fsx-ms Why FSX/P3D over FS9?

[Skywatcher 133]

I'm a FS9 user, not looking to start a war but just interested to know why people use FSX/P3D over FS9?

Here is my situation. In the past I had a poor PC, no option but to stay with FS9 but no rush to upgrade because I actually wanted to stay with FS9.
I have upgraded my PC for other games and gave FSX a run on the new PC. I could run it reasonably well, I could also afford to upgrade my CPU if I wished which would allow me to run it as good as anyone but I'm simply not interested at this point.

My reasons to stay with FS9 are this:

Has all the aircraft already developed I could ever wish to fly.
Airports and scenery for nearly everywhere.
Masses of little addons/utilities not all of which are available or will work in FSX/P3D.
I can completely max FS9 out, fly any aircraft and use any scenery and it's as smooth as silk.
It doesn't crash, I have no memory issues and it just works.

So after the upgrade I tried FSX looking specifically for the graphics differences. Yes, FSX is better but it's not an Atari v Playstation 4 type graphics difference.

It makes me curious why so many use FSX/P3D over FS9?
If you have a real monster machine, can seriously max FSX/P3D out with top aircraft and scenery and are a graphics junky, ok, maybe I can understand. Is it really such an easy decision to just ignore FS9 for everyone else?

Before upgrading I read so many threads about performance to get an idea where my machine should sit after the upgrade. So many users struggling to get a half reasonable FSX/P3D up and running and so many headaches and constant issues. If you don't have the machine to really take full advantage of FSX/P3D graphics, wouldn't a fully maxed and silky smooth FS9 be a better option? 

Graphics are the biggest selling point of FSX/P3D over FS9 imo and if you are only running FSX/P3D at 50-75% when you could be running FS9 at 100%, I believe even the graphics argument comes into question.

Anyhow, like I said, not looking to start a war. Love my FS9, will be staying with it for years to come. Would simply like to read opinions why FSX/P3D is such a clear cut decision over FS9 from those that have truly moved on from FS9?

Cheers




 

[Manny 1,293]

You are actually right about what you are doing. 

 

Imagine flying the PMDG 747 in FS9... There is nothing better than that today ...P3dV3 or not.

 

I was going to say the water in FS9 sucks...but it sucks in P3Dv3 too ..its no better than fs9.

 

The only thing that is seriously better in P3D is volumetric fog. And the water is awesome in FSX.

 

The rest are all debatable....

[cmpbellsjc 2,960]

If your computer is not reasonably fast then it's best to stay with FS9 to get desired performance you require for the type of flying you do.

 

For FSX to run well at higher settings with lots of AI and complex aircraft you'll need at least the following.

 

Windows 64 bit OS

CPU: running at least 3.85ghz or faster

RAM: at least 8GB reasonably fast low latency RAM

GPU: Minimum 2gb descent quality video card, more RAM on GPU for P3D

HD: at least 500gb or larger SSD or 10K RPM HD to house FSX or P3D

 

As far as the reason why I moved from FS9 to FSX is mainly because it's still being widely developed for as is P3D, but FS9 development has stopped for some developers. I also prefer the ground and water textures, ActiveSkyNext weather and some other addons for FSX over FS9.

 

I've been on FSX since 2008 on 5o different rigs and am happy with my choice as its worked well for me the whole time and haven't had an OOM issues or FPS issues that some have had. I'd like to get P3D at some point but will need to upgrade hardware again and am waiting for them to get to a more final version since they keep releasing point updates for it that sometimes requires reinstalls or causes addons to have to be updsted.

[JWNoctis 4]

Cloud texture over 512 is...just asking for trouble without a monster machine when weathers are bad. Indeed, clouds are among the few things that high-definition texture won't necessarily work better.

 

FSX does have better graphic, which can be made much, much better with scenery addons, like this: http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/643250383561864369/16D7BFDFAFC475351DC507769A24A5FA6A05F813/

Though those would require a reasonably current and gaming-oriented machine to run and a very good one to run well, like the type cmpbellsjc's above post indicated.

 

FSX also had good amount of quality addon aircrafts accumulated over the years, depending on what kind of flying you do. Majestic, PMDG, A2A and RealAir all got some really awesome ones that sadly did not make it back into FS9.

[Wobbie 938]

Apart from eye candy & some slightly better flight models..

As I'm sure you have realised by now, you can spend far more time flying FS9 than you can with FSX

If your are that way inclined, as i am, I have a second install of FS9 called ' Golden Wings' with a lot of 1930-1940 aircraft as well as the great stuff from Ed & Garry at http://www.ford-tri-motor.net/ It's worth a look.

 

I always end up back at my FS9. I have more fun with the low 'n slow's & prop planes.

 

Anyhow, that's just my own personal prefs.

