Is it worth buy FSLabs a320

[SierraHotel 976]

2 hours ago, sddjd said:

One thing missing from contributors who own the FSL product is their feedback on frame rates. There's no doubt FSL is the more accurate in terms of just about everything, but it would be helpful in a decision to know if that comes at the cost of sim performance for the OP.

I uninstalled shortly after i bought it for P3D, it was immediately uninstalled due to horrible FPS, I kept abreast of the updates and have now reinstalled in P3D v4.3, it's at least as good as the AS A320 Pro for FPS, which I also have. I  was very pleasantly surprised.

[Lawy 28]

6 hours ago, Chock said:

If you want to do 'normal operations' the Aerosoft Pro version is absolutely fine. If however you want to really study the A320 to the kind of level an airliner pilot on the real thing might want to do, then the FSL A320 is a better choice, because real airliner pilots have to know what to do if something goes wrong, and the FSL A320 can be useful as a study aid for that sort of thing.

To learn aeroplanes to that level of understanding, airliner pilots have mountains of books they have to read and absorb, detailed training courses and then have regular 'check rides', where the training pilot takes them in a fully realistic simulator and throws surprise problems at them to check that they've studied all of the aeroplane and all of the standard operating procedures as well as all the emergency procedures, and more importantly, can implement the correct emergency procedures safely when surprised by unusual (and indeed fairly unlikely) problems.

The most well known example of this is probably the actions of First Officer Jeffrey Skiles, who unfortunately did not really receive the kind of adulation that Captain Chesley Sullenberger received when they both landed US Airways Flight 1549 on the Hudson River after a bird strike caused a dual engine flame out. The public don't really understand that both pilots are operating the aeroplane and so of course the P1 pilot is the hero when a successful emergency is handled well. But whilst Chesley was flying the thing, Jeffrey was working the problem too, and it was the actions of both of them which made it a success, and all that was down to knowing what to do in an emergency owing to practice. The FSL A320 is something which could help pilots get to that level of practice and drill. Actually, on Flight 1549 they both forgot one thing, neither of them pressed the ditching button on the overhead, which seals the vents and helps to keep the thing afloat longer if it comes down on water, but it's easy to be wise after the event in saying that!

So, if you were an airliner pilot, you would find that a very realistic simulation of the real aeroplane which you could use at home on your PC would be pretty useful as a an additional aid to your study. Now of course FSL make no claim that their A320 is officially cleared to be used for this purpose, but since it is incredibly realistic in terms of how all the systems interact with one another and so can simulate some of the unexpected things which might happen when one system failure causes a domino effect on another, that is often what people use it for.

For example, if you have the de-icing on for the engine inlets on a real A320, you'll find that has some effect on the electrical loads on the aeroplane's systems and will also mean thrust is reduced slightly, so you have to think carefully about whether you really want to use inlet deicing on the real thing on a climb. These effects are small, and you might not even notice a small voltage drop or a small reduction in thrust on a less accurately simulated aeroplane, 'cause they might not bother to simulate it, but that sort of thing does occur on the FSL A320 because they've gone the extra mile in simulating all that kind of stuff which only really has a bearing on things in the real world, and often only in unusual circumstances.

Modern airliners are incredibly reliable and the 'non normal' stuff is incredibly rare in day to day airliner operations, its just that pilots have to be prepared for that one in a million chance of them occurring. That's what the FSL A320 is useful for. If you just want to simulate day to day stuff, where nothing goes wrong, the Aerosoft A320 Pro is fine for that and to buy the FSL one and not then use its enhanced capabilities would mean you were paying for something you would not use.

Of course it is nice to have an add-on airliner which is exactly like the real thing, 'just because it is', but that's something you can decide for yourself in regards to whether you think it's worth paying for that 'cool factor'.

I have both of them, and they're both great, so it's up to you really.

I am entirely with you on this, but it really depends on what you want from a simulation.  If you want to replicate 99.9% of flights where there are no issues then the Aerosoft  plane is fine, but if you want to replicate 100% of flights, where something unexpected may happen, then go for the FSL one.   

 

Edited October 12, 2018 by Lawy

[Simicro 247]

I will get the Aerosoft but maybe later because "Not all features were completely ready at release" ( Details here )

[Midnight Music 252]

Do you necessarily have to fly the FSlabs with failures? Can you set the on or off of that in the settings? In other words, are there presets available so you can try different things?

