Greetings all.. 

 

I finally decided to check out X-Plane after years and having purchased tons of addons for P3D.

 

I primarily fly with VR and now that flyinside beta is out, i've had the chance to dabble in X-plane.

 

I have some observations but ill hold on those for the moment (and comparisons to p3d)..

 

My questions are.. 

 

At this point i'm on steam version 10, which i guess does NOT entitle me to get version 11 for free, since it wasnt bought directly from their store, which i dont quite understand the logic there, but anyway..

 

Wondering if i should dive into getting a bunch of addons for 10 or just wait for 11 (whats the likelyhood of these having free upgrades to version 11 compatible i wonder)..

 

On the side of addons..

 

**I'm wondering if there is a need for anything similar to REX + ASN/ASCA (the clouds look fantastic out of the box, i think)?

**Out of the box, one of my sw PA airports has a botched runway at 9G1, trees on the runway, cant figure out why?

**Out of the box.. objects that should be visible at a distance, are not, and this is unrealistic.. i bumped up the view distance setting in render options to the max.. is there another tweak to go further?

**Whats the equivalent to UTX for X-plane?

**Whats the equivalent to GEX for FTXG?

**Is a mesh necessary like fsglobal, if so which are recommended?

**are there good "aerosoft" like us cities payware out there for major cities?

**Is there an accufeel / ezdok equivalent?

**Any solid 172 cessna models that are similar to A2A?

**PMDG equivalents that might exist? (edit i think there are)

 

Thanks in advance

This canal will help you: https://www.youtube.com/user/oalabdullah1/featured

 

http://www.avsim.com/topic/494883-has-anyone-moved-from-fsx-to-xplane/page-1

 

http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/

 

http://www.avsim.com/topic/494682-xplane-newbe-from-p3d-help-needed-pls/

 

http://www.alpilotx.net/downloads/x-plane-10-hd-mesh-scenery-v3/

Greetings all.. 

 

I finally decided to check out X-Plane after years and having purchased tons of addons for P3D.

 

I primarily fly with VR and now that flyinside beta is out, i've had the chance to dabble in X-plane.

 

I have some observations but ill hold on those for the moment (and comparisons to p3d)..

 

My questions are.. 

 

At this point i'm on steam version 10, which i guess does NOT entitle me to get version 11 for free, since it wasnt bought directly from their store, which i dont quite understand the logic there, but anyway..

 

Wondering if i should dive into getting a bunch of addons for 10 or just wait for 11 (whats the likelyhood of these having free upgrades to version 11 compatible i wonder)..

 

On the side of addons..

 

**I'm wondering if there is a need for anything similar to REX + ASN/ASCA (the clouds look fantastic out of the box, i think)?

**Out of the box, one of my sw PA airports has a botched runway at 9G1, trees on the runway, cant figure out why?

**Out of the box.. objects that should be visible at a distance, are not, and this is unrealistic.. i bumped up the view distance setting in render options to the max.. is there another tweak to go further?

**Whats the equivalent to UTX for X-plane?

**Whats the equivalent to GEX for FTXG?

**Is a mesh necessary like fsglobal, if so which are recommended?

**are there good "aerosoft" like us cities payware out there for major cities?

**Is there an accufeel / ezdok equivalent?

**Any solid 172 cessna models that are similar to A2A?

**PMDG equivalents that might exist? (edit i think there are)

 

Thanks in advance

I think can answer some of your questions.

 

A lot people like skymaxx pro (SMP) for cloud textures. It is an improvement, though some have noted performance hits. There is an addon called RWC (real world connector). To be honest I own it, but am not really sure that it does anything. Its supposed to improve weather transitions, though I have not really seen it. There is a new version of SMP coming, so you might want to wait for the new version.

 

To get distant rendering, check extended DSF scenery in preferences. This will have a performance hit, so see how it works with high performance aircraft. For low and slow, you generally dont need it.

 

Others can comment on addon mesh and terrain. I generally havent added any though there are many freeware options. X-plane.org store has many airport and scenery addons though I have always used freeware in their downloads sections. MrX's airports are superb, get them all.

