I'm sure this question has been asked and answered a couple thousand times, so I apologize for what I know is some redundancy. 

 

I wanted to reach out for some advice as to whether I should purchase FSX or P3D. 

 

I'm indulging myself and building a new rig for Christmas that I'd imagine would be able to handle either sim adequately. The link to the build is below:

 

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/KZXZrH

 

I'm moving up from FS2004. X-Plane, as nice of a sim as it may be, is off the table due to the limitations as far as addons, sceneries, and aircraft go.

 

That leaves me with FSX and P3D to pick between. As I see it, the pros to FSX are that it has tons of available addons, no compatibility issues with said addons, it's fairly well-known and therefore easy to tweak and adjust (in terms of config settings, DX10, etc). However the stability issues and CTDs scare me a bit. I wonder if having a fairly beefy machine will help the sim to be more stable and suffer fewer CTDs?

 

As for P3D, the one big positive is that it's a stabler platform, and the shadows, clouds, and overall potential going forward are all big positives. The negatives, however, are that it's a less-known commodity, there is less support and compatibility with various addons, and in fact, certain addons I'd be interested in (such as the PDMG 737) are forbidden. Beyond that, I've read of some issues with regard to OOMs and difficulty maintaining performance and framerate with heavier addons/sceneries. This scares me a touch, as I plan on using REX, ASN, EZdok, FTX Global/Vector and FS Global 2010, along with other sceneries and airport/airplane addons. 

 

With all that in mind, I'm leaning towards FSX but I wanted to air the question here (perhaps in a more specific way than has been asked in the past) and get some opinions and thoughts. Again, I apologize for what I'm sure is some redundancy within this question but I want to make an informed decision.

 

**as somewhat of a side question, if I was to go with FSX, what expansion pack(s) (if any) would I need to properly run it with various addons? It's my understanding that there are three versions -> the standard issue FSX, FSX Acceleration, and FSX Gold. Not sure which iteration to go with should I opt for FSX**

 

Thanks! 

 

However the stability issues and CTDs scare me a bit. I wonder if having a fairly beefy machine will help the sim to be more stable and suffer fewer CTDs?

 

Never had FSX crash on me, i have had add ons like EZDok (very frequently) crash.  OOMs are pretty common, not limited to FSX, P3Dv2 can certainly experience them, perhaps at a reduced rate, but still certainly can suffer from them; i have even read that X-Plane 64 can suffer from them.

FSX is of course entirely dead on the development front, P3D is under active development but you may not meet the licensing requirements, AVSIM and in fact LM don't like discussions around this, brings out lots of forum lawyers.

PMDG are intending to support P3D in future, with the usual caveats of no timescales and no pricing / licensing information.

 

I would purchase FSX Gold, which includes the Acceleration expansion pack...thus all the released SPs.

 

Hope that helps.

Never had FSX crash on me, i have had add ons like EZDok (very frequently) crash.  OOMs are pretty common, not limited to FSX, P3Dv2 can certainly experience them, perhaps at a reduced rate, but still certainly can suffer from them; i have even read that X-Plane 64 can suffer from them.

FSX is of course entirely dead on the development front, P3D is under active development but you may not meet the licensing requirements, AVSIM and in fact LM don't like discussions around this, brings out lots of forum lawyers.

PMDG are intending to support P3D in future, with the usual caveats of no timescales and no pricing / licensing information.

 

I would purchase FSX Gold, which includes the Acceleration expansion pack...thus all the released SPs.

 

Hope that helps.

 

Great, that's what I'm leaning towards.

 

Nice to know that 'Gold' would be the one to go for. 

 

If anyone else has input I'm all ears, but at this point I'm leaning towards FSX. 

Great, that's what I'm leaning towards.

 

Nice to know that 'Gold' would be the one to go for. 

 

If anyone else has input I'm all ears, but at this point I'm leaning towards FSX. 

Until P3D is 64 bit and well supported by third party addons, I have no interest in a half baked Sim, enough problems with FSX, don't need another 'Redheaded Stepchild"