HD Mesh v4.0

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

Question:   Does adding this to the sim,  also affect besides mountain and terrain elevations,  does this also affect where you see forestry, and its 'detail' upon the landscape, over default mesh files?

The following screen shots are with HD Mesh v4.0 installed, and I do believe that I have much better forestry coverage and detail with these DSF files on play...what do you think?  Here is just west of Detroit, Michigan,  heading out into the 'burbs...at 1,500 ASL

 

Edited December 2, 2019 by Sesquashtoo

[lzamm 143]

Yes, HD Mesh is not a "mesh" product as it would be in FSX but also includes what we would call landclass data and buildings.  From the website (my bold):

 

 

Quote

 

HD Mesh Scenery v4 can be seen as a vastly improved version of the default scenery shipping with XP11. It is using/referencing the exact same set of artwork files (textures, object, autogens, forests) which ship with XP11, so you do not need other art assets to be installed while HD Mesh Scenery v4 will also benefit from any artwork improvements (autogen, texture) coming with future XP11 versions.

The most important advantages of HD Mesh Scenery v4 are:

• The triangle mesh resolution is far higher than in the default mesh and even a bit above the level of the previous HD Mesh Scenery v3::
  • this give – obviously – better DEM (elevation data) representation (slopes, mountains etc.)
  • BUT this also vastly(!) improves the landclass data representation (which in X-Plane is very closely coupled with the triangle size in the mesh). This is most obvious with forest detail.
• The vector data simplification is less aggressive than in the default mesh (where Laminar needed to do that to limit the overall size of the global scenery). Thus road / railroad bendings are more accurate and the same is true for rivers, shorelines (but where the OSM raw data is bad, this can’t help much either)
• HD Mesh Scenery v4 also has the new “high buildings” feature included, which I introduced with Laminar in XP11. This puts all (well, with some filtering of not reasonable stuff from OSM)  buildings > 20m “height” or > 5 “building:levels” as some “high building” object (with a more or less correct height – as defined in OSM) in the scenery (“building:levels” are simply multiplied by 4m to get an approximate height). This usually gives most cities a much better look  (New York is a great example, where in OSM almost all buildings already have a height defined). This same approach also “imports” antennas / masts from OSM (as antenna obstacles)
• OSM data is updated (its “date stamp” is 1st October 2017) . Which makes it newer than current XP11 default mesh data and of course much, much newer than the data in HD Mesh Scenery v3.
• Most of the Landclass data has seen an update (which already happened with my work for the XP11 default scenery … but HD Mesh Scenery v4 can represent the high res landclass data much better)

 

 

 

Edited December 2, 2019 by lzamm

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

Thank you...I THOUGHT I was seeing much better forestry coverage as you see in the above example shots.  I am about 25 miles west of Detroit on a course of 285, and am heading out to the west coast of Michigan, to check out the cliffs overlooking Lake Michigan.

Post Edit..."WOW....folks...you WANT THIS!  It's like I just cranked the sim 300 percent in object and placement detail.  I've lost about 7 FPS over not running it, with my max'ed out XP11 graphic settings (no reflection though...), but the sim animation is still moving along without pause, and this is with the custom 'so called hard on FPS'  custom plane, that usually does a FPS reduction, over any XP11 default aircraft.  Without HD Mesh v4.0, and with this plane, I had mostly around 30 FPS, but, now am running around 21-23 FPS, if not over any central major city.  Over Detroit proper around Detroit Metro, I was running at around 18-21 FPS, but as soon as I started heading out into the burbs...my FPS climbed to and settled around 21-24 FPS.   Just so you know...I run XP11 graphically pretty much maxed out, and have a hard demand on it.  I prefer visuals over higher reading FPS, as a real world flight representation to me, is of upmost importance to promote that I am actually flying...  So, your FPS obviously will depend on what you deem acceptable screen output.  If I stay with any default XP11 aircraft, I can easily maintain my usually 30 FPS over pretty much any visual depiction.  I'm flying my new Christmas 2019 toy, in these shots. I loved this plane in FSX and P3D...so,  had to grab it for XP11.  Just to end the post, it is a wonderful representation of the real deal, and matches or betters, even the FSX/P3D version, in sounds and details.  I recommend it, if you like amphib STOL aircraft!

Edited December 2, 2019 by Sesquashtoo

[soaring_penguin 428]

Add to this mix SFD Global, and be blown away ...

[peroni 541]

Ok FPS is not everything but most of your screenshots are below the absolute X-Plane minimum of 20 fps even with 3jFPS-wizard11 running.

You might want to reduce some of the settings.
Also, depending on what is the limiting factor in your installation, using Ortho4xp generated terrain most times allows for a better framerate compared to the default or hd4 textures and a much better result overall.

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

1 hour ago, soaring_penguin said:

Add to this mix SFD Global, and be blown away ...

Have it also...

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

24 minutes ago, peroni said:

Ok FPS is not everything but most of your screenshots are below the absolute X-Plane minimum of 20 fps even with 3jFPS-wizard11 running.

You might want to reduce some of the settings.
Also, depending on what is the limiting factor in your installation, using Ortho4xp generated terrain most times allows for a better framerate compared to the default or hd4 textures and a much better result overall.

Live, I actually run at 20-23, and if not running with a custom plane...all at 30 locked.   So all good, but my forestry world-wide, is much more pronounced than it was before my adding the HD4 DSF files.  So,  for myself at least, they are a keeper!

Edited December 2, 2019 by Sesquashtoo

[olderndirt 2,295]

This, plus the Ultra stuff, was a must have 'til Orbx came along with their humungous TE downloads.  Now I need some larger storage to have both.

[MSFS Ralf 149]

12 minutes ago, olderndirt said:

This, plus the Ultra stuff, was a must have 'til Orbx came along with their humungous TE downloads.  Now I need some larger storage to have both.

My external HD arrived yesterday. These products are pretty big but look wonderful.

[Bunchy 222]

I found external HD's to be too slow compared to internal.

 

Stu

[Colonel X 1,428]

Once you souped up X-Plane with a lot of data, let it be mesh or orthos, X-Plane loading becomes a slog, that's just a given. Yes, there are differences due to the hardware (SSD or HDD, USB2, USB3, Thunderbolt, ect.) - but loading will take forever on all setups. I have everything on my internal SSD, loading LAX still takes a couple of minutes. 

[HiFlyer 9,343]

Loading times is one of the things that keeps me from using X-Plane more than I do. It's to the point where I actually wander off and go do other things while it's loading, and in the last week or so I've seriously considered just deleting everything but the base Sim.

[Colonel X 1,428]

It's always been like this. I remember waiting 10 minutes for FSX to load after I installed a global mesh.

[Paraffin 2,197]

I did notice significantly longer load times after buying two of the Orbx TE scenery sets (GB South and WA State). I don't have a SSD, everything's on a hard drive, but It's still not enough to put me off flying. I have a few AAA games that can take just as long to load. 

I almost always work up a flight plan in LittleNavMap before flying, either for a FSEconomy flight or just to find minimum safe altitude for flying in mountainous areas on autopilot. I don't do it ahead of time, so it gives me something to spend time on while XP is loading. By the time the flight plan is finished and saved out as a file for import into XP, the plane is sitting on the runway and ready to roll. 

[alpilotx 505]

There are before-and-after Screenshots which should give you a relatively good understanding about what HD Mesh Scenery v4 can give you (also how it improves forests):

• https://photos.app.goo.gl/0h8i3iBme4NVA53E3

 

Edited December 11, 2019 by alpilotx