FSX-MS P3D vs FSX

[Paul12 2]

I often hear that P3D is supposed to be better then  FSX but nobody explains why .

Are the sceneries better ?

What else ?

 

I am anxious to hear your opinions

Paul12

[airernie 263]

Please not another P3D vs FSX post.  There are more than enough posts already if you do some searching.

Also, questions like this are best asked and answered in the P3D forum.

[Chock 17,769]

There are plenty of posts about the differences, but the gist of the difference is as follows:

P3D V4.1 is 64 Bit (as are XPlane 11 and Flight Sim World), so it means that there is far less likelihood of a Virtual Address Space crash to desktop owing to 64 Bit applications being able to allocate more than 4Gb of Virtual Address Space, which is a hard limit for applications such as FSX and FSX-SE since they are both 32 Bit applications. Like FSX-SE, which was somewhat improved in terms of optimisation for newer hardware over the original FSX, P3D is similarly optimised for modern hardware to some extent, and this is an ongoing developmental process, which is why you will not only see more options for graphics settings in P3D, but also see better performance on modern machines.

Visually, there is little difference between a stock copy of FSX and a stock copy of P3D if you simply crank it up and stay with the default settings although you'd need to add Steve's DX-10 Fixer and Cloud Shadows add-ons to FSX to get all of the same visuals which P3D offers, since P3D has cloud shadows by default and some other more complex lighting capabilities too. On the flip side of that coin however, FSX and FSX-SE do have a downloadable weather capability built in, whereas if you want that capability in P3D, you need to add something like Active Sky in order to enable that.

Having said that, P3D does feature a large number of additions beyond the mere default appearance if you select them, for example, it has avatars (i.e. characters who can walk about), it simulates night vision, has VR capability, simulates underwater terrain ocean floor profiles (not worldwide, and only for littoral waters around the US, but this is more than FSX does). Being that it is used as a military simulator, P3D also has a number of combat-related capabilities, but much of this is not very overt unless one was using it specifically as a military training simulator.

P3D has quite a lot of nice default aeroplanes which were originally payware models, including a number of GA props, helicopter, airliners and jet fighters, so the standard of default aeroplanes in P3D is noticeably higher. It also features some water-borne craft including a submarine which can take advantage of the realistic underwater ocean floor profile and the more realistic water behaviour which includes tidal flows, realistic wave heights and such.

That's about it for visual and feature differences, i.e. with a DX-10 fixed version of FSX-SE, you'd probably have a hard time telling that was not P3D at least visually for the most part, but you would almost certainly be able to tell the difference in terms of performance and stability, with P3D being superior in this respect owing to optimisations and its 64 Bit base architecture.

Another difference worthy of note however, is that P3D is not marketed as a game, which FSX and FSX-SE are. This means the licensing for the users, and for the developers are different and this can mean that some add-ons for P3D will be more expensive and there is quite a noticeable difference in the user base of the different simulations because of this too.

[ckyliu 1,749]

Pretty much what Chock said. Basically P3Dv4 is a 64 bit version of FSX that can take better advantage of the latest hardware (so you don't get OOM, the lighting is better with shadows in the cockpit and cloud shadows across the land, the autogen is denser and it runs smoother) however without scenery addons it just looks like a better lit FSX. The included aircraft types have changed substantially, there's no airliners for instance.

P3D is marketed as a professional use product and many higher profile aircraft developers charge a lot more for the same product compared to FSX.

@Chock In terms of weather, I believe FSX's real world weather capability has long since died (SE might be different) but you can use the freeware FSXWX with P3Dv4 and it works nicely.

[W2DR 1,860]

I agree with Chock. But, also remember.....

Ford is better than Chevrolet

Ferrari is better that Lamborghini

and

Sophia is better-looking than Gina

[vortex681 806]

On 03/01/2018 at 3:29 PM, ckyliu said:

the lighting is better with shadows in the cockpit and cloud shadows across the land

But, as Chock pointed out, not if you're running FSX with Steve's DX10 Scenery fixer (which gives cockpit shadows) and his cloud shadow add-on!

[HighBypass 2,339]

19 hours ago, W2DR said:

....Ford is better than Chevrolet NO!

Ferrari is better that Lamborghini NO! Well, maybe Ferrari is better than those 10 cylinder Lambo's (V12 FTW, or maybe a classic Jalpa V8..)

and

Sophia is better-looking than Gina... err..

2 out of 3 ain't bad as the song goes..  

 

[Fielder 3,663]

Claudia hopes you Sophia and Gina lovers come back some day...
 

 

[EmpireKicking 8]

P3D IS allot new and supported with updates as FSX isn't.

However that being said that, with some work and able to afford the plugins you can make your FSX game into something that looks amazing still

[imaflightsimmer 1]

FSX and P3D have their pros and cons, I use FSX due to it being cheaper but I admit P3D is a better flight sim but both have advantages and disadvantages, some of the main advantages for P3D is stability and it being 64 bit, but for FSX you can use FS9 aircraft if they are ported which as far as I know you can't for P3D, also FSX has been out for longer so there's a larger quantity of addons, freeware and payware. If you're on a budget FSX is the clear winner because the sim is cheaper, and the addons are cheaper, but if you are willing to spend more money then get P3D.

[PhotoReal Earth 93]

This is your very first posting in this forum and you just want to pick up a 2 years old thread?
Are you sure that this is a good idea?
Sorry for asking 😉

 

Edited May 18, 2020 by PhotoReal Earth

[charliearon 3,023]

There, will be NO more discussion of FSX vs P3D here or in the P3D forum!