Although both are similar and probably equal, any differences though?Or, any "trend" nowadays?Which is more "popular", so to speak?Any comments on which to use most?Friendly debate now open.Regards,Marcelo

Hi,It depends a bit on where you fly. VATSIM is strong North/Western Europe and US where as IVAO is more dominant in Mid/Southern Europe.Although I'm not not an IVAO member, I guess they both are more or less equal in quality.Others can tell maybe better.But there of course always the possiblity to join them both and see for yourself.

I fly only with IVAO and can say that ATC is so far both friendly and helpful. Yes it is quieter in the USA on IVAO. I tend to sit on the fence though as far as which one is "the best" if you are not sure which one to go for I would say use both. I would say as long as you get the ATC you want then it doesn't matter much which server you are on.Andrew Brownhttp://www.gordiusfs.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/

One dif that may or may not matter is Vatsim requiers an ISP email addy, at IVAO one like hotmail (anonymous) will do.Best Regards, Donny:-wave

OK, my 2 cents worth:I have been flying online for 5 years or so.It has been Vatsim exclusively for the better part of that period, as I found this network to be providing much more ATC coverage and flying traffic than IVAO.Many people found it very frustrating to get along with the Squawbox setup as it seemed pretty complicated and cumbersome, yet I never had any problem with it.The main concern with Squawbox as far as being realistic was jumpy traffic movement. Planes, instead of flying smoothly would be jumping forward in bursts. Anyway, that was the best for the time.Then IVAO software developers came with a new pilot client called IVAP, which basically eliminated that problem.It looked like all of a sudden most of people moved from Vatsim to IVAO just for this reason.You could see migration clearly looking at Servinfo on weekend nights. Squawbox developers quickly caught up with the trend and shortly thereafter released their new version of Squawbox called SB3.The software improved a lot compared to SB2, but in my humble opinion is still inferior to IVAP as far as fluidity, airplane model library and ease of use.I am not biased to any network really, as I had many fascinating hours flying for either of them.It is true, that Vatsim has dominant coverage in North America where IVAO is basically nonexistent.In Europe Vatsim tends to cover more of a center airspace, whereas IVAO concentrates more on Tower/Approach coverage.As far as I am concerned I keep on flying on IVAO primarily due to the pilot client issues mentioned above.I got to the point of removing Squawbox 3 from my harddrive, thus deciding on flying one network only when I saw the big white triangular blob approaching the airport, which apparently was the aircraft representation of a type not currently in the traffic library.Once again, this is strictly my personal view and I do appreciate other may feel differently about it.Have fun, nonetheless, online flying is a completely different ballgame.Dom

I for one, would love to fly online. I have done it a few times using IVAO, but I simply do not enjoy it at all without more planes and live around me. Therefore I stick with Ultimate Traffic, and then hope that IVAO and VATSIM in the future will merge into one. Why invent the deep plate one more time.There will truly be a lot more live up there if they would join forces.Dennis Vogelius

This issue has been covered many times before.Vatsim officials stated, that they do not see this possible.It's truly sad, but there is too much politics involved.And mind you - it supposed to be fun after all.This is the most comprehensive analysis of this issue that will answer many more of your questions: http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...ic_id=4275#4278Anyway - stick to whatever they offer, after all it's free and brings new level of immersion.Best regardsDom

