I can't afford a TrackIR

 

IMHO you can't not afford TrackIR.

For me it was the PMDG NGX which pushed me into more VC flying. Mainly because there was no pedestal in the 2D panel so you had to switch to the VC for engine starting. The NGX VC is so good that even a longstanding 2D panel user like me soon came to prefer it. I changed my FSX default view to VC, but for some addons I still use the 2D because the VC isn't good enough or MCP controls are awkward to use in the VC. However taxiing, takeoff and landing are always from the VC regardless of the sim I'm flying.

 

That being said, the VC in FSX is simply too slow and inaccurate to use properly without some assistance. I use EZdok because it gives me easy and quick view switching, but I'm beginning to use 3D panorama mode rather than camera view switching as I find that replicates better the way the viewpoint changes as you turn left and right and look up or down. I have considered TrackIR but apart from the cost I don't think it would work well with the varifocal lenses I need. Any small head movement would mean I would not be looking through the lens sweet spot at the screen. I would have to buy single focal length lenses specifically for simming. Also, turning your head one way and looking the opposite way with your eyes makes me feel ill just thinking about it.

 

People say the VC is more realistic. In most respects it is, but not all. In real life you don't need to look at a control to operate it. For example I don't look at the gear lever to change gear while driving my car (it would be dangerous to do so apart from anything else). In the VC you must do so unless you assign hotkeys. I've had to assign many more of those since I started using the VC more than the 2D. The problems are really noticeable in busy situations such as engine starting when you have to operate controls in different panels in quick succession while monitoring yet another panel. In a real flightdeck you don't have to look directly at each switch, selector and lever. Accurately finding mouse clickspots is also an issue which slows you down.

 

I'd rather developers continued to provide a full 2D panel as an option. I would still mainly use the VC, but there are situations where the 2D is much faster and more accurate to use while simming. Preflight and cruise being a couple of examples.

Started with the HAT switch on my joystick, now I have Track ir.

 

For radio and FMS tuning I generally prefer popups because most addons have bad clickspots. Some are real nice like the Realair Legacy with RXP avionics.

which allows at least some of the peripheral vision one gets in the real world.

 

 

(especially the King Air 350 which is my favorite GA turboprop) and went looking for something better

 

 

Maybe you should try a couple of flights without the track IR or any of that stuff, just the top hat button on the CH yoke and configure the other buttons to use the eyepoint view movement and see if you like it.

 

 

Spacebar+mouse movement and mousewheel to zoom in and out as required.

 

No money spent on addons.

 

All of the reasons I switched to VC have been stated and I agree. As for the default King Air, I fly it in VC but I did purchase the Friendly Panels upgrade, and I used 2D initially but quickly switched to VC after a couple trys AND configure my yoke buttons a little. I also fly the Captain Sim C-130 and would NOT even consider using the 2D in that baby. Try it for a few flights and keep fine tuning you will (I bet) eventually just about all of your flight time in VC.

From the first moment I loaded a VC. I cannot believe people like a 2d panel. That feels onrealistic. I never fly a 2d panel in fsx. That was the main reason I dropped FS9.

Dido..the 2D panel is uuuuuggggglllyyyyy.  People spend hours on end tweaking FSX  then they want to look at a 2D panel?

I seem to recall that there was a flight sim in the early 1990's called Pacific Air War (was that the name? ? ?) It was far too resource hungry to run on the machine I had, so I never ended up using it, but I remember that was the first time I ever saw a virtual cockpit.  I really wanted to use it, I just didn't have the horsepower.

 

The use of Padlock mode in a variety of other combat flight simulators also set the stage for me to desire to have an eyepoint that could move around in 3 dimensions.

 

I used the 2D only in FS9, because most VC's were not very good, but I made the switch entirely with FSX, and had a TrackIR from the very start.  I just made the choice to do it, and did it once I realized that looking at a stationary 3D panel was not so much different than looking at a stationary 2D panel, except that the VC just looked better and then of course, offered the possibility of not being stationary, but that you could move your head around.  I don't think I would have been as ok using it if it weren't for TrackIR.  The Hat Switch was always a pain.

trackir, ezdok, that was it for me.

All this talk about smooth panning! I'd like to challenge you all to take a notice of how you perceive the world when you look around in life. Our view points are a lot more jerky than we like to think they are! You glance over your shoulder. Do you really perceive everything between your two view points? Or does the view shift just as fast as you can turn your head?

 

What really got me into using the VC was a tweak to the FS9.cfg and FSX.cfg configuration files to increase the pan-rate to something more close to the speed and jerkyness of real life... a tweak to make looking using my hat-switch much faster just like you can turn your head quickly.

 

 

Increasing the pan-rate much higher than that doesn't make much of a difference - setting it at 2000 basically reaches the limits of what the sim is programmed for - but it should make a HUGE difference if you are having trouble getting into using the VC.

 

I agree about smooth panning. It looks great in flight simulator movies, but I've never found it essential when actually flying the sim.

 

I use the increased pan rate and I've also assigned a button to instantly center the view so I don't have to mess around trying to center the view manually on short final...

VC cockpit happened in mid 2000s for me with fs2002 and found it was useful for looking around in the sky. By 2008 2d was no use anymore as fs2004 could look around smooth at that time with hatswitch buttons on joysticks. Trackir is nice but my neck muscle spasms prevent it of being of good use and hatswitch not as good track ir, but it sufficent for ga vfr flying. Could fly 2d but be wasting time when Carendo ga planes look too good to be flown in 2d. Without vitural cockpits some of us would not bother with flight sims.