Baku 2017

[WingZ 547]

Yes I put it in a dummy folder and it created a new scenery.cfg file with duplicate area numbers... this will crash the sim.  

Gotta love autoinstallers, they are there to help people who don't know what to do. Then they crash and nobody knows what to do...

 

The default installation goes to:  "Flight Simulator 9\Addon Scenery\Baku 2017"

 

 

I was just being a little lazy... what interested me was whether it wrote to the \Scenery\Asia\Scenery folder, where I have some custom files.

It does indeed, and something to be aware of: the installer creates a "Backup" folder but this is not backed up from your install. Rather it is a copy of the stock FS2004 files. So your custom files will be eaten.

[edetroit 933]

Yes I put it in a dummy folder and it created a new scenery.cfg file with duplicate area numbers... this will crash the sim.  

Gotta love autoinstallers, they are there to help people who don't know what to do. Then they crash and nobody knows what to do...

 

 

 

I was just being a little lazy... what interested me was whether it wrote to the \Scenery\Asia\Scenery folder, where I have some custom files.

It does indeed, and something to be aware of: the installer creates a "Backup" folder but this is not backed up from your install. Rather it is a copy of the stock FS2004 files. So your custom files will be eaten.

 

 

This kind of shizzle does make me angry. I think you are very wise not to trust a DD scenery install. Thank you for your report.

 

I will wait for more beta test reports before purchase.   

[graemeb 14]

Wingz,

 

Thanks for letting us know about that - very sneeky of DD to do that without advising. I will retrieve my files from one of my backups and compare.

[HaraldG 559]

I downloaded the whole yesterday evening and still have to install... my sandbox will be armed.

[gaputz 60]

I purchased and installed it yesterday.  I can confirm that the installer does not provide an option where to put the scenery.  It goes straight into the Addon Scenery folder.  I prefer to organize my sceneries by country so that was not an option using the Baku installer.  I will have to move it manually to conform with my filing system.  The installer also created duplicate area entries in my scenery.cfg file (repeating area numbers already in use) but this was easily fixed by manually renumbering the entries.  It did not overwrite anything.  I have about 1500 scenery areas in that file and I find most scenery installers do exactly what the Baku installer did in this instance.  It is something I automatically watch for.  I just assume that the installers get confused if you have over a 1000 areas in the scenery file.  Once past these minor issues I can say that the scenery performed flawlessly with very high frame rates during the couple circuits I did around the airport and area in the Ifly 737.  I installed the photo scenery version, which takes about 15 minutes to install.  My initial impression is that this this is a great FS9 scenery.

 

I did notice very little AI activity despite having massive numbers of traffic files running on my system.  Maybe it was the time of day but it seems I will need a regional update!  I hope this is not another former Soviet era airport that changed its ICAO letters, making Baku a dead end destination for some of my AI.

 

Greg

[HaraldG 559]

Hi,

 

now that download and install are complete, I can only second Greg. This is quite a great scenery. I had no problems with installing the scenery. Of course I used the sandbox, so that I was able to control what the installer actually does. All went fine: Correct scenery.cfg entries (that I had to adapt of course to my system of scenery folders), no crashes at load, superb FPS. No problems with stock scenery files, as I had no custom files for this area. (Thanks WingZ for your warning!) I further posted already in DD's forum about some problems:

 

- quite slow loading of phototerrain while in flight
- some static vehicles at light airports (and only there) without textures, as "american looking" lorries as well as tanks at military airports
- at some of the afcad only airports (and again, only there), I see problems with object shadows (rectangle shadows).

 

I will have to consider what I do further with the light airports. Some are quite good, some other (the afcad only airports) are superseded by Andrey Antas freeware. Will probably have to produce a "merge" between them.

 

Regards, Harald

[Joseph29 225]

I don't know about everyone else, but after I install any payware scenery (no matter who made it) I always check the scenery.cfg file to make sure there is no double enteries and everything is numbered right.

[edetroit 933]

I don't know about everyone else, but after I install any payware scenery (no matter who made it) I always check the scenery.cfg file to make sure there is no double enteries and everything is numbered right.

 

 

.....make sure AES is at the top ...and check for alphas/mips. The flight simmer must be diligent or find him/herself with less hair. 

[WingZ 547]

Category: Flight Simulator 2004 - Utilities Scenery Align   

 

I'm looking through the AI, and there should be quite a bit (especially Il-76!) supplemented if you like, by adding the static aircraft.

 

 

The airport itself is very good I agree.

 

 

Flying in here with that fantastic Antonov is just ... natural 

 

 

I'm not too convinced by the photoreal environs:

 

 

I think the area on the airport peninsula is part of the local scenery, as disabling photoreal for the country at large, didn't seem to have any effect.

[HaraldG 559]

Correct, there is a local phototerrain (Apseron peninsula) as part of Baku scenery, while the AzerbaijanPhotoreal consists of the area beyond. Saw my holiday home in Georgian town Kvareli from the air! However, the big phototerrain has some less resolution that the local area, so that I decided to use the scenery without AzerbaijanPhotoreal.

[edetroit 933]

Why was Azerbaijan Photoreal still put in and active in the scenery cfg when I selected NOT to use it.? :rolleyes:

[HaraldG 559]

It's a strange method DD has chosen here; I don't know why. If you uncheck APh when installing, then there will be an active scenery area with dummy .bgl files, but without textures. Maybe it's a kind of landclass then. I saw no change between having the dummy files active and having the scenery area deactivated/deleted, so I did the latter.

[Appliance 51]

Bugger ... still haven't solved my problems.   :mad:

[HaraldG 559]

Hi Appliance,

 

which options (static planes, Phototerrain) did you install? And can you reconstruct the text of the dialog box that showed up?

 

The fact that your keyboard went kaputt at the same time lets me believe that there's either something not related to that scenery. Or, taking into account the very big download, the installer may have got corrupted while downloading.

[Appliance 51]

Hi Harald.

Conundrum ... the dialog box, which contains several lines of small indecipherable type, stays on screen for less than a second after which FS9 disappears. Both PrintScreen and Snipping Tool fail to capture an image. I can discern the box offers OK and COPY TEXT choices however clicking on either is unsuccessful since the pointer is in 'waiting' mode.

 

I don't believe the download was corrupted since installation went smoothly.  Looks like I will have to use my 6 month-old back-up unless gentlereaders suggest a solution. Frankly the keyboard issue is more worrying.  

Forgot to mention I had selected both static aircraft and phototerrain.