Initial impressions after taking the plunge...

[Bobu 0]

Yesterday might have been August 28th for a lot of people, but at my house it will forever be known as "Prepar3d" day. Due to the prodding of certain members (not naming names...cough...Ben/Srdan...cough) I took the plunge and bought the academic version of Prepar3d. I started downloading around 2pm and I believe by 9pm i was ready to install.

 

Installation is straight forward. So was activation. Painless really. I have FSX installed on the same machine (until later today), BTW. Fired up Prepar3d and changed my settings. Looked around the forums and made some cfg tweaks. Got TrackIR 4 going with a 2 minute language.dll hack. Purchased the FSX to Prepar3d Migration Tool, and proceded to install 2 add-on aircraft, some photo scenery, and a couple other popular add-ons (I am not naming them).

 

Fired up P3d and saw some tearing. Added another cfg fix for that. Okay, time for a flight! First, that academic watermark is nothing to be concerned about. It is just some small text in the corner.

 

I takeoff with an add-on plane from KDEN (Photo scenery loaded) and immediately notice several things.

 

1. With my settings cranked up, fraps is saying 50-60. Butter smooth.

 

2. No jaggies or shimmering whatsoever. Image quality is perfect.

 

3. The photo scenery looks absolutely stunning.

 

4. I am not seeing anything popping up on the terrain like FSX.

 

The same add-ons and scenery just look and feel crisper. The colors are deeper, richer. The images sharper. I will make a video later today to show it, but considered I am running an ATI 5850 I could not be happier. I have had zero crashes, and Prepar3d just looks and feels like the next major upgrade to FSX. It is not a subtle upgrade.

 

Today I am going to try to sort out weather and traffic, and mesh, along with a few other aircraft add-ons, and assuming all goes well...uninstall FSX. I can't go back after seeing this.

 

Final note. The whole lack of loading screen sucks, but not that big a deal IMO. You can save your flight as a default like FSX, so in most cases it only takes a minute or two to reconfigure. Definitely not a show stopper.

[OmniAtlas 93]

Does Prepar3d allow the ENB series to run alongside it nicely?

[Bobu 0]

Does Prepar3d allow the ENB series to run alongside it nicely?

 

No idea. You'd have to Google it.

[Ben Cap 89]

Welcome aboard! :smile:

[Mike_CFII_MEL 788]

Hi,

 

Welcome the the dark side. :ph34r: LOL. enjoy your new SMOOTH sim.

[Bobu 0]

And dark side it truly is, too!

 

Something you guys need to know if you have FSX installed as well. I installed some add-ons last night and when I checked today my AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\FSX folder had been deleted. And no, I didn't do it.

[Mike_CFII_MEL 788]

Hi,

 

That is really strange, that should not happen. Don't know what addons you installed, but it sure wasn't P3D that removed your folders/files. I've never seen that happen and I've been running P3D since day one.

 

 

And dark side it truly is, too!

 

Something you guys need to know if you have FSX installed as well. I installed some add-ons last night and when I checked today my AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\FSX folder had been deleted. And no, I didn't do it.

[malibu43 2]

Can I ask what your FPS would have been in the same area with the same settings in FSX? And does P3D have full DX10 support now?

[Jean-Paul 167]

And dark side it truly is, too!

 

Something you guys need to know if you have FSX installed as well. I installed some add-ons last night and when I checked today my AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\FSX folder had been deleted. And no, I didn't do it.

 

Did you use a third party migrator tool ? I don't own the Estonian program so I'm not sure about this but it could be that the directory has been hidden, moved or renamed.

[Bobu 0]

Can I ask what your FPS would have been in the same area with the same settings in FSX? And does P3D have full DX10 support now?

 

At this point it is still very hard to compare apples to apples. I am in the process of trying to get all the add-ons I regularly use in P3d, so until I get it setup exactly as FSX I can't say.

 

Did you use a third party migrator tool ? I don't own the Estonian program so I'm not sure about this but it could be that the directory has been hidden, moved or renamed.

 

Let me check that. Using Estonian.

[Jean-Paul 167]

Can I ask what your FPS would have been in the same area with the same settings in FSX?

 

Depending on the scenery, equal, better or much better

 

 

And does P3D have full DX10 support now?

 

No DX10 support at all. Expect DX11 in Prepar3D V 2.0

[Mike_CFII_MEL 788]

Hi,

 

I'm seeing about a 12FPS increase over FSX on average, in some coverage areas, P3D display even higher (15-20) FPS increase.

 

Can I ask what your FPS would have been in the same area with the same settings in FSX? And does P3D have full DX10 support now?

[luckyswede 0]

Yesterday might have been August 28th for a lot of people, but at my house it will forever be known as "Prepar3d" day.

 

That makes me think of Eisenhower in "The Longest Day" declaring the start of the invasion of Normandy - " I'm quite positive we must give the order. I don't like it, but there it is. Gentlemen, I don't see how we can possibly do anything... but go."

 

And yes, I'm ready to go too. Prepar3D, here I come! :smile:

 

/Torbjörn Kuntze

[gandy 18]

another one that has been p3dified :)

[Jude Bradley 659]

Any screenshots of the watermark, as I'm half thinking of the $49.95 price - (that's 8 beers in Ireland)