FSX is Good - Really it is

[G7USL 117]

Peter,I don't think you are getting the point?People don't "get off" (horible word implictating sexual perversion!) as you put it on complaining about a program that was bought to run on almost EVERY computer.On the contrary the 'Aces' (Don't know how they ever got that name?) admit that they are not using Vista or the great supposedly saviour DX10, and their machines are spread across the spectrum and the lowest is the specification stated in black and white on the outside of the box!Now most of us know that, that lowest spec; is unuseable but a lot don't, and in particular the GAMING market that this program was allegedly aimed for?Flight simmers the world over have been praying for a better sim that everyone can use and not the fortunate minority who, remind us all by including all the nuts and bolts of their 'whizz-bang' systems on their signature on here.That's why they moan. It's just a shame that MS ignores the request's of their most faithful followers.Yes, we shall all pull together to tweak it but, while we are doing that, we are not spending the time enjoying the sim that we paid good money for.

[Guest Tingoose]

I see one flaw in your 'positive' approach Peter. If FSX was freeware or an inexpensive purchase I might go alomg with what you are saying. However, it strikes me that you are suggesting that it's OK to release a piece of softwre for a fair whack of dosh and to be happy with it despite the fact that you have to enter into a tweak fest to get it to run properly, and having paid good money for it. You glorify tweaking as if FSX was a piece of software especially designed for tweakers anonymous, but if I were to buy it, it would be to install and experince flight simming. FSX is a flight simulator not a tweakers' paradise. When I buy software of any type I expect it "to do what it says on the tin" and to look like what it looks like on the tin, like the software you've released for instance. . . no problems there. I bought all your stuff and it worked out of the box beautifully. The screenshots I've seen of FSX so far suggest that people have had to 'tweak down' so much that it looks bloody awful. I won't be buying.

[Mike... 7]

> Hey, Tom, you just need to take the long term view. This happens with each release>>- tdragggerFrom all the comments in this thread, that one stands out the most. This happens every single time, yet you are not inclined to change the way you're developing the sim?I'd forget about backwards compatibility and design the next version from scratch - even if it takes 3/4/5 years - truly taking advantage of all the new technologies and giving us the simple and often asked improvements, without having to hear "we'd have to make major changes for that to happen/current limitations don't allow that/etc...". Since there were three years in between releases this time, I was hoping that it would be the case with FSX. Unfortunately, it isn't. So seriously, don't make the same mistake again. ;-)Even though the moaning will die down eventually, it doesn't mean you're going about it the right way. Because you're not, in my humble opinion.

[Wnuk 12]

If you dont like the product, just don't buy it. Why continue your constant badgering of it? If there is anything better on the market at this time, please point us all to it so we can experience this Nirvana you and so many others seem to think is so easy to produce in a $70 piece of software. If it doesn't exist, maybe you can produce something for us all to enjoy?Jim

[radorabatin 24]

" Then I guess many 'won't be buying anything either' which in turn could be the death nail for the FS franchise. If the average user is the target market who benefits off of Dual Core computers with most of their newer titles, do you honestly believe their going to put in the work on their hardware the way us simmers would for this one title???Remember the customer's always right and in this since if this product doesn't work efficiently on 'his or her' hardware you can rest assured they (the non-pilot's) 'won't be buying anything'. So in essence things are going to have to change much like they did after FS2000 or we all loose out. We the customer will change and influence the product much like we've done in the past up until now (thanks to the various wonderful add-ons from this community which breath new life into the default product). FSX has to change for the better or die from lack of sales... "It is just your opinion.But it would be neverending chat if we had to explain things to each other....following months will show,and my opinion is that it will be very successful.

[Guest jrboddie]

>I'd forget about backwards compatibility and design the next>version from scratch - even if it takes 3/4/5 years - truly>taking advantage of all the new technologies ...The ultimate step in abandoning backwards compatibility and taking advantage of new technology will be an XBOX platform.

