I haven't tried the new v2 HD mesh but have been avoiding the OSM scenery from Simheaven altogether as I found last night I was coming into the London city area during an approach to EGLL and it completely brought my system to it's knees. I was literally getting 1 FPS.

 

This is one of the main reasons I generate the OSM myself, as I use a reduced LOD distance. I think the default is about 20KM, and I've reduced it down to 11km. It makes areas like London flyable, and I think it gives a good compromise between performance and quality. At a distance of 11km on my screen, it's too hard to see small houses anyway, so it's seem wastefulf or the system to draw them.

 

 

This is one of the main reasons I generate the OSM myself, as I use a reduced LOD distance.

 

I'll have to try this myself. I notice there are tools such as OSM2XP that will do this for you but never used it.

 

I don't really want the whole world covered in OSM but just a few specific city areas like Sydney, London, Hong Kong and Dubai and maybe NY. I don't know if it's just me but I notice that since 10.25 the default scenery and autogen placement looks a lot better than it used to.

 

 

I don't really want the whole world covered in OSM but just a few specific city areas like Sydney, London, Hong Kong and Dubai and maybe NY

 

Generally OSM isn't too good outside of the cities anyway. Especially in the UK. You can find one town completely covered, and then the next is empty, so sometimes it can ruin the effect unless using photo scenery. IMO France and Holland are the best covered in terms of OSM coverage. Germany is quite patchy and the US still has a long way to go. However, OSM is constantly developing and changing very quickly, you can see this by watching live edits here: http://live.openstreetmap.fr/

I am torn between P3D and Xplane for a second sim. I have some serious leanings towards XPlane but nn some answers.

Do you have to buy alot of scenery add-ons to get the great scenery I see in pics.

How do add-on acrft stack up against FS9/FSX add-ons for complexity

ATC/Real wx any good

And each time X plane is updated 9 to 10 for example, will previous add-ons still work, do not want to play the keep buying w/ each new issue game.

Thank U for any responses

Sad to see the river near Darrington Municipal still isn't there.

Most of the scenery you see in the pics is free! There are some payware airports which are generally excellent and lots of freeware which varies hugely in quality. Most airports are just runways and lights with no buildings.

 

Recent addon aircraft are fantastic quality and getting better all the time. Check out the much anticipated IXEG 737 coming next year, looks like it will knock the socks off anything in any sim.

 

ATC is awful, real weather not great. FSX does these better, but the new clouds from SkyMaxx are something else, as you can probably see in this forum.

 

Basically you could get XPlane and a good quality addon for the same price as base P3D2, and then get loads of free stuff and you won't be too much out of pocket if you decide it's not for you.

 

Other things to be aware of are lack of seasonal textures and decent AI, but other than that it's an amazing sim to immerse yourself in.

While I find the v2 mesh is simply great, I don't bother using photo scenery instead. I actually prefer photo scenery because it hasn't the impact it had in MSFS / P3D. In X-plane 10 you only load what you need see around you, so, no worries about having 200 GB of photo scenery in your disk, if you can...

 

In areas with good OSM coverage, the new cut looks good, but even Lisbon, and most of Portugal, are poorly represented in X-Plane's autogen. My fault, I know, for I could well try to start enriching the databases, but for the time being I prefer to do huge downloads of orto-photo, specially after PilotBalu updates his areas with the new mesh v2 ndras created for us.

 

 

I am torn between P3D and Xplane for a second sim. I have some serious leanings towards XPlane but nn some answers.
Do you have to buy alot of scenery add-ons to get the great scenery I see in pics.
How do add-on acrft stack up against FS9/FSX add-ons for complexity
ATC/Real wx any good
And each time X plane is updated 9 to 10 for example, will previous add-ons still work, do not want to play the keep buying w/ each new issue game.
Thank U for any responses

 

I have both P3D v2 and X-Plane, and so far I still prefer X-Plane. I've used Microsoft Flight simulator since FS2000, and P3D feels like more of the same formula. Especially since I've seen users still reporting OOM errors and poor frame rates with it. I hope things will improve (and they probably will). But basically to me P3D v2.0 is FSX with some lipstick on, and I'm not interested now until it goes 64Bit.

 

Do you have to buy alot of scenery add-ons to get the great scenery I see in pics.

No, everything I use is completely free. The photoscenery is available on simheaven.com, however if you want to make it yourself, you need to send a donation to obtain g2xpl. OSM is of course free, and anyone can edit it, which is why I really like this combination. If something is broken I can fix it, and then use the free osm2xp to put in the new buildings and forests. It might sound like a lot of effort, but I quite enjoy updating and fixing broken areas.

 

How do add-on acrft stack up against FS9/FSX add-ons for complexity

For complexity, I think the aircraft in FSX win hands down. This is gradually changing though, and more and more complex aircraft are appearing for X-Plane. This seems to be accelerating recently, with lots of new releases i.e. the 757, Saab 340A and the upcoming awesome 737 classic from ixeg. I actually prefer simple GA, but I would really like a decent GPS in X-Plane.

 

ATC/Real wx any good

Short answer, ATC is awful and was never finished (they promised to do it when 10 came first out). Real weather is ok, about on par with FSX, although the difference here is that you can feel the turbulence etc in X-Plane. I miss OpusFSX here, and wish there was an X-Plane version.

 

And each time X plane is updated 9 to 10 for example, will previous add-ons still work, do not want to play the keep buying w/ each new issue game.

Mostly yes. I've never had problems, and I use free airports for v9 all the time. The jump from v9 to v10 introduced new roads, and buildings etc, but putting in v9 scenery into v10 seems to work everytime.

Wow, wonderful responses, I can't tell you how much I appreciate all the time you all put into my questions. I think I will get the sim and give it a go, I like that Saab 340 it would fit w/ what I have in mind for XPlane. I have FSX but use FS9 I find FSX just lacks in so many areas and Xplane may be getting more popular and hence more attention, I hope so, it has so many good qualities. Again thank you all