[12JUL17] First Ever Triple Product Line Update at PMDG...

[Bnash00 85]

12 minutes ago, markdf said:

It's a well known fact that customers should never question anything they're told (or even worse, ask why!)

You are absolutely allowed to ask why. The answer to why was mentioned in the very first post by Robert: "Some further installation-based stability fixes to make sure we get everyone up and running in a stable fashion."

However complaining about it, whining about it, and or arguing about it, is frowned upon. After all PMDG developed the addon. PMDG is requiring you to uninstall \ re-install. What are you going to do about it? Resist? Then you don't get the update.

[markdf 84]

10 minutes ago, Bnash00 said:

You are absolutely allowed to ask why. The answer to why was mentioned in the very first post by Robert: "Some further installation-based stability fixes to make sure we get everyone up and running in a stable fashion."

However complaining about it, whining about it, and or arguing about it, is frowned upon. After all PMDG developed the addon. PMDG is requiring you to uninstall \ re-install. What are you going to do about it? Resist? Then you don't get the update.

Given that this is the second time in as many weeks that we've been told "You have to do this one full re-install, and then future micro updates will work" it raises legitimate questions about why we have an update manager that well, doesn't seem to be managing updates - making it just clutter on the drive.  As mentioned many people don't have the bandwidth or time to keep repeatedly going through this cycle (or for that matter are confused about it precisely because they were only recently told to do the exact same thing so aren't clear on it)

That quote in no way actually answers why, it's a vague hand-wave that I have trouble believing from a technical standpoint

As I said in my earlier reply, it needs to be remembered that every single person posting here about this is a paying customer, and it isn't up to other users to tell them they're complaining too much or to stop asking a question (no matter how sick of it they are.)  That job lies with (and only with) PMDG's own staff, there's a heck of a lot of self-appointed moderators in this forum.

If I were to push out an update to all of our customers in my day job that required a full manual uninstall and reinstall twice in the same month because our update mechanism "didn't work", I can guarantee that A) We'd have a lot of complaints and B) I'd be getting some very difficult questions from my manager

[Bnash00 85]

The problem here Mark is that you nor I have all the facts... We don't get to know what "installation-based stability fixes" means exactly. What we do know, is that in order to get the installation-based stability fixes, you need to un-install \ re-install. It's as simple as that. Sorry, this inconveniences you.

[markdf 84]

1 minute ago, Bnash00 said:

The problem here Mark is that you nor I have all the facts... We don't get to know what "installation-based stability fixes" means exactly. What we do know, is that in order to get the installation-based stability fixes, you need to un-install \ re-install. It's as simple as that. Sorry, this inconveniences you.

No, we don't have all the facts. 

Facts come from asking questions, but what doesn't help is the self appointed moderators telling people not to keep asking things. Some users on here are far too aggressive in berating other users they consider "below them" for asking things they find annoying  (Not aimed at you, but I'm also not going to name names here either as that would be going too far)

To be frank though, your sentiments towards any inconvenience I may or may not experience (while genuinely appreciated if sincere - and I'm going to assume that they are unless told otherwise, so thanks) are not really relevant to the issue either way as you have nothing to do with PMDG, I just see people telling people to stop asking about it with the implication that all the answers are in the first post - which they are not.

The question as to the suitability for purpose of the Operations Center (or even it's justification for existing at all based on recent performance) is still a perfectly valid one, and as a fellow developer I'm seriously struggling to see what obstacle could possibly be forcing a full reinstall or causing in place upgrades to fail, but I'm not remotely expecting a useful answer from another end user.  I did say earlier that the downloads don't bother me too much personally, but that I do feel that for less fortunate people it may be a lot more problematic.

Please do bear in mind that this is pretty much what my working time is spent doing - and I'm always going to give people in the same industry a harder time in the same way that (for example) a doctor watching a medical program is always going to nitpick over medical mistakes etc.  I'm always going to ask why not only as a customer, but out of professional curiosity as well.  Twice in the same month I'm told that the updater isn't working and a full reinstall is needed - do you seriously think my brain won't be trying to figure out why? It's not personal in any way (And please don't take this debate/argument personally either, because it really isn't - I've actually found you quite pleasant to debate with), but when something like that is in front of me, my brain will spend hours wondering what the cause was.  Heck, I'd sign a non-disclosure agreement just to satisfy my brain! (And then the Missus would kill me, but that's another story)

 

I'm not going to keep going with this if you've had enough of the topic - I'd rather end it amicably than push it on too far, but I did want to put my posts in context a little by sharing the direction I'm coming from (and hope it helps)

 

We may never get a proper answer, I'm well aware of that. It doesn't mean that the question shouldn't be put out there (or that I'll be able to resist it)

[davjg 32]

1 hour ago, Bnash00 said:

May I have your attention, please... May I have your attention, please...

Yes - You have to re-download new installers for the 747, 777, and 737.

Yes - You have to uninstall any and all existing versions of the 747, 777 , and 737 and use the new installers that were released today to get the update.

