HiFirst, I'm sorry if this is posted in the wrong place. Second, I'm looking for a replacement of the REX Engine. It doesn't seem to work.Whenever I load it up to download the weather, it downloads but it's always clear everywhere in the world.And as the real world weather function of FS9 itself is kind of erratic and changes from perfect visibility tocomplete fog in the blink of an eye, I'm really looking forward to a realistic engine.Thanks!

Hi First, I'm sorry if this is posted in the wrong place. Second, I'm looking for a replacement of the REX Engine. It doesn't seem to work.Whenever I load it up to download the weather, it downloads but it's always clear everywhere in the world.And as the real world weather function of FS9 itself is kind of erratic and changes from perfect visibility tocomplete fog in the blink of an eye, I'm really looking forward to a realistic engine. Thanks!

ASE , in my opinion better than the REX weather engine. http://www.hifitechinc.com/products/active-sky-evolution

Don't have REX but I do have ASE and it's really awesome in my opinion. FSMetar also works well and is free, although winds aloft are interpolated from surface wind data so they aren't very accurate. The upside is that you'll never buck a 100 kt headwind in the sim, because FSMetar winds never exceed about 30 kts at any altitude. Further, if you're into eye candy/screenshots at all, FSMetar is the clear winner for a stunning cloud depiction. Jim

Don't have REX but I do have ASE and it's really awesome in my opinion. FSMetar also works well and is free, although winds aloft are interpolated from surface wind data so they aren't very accurate. The upside is that you'll never buck a 100 kt headwind in the sim, because FSMetar winds never exceed about 30 kts at any altitude. Further, if you're into eye candy/screenshots at all, FSMetar is the clear winner for a stunning cloud depiction. Jim

Actually the upper winds are more accurate than you say with FSMetar. Last night I had 54kts head wind at FL390I agree totally regarding the clouds. It's the best and free.vololiberista

Yeah I suppose I've seen FSMetar winds above 30 kts, but none the less, they are interpolated from surface winds so they're subject to inaccuracies. Still my favorite Wx engine for FS9 though. I've always thought of FSMetar and HDEv2 in combo as "freeware REX" :) BTW vololiberista, you do know about my metar archive, correct? If not, you can download historic metars by date here that you can open with FSMetar: http://www.cat-tamer.com/flightsim/metar Jim

I don't think FSMetar itself can download historic data. What you could do is find a site like NOAA which I believe contains at least some historic info. Change your computer date and then perhaps FSMeatar would download that info. You might also have to temporarily tweak the web address in the ini. file to match that download page. Once downloaded of course you can save the info which is a good feature. whatever is downloaded has to finish up in this text format: BGBW 231750Z 30003KT 9999 -DZ SCT007 SCT010 BKN015 10/08 Q0991 RMK 3ST 4ST 5SCvololiberista

No, FSMetar can't download historical weather, there's never been any complete historical metars available for FSMetar, that's precisely the reason I set up the metar archive. ...and yes, I understand the metars text format. If you actually visit my site you'll see that you can download metars that have been saved from the NOAA site every hour for the past 2 years. I set up a script that goes into the NOAA site once an hour, transfers and compresses the metar, and stores it on my server. There is no historical Wx on the NOAA site, every metar gets overwritten with new data every 24 hrs. Just go to my site and select the date/time you want and download the metar which may be as old as 2 years (because I started archiving them 2 yrs ago). Download the metar of your choice (there are currently 14,500 to choose from and one is being added every hour), decompress it with winzip, and then from FSMetar's "Metars" menu, choose "Open metars file" and select the metar you just downloaded and decompressed. FSMetar will now depict that weather, so you can now do a winter sim flight in July without FSMetar depicting 90° F and CLR everywhere you go. Changing the computer's date or tweaking the web address changes nothing because there is no historical Wx available either from NOAA or Vatsim. Jim

Apologies for butting in guy's. One of the big bug bears of using FS9s real world weather is the the occasional wild and wacky wind shifts ,that could literally hurl your aircraft round skies and have your cruising speed go suddenly from say M75 to M88 or more in an instant .Using FS metar does this occur ,or have got to use payed up version of FSUIPC.to smooth wind shifts?I personally use AKSy and most of the time thats fine ,but if in a hurry to get airborne sometimes ASKy can take a little time to get up and running so something maybe a little simpler (fsmetar?)would be an idea ,however! if using FSMETAR still produces wild and wacky wind shifts I will not be interested .ASKy does not produce any wild wackiness by the way,strong winds ,turbulence etc etc yes ,but not unrealistic shifts as per FS real world weather.Andy

I use REX + Overdrive and it is the best texture pack money can buy. The live weather generator is OK as well. My only complaint is the weather textures for the chosen routing take about 6-8 minutes to load up. However, at £23 it is value for money. ASE at £32, of course is just a weather generator, weather textures not included. (Prices based on today's rubbish exchange rates)John

ASE at £32, of course is just a weather generator, weather textures not included. (Prices based on today's rubbish exchange rates)John

HelloBut a very much better one IMHO, compared to the weather engine included with REX.