[crosswind 825]

Would all whiners like some "rotten CHEEZZZZZZZE for your whine"At times I wonder how life would be if we lived in a "PERFECT WORLD". There would never be any room for improvement and mankind would not be able to accomplish anything because it would have already been thought of.Maybe some of you should try to itemize every single variable that is or has been implemented into FS since 2000 and see if you could do better if put in that position. As we know there is always a way of fixing things one way or the other, but it takes time. Microsoft expressed that they were not able to focus every single component within the FS engine. It seems as though they have somewhat of a lottery system in place whereby they will be selecting certain components to improve upon with the release of a new version of FS.Peter has made some very good points, and if you speak with a Microsoft rep, they will tell you the same. "FSX was designed with machines of the future(2 years from now)". For those of you that were not able to make it to the Avsim Conference, alot of MS's thought process and design theory was discussed. They (MS)did admit that there were some things that they did not carry-over into FSX, which was going to cause a gripe factor within the community especially for third party developers. I think I read a post where George Grimshaw was expressing this concern.Again, it was made very lucid by MSoft that if you max your sliders you will be a rather dissatisfied customer. "Medium settings are for todays high-end computers". The overall suggestion was to allow FSX to detect the best setting based on the system spec inspection the FSX does after installation and fly that for a while. after doing this, one can then experiment to see what other setting maybe suitable/enjoyable/acceptable for futher results.In the mean time let's enjoy what there is to enjoy and try to perfect the imperfections that may exist. I find that if I have two shots of whiskey chased with beer, I am less likely to see the minor imperfections, and the major imperfections become minor ones..... ;) Cool RunningsKroswynd

[Guest allcott]

Well, pardon my lack on trust in the FSX detection system deducing the correct setup for my computer, but allowing FSX Demo to `detect the best setting` gave me a resolution my LCD monitor doesn't support (black screen), soundcard settings unsustainable by the card in use, (seems like it picked up on my card in a networked computer, which is interesting given the comments about multiple cores and shared computing), autogen setting which brought the fps to its knees with low single digits, texture settings that made the ground a blurry mess, and aircraft with panels that were all but unreadable.So clearly their `best` isn't good enough. I have no intention of letting the release version make any decisions about how to optimise ny hardware settings, thanks! Now the problem this creates is not for the likes of us simmers and tewakers. What if granny buys FSX as an Xmas pressie for little Johnny, who installs it excitedly on Christmas Day (other religious festivals also exist) only to find this pile of steaming blurry dross? That's Johnny out of the simming game for good, back to Doom 3 ar Half Life or some other vacuous shootemup, but with crystal-cear graphics and a renderign engine that offers smooth frame rates in all but the most challenging of scenarios?I am beginning to wonder whether the whole ethos of designing for two years from now is not a huge mistake. If FS was designed to run on the machines of today, then the market of today could buy it today and run it today, not have to accept compromises or some leap of faith that tomorrow, things might be better?Looking at what is being achieved with FS9 NOW, now the hardware has caught up, you can hardly argue that FS9 with addons is not visually superior to a default FSX in many areas, especially when the FSX sliders have to be turned down to give acceptable performance. Perhaps the answer is to freeze the engine for six three years at FSX levels, effectively skipping the next upgrade cycle and see what the aftermarket can add?Allcott

[Guest Iz]

In the real world of aviation we have a very important saying:"If you assume, you make an a$$ out of U and ME."And what a truckload of assumptions are being made here."Surely it must be possible to...""They didn't even do...""This is poorly designed...""If EA F1 runs better, then this must be crap..."If you weren't on the design team (or illegally reverse-engineered FSX), then there's really not much you can say about how the game is designed, except that you may be unhappy about the performance on your machine.Make your point and move on. There's too many folks just lurking around the forums like they have no social lives and jump on any chance to say something negative. To quote Dr. Phil "How much fun to be around, do you think you are?" Add something -constructive- or get a life.In our shiny new Boeing 737-800's with winglets and without eyebrow windows and all, 55 million dollars straight out of the factory (and that is Renton, not a cardboard box that I bought in a computer shop), the FMC runs on a 1980s 20 MHz processor (and no, I cannot overclock it). Whenever I modify a route along the way, the #### thing may take up to 15 seconds to update the ETA and fuel remaining. Now I could moan about that every flight (the PMDG FMC in FS9 does it in half a second!), but it would drain my enjoyment of flying, as well as my colleague's. I'm having fun and so should you all. If you're not having fun, go find something else to do.Iz

[LAdamson 240]

>Looking at what is being achieved with FS9 NOW, now the>hardware has caught up, you can hardly argue that FS9 with>addons is not visually superior to a default FSX in many>areas, especially when the FSX sliders have to be turned down>to give acceptable performance. And the default FSX is vastly visually superior to FS9 with addons in many areas also. Since "my" FSX performance is much better than I expected, I'm now getting an bla,bla,bla attitude about some of these arguments, since it's not terribly difficult to own both these sims--- at the same time. Kind of like MSFS & X-Plane; each just offers something that the other doesn't. L.Adamson

