fsx-ms Stay with FSX or go for P3D

[Jimm 437]

Hi, just to ask, what's FSX?. The same thing I remember my grandson used to play with?.

Cheers, Ed

You were joking, right? If not, my apologies.  FSX is short for Flight Simulator X, developed and sold by Microsoft, released in 2006.

[CFIJose 5,485]

Hello all,

 

I know this has been widely discussed at several places and I have read most of it. But I am still not able to decide and cannot match the pros and cons to my system (How good my system can handle fsx and p3d)

 

My dilemma is : Should I stay with FSX or move to P3D.

 

Background: I am not a pilot. Just a flight sim enthusiast. To bring new life to this exciting hobby of mine, finally after 2007, this year I have bought a decent computer desktop just for flight simulator. The specs of my computer are Intel i7 6700 sky-lake 4.0 GHz, overclock to 4.4 GHz. 16 GB DDR4 RAM, Hard disk 2TB is SSD, GTX 970 4GB Nvidia.

 

So since 2007 I have not played flight sim. This year when I got my new computer, I immediately without doing much of a research, installed FSX deluxe, bought PMDG 777-200, a bunch of airports, FSUIPC, FS Passengers, AES credits for all add-on airports. Now I was considering buying Active Sky Next, Rex textures for clouds, FTX global and few other add-ons. Just before buying these add-ons, it struck me that everywhere on youtube and elsewhere, P3D is slowly dominating the flight sim world. I have heard lots of good things about it, out of which most important for me is that P3D is constantly updated whereas FSX will not be updated anymore.

 

So now I am thinking that having spent a few hundred dollars already on PMDG 777, airports etc, I should ask you friends what are your suggestions? Because I think if I need to go to P3D then I have to buy all add-ons again since they are different installers? (At least I am sure about PMDG). This is important for me since I have done a major investment already with new computer and add-ons and hardwares, so I do not want to put more money into FSX, if P3D is the way to go. Especially if FSX is something that will hang on for just very less time now.

 

Please provide your inputs and oblige.

 

Thank you.

 

Satbeer Singh

Stick with FSX and learn more about XPlane 10. It's a 64bit sim with some amazing night lighting, excellent payware planes, lots of excellent freeware airports, and a sim that feels more realistic from a flight dynamics stand point. You will actually feel the weather with Skymaxx Pro & RWC. The sim is in constant development and you will not need to upgrade unless you like being a Beta tester. Just my 2 cents.

[edpatino 1,964]

You were joking, right? If not, my apologies.  FSX is short for Flight Simulator X, developed and sold by Microsoft, released in 2006.

 

Hi, Jim:

Yes, just yoking!. I remember when FSX was released about 10 years ago, and the present I gave to my grandson to play with at that time, but now he switched to P3D!.

Cheers, Ed

[Jimm 437]

Hi, Jim:

Yes, just yoking!. I remember when FSX was released about 10 years ago, and the present I gave to my grandson to play with at that time, but now he switched to P3D!.

Cheers, Ed

I had hoped that was the case, considering you are using P3D, so you would have had to have some knowledge about FSX.

 

It doesn't seem that long ago though...it's nearly as long as my marriage, which almost makes for a good joke.

[edpatino 1,964]

Just for the record: AES is one of the products that does not work with P3D. The developer of the core module is no longer around, and no replacement has been in sight for many months now.

 

"P3D dominating the FS world": I don't know if this is true. It is strong on Youtube because it looks good, and forums are active on some sites (like this one) but all but nonexistent on others. I can't quantify this, but it feels like P3D still has a very long way to go to get anywhere near the FSX or XP sales figures. But then again, that seemingly never was the intent of LM anyway.

 

Hi, I would recommend reading this post:

 

http://forum.aerosoft.com/index.php?/topic/111957-what-simulator-do-you-use/&page=2#comment-757316

 

I think you should be a registered Aerosoft forums member to read it, but try anyway if you don't.

 

Cheers, Ed

[Lorby_SI 2,038]

Hi, I would recommend reading this post:


http://forum.aerosof...#comment-757316


I think you should be a registered Aerosoft forums member to read it, but try anyway if you don't.


Cheers, Ed

Hi Ed,

 

I don't know. 400 people voted - 400 out of a user base that once used to number in hundreds of thousands. And these 400 are FS enthusiasts obviously. If this statistic holds true, then LM sold or will sell about 200 licenses to them. Let us say for the moment that this is true for all FS related sites, and that LM sold 10 times that many licenses per year - still not impressive. Even a hundred times more wouldn't be, when looking to FSX SE or XP sales figures on Steam. And not all of those customers on Steam were FS enthusiats...

