I bought the Bonanza, Caravan and Skymaster yesterday. I was a little disappointed however to find these planes are frame rate hogs. I have a number of older Carenado aircraft that don't make a dent in fps. I thought that they would've been designed more for those of us who use fs9 because our rigs can't run FSX to the best of it's ability. Don't get me wrong, these are beautiful planes but my frames were all over the place flying them.

 

Well, after I purchased the Caravan, I've found that the FPS hit is a little bit hard. I had to convert all but prop textures to DXT3, and pray for good WX. I purchased the Mooney (an oldie by today's standards), now it all looks smooth (and flies not as twitchy as the Caravan). How do you like the Seneca? It's the other turbocharged aircraft in the FS9 catalog (welll, there's also the Centiruin, but I expect the FPS hit would be also hard).

Thanks for the reply, Jim. Actually, Carenado tech support answered my message and pointed out the elusive GPS switch. It is interesting to see the advancements made by them, particularly lately; and how they have been able to convert the FSX files to FS9. Yes, the Caravan does hit the frame rates a bit harder than any other of their planes. I notice it particulaly when I toggle to the virtual cockpit. I wonder if they could tidy up the coding to eliminate that?

 

It would be interesting to know how much business has come their way by this late surge of FS9 offerings. I bet more than just a little. There are tons of people who never made the move to FSX (permanently), and who like to keep updating their add-ons.

I've got the same problem in the C337. I haven't been able to find a nav/gps switch. I've tried both nav and nav/loc in the keypad, but all the want to do is track to a VOR.

 

The switch might be there, but I can't locate it.

I found Carenado support to be very good. We went back and forth about my frame rates but have not come to any conclusion. I did, however, find a great performance boost that has allowed me to run these planes and FS9 much better and for the first time in years I can run FSX at a solid 30 fps with almost all sliders to the right on computer that's about 5 years old. I installed the newest Geforce drive (310) and now that I can halve the refresh rate with Nvidia Inspector, both flight sims perform like never before. I'll definitely try that DXT3 tip Luis as the Caravan is still a bit tough on frames.

I own a lot of them and they are great quality,never had a frame rate issue however these days the standard pc built for FSX is at least the gtx 560,i.5 @3,3ghz

 

I had a look at the Seneca and it clearly mentions, 3 times that this is a VC plane, there is no mention of a 2d cockpit anywhere. It mentions the manual is in VC mode, that should have given the game away right there

 

Unless one has ben under a rock then it is very clear that a lot of devs are steering clear of 2d, why waste time and extra money on something most will never use?

the 2d is dying away at a relativly fast pace these days

But it never says VC only. That's my whole point. Great if you like VC's. But I don't like them. I still feel I was duped and will never buy another Carenado product again. Glad you like them. I don't. And Carenado still hasn't responded to any of my requests at all. Very very poor customer service.

I've got the same problem in the C337. I haven't been able to find a nav/gps switch. I've tried both nav and nav/loc in the keypad, but all the want to do is track to a VOR.

 

The switch might be there, but I can't locate it.

 

The CDI switch at the lower left of your Garmin panel will switch betwee Nav and GPS.

 

Cheers

ram1220-Bob. Mostly I fly 2D, but 3D is no more difficult. Bet one of the reasons you don't like 3D is you cant snap it back to a centre view, well Shift (num pad) Delete cures that. I've just installed the Skymaster, super purchase, beautifully made. Now if you don't like a 3D panel, then don't buy it, stop slating Carenado they are a very good Company, and stop moaning, it's childish.

Echofox

Your opinion. I'll state mine. I don't like vc's and I won't buy from Carenado again.

I gotta say I LOVE my C337! The twin tail, retractable landing gear, good performance and a great VC. My other planes might be sitting in the hangar for a while.

I gotta say I LOVE my C337! The twin tail, retractable landing gear, good performance and a great VC. My other planes might be sitting in the hangar for a while.

 

Love the C337 as well, probably the most of all my Carenado piston aircraft. I do wish Carenado would consider modeling a pressurized piston--either the 337, the 210, or the Malibu.