[bob44 1]

For myself, the A2A Accusim B17 pulled me to FSX. Otherwise I probably would still be with FS9/GW3. I like the vintage stuff. Mainly the bigger DC3, Twin Beech, Ford Trimotor kind of aircraft. But the one thing lacking was the realism, and A2A provided that. After awhile I picked up A2A's P40, for something different, never had an interest in fighters before, and have enjoyed the faster speeds with it. Same with the 172. Never had an interest in modern GA, but the realism makes it interesting. For scenery, nothing compares to GW3 for a vintage world, I keep FSX mostly default.     

[pete_auau 1,154]

the reason to move to fsx or p3d  is the ngx and of  course  the majestic and  nearly  forgot  the pmdg 747v2  when it  comes  out :wink:

[AnkH 2,233]

For me, I was also sticking a long time to FS9 due to hardware issues. But as soon as I anyway updated my machine, I switched to FSX to see if this suits me. It did, but now, I rather quickly changed again to P3Dv3. I am honest: for me, computer gaming always related to have the best possible graphics. Sure, for flightsimming, this is not the MOST important thing, but it is still important. Today, I can fly with almost max settings in P3Dv3, including self-shadowing of both my plane and AI planes, ground shadows (Trees, Buildings, Lightpoles etc.), some car traffic on the streets, volumetric fog, nice clouds (using REX4 and FSGRW) inlcuding shadows on ground and water and this all inside the VC of the wonderful Aerosoft Airbus and I still have 20FPS at least. As soon as this is possible, you can turn your question around: why still using FS9?

 

Furthermore, if you take a look on the ORBX full fat regions together with a ORBX airport and flying VFR in such a region using a nice, state of the art, GA addon such as A2A, I really would never like to go back. Thanks to the increased autogen density and the FTX Trees addon, flying around in forrestal regions such as PNW or NZ is really a game changer for me. I could provide some screenshots to better illustrate it, but there are plenty available online and even videos. Those increased quality in visuals completely changed my flying profile: while I was mostly flying tubeliners on short, medium and longhaul flights in FS9, I now at least spend 50% of my sim time simply with GA aircraft doing scenic flights all over the world but of course predominantly in a even further improved region such as those provided by ORBX.

 

So, yes, in the end, if there is a scenery available for both FS9 and FSX/P3D, you will not really see any difference instantly. But sooner or later you will. While the airport itself can look comparable, the small details and the surrounding do not (imho). P3Dv3 has much denser autogen which is also not plopping up, offers shadows all over and still maintains good framerates. One of the important things I noticed: thanks to the improved visual quality, also the immersion is improved, especially regarding altitude perception. This is mainly due to the shadows of trees and the cloud shadows, but also due to the increased autogen density. Flying at 10'000ft in FS9 never gave me anything close to the real deal regarding altitude perception, as the ground below had not enough resolution, no shadows were visible and clouds simply seemed to float at any altitude, without shadows it was impossible to tell if the clouds were 1000ft, 3000ft or 10000ft above the ground, you can simply not tell it.

 

Long story short: yes, for me, visuals are important. As you said correctly, regarding flight models and complexity of certain aircraft addons, you will find perfectly fine planes for FS9. But as I said, comparing FS9 and P3Dv3 (in my case) from a different view is more like that: P3Dv3 gives you everything what FS9 does, PLUS the visual eye candy PLUS the fact, that it is still further developed and thus more likely new addons will continue to arrive. And because of the "PLUS", I prefer P3Dv3.

[W2DR 1,859]

I use P3Dv3 because it looks and feels so much better than either FS9 or FSX. But, I also keep FS9 around because there is nothing like hand flying the old Kai Tak IGS in a PMDG 747 using 9 Dragons scenery with framerates at 100+.....great stuff.

 

Doug

[hs118 707]

There are aircraft add-ons that are not available in FS9. In fact, last week saw the release of the first designed-specifically-for-P3D only aircraft (as far as I can tell).

[scottb613 1,188]

HI Folks,

 

I'm in the midst of a jump right now from FS9 to P3D (skipping FSX entirely) - - - the motivation for me is the much higher availability of detailed Payware quality GA airports... In FS9 - these were pretty neglected... Some of the best that I ever found in FS9 were the two Flight Zone releases (PVD and PDX) which included some smaller airports... I even purchased the whole GeoRender series but most of these are truly unusable with the installation of accurate mesh... So I'm really hoping for a better GA experience... We'll see - FS9 is still staying on my machine as well for the foreseeable future...

 

Regards,

Scott

[magnetite 38]

I never bought FS2004. I went from FS2002 to FSX.

[Bjoern 1,153]

More trees and houses.

[dogtrack 18]

....and don't forget the Texture upgrade for FS9...EVO.  A great transformation in exchange for a donation.  Similar to Global for FSX in concept.

[sascha 314]

If I would move to FSX/P3D/X-Plane it would be because of internal shadows and cloud shadows mainly, graphicswise. And of course real moving trains, cars, trucks all over the place! Otherwise I believe X-Plane just has the better flight modelling... 

 

But I never really seriously considered changing. I just love my FS9, won't discard it.