Hi Damian! It is obvious that you have put in a tremendous amount of work on an incredible but very complex product. I have been an ASE user with the latest upgrades and only recently in last few months fully understood the differences btw the different modes of depiction thru direct correspondence with you thru this forum and support area. I now have this wonderful new product and tho I have thoroughly read thru the documentation, I still have some questions on how to most practically use it. I am an old pilot, not a computer geek so if these questions seem foolish to you, I apologize. Here goes:1. After initial installation, are your new textures automatically loaded into FSX or is it something I must first do?2. Does 2012 randomly select textures (wx based, I hope) from any and all of the "themes" if I haven't specified a particular theme?3. I assume that I should first choose a theme and then select or modify the textures to my liking, then "save" the theme(?) OK, I've done that. But now do I use "install" or "Wx influenced"? What is the difference? Do both choices restrict themselves to textures in my chosen theme ONLY, or will "wx influenced" use other textures?4. What is the recommended order of process when I want to begin a flight? I usually fly historic OFFLINE and after selecting a date and time, I choose a departure and arrival based on the weather conditions with the heaviest IMC I can find on the map. I then use a separate flight planner and import that into FSX. Now with ASE, my next step was to load FSX, choose my aircraft and activate the plan at my chosen departure position. I then would reboot ASE and load my flight plan after which I would extend the radii of my departure and arrival stations to about 90nm. I then would return to FSX to begin my preflight while the weather initialized. With 2012, if I install my texture theme in advance, then load my flight plan, it again installs textures. Are these the same ones from my chosen theme again or is the program now choosing from all available themes? Do I have to now re-select my theme and re-install it? And what if I want to continue to use the same theme on subsequent flights? Must I again reload it before I put in my flight plan (or reinstall it post-plan)?5. In the graphics submenus it allows me to set up a priority of 1-9 for each texture. Is that the probability of it being used (I assume that only those textures I have checked as "selected" would be relevant) or something to do with the quality of the wx that I want to use it for?6. If 2012 is making texture choices based on wx and I fly from a warm climate airport up to a snow covered destination will it give me the same runway texture for both airports? How will it distinguish? By temperature? Can AS2012 determine which areas are under snow cover within FSX?Anyway those are my starting issues, Damian. I have not been a REX user...only used default FSX so this texture business is entirely a new task for me. I do think the wx depiction engine in AS2012 is greatly improved over the last ASE Beta which I have been using. I also have Dawson's latest upgrade and that has eliminated the wind-lock issue that had plagued me.Oh, BTW, is there a texure for "ICE" that I could use for interior lakes, rivers during winter in the northern areas? That has been sorely neglected by FSX and since you DO have different water textures it is obviously something that could be modified if such a texture exists.

Thanks for the comments Craig...

1. After initial installation, are your new textures automatically loaded into FSX or is it something I must first do?

You must "install" textures first to get the graphics in... this can be done various ways, including manual install (browse/select and install in graphics screen) and wx-influenced auto install (after processing a flight plan).

2. Does 2012 randomly select textures (wx based, I hope) from any and all of the "themes" if I haven't specified a particular theme?

Randomize button selects from all available choices, it is independent from any presaved themes. Wx-Influenced uses the wx conditions and wx-influence variables to influence the selections... in either case this uses all available textures that are included with AS2012.

3. I assume that I should first choose a theme and then select or modify the textures to my liking, then "save" the theme(?) OK, I've done that. But now do I use "install" or "Wx influenced"? What is the difference? Do both choices restrict themselves to textures in my chosen theme ONLY, or will "wx influenced" use other textures?

Use one or the other.. themes are preset selections... wx-influenced is separate from that, creating their own selections.

4. What is the recommended order of process when I want to begin a flight? I usually fly historic OFFLINE and after selecting a date and time, I choose a departure and arrival based on the weather conditions with the heaviest IMC I can find on the map. I then use a separate flight planner and import that into FSX. Now with ASE, my next step was to load FSX, choose my aircraft and activate the plan at my chosen departure position. I then would reboot ASE and load my flight plan after which I would extend the radii of my departure and arrival stations to about 90nm. I then would return to FSX to begin my preflight while the weather initialized.

I would recommend: Start AS2012, find the wx you want, plan your flight, import the plan into AS2012, use wx-influenced install, then start FSX and fly

With 2012, if I install my texture theme in advance, then load my flight plan, it again installs textures. Are these the same ones from my chosen theme again or is the program now choosing from all available themes? Do I have to now re-select my theme and re-install it? And what if I want to continue to use the same theme on subsequent flights? Must I again reload it before I put in my flight plan (or reinstall it post-plan)?

The initial texture theme install should be skipped, you should wait until your plan is loaded... if you want to reuse the same wx-influenced selections that were made, you can just go into graphics screen any time after the wx-influenced selections/install was performed (before changing anything/loading a new theme) and save it to a new theme (using the New button).

5. In the graphics submenus it allows me to set up a priority of 1-9 for each texture. Is that the probability of it being used (I assume that only those textures I have checked as "selected" would be relevant) or something to do with the quality of the wx that I want to use it for?

This is explained in the manual and the on-screen text, worth a close look to understand this fully.... the values give that texture item relevance to a particular set of wx condition categories.... i.e. Surface Wind speed... the value of 1 is considered "extremely low" and the value of 10 is considered "extremely high" while the value of 5 is considered average (about 7kts). In the end this determines the likelihood of the item being selected for those conditions....

6. If 2012 is making texture choices based on wx and I fly from a warm climate airport up to a snow covered destination will it give me the same runway texture for both airports? How will it distinguish? By temperature? Can AS2012 determine which areas are under snow cover within FSX?

It uses the average route conditions, using wx conditions at each waypoint along your route of flight to determine the average. Note that snowy runways and regular runways are separate items, and regardless of conditions, if there is snow conditions you'll see the snowy textures at that airport, while a non-snow airport will show regular non-snow runway textures.

Oh, BTW, is there a texure for "ICE" that I could use for interior lakes, rivers during winter in the northern areas? That has been sorely neglected by FSX and since you DO have different water textures it is obviously something that could be modified if such a texture exists.

There are no "ice" inland textures right now, but it is something worth investigating!