I said some time back in the M$ Flight forum saying in effect : M$ should NOT DELIVER A PARTIAL BABY - i.e. Flight with Hawaii only.Laminar did just that with X-plane version 10.For an outfit with a FS that prides itself on the "mathematical blade element theory flight model", the least one would expect is that the bunch of aircraft they bundle as part of the package live up to their own hype.After TEN VERSIONS of X-plane they should have had the hang of it. Now there is very little excuse for not putting up .....Almost every version, on average, has a lifespan of about two years with perhaps a dozen or so "updates" during the version run (the frequency has gone down over the past couple of years). Every update is coupled with a list of bug fixes, mainly associated with the flight model and/or the autopilot or some such miscellaneous accessory - about 15 items fixed on average, I'd guess. Over a span of a TEN VERSIONS, one can perhaps say that there have been perhaps 1800 to 2000 flight model related bug fixes or tweaks.If anything, with better faster hardware, the flight model should be close to PERFECT BY NOW ! Ideally speaking, if all planes are based on the "blade elemnent theory based flight model", all prior versions of aircraft should fly BETTER in version 10 !

This much hyped blade element theory sounds like a fantastic thing to me, surely this is the right way to make a simulator. But... surely the whole point of this approach is for things to just "work". You make an aeroplane and if you do it exactly like the real thing, it should fly like the real thing, without having to tweak the flight model. I don't understand why you need to tweak a flight model built this way, never mind tweak it 2000 times. And most of all, at the end of that day, I honestly can't bring myself to believe any of the aircraft that come with the demo. I've not flown a real aeroplane that flies like this. I've read some posts about setting up your joystick etc. but I'm not interested. You don't have to do any of that in FSX.Feels to me like the whole point of X-Plane, the reason for using it, is a bit of a mess. I still have great hope for it because there's so much about it that seems like the right way of doing things. They have a proper 3D lighting system, they have better management of CPU cores, the default aircraft have gauges you can actually use (one of my absolute hates about some MS default aircraft) and this blade element theory, but the latter I don't understand. You read about addon aircraft having far too much elevator authority etc. How is this possible when using blade element theory?In my mind, once you have blade element theory working, what needs tweaking? You can't tweak the characteristics of air. Surely. If it needs tweaking, it's not been done properly?Lots to be excited about, and it is perhaps not fair to compare vanilla X-Plane with my FSX+million addons, but that is the reality of the situation for many of us and X-Plane falls short. I hope it gets better, it will obviously, but I'm starting to have doubts about X-Plane's main feature. I just don't trust it, and so many performance figures are far off the real thing. If this blade element theory really did what it says it does, surely we couldn't be having any of these issues. And I also don't trust this tweaking of it, I don't understand why it would need tweaking. The main feature doesn't deliver, and everything else isn't good enough.Love the airport builder idea and the proper lighting and many many things, but as a complete experience flight simulator... no.

Thx Morton, for reminding me of this plane, I downloaded it quite sometime ago, as I fly one of these in real life quite often. I noticed there has been an update since I downloaded it, so will give this one a try in XP 10

You read about addon aircraft having far too much elevator authority etc. How is this possible when using blade element theory?

Very simply, if you design a plane with garbage data then blade element theory isn't going to magically make it fly realistically.

Very simply, if you design a plane with garbage data then blade element theory isn't going to magically make it fly realistically.

Completely understood, but at the end of the day we're still in the same place. The new approach hasn't resulted in a better end user experience... yet.

Completely understood, but at the end of the day we're still in the same place. The new approach hasn't resulted in a better end user experience... yet.

It has for me a hundred times over, and the more I mess with it the better it gets. Playing with Planemaker at the moment, the sim is almost worth buying for that alone.It really bugs me when ppl make sweeping statements as tho they are fact when it is actually their opinion only.regards

Well unfortunately due to poor included aircraft and lack of default landmarks that many have taken for granted the last ten years I think this will be the reaction of many who try this great sim for the first time for a short while and discard it-a real shame...cause it has so much to offer for those who dig a little..

+1,000,000I realize XPers on these forums buy addons etc but us newbs coming over from FSX are looking for more than great night and IMC atmosphere. I think what has turned me off so much is default planes and poor city rendering.

The XPX manual says over 33,000 airports.

+1,000,000I realize XPers on these forums buy addons etc but us newbs coming over from FSX are looking for more than great night and IMC atmosphere. I think what has turned me off so much is default planes and poor city rendering.

