No one has commented on whether FE can produce the solid 10/10 overcast effect that is so notably lacking in FS9. That improvement alone would prompt me to gladly pony up the purchase price.

>No one has commented on whether FE can produce the solid>10/10 overcast effect that is so notably lacking in FS9. That>improvement alone would prompt me to gladly pony up the>purchase price.It wont, FE is not a weather maker or changes anything to the weather engine, it will "only" make your world look fantastic.OHN

Hi Peter,You seem very involved with listening to the customer's concerns, and that is appreciated.I have one question regarding your product. I have been staring at it for a while trying to make a decision on purchasing. My only hold up is whether or not it will impact fps or not. I have a pretty high end machine, and the only item in FS that can bring it down is clouds! I am currently running Chris' high performance clouds, and they have helped, but not as much as I would like.The screen shots of FE look great, but I just don't need any more hits on the clouds. I have my cloud settings at full 3d, and medium for coverage. Cloud draw distance is 40.What's your honest take on this, or is it just a wash with fps?Thanks,JDMy specs:Alienware Area 513.2ghz Intel HT2gb RAM120gb HDNvidia Geforce 5900 Ultra 256mb

Hi there,FPS is always a concern and I won't make any crazy claims that we have sloved that. Clouds at max setting in full 3D modes are frame rate hungry. That's a fact we can't get away from.What I can tell you is that our clouds are the same physical size as the default clouds and as such will be the same performance. Both being 32 bit 888 format at 1.33MBFE comes with the option to make either DXT3 clouds or smaller sized clouds or smaller sized DXT3 clouds. On some systems you may get a 40% increase in fps which one of our testers said he got. Personally I found our 32bit smaller sized clouds to be very similar in performance ot the high performance FSW clouds.I find I get about 5-15% better fps with the smaller clouds but personally I like the higher quality larger clouds (IMO)It really will depend on your system. As a rule it seems to me that the high end machines see no difference between perfomance clouds and poor machines see big improvements.So in summary I think you would find the resuls with FE ok.All users so far have indicated either no fps hit or some users say they get better fps. None that I know of that get worst.Peter

Its a ten out of ten product for me,Love it :)CheersPete

You know what,Who cares.Some people like freeware.Some people don't.Some people like payware.Some people don't.So be it.

Hi there;If this was possible to do it could be done by changing the overlap of the cumulus clouds in the primitive cloud files. FE does not touch the primitive clouds, just the texutures so they look different.If MS did this my subjective guess is that it could be done one or two ways. 1 to make and extra layer or two of clouds; active sky does that and FS Metar and FS Meteo etc2 to make the overlap bigger.if option 1 is done (Active Sky etc) then it will make fps worst maybe half in some cases depending on other factors.if option 2 is done the larger overlap will also cause fps to be about half. Given these options I would rather have a second or third layer if fps is going to be hit in this way.Also; one way that FE address this proble is to re-introduce the haze layers with varying degrees of haze. Active Sky for example has the option ot remove the haze layers as does FE so there is a choice.It should be noted that some people have put fixes on their machines to remove haze perminantly and in some cases I'm sure they don't really know the full implications of doing this. If the user has removed the haze then FE will correct this and the bottom line is it will therefore look more overcast when it's overcast. Not always but at least some of the time.If you are not sure if you have removed the haze or not and you can't get FE at this time or don't want FE then you can address the haze issue by re-installing the clouds from the master disks on the main install package of FS9. Just overwrite the clouds starting cirrus_ and that should sort you out for now.Peter

I just bought it and installed, I had FSwater before and that was good. Well worth the money, and for some reason my fps have gone up as well, strange.......Anthtony

I bought FE last night. Really great, worth the money.:D

I just wanted to say that I am not any kind of consultant for anyone. I am just an everyday person with a great enthusiasm for flight and flight simulation. After purchasing and using this product all I wanted to do was to express my gratitude to the developers for delivering such an excellent piece of software. That's all. Nothing less and nothing more. I am not here to promote anyone's products. I am only posting my personal opinion. Furthermore, the argument of a "low post count" is rather insulting and irrelevant. This is not EBAY where users have ratings.

