I think the secret of the hobby is having fun with whatever comes our way.

 

Be it an immersive and atmospheric XPlane night flight in the IXEG 737.

Or master the PMDG 737 with FS2Crew Reboot and enjoy Plug and Play Hardware like an Opencockpits MCP easily connected. Something XPlane is still far away from, getting external Hardware to work easily...

 

However, no need at all for “my toy is better than yours“ ;-)

 

Mike

Exactly, it's not a bashing forum, it was merely a question on what PMDG users and staff thought of the IXEG. Robert, Kyle and Ryan <input expected>

If we accept everything as we do now the developers will not bother to complete their aircraft which is the case of most aircraft now which are at best beta products.

 

First, my comment is to be taken within "reasonable limits". Of course there's outright BAD products out there, as in any market, and these should be avoided.

 

I'm particularly not keen on buying anything on release day because of past experiences with, as you say, unfinished beta products (I didn't suffer these myself, but through the comments of other unsatisfied customers). Usually whenever I've bought anything I've always made a rational, informed purchase.

 

So I don't agree with you in the following:

- in that we accept everything: each one accepts what fits his needs best

- in that developers won't bother: developers will try to satisfy a demand. Now it's important that a demand is there for them to be willing to develop (that's why I said we should have an open mind and not *just* pay attention to PMDG)

- in that most aircraft now are "beta": well, that depends on how you analyze it. Quality is always at the top of the pyramid in ANY market. You can expect 80% of the products to be under the "passing mark" and just 20% to be above it. That's not unique to Flight Simulation.

Keep it clean.

 

This is starting to wander into people throwing shade on other devs and sim platforms. We do not allow our section of the forum to be used for this, and discussion of other devs in general is discouraged because of the propensity of these types of threads to go south. I was just going to nuke the thread, but I didn't want any conspiracy theories coming about.

 

Clean it up, or it's getting locked up and put out.

It does appear that X-Plane is having more and more in the way of releases. I have invested a lot of money in P3D, but the amount of aircraft available seems really lacking for what it is that I would like to do.

​With what Kyle said in mind, It just seems that aircraft take years to develop, (as long as the real world counterparts) there must be what 3-4 companies all "in development" just frustrating I guess when supply cannot keep up with demand.

​Anyways I have spent a little time on the classic. and I like what I see, I couldn't get on with the platform is all, so I'm hoping that it comes towards P3D

​rgds.

​Liam "I remembered my name" Reynolds

both x-plane and p3d have strengths and weaknesses, i have the pmdg 777-200 and 300 for p3d.i have used the esp since fsx was released and i think it was great for it's time.

 I switched over to x-plane about 6 months ago, going back and forth between xplane and p3d, part is because i did not completely understand xplane's file structure and how it

actually worked.I would say as of this month i am more an x-plane fan because of the hd and uhd scenery, if you read the manuals and listen to people x-plane can be a very wonderful 

experience.

 my current planes i have purchased for p3d and fsx to date.

 

pmdg 777-200-300 fsx

pmdg 777-200-300 p3d

pmdg 737-800 fsx

quality wings 757-200

quality wings 146 collection

pmdg 747

aerosoft a320/a319

many more hear and there for fsx for p3d and fsx, i have spent about 5,000 on addons on p3d and fsx since 2006, not bad for the 10 years.

----------------------------------------------------------

x-plane 10

 

IXEG 737 classic

flight factor 777, 757,767

jar design a320, a330

ssg 747-400

rotate md 80

carenado sr22_gtsx_turbo

 

the total i have spent on x-plane is about 500.00 and all of it is airplane related.

New user's do your home work on x-plane before you call it bad, there is so much freeware scenery thats orbx+ quality it's amazing.

I have never had a crash in x-plane 10 and if you have a pretty good rig, you can really enjoy x-plane as much as p3d or fsx.

my main reason for the crossover was 64 bit and when i heard the release of the pmdg product for x-plane.

  Just giving everyone my opinion and did not bash a singe developer.

