21 minutes ago, ckyliu said:

You seem very panicky Ray, you have a fast system and connection with lots of storage, why all the concern (and why "really need some info, just don't purchase on day 0 and await some feedback)? Has everyone forgot there is a full offline mode that reverts to landclass type textures in-lieu of aerial photographs?

I'm not panicy at all. I feel it's a valid question and one that Microsoft should give us more info on.

Reading the replies here there seems to be plenty of assmptions but few facts. I prefer to buy software I know what its requirements are. I have no intention of buying on day 1 and beta testing the product. I'll watch the discussions with interest.

@honanhal, with respect that’s an assumption and not a known fact. It’s time Microsoft gave some detailed info on how this selection and download process works.

I would want to know all this before I purchase. And on day 1 their servers are going to get hammered . No testing can prepare for that.

I would also stream in all probability but it’s still a valid question for those who don’t have the required speed.

Its a valid set of questions Ray.

 

Lets see if we can get the answer to that when the NDA is lifted.

For some, its going to be really important for those that may not necessarily have the fastest/largest bandwidth internet connection but I agree with the other comments above that scenery streaming is MS' first choice here in how they envisage users operating the sim.

The other important aspect as already mentioned is going to be the efficiency of the on-the-fly decompression . Hopefully Asobo have sorted that out.I assume there will be code in MSFS that will decompress these files rapidly.

The interesting thing is how that offline scenery cache will be maintained over time. Presumably there will be scenery improvements/updates coming through at some stage so I wonder how this will work and whether you can manage this scenery cache locally based on desired scenery area/coverage, scenery resolution or by available storage space on your PC. Hopefully all of the above! I assume that this must be in the several hundred Gb range when decompressed.

Again, many assumptions here. We definitely need more details on how this is really going to work in reality. I am sure though the technology is already there to support it.

 

Regards

If you file a flight plan then surely the higher your flight level enroute the less "level of detail" that's needed.

Maybe the space requirements are not so bad, high detail around the departure/arrival airports (because your low) and not a lot when your enroute at FL300+ ?

Edited July 17, 20205 yr by MatthewS

It's fair to want to wait and see. More than likely you will find out from a user rather over microsoft.(we'll see if that will be before or after launch)  Divide 2 petabytes by the world and that's alot of data for any one spot. Especially since cities will weigh heavier than deserts .

while it may be a concern for some I dont think it will be a line in the sand issue for more than a few people. Especially since .. lets just assume it's like 10 gb. 500 gb ..or even 4 terabytes!... Just assume the worst .. very few people will decide not to buy the sim based on 'wow that's too much.. I'm out'.  Not including people that already decided the videos are all fake and they aren't buying the sim no matter what.  (Giveb 2pb/world is already known.. caches will be big whatever big ends up being)

 

And Even the bandwidth challenged can eventually download 4 tb over the course of days/weeks . In the mean while, sim in  low bandwidth streaming mode or offline mode. 

 

And again. I do think it's perfectly reasonable for someone to demand data/information before making a decision.. it's your 120 bux.  I just dont think its stopping enough people to force anyones hand.

 

But yes. knowing how much space a random city or random route in the world takes to precache would definately be great info to extrapolate from. 

Edited July 17, 20205 yr by Wewk584

16 minutes ago, MatthewS said:

If you file a flight plan then surely the higher your flight level enroute the less "level of detail" that's needed.

Maybe the space requirements are not so bad, high detail around the departure/arrival airports (because your low) and not a lot when your enroute at FL300+ ?

I would like to have such an option very much - I would probably not need ZL19 when flying an Airbus at FL300, and not even see a huge difference at that altitude... but I would surely note a delay in streaming if it is too much data...

I have no idea about how well the offline scenery is, but if it is true, that it uses a low resolution satellite map and the AI places appropriate and believable landclass textures based on that aerial source, this might even be enough for me personally at high altitudes. Of course, it´s a completely different topic during landing or when I want to fly low in a GA aircraft and take in the sights... but then I usually do not need to cover such a huge area. 

 

37 minutes ago, MatthewS said:

If you file a flight plan then surely the higher your flight level enroute the less "level of detail" that's needed.

Maybe the space requirements are not so bad, high detail around the departure/arrival airports (because your low) and not a lot when your enroute at FL300+ ?

Agreed on the LoD but then again the higher you go the greater the distance you can see. We don't want to see the boundary between the simualated world and nothing as happens in FSX/P3D. And should FSL bring out Concorde for MFS it can reach FL600 albeit over ocean but nevertheless you would still want to see land that was 300 miles away.

So many questions that need answering.

12 minutes ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

Agreed on the LoD but then again the higher you go the greater the distance you can see. We don't want to see the boundary between the simualated world and nothing as happens in FSX/P3D. And should FSL bring out Concorde for MFS it can reach FL600 albeit over ocean but nevertheless you would still want to see land that was 300 miles away.

So many questions that need answering.

Well happy to answer those when the NDA is lifted Ray, 😉 But a lot of options to play with 😎

This is a little off-topic, but I sincerely hope that FS Labs will soon provide some information on whether they plan to develop a new Concorde for MFS/P3D. Since other airplane developers like PMDG have announced that they will release their signature planes for MFS, and since that simulator can (apparently) read FSX legacy planes, it would be time for FSL to be more forthcoming with their plans, given the release of MFS next month.

But alas, it is reasonable to be concerned that they will focus all of their resources on making their Airbusses compatible, let alone converting the current (no longer sold) Concorde-X, let alone developing a brand new one. Sigh...

I am not trying to be clever here but wouldn't you think that the LOD for scenery detail could be in some way connected to the max visible distance we get to set in the AS weather engine for example. Is there not a logical connection between those two factors as well as the altitude?

I am not saying this is what MS have done. I have no idea how MS have implemented their weather engine.

Hmmm, questions, questions...

23 minutes ago, Afterburner said:

since that simulator can (apparently) read FSX legacy planes, it would be time for FSL to be more forthcoming

It seems many users are falling in the trap of thinking because MFS has some support for legacy aircraft that all their favourite addons can be quickly ported, but it's highly unlikely to be the case for your favourite addons. At most I expect MFS would only load aircraft that were fully compliant with the FSX SDK and used XML gauges, that excludes almost all popular airliners addons as they use .gau gauges that work outside the SDK to provide advanced functionality - think more along the lines of how much time and effort addons took to be ported from FSX to P3D 64 bit, then consider that any such conversion from FSX (or P3D) to MFS20 is going to require more work than that plus a full graphical rebuilding. And I can't imagine people will be happy paying top dollar for an addon that relies on the legacy flight dynamics, once the have experience the new aerodynamic simulation.

26 minutes ago, aldridgem said:

I am not trying to be clever here but wouldn't you think that the LOD for scenery detail could be in some way connected to the max visible distance we get to set in the AS weather engine for example. Is there not a logical connection between those two factors as well as the altitude?

That would make a lot of sense. The default clear view distance in FSX+P3D is much too far, even on the clearest of days in most areas you'd be lucky to see beyond 30 miles, those simulators won't let you set below 60 miles if I remember correctly!

Presumably the DVDs are organised into regions?

It uses less data than you'd think. I'm not sure of the nuts and bolts of how they make that possible. Those speculating a while back that it'd be the same data rates as streaming a 4K movie are nowhere near right.

Edited July 17, 20205 yr by bonchie

6 hours ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

But how much data would be stored for a flight from Manchester to London Heathrow for example?

I would guess around 700 MB.

Edited July 17, 20205 yr by Mihai Eu