 

As far as EZdok, you dont need it in X-plane. X-plane has a great built in camera system. Just move your view to where you want it, and hit CTRL+num pad. That view will be saved for that aircraft. If you use TrackIR, a free addon is X-camera, which gives you greater control over Track IR.

 

The best C-172 addon is from Airfoil labs. Its comparable to A2A, perhaps a couple of notches below. Currently it is bugged by an overaly sensitive leaning mechanic, which causes engine failure too easily and there is no way to disable this failure. We are waiting for a fix, which is acknowledged, so I would recommend following their website and the forum at the xplane.org site and holding off for now. Other alternatives are the excellent vflyteair cherokee, and the reality expansion pack (REP) for several carenado planes. REP rewrites the flight model and adds A2A-like features. I have the bonanza REP and its not bad, but not quite as good as the Comanche from A2A.

 

For larger planes there are more and more options. Flight Factor's 767 is pretty descent as is the IXEG 737. X-plane does not have an aircraft with an FMC comparable to PMDG, though I havent tried the Flight Factor 757 v2. In essence you cant just hit lnav and vnav and expect the airplane to take you from departure to landing. 

 

For prop airliners you have a couple of great choices. The SAAB 340 from X-aviation is superb with the best checklist system on any platform. It does have a clunky system for setting up power, and props, which frankly I have never gotten to work correctly, but this is a minor gripe. 

 

The other prop plane is the PMDG's DC-6. It's fabulous and has an automated flight engineer which makes this complex beast very manageable. 

 

Finally xplane finally has a GTN 650/750 which is as good as the one for FSX/P3D. Its a must have for GA and flying the SAAB.

 

Take your time with X-plane and you will find its flight dynamics quite satisfying. The one glaring deficiency is weather. Hoping this will be addressed though we know it wont be changed in the first iteration of XP11.

It's questions like these that make me think 'Ah, well, never mind Xplane...' You have to get used to a whole new world... yikes. But well, let's see what everyone thinks of XP11.

It's questions like these that make me think 'Ah, well, never mind Xplane...' You have to get used to a whole new world... yikes. But well, let's see what everyone thinks of XP11.

 

 

It is actually not a whole new world. The basic structure with scenery layers and add-ons for airplanes is just as in P3D or FSX. And once you discover how much exceptional freeware there is in X-Plane, then rather than thinking "Ah, well, never mind X-Plane..." you will think "Why the hell haven't I tried this earlier?"... Most likely you didn't try it earlier (as I didn't) because there are always people around who make you think that trying X-Plane is complicated. It is not. It is really enjoyable... (except for the weather which sucks in X-Plane compared to P3D)...

theskyisthelimit, on 15 Nov 2016 - 8:36 PM, said:

Greetings all..

 

I finally decided to check out X-Plane after years and having purchased tons of addons for P3D.

 

I primarily fly with VR and now that flyinside beta is out, i've had the chance to dabble in X-plane.

 

I have some observations but ill hold on those for the moment (and comparisons to p3d)..

 

My questions are..

 

At this point i'm on steam version 10, which i guess does NOT entitle me to get version 11 for free, since it wasnt bought directly from their store, which i dont quite understand the logic there, but anyway..

 

Wondering if i should dive into getting a bunch of addons for 10 or just wait for 11 (whats the likelyhood of these having free upgrades to version 11 compatible i wonder)..

 

On the side of addons..

 

**I'm wondering if there is a need for anything similar to REX + ASN/ASCA (the clouds look fantastic out of the box, i think)?

NOAA freeware weather engine http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/15453-xpgfs-noaa-gfs-weather-real-weather-for-x-plane/&_fromLogin=1

Payware Sky Max Pro and Real weather connector for 3d cloud engine, they will upgrade to xp 11 for a fee

 

 

**Out of the box, one of my sw PA airports has a botched runway at 9G1, trees on the runway, cant figure out why?

you need exclusions to be added in overlay editor but but there is a freeware which adds 25,000 aiports with exclusions, you can try this if it solves your issue.

http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/27582-prefab-scenery-for-25000-airports-with-exclusions/

 

**Out of the box.. objects that should be visible at a distance, are not, and this is unrealistic.. i bumped up the view distance setting in render options to the max.. is there another tweak to go further?

im not sure whats happening here but if the world detail distance setting is maxed up you should be fine, i dont face this issue in xp10.