I dont think we are at the point yet that one sim will replace the other, each has its own definite strengths and weaknesses.  I just got into xplane to try the new ixeg 737, it is a great aircraft that to me has strengths andweaknesses in some ways tcompared to the pmdg ngx, especially when it comes to cockpit geometry, you really dont notice how far off the window size is in the ngx until you fly the ixeg.  But that being said the pmdg aircraft is at the moment superior in many ways as well, the systems modelling is more complete, especially the fms, and the autoflight system is more accurate.  Two things that are really cool about xplane are the way the engines are modeled and the scenery.  After flying across the US with only HD mesh installed I feel like I dont need photoscenery anymore, the landclass and textures for different farms, dessert etc is spot on to me.  The other thing I noticed is that xplane models jet engines much better, you no longer have that "buzzsaw" engine sound at higher altitudes when flying the ixeg 737 for example, because xplane seems to take air density into account.  I dont know if this is an xplane or ixeg feature.  The spool up time and behavior of the cfm56's jerkyness is also represented.   Xplane falls short of p3d on wx though, even with addons its not the same as asn with p3d, and rex clouds still look better than skymaxx.  Xplane also still does not have seasons either, which is a pretty big deal imo,  Although the general visual ambiance and lighting is much better with xplane.  Cant wait to try the dc6!  Xplane will only get better as devs like pmdg start to support it.

I dont think we are at the point yet that one sim will replace the other, each has its own definite strengths and weaknesses.  I just got into xplane to try the new ixeg 737, it is a great aircraft that to me has strengths andweaknesses in some ways tcompared to the pmdg ngx, especially when it comes to cockpit geometry, you really dont notice how far off the window size is in the ngx until you fly the ixeg.  But that being said the pmdg aircraft is at the moment superior in many ways as well, the systems modelling is more complete, especially the fms, and the autoflight system is more accurate.  Two things that are really cool about xplane are the way the engines are modeled and the scenery.  After flying across the US with only HD mesh installed I feel like I dont need photoscenery anymore, the landclass and textures for different farms, dessert etc is spot on to me.  The other thing I noticed is that xplane models jet engines much better, you no longer have that "buzzsaw" engine sound at higher altitudes when flying the ixeg 737 for example, because xplane seems to take air density into account.  I dont know if this is an xplane or ixeg feature.  The spool up time and behavior of the cfm56's jerkyness is also represented.   Xplane falls short of p3d on wx though, even with addons its not the same as asn with p3d, and rex clouds still look better than skymaxx.  Xplane also still does not have seasons either, which is a pretty big deal imo,  Although the general visual ambiance and lighting is much better with xplane.  Cant wait to try the dc6!  Xplane will only get better as devs like pmdg start to support it.

I agree, XPlane needs an Active Sky Next and Rex Texture Direct before it can compete with FSX/P3d - David Lee

Is that hope or expectation? Once PMDG release the 747 V2 and FSLabs release their A320 the fanfare over the IXEG 737 will die down. I doubt Xplane will ever be bigger than the ESP platform.

i like fsx but ESP flight models are poop and on rails.

i like fsx but ESP flight models are poop and on rails.

With respect that isn't true. They certainly aren't on rails.

With respect that isn't true. They certainly aren't on rails.

Posted 04 May 2016 - 05:21 PM by Airline2Sim

As an FSX die-hard, I recently saw the light with X-Plane after the IXEG 737 came out. My thoughts thus, after 2 weeks of flying it pretty much exclusively:

 

- The night environment, even out of the box, is to die for and destroys anything I've ever seen in the ESP sims.

 

- Weather generation isn't there yet. The combo I use is NOAA plugin + real weather connector + skymaxx which works pretty well but there are still occasional cloud pops and weather shifts. Also the 'draw line' for the weather itself is still too visible for my liking. FSX with ASN (notably not P3D with its popcorn clouds) does this better currently. However, with some tweaking (Real Terra Haze and some playing around does the trick) it can look really nice.

 

-  X-Camera is a must have for me as the pan is much smoother than the rather jerky default camera, plus smooth transitions between cameras, a la EZDOK.

 

- The sim feels so much more modern and can run really smoothly even at places like LHR and AMS, both nightmares in FSX. 

 

- The flight model is less forgiving. You really NEED to fly X-Plane as it feels much more fluid. FSX just flies on rails.

 

- Scenery development is behind the curve for those coming straight from FSX/P3D. Do not expect Flightbeam/Flytampa masterpieces just yet. There are some freeware gems and some decent payware is coming through but it may be some time before you've got the whole planet modelled to the standard we see on the other side. The plus side of that is the lighting and effects of X-Plane out the box are much more advanced so even an average scenery in XP looks okay. The old 'fly there at night' trick rings very true. 