Thanks for the post;I appreciate you saying what you did and I also appreciate what all the other customers have said and for those that have recently purchased it; perhaps as a result of reading your post!As for the low post count comment; I think most of the viewers have the wisdom to ignore that kind of "insensitive" remark. I do think though that post was probably not intended to be an insult but more an observation - but I can see that it could be taken as an insult.It strikes me that "Jim" is probably a little suspecious of this very postitive thread and from "Jim's" viewpoint; who does not have FE it looks to him like I've asked a dozen of my friends to "talk up" FE; which the low count posters know is not the case.So Jim, in my view is proably just trying to "protect" others from falling in to a trap set by me....? I trust by now that Jim realizes there is nothing "dirty" going on and all that is happening here is customers are thankfully saying "bravo" and I'm taking a bow and saying thank you.To the low count posters I take it as a complement that "you" felt this product was worth making a post for.From where I sit it makes me feel like the whole effort to get the product to the standard of being so well appreciated is well worth while. It will continute to motivate me to bring more support and more product to our customers without extra cost.Peter

>You know, I would venture to say many people (much like>myself) don't post here often simply becuase of comments like>this when we do post. Just because someone may not have a high>"post count" doesn't mean their thoughts or opinions are>invalid. As another "low time" poster, I've got to agree with Wnuk's sentiments. I read these forums, but maybe I'm just too busy doing things like working, flying real airplanes, or flying in the sim to spend much time posting. If anything, maybe the fact that I spend more time actually flying FS2004 than talking about it means that I am MORE qualified to offer an opinion.Just the small thoughts of a "low time" poster.

I too want to thank the developers for such a great product. We all have spent thousands of dollars to upgrade our systems for these marvelous creations.Keep up the good work. I'm looking forward to future updates.JoseCFI, CFII

Well Peter...I don't know where to start so let's try this. <>If your reading skills were as advanced as your software development talents, you would see that I posted on at least three occasions that I DO OWN the software and LIKE IT VERY MUCH.FYI, my order # is 238226.<>and<> That's ridiculous Peter. Again, had you read my posts more carefully before insulting a paying customer, you would have noted that not only do I not feel the need to "protect" anyone, I stated that if you ARE NOT engaging marketing consultants, YOU SHOULD BE.By the way, I didn't even initiate the sub-thread on the issue of "marketing posts." And whether you know it or not and whetehr you like it or not such marketing posts are COMMONPLACE on these forums.Are you in favor of censorship Peter? Are you one of those developers...and there are a few...and everyone knows who they are...who simply will not tolerate anything but the most favorable comments on their work? If so, too bad.But if you will get your shorts out of a bunch and re-read my posts, you will see that I have done nothing but compliment your PRODUCT...and will do so YET AGAIN...IT IS A FINE ADD-ON AND I USE IT DAILY.Jim

>Suffice to say, and any "married" man will agree,> I got off and she read her e-mails.... Naaah, Ive been using computers for decades, and my wife never complains. She says, "I always know where you are when Im not home." Computers very seldom "wear out" and many generations ago when I had the Tandy Model I, I upgraded to a Model III, and gave her my old one. That has continued ever since, she always gets the one I formerly used. She has no need for a fast computer, though she now has a Pentium III, 2.4 and is very pleased with it. For surfing and sending email, even with DSL, is totally satisfied. My problem will come as she recently has become interested in learning to Fly with FS, and as she has an excellent Nvidia card, am going to set her up... But, dont know how long she will be satisfied with the Cloud sliders pulled down, and Traffic, etc... But, she knows if she wants the computer I now have, it means that I'll be getting a NEW one. ;-) You can't beat "tradition!" or habits and if next time you want to upgrade, just make your current system, hers... Bob