"This statement would seem to indicate an intimate knowledge of both product's code."Nope.. my point was that neither product is "simple". Their complexities lie in different areas, and both had their own unique issues at time of release. But one has seen two patches since its release, and the other has seen none.Which begs the question... "Why?"Cheers,Greg

Hi, "Nope.. my point was that neither product is "simple". Their complexities lie in different areas, and both had their own unique issues at time of release. But one has seen two patches since its release, and the other has seen none.Which begs the question... "Why?""Because you won't see others lomac title series as many as Msfs title, I won't be surprised if you will not see another lomac, they patch this one and there was 10X more bugs then fs9 at the release and that's it's, it's the most easy thing to do, also when they works on patch this is means, they are not working on something else, imagine msfs still working on patch at this time, it's almost impossible to release another title at 2 years interval.All these are in the same pattern, fly, propilot, fu series, and tons of others titles, they patched but have extremly short life. Msfs not patched but strong legs to survive to long terme, in my case I prefers to see each 2 years a new title then have 2,3 title and get patched and after good bye.ThanksChris Willis[link:fsw.simflight.com/FSWMenuFsSim.html]Clouds And Addons For MsFs

You both make good points, And considering Flight Sim's track history, Microsoft has been re-releasing that title fairly regularly. Since 1998, it has been released in two year intervals. In that same time, Microsoft also released three iterations of it's Combat Flight Sim series, and at least two (that I know of) versions of Fighter Ace.In addition, they do projects that aren't even sim products.The racing title, Midtown Madness, was tested primarily by the sim team, because the 'Action' games department that I worked in was currently working on a 5 projects (Close Combat 3, The Age of Empires Rome Expansion, Microsoft Pinball Arcade, Urban Assault, and a Puzzle Game by the maker of Tetris called Pandora's Box). UBI Soft has had some ongoing development with IL2, and it's expansions (which also serve as patches), and LOMAC. I agree with the posts mentioned above, it is highly unlikely that you will see a LOMAC 2, as the complexity of the sim, deterred many less hardcore simmers, and the performance issues in all but the fastest machines were also a contributing factor. I bought LOMAC and returned it because I couldn't get satisfactory performance even on my 2Gig Athlon.Microsoft has hit the sweet spot with Flight Simulator being accessable enough for most aviation enthusiasts, while being complex enough for the hardcore group. A bi-yearly release schedule ensures that we become excited about the next release about the same time the older product starts getting blase'The only patch Microsoft made recently is for FS2000, and that is for the performance issues that the program was infamous for.

"The only patch Microsoft made recently is for FS2000, and that is for the performance issues that the program was infamous for."That's probably the one thing that makes me wonder why Microsoft didn't decide to patch FS2004. The issue with Autogen caused a performance problem far worse than anything I saw in FS2000, and the only solution available is to disable the new functionality introduced in the sim. This is at least as serious as the FS2000 performance problem, in my opinion.I still believe a cultural change took place within the higher ups at Microsoft vs. MSFS after FS2000's release. Many of us fly the sim and enjoy it, but there are issues of the same severity, the type of which were patched in FS2000 and FS98.-John

"I still believe a cultural change took place within the higher ups at Microsoft vs. MSFS after FS2000's release. Many of us fly the sim and enjoy it, but there are issues of the same severity, the type of which were patched in FS2000 and FS98."I share your preception, John.Greg

Hi all.If I understand it correctly, FS2000 had 2 patches:http://www.microsoft.com/games/flightsimul...s2000update.aspI did own FS2000, and without the patch it was very bad... with the patch it was still bad, but playable.FS2000 was bad, FS2004 is good. I know this is my subjective reasoning, but by this simple comparison, there is no way FS2004 requires a patch.FS2006 will have problems. There are only a handful of priorities that will be addressd by that version. Hopefully, the seasonal CTDs will be history, as will the CPU-hogging characteristics of the default autogen settings ( although these are remedied by slider settings and some CFG tweaking ). I'm hoping we will get a "flatten exclude" that will return the terrain to the pre-flatten mesh-state. I also hope we get more accurate default airfield/runway/navaid placement ( although 20000+ airfields will be a bit much for the design team to verify ).Dick

I run autogen dense, & everything goes superbly.Sure you're not dreamin' John!Peter Sydney Australia

As far as I have been able to assertain, the autogen issue only really occurs at the "extremely dense" setting - which is why I really don't think it should be called a "bug" per se. I mean theoretically, given a powerful enough PC, the issue will likely dissappear. So until 4ghz CPUs and 256meg vid cards become the norm, just run the autogen at normal like I do and the problem is non-existant. :)

Hi, "the autogen issue only really occurs at the "extremely dense" setting"And not on all areas.As fs2000, the patch never fix the stutter and performance on all area in fs2000, install it now and see the major stutter and poor performace on any computer available, (even ms confese there was nothing we can do) it's more a "transparent patch", with some easy cfg entries, MS patch never fix MAJOR problemfeature anyways. let's not talking about the black shadows which is still not correctly implemented in fs2002 and 2004 and the coastline entries in the cfg that's was already in the alpha screenshots, then removed to the final and then reappears in the patch, these type of non quality patch are useless and never fix major thinganomalies Many month of time and testing only for these type of "transparent patch" ThanksChris Willis[link:fsw.simflight.com/FSWMenuFsSim.html]Clouds And Addons For MsFs

Chris, I hope you can fix the overcast issue with your clouds, maybe a 2d layer... I'd like to fly 2 years with overcast working :)Thanks,Ulisses