 

- You can say bye bye to OOMs, blurry textures and all that 32-bit nonsense. All the tech in X-Plane is bang up to date and all that cash spent on your PC gets harnessed. However, don't be under any illusion that if you go bonkers on the HDR, AA and detail level that it'll run at 60fps. It won't!

 

- Apart from the IXEG, none of the jets are up to PMDG level - yet. The FF 767 is probably as good as it gets, but it's kind of mid-level against the PMDG yardstick. 

 

In summary, it's a good time for X-Plane. Bear in mind we don't know what DT have up their sleeves in terms of DLC for DTG Flight Simulator and it might just be that the big devs bet the farm instead on porting to a modern 64-bit sim that is still open architecture - X-Plane...

 

Great summary FSXSEPILOT!

 

I got the IXEG 737 as well, as a die hard FSXer I'll add a few things:

 

XP10 first impressions:

 

1) Fantastic FPS! If you have a beast of a graphics card you'll absolutely love it. (I got a GTX 980 for The Witcher 3 & Oculus Rift, I just love it when the card gets a good workout)

2) 64-Bit platform! You'll not run out of VAS, but you can run out of VRAM on your graphics card if you push the sliders too hard.

3) User interface very unintuitive. difficult to setup with some odd design choices (e.g. Quickflight menu is like the FSX free flight menu, but they neglected to put in which gate you want to be, and what livery you want)

4) Mouse action is weird, and I really missed using the scroll wheel to turn dials. I heard they might put something in at v10.50 but developers have to implement it individually in their own aircraft

5) Water textures are really strange. It's like polished glass which I really hate. What's wrong with FSX's water implementation from 10 years ago?

6) ATC is broken. Don't use it. AI traffic is like default FSX - you might as well disable it. There are addons like XLife but it's nowhere as complete as Flight1's Ultimate Traffic.

5) Payware addons are generally more expensive, and less detailed. In other words you get less value out of your $$$.

6) XP10 has worldwide airports, but for some reason there are no buildings in the vast majority of default airports. All you get are runways, taxiways and apron, but no terminals or hangars.

7) XP10 do have good basic freeware addons for most airports, as basic scenery design is very easy - just plop a few library objects like Lego and go.

8) If you like heavy metal, XP10 is relatively spartan in terms of complex aircraft. I got the JRollon CRJ and J32, and my impressions were "Not bad, not quite up there with PMDG as implementation is a bit simplified in some places (e.g. You can toggle the start switch with nothing happening because I haven't set the panels up properly, but the starter sound can still be heard.)

9) XP10 graphical weather depiction has huge potential with nice fluffy clouds, but addons like SkyMaxx Pro are expensive and doesn't do as good a job as Activesky/REX does in FSX. XP10 is crying out for the REX team to release a X-plane product.

10) Landclass and autogen is a bit strange - mostly North American landclass objects. if you've enabled animals you might see a pack of wild deer running across the runway on short final. Also there's an unusually high amount of wind turbines everywhere, even in places where they're not supposed to be - around airports. (Yes I'm aware of Caernarfon airport)

11) No world landmarks! How hard is it to build a few dozen low-res library objects for the big cities around the world? What are they doing with those 8 DVDs?

12) Hardware controllers are absolutely essential for XP10, a yoke/joystick, throttle and rudder. Assignments are somewhat difficult to set up but so is FSX with FSUIPC.

13) No 2D panels for many aircraft.

14) Graphics are really drab, none of that warm 'digital vibrance' compared to FSX/P3D. IMO XP10 really needs good ENB and shaders, just like how GTA4 was transformed by the ICEnhancer mod.

 

 

IXEG first impressions - including some comparisons to NGX and Wilco/Feelthere 737 PIC Evo.

 

1) Huge potential, somewhat buggy and unpolished at places - most of it in the FMS, VNAV profile and strange shapes with the magenta line. It flies like Majestic's Q400 with 2 underslung jet engines. Never hand flown a real 737 or a level-D sim so can't comment on fidelity.

2) Non-FMS/Autoflight systems complexity up to PMDG standard, I haven't tested any failures however I expect it to be good.

