Hi Guys,

I seem to have a unique problem with Fsdreamteam airports. Disappearing buildings is not unusual but this problem seems to be. Umberto worked with me for several days and we could not solve it, so I thought I'd throw it out for consideration. I have 15 FSDT airports which I have used for years with only minor problems. Then last week I started experiencing the disappearing buildings phenomenon. To make a (very) long story short here is the situation. Let's say I do a clean install of an FSDT airport. I fireup FSX and go to that airport and everything is normal, buildings, etc. If I logoff of FSX and wait a minute or an hour it doesn't matter, and then login to FSX again and go to that airport I have no buildings; I don't even have runways only a photo image. The only way I can get the airport back is to uninstall everything, all FSDT airports, couatl, addon manager, etc. Then if I do a new reinstall and go to that airport everything is normal again. But I only have one shot at it. If I sign out of FSX again and come back in, everything is gone. So I'm at the point that if I want to use a FSDT airport (it's the same with all of them)  I have to uninstall everything and reinstall the airport. It doesn't matter if I boot the PC, the only thing that works is uninstall/reinstall.( If you're curious you can see my thread with Umberto at the FSDT forum.  Its under KIAH support (at first I thought it was loading a PMDG aircraft that caused it. Wrong!)

 

Hi

have you activated the airports? If they are not activated the buildings will disappear.

Yes, they are activated.

halwatk

 

1 hour ago, Halwatk said:

Yes, they are activated.

halwatk

 

Just read the thread you posted on the FSDT forum. That’s a weird problem indeed. It almost sounds as Umberto thinks your using P3D when he talks about installing the scenery outside the sim, because in the FSX version the sceneries install inside the FSX/Fsdreamteam folder. 

When you download and install the sceneries your antivirus program is turned off correct? Your also installing the correct version right, FSX and not P3D?

I would ask Umberto to schedule a TeamViewer session with you so that he can see what’s going on with your computer.

Thank you for taking the time to read the thread. I'm going to make sure I've got FSX. I think Umberto indicated somewhere in the thread that the newer FSX installers install outside the sim. The airports I'm downloading automatically go to C:\Program Files (x86) unless changed. This all "seems" to have begun after I used the new "live update".

 

Hal

UPDATE: OK, what is actually happening is that after the initial loading after a reinstall the couatl.exe file becomes "dead" and does not work. For example after a reinstall of say, CYVR when I first open FSX and go to CYVR it loads the scenery normally. During the first session I can also click on "restart couatl and rebuld airport cache" and it works. Couatl will rebuild the airport as many times as I click on it.  Once I exit FSX however, and come back to the airport a second time couatl is dead and will not work.

 

Hal

16 minutes ago, Halwatk said:

UPDATE: OK, what is actually happening is that after the initial loading after a reinstall the couatl.exe file becomes "dead" and does not work. For example after a reinstall of say, CYVR when I first open FSX and go to CYVR it loads the scenery normally. During the first session I can also click on "restart couatl and rebuld airport cache" and it works. Couatl will rebuild the airport as many times as I click on it.  Once I exit FSX however, and come back to the airport a second time couatl is dead and will not work.

 

Hal

After you shut down FSX, open the process manager and make sure that FSX, Couatl and other FSX programs and resources have shut down completely before relaunching FSX. Sometimes it can take some time for all of them to shut down and if you don’t open the process manager to check before restarting FSX, weird things like this can happen.

 

Thank you I have been doing that. Even if I cold boot the PC, a second or subsequent  login to FSX results in no buildings, runways, etc. Do you how the couatl engine works? How does it "call" the various scenery components? It seems like if it were a permissions issue it would never install the buildings, yet it is able to do so on the first FSX signon after a reinstall. I even unchecked the box "empty scenery cache on exit" to no avail.

 

Hal

23 minutes ago, Halwatk said:

Thank you I have been doing that. Even if I cold boot the PC, a second or subsequent  login to FSX results in no buildings, runways, etc. Do you how the couatl engine works? How does it "call" the various scenery components? It seems like if it were a permissions issue it would never install the buildings, yet it is able to do so on the first FSX signon after a reinstall. I even unchecked the box "empty scenery cache on exit" to no avail.

 

Hal

The Couatl engine controls the building placements, etc, that’s why that module is needed to be running for the buildings to be seen. 

Are you running any security/virus software and if so, have you excluded it from the FSX folder?

Yes I have excluded the FSX folder from virus checking. I keep thinking there must be something obvious I'm missing. Of course a workaround would be to simply reinstall an FSDT airport when I want to use it. Then uninstall it afterwards. A little cumbersome, I have 15 of them.

Hal

P.S. I really appreciate your taking the time to consider this.

Hi,

Make sure that "C:\Program Files (x86)\Addon Manager" is also excluded from scanning - with the release of the last few airports FSDT moved all their airports and software out of FSX.

DJ

It is. I've also tried installing it within FSX. Same result.

 

Hal