FSX Essentials (Payware/Freeware) in 2013?

[RogueSix 0]

Hi folks,

 

I've recently returned to FSX after a long hiatus from flight simming in general and I'm wondering what you guys would consider as the essentials or must-haves in terms of free and/or paid add-ons.

 

Some basic info:

 

- I live in Germany and would like to do most of my flying in Europe for starters (with other areas of the world to follow later for sure)

- I have a fairly beefy rig with an i5-2500K@4.2GHz, 8GB RAM, GTX 680, 256GB SSD

- Currently running FSX in DirectX 10 mode w/ dual monitors, HOTAS Warthog and the add-ons listed below

 

I've done a bit of research myself and after -more or less - careful evaluation have acquired the following already so...

 

HAVES:

 

- FSUIPC and LINDA for setting up the controls and basic stuff

- REX plus Overdrive for weather and realistic clouds

- GEX Europe for looks

- UTX Europe for looks

- GSX for a bit more realism

- UT2 including the fall/winter schedule for more realism

 

WANTS:

 

Anything and everything that adds more realism and more immersion and is considered to be a "must-have" by you guys. Please keep in mind that I wish to maintain DirectX 10 compatibility (everything is working fine right now). I will definitely get PDMG 737NGX at some point but for now I want to start small with a Cessna (either the default or might get an add-on pack for that one as well) or Piper and work my way up the ladder before tackling the bigger birds.

 

Finally some specific questions:

 

1) Are there any add-ons in the scenery department that will work flawlessly with the UTX/GEX combo? Like Aerosoft's airport sceneries or generally more detailed sceneries?

Reason for asking: GEX/UTX looks good but still seems a bit rough for my taste. I live in a medium-sized German city, i.e. in Freiburg in the SW of Germany. It's a town of ~200K people but when flying over my area I definitely do miss some detail, especially the prominent "Freiburger Münster" which is our local cathedral and should really stick out .

 

2) Is there a must-have add-on to add realistic ATC messages and realistic radio messages from other flights? Preferably one that is compatible or interacts with my already installed Ultimate Traffic 2?

 

3) Somewhat related to 2)... is there an add-on that adds a much better AI for tower, ground and ATC so you get a real sense of being supervised and controlled?

 

 

Thanks a lot in advance for providing any useful hints and advice!

[FloG 148]

Welcome to Avsim!

As for the Cessna: I'd recommend you to stick with the default one for the moment, which is said to be quite good, plus there's some modified flight dynamics for it, because there are two C172s in the works as well as a Piper IIRC, and all of them are made by Realair(C172) and A2A (the other two), which are kinda the "PMDG of GA planes". You could also go for the A2A Piper Cub, which is a great addon, but it's very slow, so not your first choice for cross-country flights.

Regarding the sceneries: Aerosoft published some Germany photoscenery (VFR Germany, but I don't know about DX10 compatibility), which also covers Bavaria, and they have some nice airports, too. The only Bavarian airport that comes to my mind is Munich, though. Then there's Innsbruck, which is a very nice scenery, and Vienna (one of my favorites in Europe). ORBX are expanding their coverage of Europe, too, and they might cover Germany, too, though I'm not sure about that.

I remember back when I got into flight simming, that I didn't want to go outside Europe, but one day I decided to buy ORBX PNW and some of the airport sceneries for that area, and now I spend nearly all of my GA flying time in the North West of the US, so you might want to take a look at those sceneries, too, especially if you want really nice scenery and an experience that is probably really "as real as it gets". Besides, ORBX will probably be one of the standard answers to "What's the best scenery there is?" here on the forums.

 

Regarding the ATC question, I can only say so much: I have Aerosoft's ProFlightEmulator, but I hardly ever use it, mainly due to limited time, and there's other programs out there, too. But probably the best thing is to go to either VATSIM or IVAO, and fly online because you'll have real people as controlers.

 

Best regards, and enjoy the community here,

Flo

[RogueSix 0]

Welcome to Avsim!

 

Thanks!