I have been flying sporadically online since the days of SATCO, thus many years ago. I have always been amazed that we have this possibility on interaction. But since the split this issue has been on the back of my head, always thinking how would it be to be everyone online in the same virtual world.It seems that some major differences provoked the split. And i can understand them all. But many times there are also differences between users, and administrators always remind us how to excercise politeness, comprehension and collaboration so we can all coexist in the same network. Well i dont see these particular two organizations making this kind of effort at all.Some people say competition is good because then we have many options to choose from. I agree. But every competition is built on top of a collaboration based framework. And that is what we dont have. We have two independant organizations diverging in two opposite directions and no common work whatsoever. We could have both: collaboration where needed and competition where everything is already launched. Instead some areas are not advanced enough so that competition does any good, in those areas collaboration work would help better.Both organizations have very strong and developed politics and bureaucracy mechanisms but they have been very lacking in software development. Only in the last months this has started to improve but yet we run on server software strongly based on something someone kindly donated to the community for the community a lot of time ago.Flying online has 2 main reasons: ATC and traffic. This two factors build up the decision for each user of which network to use (most of the time). Other kind of differences between the two networks seem to not affect pilots at all and slightly to ATC. I, for one, have not noticed any difference.So I have been thinking on an utopic model where collaboration and differences could coexist benifiting users in the process.It is one virtual world shared by ATCs, pilots AND organizations. What it is shared and in what terms should bet set up in a way collaboration and competition arises as needed. People in charge of organizations will have to collaborate with other organizations, something right now avoid at all cost (I see this as a responsibility, you can not live as you where the only one in the world) and i think is part of their "work".This can be done with many grades of complexity. But seeing the man power each organization has it is a project that could be studied.We could have some common rules and some rules per organization. We could have more bandwith and server power. We could haver better server software, ACARS, libraries for panel builders, better virtual airline support, global economics, vast model library, synchronized navdata (my dream: decoupling between scenery and navigational items for fs10), more training material, more traffic, more ATC, etc...Dont take me wrong, i appreciate a lot what we have for free, but that doesnt mean someone has not the right to expose ideas for improvement. What I see is a lot of room for improvement and a market opportunnity for microsoft (now that mmorpg are so famous).

>Squawbox developers quickly caught up with the trend and>shortly thereafter released their new version of Squawbox>called SB3.>The software improved a lot compared to SB2, but in my humble>opinion is still inferior to IVAP as far as fluidity, airplane>model library and ease of use.Hi Dom,did you try Vatsim`s client FSInn?Jorge Niny

Hallo Jorge,I have not tried it.Can you give me a short description of this client handling my concerns listed?ThanksDom

I have been flying on Vatsim, for about 2 1/2 weeks. I had tried installing and flying on it in the old SB2 days and was not happy with the complexity of getting SB2 and everything else going. The new SB3 is really easy to install and operate, and I am now to the point where all my flights are Vatsim flights. The ServInfo program shows me where all the activity of both controllers and flights are at any given moment and I can chose where to start and end my flights based on that. Having the real ATC and real interaction with people more than makes up for the lack of AI in my opinion. Last night , after a flight from STL to MEM, I I looked at the activity on Vatsim and IVAO. This was about 0100Z and while Vatsim was loaded with pilots and controllers, IVAO was very low in both. I think much of that has to do with the time differences in the US vs Europe.

hello,here are some thoughts......the thrill in my opinion, of online flight simulation is crowded skies with controllers gasping for air and pilots moaning about delays. we must remember that there are two sides to this simulation, ATC and pilots. my thought is why are there two networks with sometimes low traffic levels? if all the traffic and controllers log on to one network instead of spliting into two, then maybe we all could enjoy caotic skies. on line flight simming is all about having fun seeking perfection and new levels of realism as a community. so with all of this in mind why not set aside diferences and join efforts to truly provide OUR community the best possible in a united way?im not going to say which network i prefer but these thoughts have always boggled my mind.best regardsjohn

FSInn will use any aircraft from your own FS installation to render anything at all.If it doesn't find a matching type and livery it will match type only.If it doesn't find that it will match category.etc. etc.

FSINN can use a Peer 2 peer multiplayer, if the other pilot is using FSINN, in this case the multiplayer is as good as true multiplayer. Personally I use both depending on the situation. FSINN: Multiplayer flights with friends using a private server; this allows having the same experience as with multiplayer plus weather, Servinfo etc.SB3: With airliners in VATSIM;Both are an outstanding piece of code.Jos

Hi Dom, sorry for the inexplecable delay.I