Lee

[Nyxx 6,993]

2 hours ago, Lawy said:

I am entirely with you on this, but it really depends on what you want from a simulation.  If you want to replicate 99.9% of flights where there are no issues then the Aerosoft  plane is fine, but if you want to replicate 100% of flights, where something unexpected may happen, then go for the FSL one.   

How the aerosoft replicates 99.9% As you put it is nothing like the 99.9% of how the FSL simulates it. Unless you want to turn a blind eye to a huge amount of emersion that happens on 100% of every flight you take in the FSL. Just like everyone is pointing out it has nothing to do with failures.

It has everything to do with the 7-8 years it’s taken them to bring to us the 319 we have today.

Here is a fraction of what you get in every flight, 

Bugs on the windshield like in your car, they don’t go away and build up until you get maintenance to clean them

There own custom rain that’s in a different league to realglass and even PMDG new rain. The Speed and the way it changers directions with the Speed of the aircraft. Break hard and water fails over the windshield from the roof.

The sounds from everything have to be heard to believed. Go into a wing view from within the cabin and hear normal cabin conversations and the noise from the engines is different. 

On a hot day open the cockpit windows and suddenly all the out side noises hit you even the amount of the window opening makes a different. If you want to blow your ears  start the engines with them open. It’s no wonder it’s not allowed in real life.

I could right a book on it, but for anyone to just gloss over this and tons more things it’s really a joke.

Dont want to pay the asking price, fine but in this case you get just what you pay for. The very best.

 

[Nyxx 6,993]

26 minutes ago, Midnight Music said:

Do you necessarily have to fly the FSlabs with failures? Can you set the on or off of that in the settings? In other words, are there presets available so you can try different things?

Lee

If you mess up you will can pay the price, but bird strike etc you have to set up.

But to give you an idea of what can happen, once I did a flight from EGLL to Belfast, now I thought I had like the countless 100’s of flights I’ve done in the FSL. I forget to (think I presses twice) lift the landing gear down

So what happened?

Because out of EGLL your normally held at 6000ft until cleared, as I was cleared to 12000, off I went but noticed my Speed was slow after cleaning 10,000. I could not work it out until the stupid mistake hit me.

What happens, well in this case my fuel burn was so bad I had no choice to divert to Manchester as I was getting warnings I did not have the fuel to get to Belfast in with my normal 30 mins extra fuel on top of a diverted airport, because the landing gear had been out so long it was xxxxed and would not retract. 

Also the bus would not climb with the drag. It was like  swimming in oil.

So yes there are built in consequences but mainly failures are something you programme to happen. 

Edited October 12, 2018 by Nyxx

[Pilot53 544]

FS Labs is in a league of its own, no other developer for xplane or p3d can match their level of simulation in my opinion.  They simulate things that most simmers do not even know exist.  Here is a short list of a few things that stick out to me compared to the other top end addons:

1. The Sounds - The engine sounds will change based on the density of the air as you climb, they dont just get quieter they actually change in pitch and harmonics like they should.  This is something I have wanted for years and There is not one other addon out there that simulates this.  Apart from the engines the rest of the sounds are amazing as well.

2. The flight dynamics - Again something I have been wishing for for years, correct simulation of jet engine behavior and parameters.  Bring the throttles up to 50% and watch them crawl up to around 35%-40% n1 and then jump to 50.  Every other addon has this backwards, they simulate the correct spool time but the engines respond fast then slow down upon reaching commanded n1, they should do the opposite which they do with the fs labs bus.  Try bringing the engines to idle at high altitude, the engines will take much longer to respond potentially causing an underspeed situation.  The only other addon that I know of that simulates this correctly is the IXEG 737 for xplane.  In addition they are working on fine tuning their flight model to improve simulation of edge of the envelope stuff like coffin corner etc.  Nobody else simulates this except maybe the majestic dash 8 but I have not flown it.

3. Icing - The accurate icing simulation is amazing and really adds another layer of realism that quite frankly I am surprised we don't see built in with p3d by now, I mean it IS a flight simulator.

4. Systems - The systems and MCDU are what you would expect if you are used to flying pmdg addons, simply superb.

 

Personally I dont really even care for flying airbus aircraft that much, I much prefer flying non fly by wire aircraft, but fslabs have done such an incredible job with their a320/a319 I simply dont fly anything else anymore, nothing else measures up with the above points.

