Prepar3d as secondary sim?

[Upkeep 8]

I have been thinking for a while of getting Prepar3d as well a Xplane. I have been an Xplane user since version 9 and also have 10 and 11 which I use all the time. I have a modest amount of payware aircraft and I have no problems with XPlane at all. I particularly like all the community material including airports and utilities, many of which are free. I like the regular updates, the forums, and everything else. In short, I enjoy XP. 

However, I would also like to try something different as well, just for variety., but I have a limited budget and would really want to keep any available expenditure to Xplane, and continue with this as my primary sim. 

Is it worth my getting Prep3d as well, bearing in mind that I would probably limit payware to one PMDG or so.  I have a feeling that I would not be very satisfied with just a vanilla version. Does anyone run Prep3d as a secondary sim, and has that made any sense?

I know a lot of posters use both. I would just appreciate some advice on the matter. As far as I can see there is very little freeware around for Prep3d, so if to make it usable I have to spend a lot it is probably a non starter and I would just keep to XP. 

So, would be interested for some views. 

Thanks so much

Upkeep

[strider1 575]

1 hour ago, Upkeep said:

I have been thinking for a while of getting Prepar3d as well a Xplane. I have been an Xplane user since version 9 and also have 10 and 11 which I use all the time. I have a modest amount of payware aircraft and I have no problems with XPlane at all. I particularly like all the community material including airports and utilities, many of which are free. I like the regular updates, the forums, and everything else. In short, I enjoy XP. 

However, I would also like to try something different as well, just for variety., but I have a limited budget and would really want to keep any available expenditure to Xplane, and continue with this as my primary sim. 

Is it worth my getting Prep3d as well, bearing in mind that I would probably limit payware to one PMDG or so.  I have a feeling that I would not be very satisfied with just a vanilla version. Does anyone run Prep3d as a secondary sim, and has that made any sense?

I know a lot of posters use both. I would just appreciate some advice on the matter. As far as I can see there is very little freeware around for Prep3d, so if to make it usable I have to spend a lot it is probably a non starter and I would just keep to XP. 

So, would be interested for some views. 

Thanks so much

Upkeep

You are not going to like Vanilla P3D. You need to pay to play, kind like apps on the apple eco-system. But you knew that already..... P3d does offer a 90 day return policy, but you will be SOL if you purchase PMDG and decide you don't like Vanilla P3D....

[jcomm 5,890]

If you're fine with GA, and whatever comes in the future from DTG, get FSW instead.... it's a lot cheaper, and offers some alternative features to the present state of X-Plane... or.... get Aerofly FS2, and enjoy the recently offered Q-400, and the updated A320, B737...

This all assuming you're all for civil aviation, because otherwise I would point you DCS and / or IL2 Battle of Stainlgrad/Moscow/Kuban

[FlyBaby 659]

2 hours ago, strider1 said:

You are not going to like Vanilla P3D. You need to pay to play, kind like apps on the apple eco-system. But you knew that already..... P3d does offer a 90 day return policy, but you will be SOL if you purchase PMDG and decide you don't like Vanilla P3D....

I agree here. For me P3D needs a lot of addons to make it worth playing. With that said, once Orbx (Global, Vector, OpenLC Na, & HD trees) and 3rd party clouds  / weather are installed, P3D shines well and stacks well against the competition. FSW comes pretty feature rich right out of the box for GA flying.

 

 

[tonywob 4,768]

I recently picked up P3D v4. What really frustrated me immediately is that everything is payware, and the base  sim needs lots of addons for it to be decent. At a minimum, I needed a camera system for doing views, a basic weather engine, ORBX global and some aircraft. All of this costs a lot of money and coming from X-Plane  where people release tools and addons for free, this frustrated me. Not only does the sim cost $200, but you are then required to pay out even more money for things that other sims have built-in (Which is just wrong in a sim that costs so much money). Oh, and when P3D v5 comes out with minor features, you'll have to pay that $200 again.

Also, be prepared (see what I did there ;-) to pay more for identical products as well. Developers have made a habit of charging "pro" prices for their addons, e.g. An A2A aircraft can set you back $79 and PMDG products over $100. No working GPS, so yes you have to buy a 'pro' license cost as well. Looking for a tweaking tool or OSM scenery, yes even that is payware

P3D certainly isn't an impulse buy. You need to invest a lot in the platform to get any enjoyment out of it. Luckily my ORBX products still worked from my FSX days, but everything else I owned needed to be rebought for nearly double the price. The only thing that I enjoy on that platform is the A2A planes which are unbeaten on X-Plane, everything else I don't care for.

