Hello,

 

I purchased this on the comments and reviews that I read. I have previously been using AS2012 I did a flight from Winnepeg to Anchorage in the PMDG MD-11. The cloud coverage was impressive, and accurate. I was hopeful on the wind smoothing. I discovered that an old problem that active sky has seemed to fix returned with this addon. Its the age old fsx problem of extreme wind shifts. in all of my PMDG aircraft including the NGX, these windshifts will cause autopilots to disconnect and create overspeed and low speed warnings, and can send my aircraft diving into the ground.

 

I cannot accept this as a $45 addon when I can just run active sky 2012 with no issues whatsoever. I have read that the makers of OpusFSX will not ever never ever ever go to the global weather environment. I have read its PMDG's problem (it may well be, I don't know) To be honest I could care less. The only thing I know is...it's my problem.

 

I feel that for the money this addon should work as good or preferably better than the current choices. I can see it has great potential, and does many things right. This windshift issue however has the potential to completely ruin a flight making the accurate weather depiction and awesome cloud coverage, and all the other neat features of this addon completely worthless. HIFIsim had the same problem with its active sky franchise. They knew how important it was to fix, and they fixed it. In my opinion it is currently the best choice out there for a fully featured weather simulation.

 

That being said I can see the potential of this addon. I hope this issue is addressed quickly. I understand that this bug resides within FSX itself. I know the addon developers are simply dealing with the crappy bugged code that microsoft left fsx with. I can imagine for any developer this is frustrating....BUT....this is not freeware. The expectations are higher. Fix this.

 

I am using OpusFSX with default settings. WInd smoothing is enabled. I am using it on one machine no networking involved. FSUIPC wind smoothing and pressure smoothing is disabled. I am using the most recent version of OpusFSX.

 

Any advice or assistance on this would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks

 

Guthrie

I think that if you had done some reading and digging through the forums that even though you DO deal with "and will have to deal with the windshift if you want upper winds and accurate surace winds" that the program itself does more and then some than Hifi or REX has been able or capable of doing with their weather engines. Yes it's payware but you can't make everyone happy. As was mentioned on a post here before that you can try 3 different engines and find certain features available on one that isn't on the others. For OPUS it just so happens that they have the accuracy and not the "wind performance". I understand that the wind component is an important one to flying, however, if you can tweak your system some and have some patience with what Stephen and Cheryl are doing and trying to do (despite our mild impatience and complaints) that in the end OPUS will most likely come out on top when all is said and done.

 

No one made you buy this program. I've paid for payware scenery that I have seen freeware developers release and do a better job at later. Choice is yours.

Hi Guthrie,

 

We are currently working on a new beta today which we are hopeful will have a major impact on minimising (if not eradicating) wind shifts whilst still giving you accurate weather. We are quite excited about it. It just takes time to try different things and see how FSX reacts, a lot of software development, we are going as fast as we can, believe me!

 

Not everyone suffers from wind shifts but if you are then you can configure OpusFSX in many different ways, if you are going on short hops (doesn't sound like you are) even just update the weather at the start of your flight then disable Live Weather, then you won't get any wind shifts, I believe this is similar to what AS does, basically setting fixed weather so that you don't upset FSX.

 

Anyway as far as I am aware we are the only company to offer a 30 day money back guarantee on a weather engine (plus more) so if you are not completely happy with what we manage to produce within 30 days you can get a refund, can't say fairer than that.

 

Regards

Cheryl :smile:

If you guys can eradicate the wind shifts then you got another customer here. Everything else sounds brilliant.

I'm really Iooking forward to hearing if your new beta produces the goods

Hi Guthrie,

 

We are currently working on a new beta today which we are hopeful will have a major impact on minimising (if not eradicating) wind shifts whilst still giving you accurate weather. We are quite excited about it. It just takes time to try different things and see how FSX reacts, a lot of software development, we are going as fast as we can, believe me!

 

Not everyone suffers from wind shifts but if you are then you can configure OpusFSX in many different ways, if you are going on short hops (doesn't sound like you are) even just update the weather at the start of your flight then disable Live Weather, then you won't get any wind shifts, I believe this is similar to what AS does, basically setting fixed weather so that you don't upset FSX.

 

Anyway as far as I am aware we are the only company to offer a 30 day money back guarantee on a weather engine (plus more) so if you are not completely happy with what we manage to produce within 30 days you can get a refund, can't say fairer than that.

 

Regards

Cheryl :smile:

 

tyvm for the encouraging news. I am excited to try it out! like Phil said I think if you get the windshift issue sorted this will be the best weather addon available. I appreciate your efforts, and the suggestions.

 

Guthrie

today I downloaded the beta, and did a flight from winnepeg to anchorage. I monitored the flight closely. I used the PMDG MD-11 at altitudes of 340-350. I am happy to report that the weather looked amazing and the windshifts that had previously doomed my flight were gone. I only saw a couple minor effects on the aircraft, but the autopilot was able to adjust without issue. I would say this issue is resolved with the current beta. Amazing job. I am a happy customer at this point.

 

Guthrie

By wind shifts, are you guys referring to the problem that causes S-Turns in the PMDG NGX and possibly the Level-D?

 

If so, wasn't this tempered by some ASE tweaks and resolved by FSUIPC settings?

 

I do apologize for not being up to speed on this topic, I've had the aforementioned tweak applied to ASE for so long that I haven't cared too much about staying current. What brought me out was looking at upgrading to AS2012 or OPUS. I have to believe that positive posts regarding the REX weather engine are by those who don't fly high-end airliners.

 

By the way, just one question. Is OPUS compatible with VATSIM?

 

Thanks.

 

Dave

By the way, just one question. Is OPUS compatible with VATSIM?

 

It's all I ever use on VATSIM. As far as METARS are concerned, I have always had matching weather reports from VATSIM and Opus. No problem. Go fly! ^_^

It's all I ever use on VATSIM. As far as METARS are concerned, I have always had matching weather reports from VATSIM and Opus. No problem. Go fly! ^_^

 

Daniel,

 

Thanks so much for the reply and information!

 

Dave