3 hours ago, Fielder said:

If all else fails try moving the files around from inside a DOS box instead of from inside Windows. Sometimes that works.

Just type CMD in the box in windows START.

Those were the good old days. 😄

The Add-On-Linker has the added benefit that you can use a folder tree in the outboard "my-addon-location" folder to organize add-ons by asset type or geographical categorization.

You don't have to deal with a flat Community folder with hundreds of obscurely named add-ons.

Use that tool linker and unlink all non airport scenery addons. Use just the Airports. I have over 100 airport add ons and it take nor more than 2 additional min to theempy 3 min. so it takes 5 whole min fo start the sim. no more.

Edited February 12, 20215 yr by Manny

3 minutes ago, Manny said:

Use that tool linker and unlink all non airport scenery addons. Use just the Airports. I have over 100 airport add ons and it take nor more than 2 additional min to theempy 3 min. so it takes 5 whole min fo start the sim. no more.

Agree. For years now I have used a ton of Megascenery photoreal addons with FSX and use SceneryConfigEditor to turn on/off the various scenery areas based on where I am flying today. Now with MSFS I do the same with the Addons Linker.  I find no compelling reason to activate or load scenery that will not even be in use for a particular flight.  I restart my sims before each flight, and using the linker to make relevant selections/deselections is incredibly fast and simple. 

I am flying St Louis to Indianapolis to Chicago and then back to St Louis today.  I have zero need to load my large collection of southern California scenery addons.  And when I do decide to fly again in the southern California area, I have those addons organized in a way that I can check one box in the linker.  And when done uncheck one box.  I can do the same with airplane liveries and mods.  If I am flying the Bonanza why would I need to load liveries and mods for the DA62 or the Caravan?

1 hour ago, Manny said:

Use that tool linker and unlink all non airport scenery addons. Use just the Airports. I have over 100 airport add ons and it take nor more than 2 additional min to theempy 3 min. so it takes 5 whole min fo start the sim. no more.

Do you mean keep the airport addons in the actual Community folder, but all other scenery as links through AddOn Linker?

1 hour ago, Republic3D said:

Do you mean keep the airport addons in the actual Community folder, but all other scenery as links through AddOn Linker?

No.. MOVE All the addons except for Orbx and FSDT (Which do their own thing) to another folder. which I have named as "Community_Files' and various sub folders  within that folder for liveries Payware, freeware. you can do sub folders by georgrpahy if you like.

Link them all using the linker tool. But delink anything that is not an airport which are huge files and huge size. The linker tools would help you sort by size and number of files. Use that to gauge if you really want to pay the high price of loading time and then unlink it.. But its there for you if you need it. So the community folder would have links to all the airports but not actually have the files inside the folder "COMMUNITY".

I also have a folder called MODS within the folder COMMUNITY_FILES where Input the mods files. and link those. This way I can unlink the mods quickly without actually deleting the files if the need arises.

 

when you install a new add on (other than ORBX and FSDT) install them in COMMUNITY and once installed. Cut and paste the new addon over to your COMMUNITY_FILES\SCENERY\PAYARE\<New airport addon> <----( this is my folder structure) and then link this addon to the COMMUNITY Folder/

 

Hope I've stated that clearly. 🙂

Edited February 12, 20215 yr by Manny

Thank you all for recommending the "MSFS Addons Linker".  I didn't know about this great utility until this thread.

On 2/12/2021 at 6:28 PM, Manny said:

No.. MOVE All the addons except for Orbx and FSDT (Which do their own thing) to another folder. which I have named as "Community_Files' and various sub folders  within that folder for liveries Payware, freeware. you can do sub folders by georgrpahy if you like.

Link them all using the linker tool. But delink anything that is not an airport which are huge files and huge size. The linker tools would help you sort by size and number of files. Use that to gauge if you really want to pay the high price of loading time and then unlink it.. But its there for you if you need it. So the community folder would have links to all the airports but not actually have the files inside the folder "COMMUNITY".

I also have a folder called MODS within the folder COMMUNITY_FILES where Input the mods files. and link those. This way I can unlink the mods quickly without actually deleting the files if the need arises.

 

when you install a new add on (other than ORBX and FSDT) install them in COMMUNITY and once installed. Cut and paste the new addon over to your COMMUNITY_FILES\SCENERY\PAYARE\<New airport addon> <----( this is my folder structure) and then link this addon to the COMMUNITY Folder/

 

Hope I've stated that clearly. 🙂

I understand! Thanks for the explenation.

I have the Micorosft digital rights issue where you can't move or copy anything out of the Community folder. You can only delete or move into the folder. So I have to do it differently and delete all mods and then re-install using the AddOn Linker method instead

27 minutes ago, Republic3D said:

I understand! Thanks for the explenation.

I have the Micorosft digital rights issue where you can't move or copy anything out of the Community folder. You can only delete or move into the folder. So I have to do it differently and delete all mods and then re-install using the AddOn Linker method instead

Wow first I've heard of that. What about creating a symbolic link. MSFS is installed on my C drive while the addons get installed to my E drive.

mklink /d "C:\Users\joebloggs\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.FlightSimulator_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalCache\Packages\Community" "E:\DATA\Microsoft Flight Simulator\Community"

Just make sure where ever you link it to you've got full control.

Edited February 14, 20215 yr by dtrjones

Create a zip file outside of the community folder. Add the contents of the CF. Delete from CF.