[pete_auau 1,157]

8 hours ago, Mitch24 said:

No, ridiculous price, don't feed into the ever-rising pricing for addons

Stick with Aerosoft, and then spend the rest of your saved $100 and go have a fun night out. 

just  do  go out  for  a  couple of  nights  and  save  your money  

[speedyTC 195]

11 hours ago, itay5344 said:

I have another question: Can I get the non normal checklist for failures in the FSL version ?

Go to this site and under the Miscellaneous window on the right look for Abnormal Procedures. It will download a pdf for you.

[John_Tavendale 453]

Even if you just want to fly from A to B the FSL is streets ahead of Aerosoft.

Better flight model. Better sounds. It might not be as pretty, but it's not something you can beat.

[Barnes 192]

4 minutes ago, John_Tavendale said:

It might not be as pretty, but it's not something you can beat.

John - It’s actually quite pretty once you slap TomatoShade and one of your paints on it...

[itay5344 6]

I heard that the performance of the FSL is bad.

I use: I7-6700 3.40GHZ, GTX 1070, 16GB RAM, Windows 10 64bit, P3D v4.3.

Will the FSL work fine with high FPS in this PC ?

[ZKOKQ 984]

39 minutes ago, itay5344 said:

I heard that the performance of the FSL is bad.

I use: I7-6700 3.40GHZ, GTX 1070, 16GB RAM, Windows 10 64bit, P3D v4.3.

Will the FSL work fine with high FPS in this PC ?

Don't believe everything you hear 🙂 I run a PC that is 7 years old, Sandy Bridge 2600K and a GTX970 16Gb Ram. (Soon to upgrade to a mega monster) and my old system runs it very well. Like anything, be modest with your settings and all will be fine. I get the same smoothness as the PMDG 747

[Nyxx 6,993]

2 hours ago, itay5344 said:

I heard that the performance of the FSL is bad.

I use: I7-6700 3.40GHZ, GTX 1070, 16GB RAM, Windows 10 64bit, P3D v4.3.

Will the FSL work fine with high FPS in this PC ?

It was but not now, they have even pulled something out the hat and made DL have very little fps hit now. It runs at the same fps as the PMDG 747-4.

my CPU is faster than yours but the same card and ram.

Edited October 13, 2018 by Nyxx

[krazyk 157]

The Aerosoft bird is fantastic if you want a beginner's Airbus that does most of the face value items quite well. Things like the texture & model work, variants, shared cockpit (still a WIP, I understand), FMS, etc. These are things the average simmer would interact and enjoy without questioning the underlying functionality or basis of the simulation because it gets them from point A to point B but it won't do anything else for you - sounds, systems, immersion, etc. 

The FSL bird is fantastic if you want an advanced simulation of nearly all Airbus systems as well as aerodynamics logic. Here you will find the true showcase of 'cause and effect'. From the jaw-dropping systems to the aural simulation of what the real world counterpart sounds like, this is where it all comes together and I don't think anyone that has tried both products would deny that. 

The price points reflect the above. For Aerosoft, you pay X amount for recycled code which was improved upon while also adding newer features like the inclusion of TFDi Reallight & TrueGlass, and several Airbus variants but you only get the features that will allow a fairly inexperienced simmer to be content.  

For FSL, you get an add-on that will show you its worth from the minute you load it up to the minute you shut it down, relentlessly. It's a product that is far beyond just an aircraft shell and systems simulator. In fact, it goes beyond anything else I've ever experienced in an aircraft add-on before - even Majestic whom I considered to be at the top of the game. 

You pay a high initial cost but I assure you, you are getting a LOT more for your money here compared to some other top-tier companies in the business.

I don't think anything else comes close to what they have achieved and they seem to consistently raise the bar that was already too high for anyone else to reach. If you can justify spending your valuable funds on something like PMDG which doesn't offer a strand of immersion close to the FSL, you can easily justify the cost of picking up an Airbus by FSL and really celebrate what simulation has become today. I rarely describe an FS product as 'art' or 'a labour of love' but I truly believe that Majestic and now FSL have created works of art stemmed from a passion that surpasses every other developer in the business of making aircraft add-ons.  

As for performance, I run both the FSL A319-320 on an old i7 4790K with a GTX 970 and 16GB of RAM and have little to no issues running the aircraft with modest to above average settings. 

Edited October 13, 2018 by krazyk