 

As for the Cessna: I'd recommend you to stick with the default one for the moment, which is said to be quite good, plus there's some modified flight dynamics for it, because there are two C172s in the works as well as a Piper IIRC, and all of them are made by Realair(C172) and A2A (the other two), which are kinda the "PMDG of GA planes". You could also go for the A2A Piper Cub, which is a great addon, but it's very slow, so not your first choice for cross-country flights.

 

Sounds good. Thanks for the advice and the tips where to look for the PMDG of GA. Definitely going to check that out once I have a grip on the default Cessna.

 

Regarding the sceneries: Aerosoft published some Germany photoscenery (VFR Germany, but I don't know about DX10 compatibility), which also covers Bavaria, and they have some nice airports, too. The only Bavarian airport that comes to my mind is Munich, though. Then there's Innsbruck, which is a very nice scenery, and Vienna (one of my favorites in Europe). ORBX are expanding their coverage of Europe, too, and they might cover Germany, too, though I'm not sure about that.

 

Cool, thanks. What I am wondering about though is: The airports should all work fine with GEX and UTX installed, right, since they are basically a different kind of entity or data set that is not covered by GEX/UTX... is that right?

What about OrbX, VFR or Innsbruck though? From what I have read it would collide at the very least with GEX, correct? What about UTX? Would I be required to manually set up my sceneries depending on my planned trip before each flight?

 

I remember back when I got into flight simming, that I didn't want to go outside Europe, but one day I decided to buy ORBX PNW and some of the airport sceneries for that area, and now I spend nearly all of my GA flying time in the North West of the US, so you might want to take a look at those sceneries, too, especially if you want really nice scenery and an experience that is probably really "as real as it gets". Besides, ORBX will probably be one of the standard answers to "What's the best scenery there is?" here on the forums.

 

Oh yeah, after I have seen some of the amazing OrbX PNW screenies I definitely want to explore that area one day as well but first of all I want to become familiar with navigation and VFR/IFR in Europe before moving over to the US where it seems like some standards are quite a bit different. I am confused enough as it is so I want to "master" Euro flying first before venturing forth .

 

Regarding the ATC question, I can only say so much: I have Aerosoft's ProFlightEmulator, but I hardly ever use it, mainly due to limited time, and there's other programs out there, too. But probably the best thing is to go to either VATSIM or IVAO, and fly online because you'll have real people as controlers.

 

VATSIM sounds great and once I have acquired more basic and advanced skills I think I'll definitely sign up there to maximize the simming experience. Until then I guess that... hmmm... UT2 plus LiveATC will have to do. I mean UT2 has the real schedules and when tuning into the nearest major airport via LiveATC on my laptop, well, it's a bit of a band aid but better than nothing, huh?

[FloG 148]

The airports should all work fine with GEX and UTX installed, right, since they are basically a different kind of entity or data set that is not covered by GEX/UTX... is that right?

Generally speaking you're right, but in some special cases there might be some issues with UTX, as in some places roads might cross the RWY, where they should actually be below them(I haven't encountered such a thing myself yet, though in the time when I used UTX - I dropped it due to performance reasons on my older computer, and didn't install it yet).

 

What about OrbX, VFR or Innsbruck though?

As long as those have higher priority in the scenery library there shouldn't be an issue with those addons either. In fact, only UTX can really interfere with other sceneries, as GEX is only replacement textures for the default land textures. And most sceneries wer designed with UTX in mind, anyways, so there shouldn't really be any compatibility issues. If there are some known issues, usually the manuals will tell you how to handle them, otherwise ask your questions here, some of these helpful people always has an answer.

 

some standards are quite a bit different.

Not in the sim, at least as far as I know.

[ESzczesniak 128]

What type of flying do you expect to do mostly? Starting small with the basics is a great plan. I ask though, because different styles have different "must haves".

 

I am mostly a tubeliner and military aircraft guy. VRS recently released their TacPack which takes the F/A-18E to a whole new level on the military side (that's about all I can say for hot new military stuff).

 

On the airliner side, you know about the NGX. While no one really knows, I do expect to see the PMDG 777 this year. PFPX is a flight planner soon to be released that looks to be exceptional. And Majestic Software should have the Dash 8 Q400 soon. For Europe, Aerosoft is the king, but FSDreamteam has some very nice airports. For better or worse though, their only airports outside the USA are Zurich and Geneva.