FSW on the other hand, that works out of the box, has great weather depiction, a friendly UI, great built-in airplanes, and it only cost me $25. Once addons start appearing for this platform, I can't see how P3D can compete anymore.

 

 

[MarioDonick 752]

P3D and its addon ecosystem certainly offer a great simulation environment. I had installed v2 and v3 for a long time parallel to X-Plane, along with a LOT of OrbX stuff, the A2A Comanche, the PMDG 737. Weather came from FSGRW (the same tool I use for X-Plane), and I had the Flight1 GTN750.

Theoretically, I wouldn't have needed anything else for my flying purposes (which was: Relaxing from X-Plane-related development & support), but the VAS-related OOM crashes always stressed me. Even when I did not have any OOMs I was still afraid of getting these and constantly monitoring VAS. However, this problem is gone now with P3D v4, so I'll definitely take another look at P3D soon (although currently I prefer to invest my money in my real-world flying lessons).

[Upkeep 8]

Thank you all so much for taking the trouble to reply. All your comments are most helpful and interesting. I am glad I posted my question.

It is interesting that you could take a vanilla version of XP, add just freeware and one or two donation ware and get a pretty fine sim without having to pay a penny more.

I think the conclusion so far is that Prepar3d is not an impulse buy (which I think would be the case for me for a secondary sim) and that if purchased I would end up having to add a lot of payware, which I really don't want to do. This is especially the case as I like tubeliners, though I do try out GA occasionally, and would possibly be content with a GA only secondary sim. 

I think I would rather channel what budget I have into XP. The comments about FSW and Aerofly instead are interesting and I may decide to follow that route. I have DCS, which I do find fun, though the learning curve is a little steep for me in some respects, ie I get shot down pretty quickly so it is a short sim experience!

Anyway, thanks again for all the very useful comments

I appreciate your taking the time.

Best wishes

Upkeep

[Humpty 751]

IMO no sim is looks good without addons , but P3d makes ones pocket empty.

 

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

I totally agree with everybody else.  P3D (anything) as vanilla...well..sucks.

Get ready to shell out $$$ to bring it to your satisfaction.  I have hundred's of GB's of 'stuff' jammed into my P3D v3.4....so be warned.....

...and it still will not come close to the night life feel, that XP brings tens seconds on your system, right outta the gate...

Yep....

[CarlosF 1,234]

P3D is a money pit if you ask me!

[Upkeep 8]

Thanks very much for the additional comments. Looks like P3D is going to be a too expensive route to take....

Thanks again.

All the best

Upkeep

[strider1 575]

16 hours ago, jcomm said:

If you're fine with GA, and whatever comes in the future from DTG, get FSW instead.... it's a lot cheaper, and offers some alternative features to the present state of X-Plane... or.... get Aerofly FS2, and enjoy the recently offered Q-400, and the updated A320, B737...

This all assuming you're all for civil aviation, because otherwise I would point you DCS and / or IL2 Battle of Stainlgrad/Moscow/Kuban

I was going to suggest FSW but I don't think PMDG has a add-on for that sim. Aerofly is a low resolution orthosim. Now that we have orth4xp and the ability to create high quality orthos, why even waste your money with Aerofly? And the aerodynamics 172 are unrealistic last time I checked.

[deetee 164]

I hear Aerofly mentioned a lot; just out of curiosity what is the attraction of only having a couple of relatively small areas to fly in, when the others have the whole world? Reminds me of MS Flight! 😉

[mmerelles 78]

P3D & limited budget = NO GO!

 

I just purchased a powerfull pc for xplane11. Decided to give P3D a try, why not? Purchased P3Dv4 + ORBX Global + PMDG738 (USD 250 in total). Looked absolutely horrible, quite an archaic simulator, felt like i was on my fs2004 days while i was fs user 15 years ago.

 

But if you look at some youtube videos you can make it look much better spending big chunk of money on many addons.

[Upkeep 8]

Thank you all again. Very interesting additional remarks, especially mmerelles comments on his set up and PMDG etc,  and I think that this and all the other postings in this thread confirm the best action for me:

1. Drop the idea of P3D completely

2. Concentrate any available budget on one sim: XP

In fact, you can have a lot of fun on XP with actually having to spend anything at all. That is a great strength of the sim.

All the best

Upkeep