 

**Whats the equivalent to UTX for X-plane?

there is none out of the box but OSM freeware data "world2xplane" http://simheaven.com/?page_id=3260

 

**Whats the equivalent to GEX for FTXG?

Also here nothing out of the box

 

**Is a mesh necessary like fsglobal, if so which are recommended?

freeware http://www.alpilotx.net/downloads/x-plane-10-hd-mesh-scenery-v3/

 

**are there good "aerosoft" like us cities payware out there for major cities?

DD design payware for NYC but you can check these freewares on x plane.org which have cities

KSAN http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/24953-ksan-san-diego-international/

KSFO http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/24393-ksfo-san-francisco-intl-and-city/

 

**Is there an accufeel / ezdok equivalent?

world camera built in x plane however freeware x camera for saving views

http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/24209-x-camera-linmacwin-32-64/

 

for accufeel , there is a freeware which simulates g force, head shake etc....https://www.simcoders.com/headshake/features-and-download

 

 

**Any solid 172 cessna models that are similar to A2A?

airfoil labs payware

 

**PMDG equivalents that might exist? (edit i think there are)

IXEG 737 payware

 

Thanks in advance

Please see answers above

 

Also i recommend these freeware airports which matches paywares

PAWD airport freeware which matches payware http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/25932-pawd-seward-airport-alaska-usa/

http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/27345-scse-airport-and-city-la-serena-chile/

http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/34755-scfa-andr%C3%A9s-sabella-international-airport-and-military-airbase-cerro-moreno/

 

 

also Fly with Lua plugin freeware is a must http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/17468-flywithlua-for-xp9-and-xp10/

Ventura sky freeware http://venturasky.com/resources/downloads/

 

And you will discover yourself more and more

 

i recommend these facebook groups

https://www.facebook.com/groups/XPDedicated/

https://www.facebook.com/groups/XPlaneNG/

 

and these you tube channels will help you

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAi6U-mNuHv4g7aeUhNvx6A

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCD_KVVtpxSbrOwZL0m6pj0g

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLaLioKcbnH-G-NP2ccLRAw

 

Regards

If it helps the OP, I recently transitioned from P3D to XP and I couldn't be happier.  Sure there are little nitnoids here and there, but when you start flying, especially from dusk to night, the visuals are far superior and more realistic.  The weather I haven't gotten further than default, which I do find annoying, but I am saving my cash until 11 comes along, which I got as a free upgrade due to purchasing XP10 from the site, not Steam.  I did break down and get the Piper Sport Cruiser from Carenado (wanted a quick cheap aircraft to play around with) and it performs rather well (no autopilot though).  The default Baron does better at handling than the default C172, but again, I stress that the performance of XP is much easier on my rig than P3D ever was.  My fps are pretty decent, though I don't pay much attention to it because, like P3D, it was about the smoothness of the sim, and XP is butter smooth.

 

With the environment, the LOD seems much further out than with P3D, the lighting at night beats ORBX in my opinion, the lighting at airports is superior in that light reflects off of all objects, so you don't get the dreaded dark planes at the gates.  Strobe lighting looks like strobes in XP, which again is a plus...all in all, XP feels more real.  I can excuse the little details that need work, even if XP11 never came out.  I'll probably check out SMP after XP11 releases, and as for commercial aircraft, I am torn between a few, which may change soon and I'll throw down some cash for all of the ones I like.

 

As for airports, I have yet to buy any because I found a lot of great free ones.  Anything from MisterX6 is worth the download.  I have KSFO, KLAX, KSAN, and KBOS, all of which are payware quality.  I also have YSSY, YMML from another author that are just as good.

 

Impressive would be putting it mildly for the hard working devs that have contributed to XP.

Thanks for all these suggestions.. this is perfect.

 

I guess there is no tileproxy equivalent with xplane either i assume?  Sounded like from what i read, that at least in photoscenery its a bit of "work" to get areas created, manually at least.

 

Either way, i'm not abandoning p3d, nor giving up on aerofly fs2.. i figure why just use one, when you have 3.. use the best features of each

 

I've also heard its possible to get radar contact v4 to work in XP.. atc and voice commands is another area i want to get working, especially when used in conjunction with the rift and flyinside.