[FaxCap 13]

I'm not sure if this "fits" but do you have Accu-Feel?

 

Ken

[GodAtum 69]

For ATC, get ProATCX. The voices are great and is works reasonably well. Unlike some of the other ATCs this has SIDS and STARS plus background ATC chatter. You can also get the co-pilot to handle all voice comms too!

[RogueSix 0]

Thanks for the additional suggestions! PFPX and ProATCX are on my watch list now (will buy ProATCX as soon as UT2 support has been added) and Accu-Feel will be bought shortly.

[ailchim 214]

OpusFSX for weather

 

http://www.opussoftware.co.uk/opusfsi.htm

[pete_auau 1,166]

OpusFSX for weather

 

http://www.opussoftw....uk/opusfsi.htm

 

He has already got rexe as stated in his 1st post

[HansRoaming 73]

To give some background I'm also on a journey of start small and work up, I'm using DX9 mainly for compatibility reasons, here's the add ons I use and why:

 

Hardware:

Laptop, another screen and offload some load

Warthog, enough said

2 x Saitek throttle units, good for twins, flaps, etc

Saitek radio panel, takes a lot of fiddle out of the VC! Worth it!

CH Rudder pedals, need to have those

 

Scenery:

Orbx, best I've found so far as regional and airports add to immersion apart from small VFR only airports pretty much have everything they have.

Earth simulations, amazing islands around the UK

Aerosoft, Flytampa etc some fantastic scenery not covered by Orbx although not regional.

FSGenesis, higher resolution meshes for the world, transformational!

Some amazing freeware like greek coastlines, Finland, Caribbean, Israel, lebanon.

 

Aircraft:

Anything by A2A, very real and aircraft are alive

Anything by Real Air

Some Carenado, all look great although they lack depth but with RXP GPS are better than default

Feelthere Phenom 100 (good step up jet), Flight 1 Mustang, same

Eaglesoft CJ1+ V2, nice FMS

Eaglesoft Citation X, great jet to learn on VATSIM as deep FMS and fastest civ jet in the world

Feelthere regional and Ejets, nice short haul

PMDG J41, 737, bigger stuff

Military stuff by Aerosoft, VRS, Iris and Milviz, good funky stuff

Aerosoft Twin Otter, great plane

Aerosoft PBY, Awesome seaplane

Baytower RV7 great GA aircraft, fast and very precise, can land in someones front garden!

Some great freeware planes out there Basler B6T, T45 etc

 

Add Ons:

FSUIPC, excellent glue and controller set up, registered version, also Citation X FADEC needs it.

Opus, camera and weather, works great with Rex OD textures, its look out your window and you get that in the sim weather

Accufeel V2, adds depth to your aircraft (great with PBY)

Avlasoft EFB, route planning and helps me with sid's stars and moving map complete with ability to set com1 & 2,works on vatsim

Plan G, freeware and great for VFR

Navigraph & NDac, update the FMS on your planes plus all your charts easy to find.

VOXAtc, real world ATC with AI traffic plus uses voice recognition so you speak to your ATC, using it to train for VATSIM

FS2Crew, voice recognition for FO on planes it supports.

Reality XP Guages - good for older aircraft but you need to like dabbling with panels, modern planes dont need it

Reality XP 430 + 530, great Garmin GPS units that use the trainer, only AIRAC update to mid 11 mind you.

 

Online:

VATSIM, real world ATC and routes, adds depth, currently learning using the Citation X

 

Hope this helps with the Add ons I've got and the why I use them. In terms of flying I like to pick somewhere in the world and fly in short 3 hour hops top, tend also to takeoff from last airport I landed at too so continuous journey.

[SierraHotel 987]

 

 

He has already got rexe as stated in his 1st post

 

Which doesn't come close to the fidelity of Opus when displaying the weather, REX for the clouds etc, but Opus all the way for accurate weather.

[pete_auau 1,166]

So the other weather addons as2012 and rexe dont give accurate weather

[HansRoaming 73]

I can only speak for Rex but Opus does a better representation of what the METAR says based on looking out the window at my location, however REX is more than just a weather engine and they have given me updates for free since I bought it a few years ago so would thoroughly recommend both as the combination is killer!