No - You don't need to deactivate your license via the CDU.

Why - Because PMDG said so...

That is all...

lol

[PMDG777 231]

19 minutes ago, markdf said:

No, we don't have all the facts. 

Facts come from asking questions, but what doesn't help is the self appointed moderators telling people not to keep asking things. Some users on here are far too aggressive in berating other users they consider "below them" for asking things they find annoying  (Not aimed at you, but I'm also not going to name names here either as that would be going too far)

To be frank though, your sentiments towards any inconvenience I may or may not experience (while genuinely appreciated if sincere - and I'm going to assume that they are unless told otherwise, so thanks) are not really relevant to the issue either way as you have nothing to do with PMDG, I just see people telling people to stop asking about it with the implication that all the answers are in the first post - which they are not.

The question as to the suitability for purpose of the Operations Center (or even it's justification for existing at all based on recent performance) is still a perfectly valid one, and as a fellow developer I'm seriously struggling to see what obstacle could possibly be forcing a full reinstall or causing in place upgrades to fail, but I'm not remotely expecting a useful answer from another end user.  I did say earlier that the downloads don't bother me too much personally, but that I do feel that for less fortunate people it may be a lot more problematic.

Please do bear in mind that this is pretty much what my working time is spent doing - and I'm always going to give people in the same industry a harder time in the same way that (for example) a doctor watching a medical program is always going to nitpick over medical mistakes etc.  I'm always going to ask why not only as a customer, but out of professional curiosity as well.  Twice in the same month I'm told that the updater isn't working and a full reinstall is needed - do you seriously think my brain won't be trying to figure out why? It's not personal in any way (And please don't take this debate/argument personally either, because it really isn't - I've actually found you quite pleasant to debate with), but when something like that is in front of me, my brain will spend hours wondering what the cause was.  Heck, I'd sign a non-disclosure agreement just to satisfy my brain! (And then the Missus would kill me, but that's another story)

 

I'm not going to keep going with this if you've had enough of the topic - I'd rather end it amicably than push it on too far, but I did want to put my posts in context a little by sharing the direction I'm coming from (and hope it helps)

 

We may never get a proper answer, I'm well aware of that. It doesn't mean that the question shouldn't be put out there (or that I'll be able to resist it)

Ahhhhh yes the old irony of somebody bagging self appointed moderators. So you're now moderating the self-appointed moderators no?

In all seriousness Mark, did you ever stop to consider these few facts:

a) The Operations centre update mechanism was only released a short time ago so maybe doesn't have the full capability of installing every kind of update as yet? I'm guessing no since you seem to believe that software should be 100% perfectly functional from day 1 (But then again, you're a self proclaimed developer so you should understand that software doesn't always work exactly as it needs to)

b) A short while ago we had no update mechanism in the operations centre, so every update required a complete uninstall reinstall.

As for your analogy with Windows earlier, by that point Windows had been through thousands of iterations and upgrades over decades. The update mechanism in the ops centre has been out not even a year. When was the Windows Update mechanism made available?

Now I know you're going to come back and start going on about how I'm not PMDG so I have no opinion and you demand a response from PMDG (Again the irony in this considering you've spent your last posts ranting about how all customers have an opinion), and that it's not good enough from PMDG etc. But consider this, PMDG is no Microsoft. Have you ever for one tiny second considered the fact of they're a small team and they're trying there best with the resources they have? I know you haven't because you repeatedly bag PMDG at every opportunity with the excuses of "I'm also a developer ... you don't know what you're doing, I do" or "I'm a paying customer you must give me an official response". PMDG could easily turn around and never update the software again like a lot of developers do, then everybody loses.

[markdf 84]

37 minutes ago, PMDG777 said:

Ahhhhh yes the old irony of somebody bagging self appointed moderators. So you're now moderating the self-appointed moderators no?

In all seriousness Mark, did you ever stop to consider these few facts:

a) The Operations centre update mechanism was only released a short time ago so maybe doesn't have the full capability of installing every kind of update as yet? I'm guessing no since you seem to believe that software should be 100% perfectly functional from day 1 (But then again, you're a self proclaimed developer so you should understand that software doesn't always work exactly as it needs to)

b) A short while ago we had no update mechanism in the operations centre, so every update required a complete uninstall reinstall.

As for your analogy with Windows earlier, by that point Windows had been through thousands of iterations and upgrades over decades. The update mechanism in the ops centre has been out not even a year.

Now I know you're going to come back and start going on about how I'm not PMDG so I have no opinion and you demand a response from PMDG (Again the irony in this considering you've spent your last posts ranting about how all customers have an opinion), and that it's not good enough from PMDG etc. But consider this, PMDG is no Microsoft. Have you ever for one tiny second considered the fact of they're a small team and they're trying there best with the resources they have? I know you haven't because you repeatedly bag PMDG at every opportunity with the excuses of "I'm also a developer ... you don't know what you're doing, I do" or "I'm a paying customer you must give me an official response". PMDG could easily turn around and never update the software again like a lot of developers do, then everybody loses.