Here' my rant :-)Actually I used XP 9 for quite some time and had great moments in the commercial MU-2 - a really well done model and just shows the nice potential in the XP-engine. But after a while I ran back to FSX, not just for the bigger range of add ons but it feels more like a complete piece of software. I have been flying in the full version of XP10 for a week now and honestly don't feel like shouting hallelujah. The exaggerated wind/turbulence often forces me to use "clear-skies" settings instead of real weather. The lack of at least one quality default aircraft had me trawling the net for alternatives just after a couple of hours. Seeing the AI traffic struggling on almost every airport I've witnessed gives the impression of an unfinished product. Airports look unfamiliar and deserted without buildings. Runways are some places curved at strange and drastic angles to follow terrain, and why is it difficult to tell XP - in code that trees don't grow on runways ?To quote a lot of people already; first impression goes a long way. And for the majority looking for a simulator experience on a desktop the XP series never seem to quite catch them all on fire. I was really hoping XP10 would blow me away, which it literally did ;-) but besides the exaggerated winds it failed to impress me much. And you really cant hide behind explanations such as low developer budget and minor staff etc when you charge the buyer commercially rated prices for each release.My own salvage is that I am a patient man; so I will continue the use the XP10 and hoping for small and major updates and changes in the future. But I'm afraid the bigger audience will drop out, and they are the ones who could finance XP in the long run making it perhaps superior to competitors.Happy flying!

Excuse me if this is a bit off-topic and thread-hijacking.. Many have noticed the excessive turbulence, me included. Is there any setting or fix for this? Every airplane seems so inherently unstable. I purchased the Carenado F33 and that one also is all over the place even in VERY low wind-speeds. It slides sideways while sitting on the runway for pete´s sake.. I´m no real pilot, but I have a hard time believing that a real plane behaves in such a way.

+1,000,000I realize XPers on these forums buy addons etc but us newbs coming over from FSX are looking for more than great night and IMC atmosphere. I think what has turned me off so much is default planes and poor city rendering.

So Ryan, you fly FSX with no addon-aircraft and scenery just default everything, Like MOST FSX users! Right!No ONE is forcing anyone to purchase XPX, try the demo and if you don't like it move on. Why beat this to death.@Swe_Richard,Go to the Weather Tab and lower the turbulence to your liking, if your using RW, you can't change this at this time.

@Swe_Richard,Go to the Weather Tab and lower the turbulence to your liking, if your using RW, you can't change this at this time.

Thing is, turbulence is already at zero.

a bit off topic, but i made a new install of fsx to code a bit around scenery files, so pure vanilla install.Believe me it's frightening.Keep that in mind when testing another sim, you can't ask it to be at the same level than another software where you put hundreds of hours and money to make it prettier.

+1Your so right Benny, but this is what people are doing, just makes no sense.

I would disagree. The complaints most are complaining about-lack of recognizable world objects, airport buildings, and variety of buildings has been available in the default fs series for almost ten years-no add ins required. Also decent ATC with every approach for every worldwide airport, a built in mission system, 4 seasons, varied water for different regions,And for the last 6 years high resolution textures.I personally don't think it is unreasonable that someone who has used such features in a sim for a number of years would be disappointed to find the newest and what has been billed as a revolutionary sim is lacking most of the above.Therefore, I find a stronger argument is to admit these things are missing-at least presently, mention what one may expect to be added in the near future, and mention the areas where Xplane is superior or has unique features-of which there is plenty to mention.Dismissing people's honest reactions I don't think solves anything.Again, why not counter the observation that there are no recognizable buildings in cities or airports with-you are absolutely right -however that should be rectified in the next 4 months. In the meantime you might enjoy the fact that there are no blurries over the high res terraIni-ever!-, that performance will be better with similar settings, and that roads look like roads and not like a vector drawn line that is arbitrarily placed on top of textures that don't match.To me at least, this might win more new users who are frankly giving first looks and comparing to what they have used for many, many years. I would hope that would be the goal-as more users equals more add ins and future success.

So Ryan, you fly FSX with no addon-aircraft and scenery just default everything, Like MOST FSX users! Right!No ONE is forcing anyone to purchase XPX, try the demo and if you don't like it move on. Why beat this to death.@Swe_Richard,Go to the Weather Tab and lower the turbulence to your liking, if your using RW, you can't change this at this time.

If....................a lot of users don't end up purchasing XPX, then a lot of 3rd party developers won't be moving to XPX. That's just the way it is. Criticisms are valid, and should be taken seriously. Personally, I have no interest in populating an X-Plane world. That's just not a hobby I'm interested in.