flight plans when flying in the sim. I also plan to write a weather theme maker when I get around to it, but that will create a theme you then copy into the sim rather than change anything in the sim itself.I am extremely picky with add-on aircraft because I think Microsoft always sets the bar extremely high with their default aircraft, despite a lot comments you may hear to the contrary. I usually don't use any add-on aircraft unless they are of exceptional quality and as easy on the frame rates as the stock aircraft. AS for using third party aircraft then, I've only made long term exceptions for the RealAir Simulations and MAAM products, as I think they are of an extremely high standard indeed and good value for money.