My Next Add-On...

[zeddock 0]

I have FSX Gold with Accel

Added FSUIPC to get better control of axis.

 

Now I want to improve looks.

 

Seems REX4 is in the running, but I think it is only for certain textures...

So, if I spend most of my time in a 172 about 3000ft or coming down to different USA airports,

 

What would help me?

 

1. A2A stuff I will add tomorrow... preflight, realism, etc.
2. I am curious about FScene and Orbx
3. Flight1 Ultimate Terrain X USA Scenery for FSX ???
4. Ground Environment X: North America - FSX ???
5. FScene Twinpack #1: USA/Canada/South American????
6. Addit! Pro: Aircraft & Add-on Manager/Installer for FSX???

 

 

What is a good first addition to make everything, including ground of my local Morgantown, WV airport look better?

I am curious about others.

 

I want to improve now, but slowly.

 

But I do not want to mess myself up for operations of FSX, or for the changes to the sim world with updates to FSX.

 

This could be called best add-ons for 2014!

 

Thanx!

 

Zeddock

[Don t moderate me this way 882]

REX4 could become the first one of your next addons ...

[FloG 148]

For WV, I'd suggest to take a look at MegaSceneryEarth, maybe they got your state covered with photoreal textures already? (Be warea that photreal ground textures isn't exactly everyone's first choice, though),

If you don't mind flying in other states, ORBX NA, particularly SAK and PNW, is an excellent choice IMO, plus there's plenty of airports for the area already - both freeware and payware.

[Glynn 405]

Stay well away from FScene would be my advice

[HansRoaming 73]

Orbx Scenery for US, just adds detail you'll like.

A2A 172

Rex + a weather add on like Opus 

G-Plan (freeware) so you know where you are and what the airspace around you looks like if you care.

[scianoir 610]

Orbx FTX Global will improve the appearance of FSX worldwide and then you can chose individual Orbx regions (currently 5 areas available for North America)  if you wish the provide a very high degree of realism for areas in which you like to fly. I use FTX Global which I very much like but as yet have avoided Orbx FTX Vector which seems to have some issues. The vector features in my setup are provided by the Ultimate Terrain X series of addons which I already had before FTX Vector appeared and these are quite compatible with FTX Global.

 

The other alternative to Orbx is to use UTX combined with Ground Environment X for the areas in which you wish to fly and again this is an excellent option but would not provide you with the same level of detail as the individual Orbx area addons.

 

I have no experience of FScene with FSX but uninstalled this from FS9 some years ago.

 

Bill

[zeddock 0]

 

 

ORBX NA... ... is an excellent choice IMO, plus there's plenty of airports for the area already - both freeware and payware

 

I am confused by this.

 

So you add ORBX NA and that is like a framework to which you can add pay and free airport scenery?  If that is correct, does the ORBX NA framework improve the basic areas you do NOT get specific airport scenery for?

 

I will check on MegaSceneryEarth.  Why is photoreal not for everyone? What is the downside if you have a decent computer and graphics card?

 

Thanx!

Stay well away from FScene would be my advice

 

Care to back that up a little so I know it isnt just a personal or grudge choice?

 

And no offense meant by that BTW.  I have my own set of boycots. <smile>

 

zeddock

 

 

Orbx Scenery for US, just adds detail you'll like.
A2A 172
Rex + a weather add on like Opus 
G-Plan

 

"Orbx Scenery for US"  <-- Do you mean buy it and then ALSO add the areas I like?  I am new to all of this so I fear I do not understand yet how these things work.  I am catching quickly that they charge way too much for the good stuff, so to limit the expense to where folks can afford, they split their scenery paks into airports, towns, areas, or continents?

 

Will REX4 be ok as opposed to Rex + weather?  BTW, I do not currently care much about the weather for my needs.  Trying to become a GA pilot and a student right now. First must master landings, etc.  I will work on crosswinds, gusts, etc, after the basics. <wink>

 

Looking for G-Plan right now.  That sounds great!  Is that similar to 
"Addit! Pro: Aircraft & Add-on Manager/Installer for FSX"  ?

Orbx FTX Global will improve the appearance of FSX worldwide and then you can chose individual Orbx regions (currently 5 areas available for North America)  

 

I have no experience of FScene with FSX but uninstalled this from FS9 some years ago.

 

Thanx for the ORBX info. I will try to understand the difference between Global and Vector.

 

Another had similar low regard for FScene. Guess I am taken by the ads, but then again I wonder if anyone here has experience with FScene4, which I guess is the newest.

 

Thanx!

[HansRoaming 73]

The way to look at things is like this:

 

Default - pretty nasty 

Orbx global + vector - spruces up the whole world but you'll need to add mesh and landclass, gets pricey for lots of detail but IMHO looks lovely.

Orbx region - Much better than Orbx Global, airports start to get some love and look better than default

Orbx airports - very high detail airports

 

In a 172 you could go with regions and if there is one airport you base out of then maybe get that. It's a reasonable way to start.

 

Photoreal is fantastic until you get down low and realise that apart from mountains, everything is a flat picture painted on the landscape. I do have Arizona and Nevada photoreal because that's where I fly a lot in fast jets all over the desert and also it isn't highly populated with buildings etc.

[zeddock 0]

You folks are really great to respond like this. Thank you!

 

zeddock

Thanx!

 

"Photoreal is fantastic until you get down low and realise that apart from mountains, everything is a flat picture painted on the landscape."