 

As for not liking aircraft with only VC's, I used to feel the same and I still feel that way when it comes to airliners or commuter aircraft. I don't mind them on GA aircraft--but I first had to get a joystick like my AV8R that had a pan feature.

 

It was interesting that on my first flight lesson in a real GA aircraft, my CFI lectured me on being too focussed on the instruments and not looking outside enough. He noted that's one thing his MSFS students seemed to have in common, even though he praised MSFS for familiarizing students with instrument functions. He noted that MSFS tended to cause instrument tunnel vision. My MSFS landings became much better when I quit my constant attention on what the instruments were doing, especially during the last 50 feet or so before touchdown. IMHO, I feel 2D panels tend to cause much of that tunnel vision since 2D panels were all I used until a few years ago.

 

John

"It was interesting that on my first flight lesson in a real GA aircraft, my CFI lectured me on being too focussed on the instruments and not looking outside enough "

as you know in the real world your taught to fly attitude eg 1/3 sky 2/3 land in a 152 = straight and level.

Your opinion. I'll state mine. I don't like vc's and I won't buy from Carenado again.

 

there is a turbo mod floating around the avsim forums some where. I have it and she now climbs at 4000ft /minute

Love the C337 as well, probably the most of all my Carenado piston aircraft. I do wish Carenado would consider modeling a pressurized piston--either the 337, the 210, or the Malibu.

 

The 337 is my favorite Carenado as well - piston or turbine! Of course, Carenado does the pressurized Malibu JetProp, but I'd also love to see them do a piston Malibu.

 

It was interesting that on my first flight lesson in a real GA aircraft, my CFI lectured me on being too focussed on the instruments and not looking outside enough. He noted that's one thing his MSFS students seemed to have in common, even though he praised MSFS for familiarizing students with instrument functions.

 

I'm surprised he focused on your sim experience. CFIs have been chiding first flight students about looking at the gauges too much since long before computer flight sims were ever invented. :-)

 

Scott

The 337 is my favorite Carenado as well - piston or turbine! Of course, Carenado does the pressurized Malibu JetProp, but I'd also love to see them do a piston Malibu.

 

 

 

I'm surprised he focused on your sim experience. CFIs have been chiding first flight students about looking at the gauges too much since long before computer flight sims were ever invented. :-)

 

Scott

 

He was an MSFS enthusiast himself, and trusted my sim experience so much (based on our pre-flight discussion) that on my first lesson he let me take off by myself, fly to the practice area by myself, and fly back towards the airport by myself. He only took over on final and handled comms.

 

Another CFI who had a flight school in Chandler, about thirty minutes from the airport in Mesa (Arizona) where I took my flight instruction had an MSFS based sim set up in his school, and he championed VATSIM as the best place to practice comms.

 

In my own experience I found a well done flight model in MSFS could match what I experienced in my Allegro trainer almost perfectly, even to the stall break. And I believe the same is probably true with X-Plane as well. What MSFS didn't help with was handling the aircraft in choppy air. Not due to any fault with the sim or flight modeling, but due to the lack of feel that you really need to handle an aircraft well in choppy flight. The other weakness was crosswind landings--MSFS never fixed the ground handling in a crosswind, which is grossly unrealistic in a tri gear aircraft--too much a tendancy to weathervane in even a mild crosswind, which I never experienced in my lessons.

 

John

In my own experience I found a well done flight model in MSFS could match what I experienced in my Allegro trainer almost perfectly, even to the stall break. And I believe the same is probably true with X-Plane as well. What MSFS didn't help with was handling the aircraft in choppy air. Not due to any fault with the sim or flight modeling, but due to the lack of feel that you really need to handle an aircraft well in choppy flight. The other weakness was crosswind landings--MSFS never fixed the ground handling in a crosswind, which is grossly unrealistic in a tri gear aircraft--too much a tendancy to weathervane in even a mild crosswind, which I never experienced in my lessons.

 

I agree that there are aspects to crosswind landing that don't sim well...on some airplanes at least. On the other hand, when I was getting my own license there was rarely a crosswind day so I took to my sim. Using that, I was able to learn how to do the one wheel landing (my mind just would not accept that that was the necessary thing to do until I did it 4 or 5 times on the sim). It really helped me a lot.

 

Gregg