I guess there is no tileproxy equivalent with xplane either i assume?  Sounded like from what i read, that at least in photoscenery its a bit of "work" to get areas created, manually at least.

 

There are various photosceneries readily available for X-Plane:

 

most Europe and some other areas at: http://zonephoto.x-plane.fr/Cartes.php

 

Italy at higher resolution at: http://www.x-italy.it/

 

Spain UHD at: http://www.spainuhd.es/p/descarga.html

 

There's also a donationware tool to create photoscenery called g2xpl: http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/forums/topic/59170-g2xpl-get-it-in-post-1/

All here sounds fantastic. I picked up XP10 just to get XP11 and I'm waiting for the release. Last time I did anything X-Plane was back on version 9.

I have a 256 SSD drive that I'll be using but it looks like it is not going to be enough.

 

 

**Out of the box.. objects that should be visible at a distance, are not, and this is unrealistic.. i bumped up the view distance setting in render options to the max.. is there another tweak to go further?

 

This is an issue of FlyInside related to the FOV setting. Check this topic:

http://forum.flyinside-fsx.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=3440

Also forgot to mention the below freeware essential plugins

 

1- captain/cabin announcement  plugin http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/34723-3jcabin-sounds-sound-enigne-plugin/

2- Runway Awareness and Advisory System   http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/34150-x-raas-runway-awareness-and-advisory-system-plugin/

3- X Saitek panels in case you use these for your setup http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/14646-xsaitekpanels-linwinmac3264/

If you have purchased XP10 less then 30 days ago request a refund. Steam has a 30 money back policy. Then buy it directly from XP. As for the logic? It's simple buy directly from XP!

This is an issue of FlyInside related to the FOV setting. Check this topic:

http://forum.flyinside-fsx.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=3440

Fantastic find and work over there!  I'll try this tonight (setting world view to 0.3).. so its more the world view setting than the fov one technically right?  ie: i've never quite understood the fov setting, which is defaulted i think to 103%.. i thought that was related to how much you see in the goggles.. ie: rift being 110, i've always thought i should set that to 110?

 

Then onto the world view.. i hadnt played with that yet, but as you appear to have discovered, going lower is the key to making objects that would normally be visible in 2D work similar in VR.

If you have purchased XP10 less then 30 days ago request a refund. Steam has a 30 money back policy. Then buy it directly from XP. As for the logic? It's simple buy directly from XP!

Unforuntately i bought it sept 12th for $44 on steam.. when you click the refund it warns that most refunds are only good for 14 days, however, i tried to submit it anyway, now i await (the fail) message i guess.  That really sucks, end up spending something like 110 to get something that i think is 60 if you order xplane 10 right now directly.  Shame they wont honor the steam price in exchange.  I assume if if i just wait till released, it will be about the same price either way.  

There are various photosceneries readily available for X-Plane:

 

most Europe and some other areas at: http://zonephoto.x-plane.fr/Cartes.php

 

Italy at higher resolution at: http://www.x-italy.it/

 

Spain UHD at: http://www.spainuhd.es/p/descarga.html

 

There's also a donationware tool to create photoscenery called g2xpl: http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/forums/topic/59170-g2xpl-get-it-in-post-1/

 

The g2xpl sounds similar to tileproxy assuming it works.. i'm mainly interested in areas in the USA for now i think.  I'll have to give it a try.

Is there a tool like sceneryconfigeditor for xplane that can be used to turn on and off scenery addons or create groups?

 

edit: would this xaddonmanger be the one? (edit: that might have only been mac)

 

 

Fantastic find and work over there!  I'll try this tonight (setting world view to 0.3).. so its more the world view setting than the fov one technically right?  ie: i've never quite understood the fov setting, which is defaulted i think to 103%.. i thought that was related to how much you see in the goggles.. ie: rift being 110, i've always thought i should set that to 110?

 

X-Plane std. FOV is 75 I think. The higher it is set, the smaller the Autogen render radius. So FlyInside std. is 100, but anything below 150 gives me black borders when turning my head. So at 150, pretty much of the render radius is compromised...