fsx-ms POLL - FSLabs A320 "finished enough"

[Steve Dra 7,588]

I would answer a resounding "yes" to the poll question.

I have to admit that I've been painting it way more than I've flown it so far, so I only have limited time in the air and only 2 actual point to point flights (KJFK>MMUN and KDFW>KLAX).

 

However, the flights were flawless, the plane followed the flightplan to a T, observing altitude restrictions on the SEAVU arrival into LAX perfectly.  As others have noted, she hand flies beautifully, and the built in logic to keep the dumb human operator safe when he thinks he's in a F-16 all do their job as I understand the real life counterpart does.

 

I fly her in FSX:SE with Steve's DX10 fixer at the moment, have good FPS, and I have yet to get an OOM with reasonable sim settings.  

 

I believe she'll shine in P3D when she's released for that platform, and here is the biggest thing to consider if you're holding off your purchase for that event (but really itching to get he up in the air):

Lefteris at FSL has plainly stated that if you get the FSX version now, you won't have to buy the P3D version at the full, separate price, but only pay the difference the P3D version will cost.

So, if you have a good running copy of FSX (DX10 preferred but not required), running along side of P3D as I do, and can buy it now, you'll get to familiarize yourself with it in FSX before the P3D release. :wink:

 

The way I view my purchase is that I'm at a place in my life where I can justify the cost within my entertainment budget, and to be honest I enjoy supporting Devs who put so much into their creations for us to enjoy.  In addition, Lefteris and his team have been very responsive and active in the forums, fully supporting their product, and have genuine conviction in growing the product to its fullest potential (at least from what I've witnessed so far).

Think of how long the project took, and look at other devs who've had similar project timelines and just quit (or never officially quit, but who's future release(s) can be considered "abandonware" or "vaporware").

FSL stuck with this project, saw it though to release, and now are working hard to improve and update it for multiple platforms.  I will always be impressed by that, and that fact greatly influences my decision to be a customer (for any dev, regardless of the product).  I honestly believe they've earned my business.

 

Oh, she's pretty easy to paint...and a picture is worth a 1000 words I always say.  :smile:

Here is one of my paints, Mr. Frog rocketing out of KJAC with the Tetons in the background. ( I have 4 Frontier paints out already, with more on the way).

Vasilis, the FSL official painter, has already punched out over 100 excellent paints (he's not done), and there are several other painters also painting her...including Mr. Tavendale!

[lefteris 70]

Dear Robert-

 

1) I have not found your name in our customers' database. Are you sure you have purchased?

 

2) The brightness and symbols are already perfectly readable, the comparisons with other add-ons that you're making are with displays which deliberately set their lines and fonts to be twice as thick as in real life (and is unrealistic IMO - just resize them to the real size of 7 inches diagonal and then compare them to pictures from their real-world counterparts - once you see it, you will not be able to unsee it), but I will not enter into a debate on this matter, I will only say that:

 

In our A320-X, we provide all kinds of customizations for our display units. Edit LCDColors.ini and let colors be changed to your liking. If you followed those threads in our forum, you'd see that various users have suggested other colors they prefer for the Flight Director bars (what is an ILS bar? do you mean the LOC and GS diamonds?)

 

Also, our upcoming update already features a new LCDPens.ini file which will allow you to change pen thickness for these display units, to make it as thick or as narrow as your heart desires. This has also been part of the discussions in our forum - perhaps you missed that one though, as you haven't provided the link to that post...

 

I'd respectfully recommend that you restrain yourself from comments such as "crappy PFD/ND" - these comments do not help a productive and respectful discussion, they only serve to lower the level of conversation to "troll".

 

As for the price (which is $99 + VAT - VAT goes to your government and from the rest we only get a portion, as there are several other costs involved), I'd really welcome you to produce a simulator product that does all what our A320-X offers for less. In fact, many customers who have taken the time to explore what it offers are amazed that we're not charging much more - to give you an idea, the closest competitor to the quality level found in the A320-X charges $30,000 *just* for the ECAM actions package alone (as an add-on to their A320 sim package, with less failures built in).

 

This, of course, is also a different conversation topic, so let's not argue it in here either.

If you have constructive criticism, we're very open to it - you'll see many more discussions in our forums that are technical in nature and will showcase exactly how deep the simulation level goes. Feel free to visit us - you'll always get the same level of respect that you put in...

[sgreen91 182]

The brightness and symbols are already perfectly readable

 

I also have a problem reading them as I have to pop out the ND during landing but I do run a 4K monitor so that may be the issue.  I have no idea what a real airbus ND looks like in flight so I cannot comment on whether X or Y airbus is real I just know the Aerosoft version I can at least see the FD bars but their version does not pop out either.

 

Look forward to the update.

[pete_auau 1,159]

Then there's the performance impact, you need an really high-end system, but that's no show-stopper.

 

Not really if you can run  the ngx or the t7  on your pc  than you should  have no issue with  the bus

[jcomm 5,938]

I can't necessarily offer my vote since I do not own the add-on, but from everything I've been reading and watching in youtubes, this looks to me as one of the most complex implementations of an aircraft ever created for a PC-based flightsim, I'd say in pair with Aerowinx PS1 and now PSX which I use.

 

We could only compare it to Airlinetools A32x, but the price tag and functionalities for ( casual harmchair ) simmers like me put it on a different league....

 

I also know again not for owning any of their addons, but for observing for years how they supported their Concorde, that FSLabs is a respectable developer, with a powerful dev team, and can certainly keep their customers satisfied with their investment.

[Libra204 4]

Hi

Does anyone know if the FSLabs Airbus uses and external flight model similar to the Majestic Q400?

Thanks

 

Csaba

[JYW 2,980]

3 hours ago, Libra204 said:

Hi

Does anyone know if the FSLabs Airbus uses and external flight model similar to the Majestic Q400?

Thanks

 

Csaba

As I understand it, the FSL uses an extremely complex flight model which accounts for the reams of rules and conditions offered/imposed by the FBW.   However, I don't think the flight model is truly 'external' to the degree of the Q400's NASA-derived JSBsim FDE.

[Libra204 4]

JYW, thanks for the qucik response :)

 

I have been searching to no avail for some text proof whether it is the case..but now you have shown me the light 

 

Regards

 

Csaba