Far from it, I fully respect your right to have an opinion - I just don't expect you to have definitive answers as to the reasons behind it (Largely because it would be impossible and unreasonable for you to know those things.)  And no, no product is ever 100% functional (and I mean ever) but I am as stated interested to know what issue was so insurmountable that we've been here twice in quick succession, and that I couldn't think of any technical reason why it should be the case based on my own experience.  I did not empirically rule out there being one at any point.

I don't even demand a response, I even said that I fully expect that we may never actually get one. I never said paying customers were entitled to do anything other than ask and have a voice either - but please, continue replying to the version of the post you'd prefer me to have written.

In fact all I've argued is that there's nothing wrong with people asking these questions and that it's not up to other users to tell them not to. I haven't dictated what anyone at PMDG should do in response. 

 

EDIT:

Chris and I have been talking privately just now, and I think it's safe to say that we've both cleared up any disagreement (and I've apologised for being as abrasive as this post initially was), so I'm off to bed and not going to be re-opening the debate over this with anyone else in morning :)

[mtrainer 136]

Thanks.  Now back to topic - I just installed the 737 NGX for V4 - and although I've only got a 30 minute test flight in, the framerates seem quite improved - to me, this is the single biggest noticeable difference in the original V3 vs. V4 version.  Anyone else seeing a very healthy improvement in frames (in all fairness, I haven't yet started cranking up the sliders, still running at the Prepar3D default recommendations).   I'm getting 40 FPS at FlyTampa Chicago Midway which makes for some smooth landings.

So far very impressed!  I'll pull down the 747 this weekend.   Good job PMDG!

Mark Trainer

 

[markdf 84]

Just now, mtrainer said:

Thanks.  Now back to topic - I just installed the 737 NGX for V4 - and although I've only got a 30 minute test flight in, the framerates seem quite improved - to me, this is the single biggest noticeable difference in the original V3 vs. V4 version.  Anyone else seeing a very healthy improvement in frames (in all fairness, I haven't yet started cranking up the sliders, still running at the Prepar3D default recommendations).   I'm getting 40 FPS at FlyTampa Chicago Midway which makes for some smooth landings.

So far very impressed!  I'll pull down the 747 this weekend.   Good job PMDG!

Mark Trainer

 

I should be in bed, but just saw this.

I didn't benchmark before I reinstalled, but my performance on v4 seems better than I can ever remember getting under older versions, and I'm running my settings pretty high (Settings screenshots on Dropbox) At times sat on the tarmac at Eglin in the VC it was holding 50-60fps easily, and the same or greater in the air.  When I first started playing FSX I never  dreamt I'd ever achieve this kind of performance on such high fidelity addons - I think this marks a real turning point for our hobby!

[edpatino 1,964]

I'm sick of uninstalling and installing back those things, under the expectation that it will be micro-updates in the future. I'd rather wait to see if this time is gonna be the last one, or if it will continue...

Ed

[Raven9000 272]

2 hours ago, markdf said:

I spend all day working on development and software maintenance, as in it's my full time paid job.  So yes, I do have a background in this, but I'm not saying I know more than the developers - just you, who is arguing with me I'm wrong but about all you've actually backed up your assertions with amounts to "Because that's what I've been told" rather than any kind of meaningful rebuttal.

You already had your meaningful rebuttal straight from the devs, who know a bit more than you how their own product works and what it does.  If you think you know more, do what you want and enjoy your sim...

[PMDG777 231]

16 minutes ago, edpatino said:

I'm sick of uninstalling and installing back those things, under the expectation that it will be micro-updates in the future. I'd rather wait to see if this time is gonna be the last one, or if it will continue...

Ed

The updates are fairly minor and the reason for the uninstall reinstall was down to installation changes which the ops centre obviously can't handle. I think you'd be safe without the update for now.

15 minutes ago, Raven9000 said:

You already had your meaningful rebuttal straight from the devs, who know a bit more than you how their own product works and what it does.  If you think you know more, do what you want and enjoy your sim...

Alright guys easy does it let's leave this one here before Kyle has to step in.

[davecessna 9]

They seem to foster this "self-appointed mod" attitude on this forum so I doubt you'll be seeing any real moderation. Thank goodness this isn't their primary method of customer support.  

 

I have the 737 in v4, though. Happier than a pig in mud. Incredible how far this sim has come in the past 2 years. 

[PMDG777 231]

2 minutes ago, davecessna said:

They seem to foster this "self-appointed mod" attitude on this forum so I doubt you'll be seeing any real moderation. Thank goodness this isn't their primary method of customer support.  

Yes well unfortunately they (PMDG) don't have the time or the resources to actively moderate the forums, I'm sure everyone here (myself included) would rather they focused on development and testing rather than sorting out petty arguments.

[Raven9000 272]

30 minutes ago, PMDG777 said:

Alright guys easy does it let's leave this one here before Kyle has to step in.

I thought that's what I did..? (Done arguing with "geniuses" :P )