Upgrading to P3D 4.2 Help

[B777ER]

So with the upcoming version 4.2 I have a question as I have not done this before. I have a bunch of scenery installed via the addon.xml method. Researching I found this:

- Instead, sceneries added with their own add-on.xml, won't be affected by the complete reinstall of the sim because, when you restart the sim for the first time, it will ASK if you want to reactivate all the sceneries installed that way, provided the add-on.xml has been placed in the suggested location, which is under Documents/Prepar3d V4 addons.

A couple questions:

I have two add-on.cfg's, one in C:\Users\Eric\AppData\Roaming\Lockheed Martin\Prepar3D v4 and another in C:\ProgramData\Lockheed Martin\Prepar3D v4. BOTH have scenery in them. The one in Appdata\... has Fly Tampa, LatinVFR and DD's stuff from New York, Seattle and Washington DC, Flightbeam and the UK2000 scenery. The other has all the FSDT scenery, Imaginesim and Aerosoft scenery along with SODE. The above only talks about one in the documents folder. Trouble is, even with FlyTampa updating two sceneries to P3D4 installers with the xml method, they are not listed in their, (LOWW/CYYZ).

To be honest, I am confused on why the scenery is spread out over two different add-on cfg's, never mind the regular scenery.cfg. So how do I do a full reinstall (in lieu of just the client) and not lose all this? I assume the Prepar3D v4 Add-ons folder in documents does not get deleted when you uninstall version 4.1? Do I back up both of these cfg's and then copy/paste them into the new 4.2 folders? Flightbeam and Drzewiecki Design actually has all their scenery install into the main P3D folder still, so I guess I need to copy/paste that back out and then back in? All the aerosoft scenery will need be installed again anyways. I have a feeling I am really going to screw something up going from 4.1 to 4.2 and wind up starting from scratch.

[Lorby_SI]

4 hours ago, B777ER said:

I am confused on why the scenery is spread out over two different add-on cfg's, never mind the regular scenery.cfg.

The add-ons.cfg in "\Roaming\" is dynamic, the simulator rewrites it every time you start P3D. It contains the content that P3D has discovered in "\Documents\Prepar3d V4 Add-Ons\" automatically.

The add-ons.cfg in "\ProgramData\" is static, it is used when addons are installed using the P3D command line tools.

You don't have to concern yourself with the first one, it will always be recreated automatically. But you are right about the second one, if you delete it, the content is not referenced any more - just like with the scenery.cfg and all the other cfg files. Just for clarification: the add-on.xmls are not only about scenery, they can reference any type of content (aircraft, effects, shaders, textures - everything). It is advisable not to think of them only in relation to the scenery.cfg, you might miss something.

If we are lucky, then the 4.2 update will be just the client. That was often the case with these point releases in the past. Then you only have to uninstall and reinstall that part of P3D and your config files and content remain untouched. But if it is a full reinstall of the whole simulator, then you will have to reinstall all addons too that did not use the dynamic add-on.xml method.

Best regards