[Guest Jimbofly]

God your whining is getting annoying.There are numerous posts now explaining why FSX is the way it is, and how you can improve it. ACES had their reasons for doing what they did, and I actually agree with the way they did it.If you can't be bothered reading up on the abovementioned explanations then you only end up sounding like a winger, along with the other wingers.James

[slashed2 53]

What if Johnny has a love for flying, internet access and the ability to read? Most likely irregardless of whether or not it looks great or not, if he loves to fly he will. If he needs to tweak it he will pop on instant messenger or search the internet for fixes and most likely find his way to a forum where all the tweaks are.As an example, one of my sons, being 16, is constantly on the computer yapping to friends and downloading updates and tweaks for his favourite games. Here's a kid who can barely wake himself up in the morning and moans when he has to do any chores around the house, but give him a game he likes and he'll spend hours of hard work searching and configuring despite the fact he has no idea how a computer works or why he can talk to people halfway around the world via teamspeak. Don't underestimate Johnnys problem solving abilities.The last paragraph about FS9 and hardware catching up is interesting, though by that logic we should be getting FS9 now instead of FSX. That's a strange paradox with FS, FSX is designed for future hardware to gain full access to it's features but will FS11 be coming out the gate when everyone finally has FSX running as they wish? Or do they maintain the cycle and hope the hardware achieves equilibrium with the software and continue the cycle with FS11? Also, it's too early to tell the true nature of the beast here as still the official release has yet to allow mass access to the software. With tweaks already rising to the surface and add-ons already making their way to the library how will things look in about 3 months for FSX? Maybe all these problems will be resolved, maybe not, but you have to admit it's exciting to watch.Ian.

[Manny 1,293]

FSX is NOT built for the future. Future is Quad core. Not 12Ghz CPU. Future is 64bits. FSX as of now is legacy app. :(If it was optimized for Quad core and we have no Quad core CPU now... and if people were impatiant and whined about why this Quad app is a dog in their single core cpu.. I can understand such expectation as being unreasonable. Its disingenuous to keep propogating this myth that its built for the future.MannyPS: I should add FSX is very nice on a top of the line machine today... but not much room for addons. And no growth potential due to its inherant architecture. Where is FSXI going to be? Would that demand a 20Ghz single core machine? P-12C Pilot has already addressed this as... a to do item on their agenda. So it looks like its been acknowledged that this has reached its end as far was what can be squeezed out of it without some serious mods.

[JP_Visser 3]

well,i'm happy FS9 runs on my AMD1800xp (yes,a dinosaur,i know)but even so i will be buying FS-X.i'm not a developer or a software engineer or whathaveyou,but i AM a flightsimmer,and have been since my old P2 266ran FS95.i'll look forward to the day i finally saved enough money to get me a shiny new machine,and i will run FS-X then.i think it looks beautiful,and i've seen lots of new stuff,as well as new aircraft ( oh my,the beaver :D)i think MS did a great job,and i think you moaners should count yourblessings,instead of whining and ruining my Avsim forum time.cheersJP.

[slashed2 53]

I'm still attempting an understanding Multicore uses, I'm still stuck on the C-64 era with one cpu, lowly cpu at that, relatively speaking. From what I've gathered it is tool to increase multitasking which FS cannot?/will not? take advantage off. Can add-ons take advantage of it? For example, I've seen many post they use a second pc for Radar contact and ASV to alleviate resource drain, can these programs be assigned to 1 cpu and FS to another on multicore systems? Another question I have is clock speed. Considering the highest speed I've seen is 4 ghz on a single cpu, how much faster can 2-2.13 core duo's outperform it on a single process? Multithreading I understand to a degree with different threads within the process being computed via different cpu's, but if these threads are being processed at 2.13 ghz how is that greater speed than the same threads being processed on a 4 ghz? Is multicore technology cumulative or still limited to the clock speed of each cpu?By my logic (which is usually a bit flawed or ignorant of the facts) it should not increase efficiency on one process, but should really speed along 2 processes running at the same time, thus the multiprocessing advantage. As far as single processes, it should not help at all or very little. I know this subject has been beaten to death but it's still an interesting conundrum for those putzing along still on single cores.Ian.