3) There seems to be some missing content in the FMC compared to the NGX and Wilco 737. IXEG has stated that some features will be missing in v1.0

4) Excellent graphics, gauge and night lighting is the best I've ever seen in any addon. You can see those warning lights flicker a bit and glow, just like when you apply a bit of voltage to an incandescent light bulb.

5) REALLY NICE TRIM SOUND - Just like those old fashioned Boeings. The trim wheels doesn't spin as fast though.

6) God I hate the XP10 mouse-drag implementation for turning knobs, it's too imprecise for setting the MCP. At one time I would spend 10 seconds trying to get 6000 in the altitude window, while moving between 5900 and 6100. That's IMO what the scroll wheel is for.

7) Pretty pricey at $75, and you only get the -300.

8) I expect an intensive patching schedule given the missing features (e.g. The cabin doors won't open, but the cargo doors do open!) similar to the Rotatesim MD-80. It might be worth it to wait and see how the patching schedule pans out.

 

Final thoughts:

I really liked the 737 Classic and followed the IXEG team intensely, so I'm biased and I think it's worth $75. However for people used to PMDG quality they might be less forgiving. I imagine they'll be reasonably delighted, followed by brief moments of "Ugh...." and "Why did IXEG do that?"

I am extremely impressed with the IXEG 737.

 

Future is going to be very interesting indeed..

 

If Xplane take this oppurtunity to really develop the visuals, and user interface, it has all the hallmarkings to take over the P3d dominance and we can finally forget talking about licences

Visuals in XP are amazing. Especially night time. As for user interface. Its way beyond anything P3D or FSX have to offer!

 

 

the total i have spent on x-plane is about 500.00 and all of it is airplane related.

New user's do your home work on x-plane before you call it bad, there is so much freeware scenery thats orbx+ quality it's amazing.

I have never had a crash in x-plane 10 and if you have a pretty good rig, you can really enjoy x-plane as much as p3d or fsx.

my main reason for the crossover was 64 bit and when i heard the release of the pmdg product for x-plane.

  Just giving everyone my opinion and did not bash a singe developer.

Exactly,  I have been using the Microsoft line of Simulators for 25 years and P3D the last 3 years.  I have been an XPlane user 10+ years and its amazing! I don't take any notice of the people who have not really given XP a fair go. These are the people who buy XP, load it for the first time and play around for an hour or two then say. I don't like this because its not the same as FSX. Really?? I am glad. They then come on forums such as thses and say XP stinks and FSX is so much better.  They have no idea what they are talking about to even give an opinion that can be taken seriously. How can they when they know nothing about XP other then installing it. XP is to complex for some I guess.

Exactly,  I have been using the Microsoft line of Simulators for 25 years and P3D the last 3 years.  I have been an XPlane user 10+ years and its amazing! I don't take any notice of the people who have not really given XP a fair go. These are the people who buy XP, load it for the first time and play around for an hour or two then say. I don't like this because its not the same as FSX. Really?? I am glad. They then come on forums such as thses and say XP stinks and FSX is so much better.  They have no idea what they are talking about to even give an opinion that can be taken seriously. How can they when they know nothing about XP other then installing it. XP is to complex for some I guess.

 

I think both sims have their own strengths and weaknesses, but FSX is the culmination of 20+ years of continuous development by Microsoft, and UI wise it's about as good as it gets. Most people's first impressions of X-plane is through the UI and if they don't like it, they'll go back to FSX. You might not care about these people, but they are the ones that will grow the X-plane platform. For the vast majority of newcomers, the FSX UI just simply works - it's initutive. We've seen a lot of improvements in the X-plane platform and the devs have added features similar to FSX (e.g. Quick Flight menu) and IMO there is room for further improvement. Making XP10 as similar to FSX can only benefit the platform and create converts - everyone here wants a better FSX, and for many P3D, not XP10, is their answer.

 

It's like X-plane for Android and iOS. Who here plays X-plane on a mobile phone? But there are people out there who would, and that's why X-plane is available for Android & iOS. It's all about growing the platform.

 

 

- The flight model is less forgiving. You really NEED to fly X-Plane as it feels much more fluid. FSX just flies on rails.

 

That's because the nose is always hunting side to side, like a bad case of dutch roll. Or, the infamous overdone torque roll, that has simmers constantly trimming for an un-realistic left roll. Actually, the left roll problem, is starting to become a phenomenon of the past, but just lately. I don't go with the "rails" thing either. Never have, in all these years.