I set the advanced weather for overcast stratus (8/8), low ceilings, poor visibility, and moderate cloud tops. I take off in realistic IMC based on my settings. However, when I break out on top the cloud cover below is then showing only a broken condition with good vis under it. Descending back down into it, it is realistic as per settings again. Anyway to keep the condition continuous overcast while flying on top? Thanks...Roger

While you can play with settings............. I just don't believe that FS2004 can portray solid overcast "from above" as well as FS2002. This morning, we have dense fog in the Salt Lake Valley with visibility less than a quarter mile. I live next to U42 (Salt Lake City #2 Municiple Airport) & downloaded real weather into both sims.Each sim renders the fog quite realistically, but FS2002 definately "wins" when I break out of the fog & see a very solid overcast with mountaintops "peering out".IMO---- it's these tradeoffs that are the reason I run FS2002, FS2004, and X-Plane for flight simulation. They're all unique & each product just does somethings better. An example, is that I prefer clouds & mountainous terrain/rivers/roads/auto-gen of FS2004....... but overcast is just more realistic in FS2002! L.Adamson

Sorry to say I've missed the forums in the past week..I had to visit my office in California. I flew home last night (btw, coming into Phoenix we could see the lights of both Phoenix and Vegas about 130 nm distant...awesome vis and far cry from the rain we had in SFO prior to wheels up).Anyway, I found a fairly decent way to improve the overcast in FS2004. I modified the cirrus overcast bitmap first by clearing the alpha channel. Now when I want to simulate a flight into the soup, I place a 1 ft. (yes--just one foot!) thick layer of my cirrus overcast underneath the "real" overcast layer. The result gives a very solid deck.... Here's an example of the end result:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/57167.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/57169.jpg-John

Ummm,,, how do you remove the alpha channel? This is the biggest problem I have in FS9. (No solid overcast) Thank you.B Bjorkman

I used the program called DXTBMP... I loaded up the cirrus overcast bmp, then overwrote the alpha channel setting the alpha bitmap to white....

John, Tried this finally tonight and it does not work here. I just reinstalled my default cirrus overcast bitmap to do this also. Still results in a non overcast here. Care to show us exactly what your doing with the bitmap? I changed the alpha to all white as you said and saved it. What are you saving it as? mine seems to be a 32 bit extended bitmap with alpha, should it be dxt3 or dxt1? I put a 1 foot overcast layer as you said then a stratus layer above and it aint oc here! Thanks. :)Hornit

There are four bitmaps prefixed with cirrus_overcast:cirrus_overcast.bmpcirrus_overcast01.bmpcirrus_overcast02.bmpcirrus_overcast03.bmp Make sure you change all four (I just modified the one bitmap, cirrus_overcast.bmp, and copied it into the other three). Mine are all saved as 32 bit extended bitmap vs. DXT1 or DXT3... When you set up the one foot cirrus layer, it must be set to overcast. The cloud layer immediately above it should also be set to overcast for best results. -John

Wow, this sounds great. I went and got the dxt program, and thats where it got over my head. I've spent the last 2 hours trying to figure out how to change the alpha to white. Any further clues? I downloaded the trial of Paint shop pro 8. Do you need a paint program to edit the alpha channels, or does it all go thru the DXT program? Thanks in advance. B Bjorkman CFI

I will package up the modified textures with a short readme.txt and upload them to the library here... Expect them sometime this evening, and do a search under my name (John Cillis) as author...-John

Just get Chris Willis's (FSW) clouds update and your problems will be solved. The Cirrus clouds have no effect on framerates, the only reason why you see some improvement here is you deleting some of the cloud bitmaps which is something I wouldn't do... Go to FSW's website and get the update...John isn't FSW's updates working for you or have you tried them??? For all you that use this update don't update the cirrus clouds because they don't effect your framerate and the default ones look better.

My mods to the cirrus overcast bmps were strictly for simulating a true overcast deck--they aren't meant to improve performance or solve any performance related issues.They do help achieve a completely solid deck, day or night. Unless Chris read my post here a few months back on the subject and included my cirrus_overcast solution in one of his sets, his sets aren't specifically for the overcast issue in FS2004.I should also note that my solution does not involve deletion of any cloud bitmaps--I'm not sure where you gathered that from. It simply involves a modification to the alpha channel in the cirrus bitmaps....that's it... My bitmaps REPLACE the existing ones...I uploaded my modified textures a few moments ago. As soon as they go through the library's due diligence, they should be available and I've included a readme.txt for easy installation. I should have created this package months ago...since I've been flying with the modified textures for that long... Sorry 'bout that--hopefully my package will make amends...-John

John Hey, thanks alot for uploading them to the file. I have been doing other things this afternoon as it was a beautiful day here in midwest of the US. I came back down tonight to try tackling this problem again and read your post. I'm patiently waiting for the file to be put into the uploads. B Bjorkman CFI

The textures have arrived in the library--here is a link:http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?CatID...misc&DLID=42310-John

JOHN!!!!!! YOU DA MAN I just flew the most realistic ILS in FS9 I have ever seen. This is the best fix (for me) yet! Thanks so much! One question, if you've known about this for awhile,,,,, what other secrets do you have?????? lol. Thanks again. B Bjorkman CFI

John,absolutely friggin fantastic!!!! I just had my first true overcast in FS2004. WOW, I don't want to blow my own horn, but I've shot so many IFR approaches IRL and with those textures IFR becomes interesting again in FS2004.Now, if we can have ActiveSky implement that I'll send you $20 bucks to make this sim IFR-usable again ;-)Keep up the great work,Petehttp://members.aol.com/pzsoulman/myhomepage/logo.gifAthlonXP2000,AbitKX7-333(latest4in1),512MB/2700SDRAM,WinXP,DirectX8.1,Geforce3TI200(128MB)(Det.30.82),SBlive(WDM5.1.2601.0)