What feedback can xEnviro users give a prospective new user about the add-on ?

- is it still being actively mantained ?

- is itreaching your expectations ?

- where / how does it do it's best work, compared to default weather engine ?

- how heavy is it for older rigs ? ( I can use XP11 with no autogen with no problem if that can help.... )

Any suggestions, info, feedback really apreciated.

 

Seasons Greetings !!! 

As you know i don't own it. But from the screenshots it's just too good. It's probably miles ahead of the default wx engine

Performance is bad according to users.

I have this installed and follow it with interest, but see my answers below: 🙂

 is it still being actively mantained ?

Yes, but updates are slow. Currently they're concentrating on performance improvements, but there are other major issues to fix, e.g. The way it changes the ortho colours even with season changes off (It turns everything pink), the ability to have your own weather themes, and Mac OS support. 

- is itreaching your expectations ?

No, I don't often use it because it forces you to use the real reported weather and most of the time it's over exaggerated, making things too dark, hazy and unflyable in Europe during the Winter., especially in Poland. It completely destroys my orthos, altering colours even with seasons off. The lack of custom weather means I only use it now and then and makes it not great for GA or heli flyers.

- where / how does it do it's best work, compared to default weather engine ?

The clouds are much better and are true volumetric and can produce some beautiful effects (they can also go horribly wrong). It also reduces the sudden weather changes, e.g. it depicts flying between different conditions nicely, with clouds forming etc.  When it works, it blows away the competition, but it's so full of bugs and lacking features that fancy clouds alone aren't enough. But I'll keep it around in the hopes all will eventually be addressed.

- how heavy is it for older rigs ? ( I can use XP11 with no autogen with no problem if that can help.... )

It's heavy. In cloud covered skies it can eat up an additional 10-15fps, so if you have problems now, this won't help

I paid quite a lot of money for this when the first version came out, in what seems like ages ago. The draconian DRM, lack of weather themes and always online requirement and many many bugs means it serves purely as a fancy tech demo to play with at present, although it's promising and going in a good direction

Bought it way back for 70 Euro....

 

It was extremely heavy on my old rig. Couldn't use it in vr for quite a while so discontinued to use it.

 

Development is very very slow and TBH I lost interest in it.

 

Cheers

Jozeff

I can also concur with Jozeff.

I keep looking at its update progress but for me, performance deficit is too much in its current build 1.13.

 

Stu

When it works well it's fabulous and among the best add ons I've ever bought.

However, yes it is expensive, yes it is a resource hogger and sadly, no it doesn't always work well, at least the moment!

Happy Christmas one and all.

Phil

You get some nice effects but it's unusable in 4k and VR due to performance issues. They're working on that but no timeline of when\if it will be compatible.

Thank you guys,

guess I have enough feedback already 😕 - guess I'll save my money for other add-ons...

Well, maybe weather will get better with XP12, or even before that  - one never knows 🙂

 

Yep makes sense waiting right now , but i feel XE is revolutionary.

I was also considering xenviro but saw similar feedback and posts to above so did not go through with it. I am pinning my hopes on the xplane dev seeing those fs2020 clouds and deciding it's time to spruce up the weather system in xplane. Maybe after Vulkan.

28 minutes ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

xEnviro produces a graining effect that I didn't like ... it's a product I wanted to love but have since put on hold and uninstalled

It's not as bad in the latest version, have you tried since?

Sometimes it looks like the clouds are vaporizing with xEnviro. And when it's not heavy overcast, you can easily notice the grid structure the clouds are placed on. But it looks perfect with the heavy overcast. (if your system can handle it) 

You are looking at 10 fps with one layer of clouds on a 4K panel. 

Performance was poor and features limited. I gave up on it and uninstalled. Moved on. Wrote off the high purchase price.

Hi José, I like it a lot while flying not into dense populated areas. It’s heavy on FPS but what I like most, are the „true clouds“. I give you an example: While you travel, you see clouds in the distance. Those clouds come closer, without any jumping weather changes. You can fly through them and you get the full immersion diving into them. If you descend through a hole in the clouds, you will not touch them, it feels so real. They have some work on it ahead. If I use ortho scenery or flying into add on NYC, I better stay away and use other products. If I need some seasons, let’s say for a flight from Colorado to Southern California, I use the seasons feature. It changes season within a few minutes. Not perfect, but preferred over Terramaxx.