If you want the airliners, check out http://precisionmanuals.com/. PMDG does the best of the best work on airliners. However, as someone above mentioned, they are somewhat study-intensive. You can hop in and just fly around, but to actually operate it takes a bit of willpower.

 

If you're an Airbus fan, Aerosoft's Airbus X Extended (aka AXE, Airbus X A320/321) provides an excellent level of graphics and decent systems simulation. They aren't as study-intensive as PMDG's planes are, but have enough layers to keep things interesting. You can find that at http://aerosoft.com

 

If you want some interesting levels of depth added into your aircraft, look at http://a2asimulations.com. They have a module called Accu-Sim that is nothing short of spectacular. http://realairsimulations.com also has an excellent selection of quality GA stuff.

 

Once again, welcome!

Welcome to Avsim, Brian!

 

In general, I agree with what aamir said (post #4), but I'd like to add REX - those textures are definitely  among the best and they alone make FSX look much more real than default.

For planes, it's probably the best to start with some easier ones like the A2A J3 Cub (darn slow, but nice to get started and to explore the sim, and it can bring you to some adventures as well) or some Carenado planes, and steadily work you way up to more complexity - at least that's what I think is best, my first plane addon nearly made me stop simming, since I was in no way prepared for its complexity.

If you're into airliners, the Aerosoft Airbus X is called a "mid-range" product, but the way an Airbus is designed, that plane is really quite easy to learn - but in case you're more into Boeings, I'd suggest the QualityWings 757 to start out.

 

As for airports, it will strongly depend on what type of flying you want to do: For GA, there's probably nothing like ORBX PNW or FSAddon's Tongass Fjords. However, if you want to fly airliners, there's a great variety of developers to choose from: FSDreamTeam (mainly US), Flightbeam, Aerosoft (mainly Europe, but some nice Alaskan airports, too), FlyTampa (American and exotic destinations, such as Kai Tak or St Martin) and Tropical Sim and LatinVFR (both offer mainly Caribbean and Latin American airports)

Brian --

 

Welcome, and good luck! You just got yourself into a whole new world of fun, and frustration. The frustration is mainly a result of MS releasing FSX in 2006 in a very unfinished and very flawed state. They issued 2 service packs after that which fixed some things and broke others. So It's still a very imperfect program right out of the box.

 

First, and foremost, you need a whiz bang, state of the art pc IF you want to get the best possible performance out of FSX. It is very, very cpu dependent. So you need one that is overclocked to 4.2 or better. I am NOT a techie, nor am I an advanced simmer, but I have, like everyone  else, struggled with the hardware and all the gazillion tweaks for the past 10 years or more. So the hardware IS the most important thing to consider to begin with. Don't skimp! Forget the scennery and airplane add-ons until you get the pc running the default program as best it can. Follow the hardware and setup guide posted here at the top and spend a good deal of time in the AVSIM Hardware forum. Look at the recent threads where folks like yourself are wanting a good FSX rig. There are lots of them. Most of your questions are already answered there. Paul Johnson is the guru there, but there are other smart hardware savvy guys as well.

 

My suggestion is ---After you are satisfied that your new pc is running the default program in the best possible fashion I would buy and install *Steve's DX10 Fixer*. FSX was released with DX1o not working properly so we had to use it in in DX9 mode ---- until just recently. Some smart guy by the name of Steve fixed it, for the most part. The result is much nicer graphics and smoothness ++. Then you can think about the other weather, scenery, and airplane add-ons!  Just my suggestion.

 

One last thing --- over at Simforums there is, arguably, the most hardware/software savvy guy in the FSX world. His name is Nick Needham. He comes across as an egotistical bag of hot air, but he is the definitive authority on FSX. He is also one of the primary scenery developers for FSX. He has published the FSX Bible (thinks he's God). You can find it here:

 

http://www.simforums.com/forums/the-fsx-computer-system-the-bible-by-nickn_topic46211.html

 

This *bible* also contains a lengthy Windows 7(the current preferred os for FSX) setup and tweaking guide that will blow your mind. It works too!

 

Once again your pc is the key to FSX happiness. Do it right and you won't regret it!

 

Bruce

Here is what I consider the must halves for FSX.

 

-FTX Global

-Mesh and landclass add on such as fs genesis and scenerytech.  These will help u get the most out of  FTX Global.  

-REX

-Weather engine,  REX comes with its own but the Active Sky series and Opus are better.  Use REX just for textures.

-PMDG NGX with FS2Crew

-A2A 172

-Real Air Duke

-Milviz B55 Baron

-Majestic Q400,  Ranks right up there with the NGX with very good FPS.