 

So, it sounds like for my needs/wants, I go with ORBX Regions, and add airports as I want to improve.  

 

Would this selection be the Photorealism?

If it is, you say it looks good until you get low, but are you saying it is actually WORSE than FSX basic?  Because I think most of the stuff for me now, will be LOW!

It will be in Morgantown, WV which has a LOT of hills, (some say mountains,) so that might help my sight picture visually.

 

If I go with Regions, can I NOT add +vector onto that later?  It looks like your comments suggest Global + Vector would be best?

 

So if I now go with Global Regions, and later want to add +Vector, would that work?

 

Why is this stuff so complicated?  A confused customer doesn't buy! <laughs>

 

zeddock

 

 

G-Plan (freeware) so you know where you are and what the airspace around you looks like if you care.

 

Found this under Plan-G ???

 

Looks awesome!  Does it complicate other add-ons? Or can i just load it and not worry about interaction with other things I add?

 

Thanx for the referral!  Book/Novel looks good too!

 

zeddock

[HansRoaming 73]

With Orbx it is not an either or.

 

I have in order of first at the top of the detail pile:

 

Orbx airports - high detail airports (generally requires regions, except for the global freeware ones)

Orbx regions - another level of detail on top of Global (has mesh, landclass and lots of details, doesn't need anything else)

FS Global and Vector - this gives me coverage outside of Orbx regions

Various landclass add ons, some global some country specific

FS Genesis meshes, one of many mesh providers

 

I have other add ons as well but hopefully the above explains how they layer on top of one another.

 

The reason I have it all is so detail and immersion doesn't hit a cliff as I fly around, the worst I'm going to get is FS Global and the best is an Orbx airport in an Orbx region with lots of goodness.

 

Now if you can fly outside your home base the Orbx regions would be a good place to start, if you can't then see about a mesh and phtoreal although bear in mind when you get down below say 1500' - 2000' things will look like flat paintings on top of the landscape. For me it doesn't matter as desert pretty much is flat on the landscape.

 

Yes, sorry it is Plan-G and doesn't effect your other add ons, just remember to update its nav database when you add FSX scenery.

[Capt Speirs 52]

Stay well away from FScene would be my advice

 

Why?

[Glynn 405]

Why?

 

Because they are basically the same textures that were released for FS9 packaged up for FSX.

 

If you want  4.8m/pixeltextures in FSX then by all means buy the product.

 

Source:

http://forum.simflight.com/topic/50694-confused-by-blurring/

[scianoir 610]

 

 

Photoreal is fantastic until you get down low and realise that apart from mountains, everything is a flat picture painted on the landscape. I do have Arizona and Nevada photoreal because that's where I fly a lot in fast jets all over the desert and also it isn't highly populated with buildings etc.

 

I agree. Photoreal scenery is good when flying 2500-3000ft or more above ground level but lower than that and it tends to get less and less realistic eventually becoming a featureless, flat and quite unreal looking landscape at low levels particularly on approach to an airport. Another problem with photoreal scenery, which has not been mentioned, is that it can use a lot of your computer's resources when in use and may lead to the dreaded OOMs when you have been flying over it for a while. I have been using Horizon VFR Gen X photoreal sceneries for the UK and Ireland and they are great over about 3000ft particularly in terms of identifying accurate geographical features and for VFR navigation, but I am now replacing them with the Orbx Ireland and UK regions and I have to say Orbx wins in terms of the realism of the total flying experience.

 

Bill

[tttocs 301]

A few more words on photoscenery.  First of all, I'd suggest the best way to know if photo works for you is to try it.  To do this, I recommend you navigate over to Blue Sky Scenery ( http://www.blueskyscenery.com/ ), and download a couple of the areas to try.  I'd recommend something in AZ, Utah, NV or SoCal, as I think the desert SW works well for photo.  Blue Sky is donationware, so you can try it with no risk.

 

Yes, on the ground things can be dreary at many fields, but I tend to fly to/from places where I have upgraded airports, which improve the situation.  There are some wonderful freeware airports that work with photo (KSEZ and KGCN are two examples), as well as various payware airports if you want larger fields.  And even for default fields, in some places it just works anyway.  Sitting on the ground at Palm Springs with the dry mountains rising all around you, for example, is simply stunning.

 

I'm one of the few who likes photo in some instances and hates it in others.  You may hate it, love it or love/hate like I do, but the best way to find out is to try it, and that's cheap and relatively easy to do.

 

This from someone who is NOT a photo-evanglist, and who generally prefers Orbx regions if they're available.

 

Scott

 

Edit:  I also meant to mention that the altitude at which photo really begins to work is variable and depends greatly on the quality and time of day of the original imagery.  The higher the resolution and the deeper the shadows, the lower the altitude when things start to pop with the illusion of 3D. 

[zeddock 0]

I have purchased these:

Orbx FTX Global

Orbx FTX Vector

Rex4

A2A C172 Trainer, which seems to come with Accu-sim and Accu-feel?

 

I just completed the install of Global but have not yet started her up. I will report back with each phase.

 

Any comments or suggestions of wisdom?  Feel free to put here.

 

Note: I am on the fence about photorealism stuff, but plan to use the Mega option if I do it since they have WV at 9m. (I think that is good?!)

Also, I could not get a region that included WV, and I didn't quite understand the OpenLC stuff or whether it would help my cause.

 

zeddock