Well, there's two main points that I gather from this thread and all other threads like it:1. Microsoft will never issue a patch for FS2004. For that matter, they most likely will never issue a patch for any future version of FS ever again.2. Most beta testers (most, not all) on the forum here do not think that the issues present today warrants a patch. In fact they think that we should all be basically kissing Bill Gates' feet in thanks for giving us FS (which I intend to do...see below).One of the arguments is that the hardcore community is small so its not worth putting out a patch for such a small percentage of your total sales...... I don't buy that argument, simply because a lot of the features that's present on the sim today is as a result of microsoft listening to the hardcore community. Hell, even the release of the SDKs is an attempt to keep the hardcore community happy. How many casual simmers who doesn't even know about the existence of addons would be downloading SDKs?I used to think that discussing this on the forums here and sending messages to microsoft support would help.....but how can it when so many here don't even think that a patch is necessary? Its a lost cause.I have given up completely on expecting any patch from Microsoft ever again.From all these threads, I can only draw the following conclusions:I will, as will all of you here, buy the next version of FS....I will, as will all of you here, wait patiently for up to a year or more for the bugs to be fixed by the community. (I think it may be a bit much to ask resident beta testers of FS2006 to be on the look out for the windshift and timezone problems, for example, when most of them don't even think its a problem now, so I'll wait for FSUIPC and the other unpaid FS bugfixers to solve these and other problems that are certain to crop up).And I will, as will most beta testers here, kiss Bill's feet in thanks and praise if I ever have the oppertunity to meet him.Thank you Bill, for a fine piece of software (never mind the dirt that's just about visible from under the carpet). :) :)

Tony,You have indeed enlightened me, and from this point on, I too will change my ways1. I will expect Bill Gates to include an actual Cessna 172 in my next version of flight sim, and if it costs more than $60.00 I will moan and groan about how it is obvious that Microsoft is trying to pick my pockets. How dare he only provide 24000 plus airports with amazing accurate terrain mesh with global coverage!!!!2. I will continue to minimize the technical advances made by the flight simulator team in the past 6 years, while focusing, instead on the fact that my winds aloft don't "shift" realistically when real weather is downloaded at it's 15 minute interval.3. I will completely ignore the time and effort it takes on software development, and continue to see Flight sim, as just another program, much the same as Tetris, and Solitaire are "just programs".4. I will assume that all beta testers and people who have worked in the software industry, who actually have real world experience in bug tracking and resolution, are nothing more than Bill Gates butt kissers and deserve less respect than the dog doo I scraped off my shoe this morning.5. I will continue to hold in high esteem third party developers who can spend lots of time focusing on one single area of MSFS, while at the same time, criticize and downplay the achievements by the Microsoft team for providing an extremely full functioned peice of software that works well for over 90% of the consumers directly out of the box.6. I will continue to criticize Microsoft for failing to update the program through patches, even though such updates could in fact make the add-ons, which I collectively paid more for than the base program, unusable, and would most likely cause the next release to slip. And if a patch is generated, I will be sure to hold Microsoft responsible for the slip date, since they should very easily handle three ongoing projects at a time, plus issue patches, in a timely manner. I will also ignore the fact that Microsoft's last patch for a flight simulator was with Combat Flight Simulator 3. Even though the same team often works on both projects, and many advances from CFS are incorporated in the next version of Flight Sim, I will still spread the falsehood that Microsoft never patches their products.7. I will continue to bash Microsoft, even though they release SDK's so that I can continue to purchase $30.00 addon airplanes and AI traffic utilities, or download products never before available thanks to the release of said SDK.8. I will continue to hold on to the ignorant belief, even though told by professionals in the field to the contrary, that any bug that is reproducable is very easy to fix, and that the decision not to fix it, is simply made because of Microsoft's ongoing plan to globally pick my pocket and rob me of my cash.9. And MOST importantly, I will continue to have such a strong sense of my own importance in this world, that obviously any company that refuses to address my pet peeve, immediately, must be held in the upmost disdain. I will also view the other 90% of the entire flight simulator community as either dim witted morons or corporate butt smootchers becaue they have the audacity to imply that perhaps it is ME who is being a bit unreasonable.Tony, if you do feel as bad about the state of the Flight Simulator program, feel free to no longer purchase the software, or better yet, develop your own flight simulator so that we can hold you in the same regard that you obviously hold Microsoft in.

Oakey-doakey then... yet another fine conclusion to what had been at one point an actual mature and objective discourse.Hey, at least the folks who work hard to create this product will have something to chuckle about when they get back to work Monday. If nothing else this thread (as so many before it) will be entertaining to them.Greg

>Hi David - >>There is a way to fix that? I must have missed it, and I'm>still running 2k2.>>Could you point me in the right direction?>>Thanks,>AndrewYeah,just use the word Apron in a search on this site. There's a file by Hans Van Wyhe that fixs aprons/ramps on 210 airports in FS2002. It sure fixed the one at St.Thomas.Like I've said before its ridiculous that PAYING customers of FS2002 needed to fix those ramps when MS could have and should have done the job themselves.David

>Oakey-Dukey then... yet another fine conclusion to what had>been at one point an actual mature and objective discourse.>>Hey, at least the folks who work hard to create this product>will have something to chuckle about when they get back to>work Monday. If nothing else this thread (as so many before>it) will be entertaining to them.>>GregYep..as usual it degrades to the same ridiculous discussion back in 2002 where Bill is our God,we should all be down on our FS knees thanking our lucky stars he doesn't pull the plug on FS and we should shut up about any of this patch talk. Baloney,MS has made millions off this product and will continue to make millions more. I could care less about the $$$ factor Gates and MS have raked in but when a product like FS2002 has a SERIOUS flaw like it did with the aprons/ramps then I want a FIX for it. The fix never came until paying customers of FS2002 issued their own patch--its in Avsim's library if anyone wants to take a look.David