Cloud comparison levels + fps

[strider1 575]

In X-Plane the spiraling slipstream seems to be less than it should be, but AFAIK there's no way to increase it from outside, since it's part of the X-Plane core flight model.

 

What I'm trying to do, is amplifying its effect thanks to a supplemental aerodynamic surface, tuned so that it does not interfere with the rest of the flight model.

 

Also, from Andy Goldstein's experiments, looks like the reason for the discrepancy was not only the weak spiraling slipstream, but also the fact than in the real aircrafts the dihedral effect (roll/yaw coupling) is stronger than calculated by X-Plane. So it must be compensated as well (not hard to do).

 

Awesome ! Keep us posted on your observations and test results ! And if its good please post the modified 172 !

[Jimmy RFR 406]

 

 

The clouds impact fps the more you set though

 

Depends.  On my new card, I can set crazy levels of clouds with very little effect *most* of the time.  Cloud shadows don't cause it much work either, most of the time.  However, water reflections can be a killer almost always. Same with crepuscular rays in SMP.

 

What I meant is that I find it kind of strange how the 'straw that breaks the camels back' seems to change from day to day.  One day it's the clouds, next day it's the overload of OSM buildings, next day it's the water reflections.  I'll have performance suffer one day, and I'll crank back each thing one at a time, often with only 2 - 3 fps effect, until I find the culprit... and the culprit might be different on any given day.  With FSX, it was very predictable, allowing me to pinpoint the 'best' that I could reasonably achieve very easily.

 

I suspect that if I had a more powerful CPU with a higher overclock, I may not have such issues.  I could also have an unidentified bottleneck somewhere else too, I don't know.  It doesn't cause me too much grief, since 95% of the time I can keep a nice smooth locked 30 fps no problem, as long as I don't get too crazy with all of the sliders at once.

[tonywob 4,768]

The default clouds for me, at any setting are an absolute killer. I'd love to be able to fly through bad weather in XPX, but it's not something I've been able to do.

[Jimmy RFR 406]

 

 

The default clouds for me, at any setting are an absolute killer.

 

I'm curious as to why certain features in XP are a framerate killer compared to their counterparts in FSX? It seems like the clouds come with a high performance penalty, as does the terrain mesh.

 

When I first started with FSX, I found that clouds and ATI cards did not get along at all; simply switching to NVidia made clouds a non-issue.

 

It feels strange to go back to demanding clouds.

 

I fear that even if / when any 3rd party developers bring a proper weather engine to XP, it won't matter much, since hardly anyone will be able to use it for anything other than accurate wind portrayal.

[jcomm 5,885]

But we already have very good wind, set by METAR for the lower levels, and by the NOAA plugin aloft - whole World!

 

Yesterday I spent some  time comparing the values with the GFS charts, and they were very close, in direction and intensity.

[Jimmy RFR 406]

But we already have very good wind, set by METAR for the lower levels, and by the NOAA plugin aloft - whole World!

 

Perhaps in the 10.40 betas?  I'm a Steam user, so I'm sitting with 10.36, and I've definitely hit a few instances of poor wind depiction in relation to the current closest METAR.  That, and some very sudden shifts when a new METAR is loaded.

 

Nothing that I've really cared to complain about though.

 

On a another weather related note, is there a method to get the NOAA plugin to ignore a certain weather station?  I use CYEG as a hub to fly out of 75% of the time; for whatever reason there's two weather stations located there: CYEG which offers fully detailed weather, and CXEG which does not.  Depending on where you are on the airport grounds, you'll often get the weather from CXEG, which results more often than not in clear skies.

[jcomm 5,885]

AFAIK the NOAA plugin doesn't mess up with station data - only GFS model data from NOAA. The METAR data comes directly from XP10 own weather D/L and management.

[Murmur 3,941]

There's only one thing where X-Plane default clouds have an advantage over FSX from a point of view of realism, in that during sunrise and sunset, clouds at different altitudes get different lighting and color. So at sunset low clouds are orange while hi clouds are still white (or low clouds are dark while hi clouds are still orange). Probably no one ever noticed this until now, but I like this touch of realism. :smile:

 

 

In FSX instead, clouds at different altitudes get the same color even at sunrise or sunset, and this is less realistic:

 

[ryanbatc 12,770]

AFAIK the NOAA plugin doesn't mess up with station data - only GFS model data from NOAA. The METAR data comes directly from XP10 own weather D/L and management.

I think it does read metar's. I've been having an issue where I'm getting SN (snow) at airports. I searched through the forums at the org and found that in my example METAR the remarks section contains the phrase VISNO. And apparently the program is reading that phrase and extracting SN and creating precipitation in the form of snow.

[jcomm 5,885]

 

 

VISNO. And apparently the program is reading that phrase and extracting SN and creating precipitation in the form of snow.

 

Ooops !  REally ?  I have to check that... Thx for pointing it out.