 

I think, that the market for fully fledged civillian flight sims and their addons has been on a steady decline for years, and P3D still is but a small share. I suppose there is more than one addon developer now contemplating if further development for any of the existing simulators is wise at this moment (except XP). If one of the new sims has superior looks to P3D and less restrictive pricing, the whole "game" may change in an instant. Especially if some version of P3D breaks compatibility with existing addons for good (except their preferred partners of course).

[edpatino 1,964]

Hi, I would recommend reading this post:


http://forum.aerosof...#comment-757316


I think you should be a registered Aerosoft forums member to read it, but try anyway if you don't.


Cheers, Ed

Hi Ed,

 

I don't know. 400 people voted - 400 out of a user base that once used to number in hundreds of thousands. And these 400 are FS enthusiasts obviously. If this statistic holds true, then LM sold or will sell about 200 licenses to them. Let us say for the moment that this is true for all FS related sites, and that LM sold 10 times that many licenses per year - still not impressive. Even a hundred times more wouldn't be, when looking to FSX SE or XP sales figures on Steam. And not all of those customers on Steam were FS enthusiats...

 

I think, that the market for fully fledged civillian flight sims and their addons has been on a steady decline for years, and P3D still is but a small share. I suppose there is more than one addon developer now contemplating if further development for any of the existing simulators is wise at this moment (except XP). If one of the new sims has superior looks to P3D and less restrictive pricing, the whole "game" may change in an instant. Especially if some version of P3D breaks compatibility with existing addons for good (except their preferred partners of course).

 

 

Hi Oliver:

 

Thanks for your comments. I think you're somewhat right and think that Aerosoft didn't let the poll roll over for more time, just 15 days or so, so not too much people had the opportunity to know the poll with anticipation and vote. Avsim used to have a market evaluation every two years and the last one I think was made more than two years ago and there's no further information available.

 

Do you have numbers for sales of FSX:SE and XP on Steam?. Please share the link if possible, I'm just curious to know.

 

What I can tell you, and this is just my personal experience, I'm with P3D since v2.4 and I will never look back to any version of FSX; almost all of my previous addons work Ok with P3D (you can count with the fingers of one hand the ones that don't), so no big money expent in compatibiliy issues; tried XP once and I could compare it with a good FS98 and see no interest in trying it again (and all this stuff related to 64-bits and 32-bits is just a waste of time in my opinion, but agree that is a path forward for the future of P3D, as it is for FSX:SE or any other as well).

 

Cheers, Ed

[Lorby_SI 2,038]

Hi Ed,

 

for Steam sales numbers (in the last three weeks), check the "SteamSpy" site:

 

FSX:SE owners: 626,734 (+20,963) (which is 0.3% of all Steam users if I'm not mistaken)

XP 10 Global 64Bit  owners:   69,331 (+6,978)

 

(No, XP is not missing a digit)

 

Most interesting are the user statistics too, on the same site. For example 11% of the FSX/XP owners were using their sim in the last two weeks...

 

I don't have any doubt that P3D is the superior simulator to FSX. The question is/was if it is worth it at this moment to throw away an "investment" in FSX and proceed to P3D. I think there is no harm in waiting just a little longer, see how things turn out. Things are different obviously, if you don't have much payware, if you plan to buy different payware for P3D or if your addons will continue to work anyway. But there is no guarantee for that, in time you might be stuck with them on the last release of version 3.x And as the OP mentioned AES, I feel that I had to warn him that it will not work in P3D (AES can get quite expensive).

[edpatino 1,964]

Hi Ed,

 

for Steam sales numbers (in the last three weeks), check the "SteamSpy" site:

 

FSX:SE owners: 626,734 (+20,963) (which is 0.3% of all Steam users if I'm not mistaken)

XP 10 Global 64Bit  owners:   69,331 (+6,978)

 

(No, XP is not missing a digit)

 

Most interesting are the user statistics too, on the same site. For example 11% of the FSX/XP owners were using their sim in the last two weeks...

 

I don't have any doubt that P3D is the superior simulator to FSX. The question is/was if it is worth it at this moment to throw away an "investment" in FSX and proceed to P3D. I think there is no harm in waiting just a little longer, see how things turn out. Things are different obviously, if you don't have much payware, if you plan to buy different payware for P3D or if your addons will continue to work anyway. But there is no guarantee for that, in time you might be stuck with them on the last release of version 3.x And as the OP mentioned AES, I feel that I had to warn him that it will not work in P3D (AES can get quite expensive).

 

Interesting numbers.

Cheers, Ed

[bjratchf 80]

I love the atmospheric presentation of P3D, but FSX still has a great presentation of "light/ambient lighting" after DX10 and Steve's Fixer tool. I also use the flythemaddog addon to help with recurrent training- which only works with FSX. So still good things in both parts.