14 hours ago, GSalden said:

Why would you want to buy an older version ? 

Oldies but goodies.

23 minutes ago, Simicro said:

Oldies but goodies.

With V5 around new products will probably be V5 only so little by little V4 will fade away.

If you have it : very good sim. If you are at the point of buying a P3D version : buy the latest.

I see this exactly like Gerard already said. 

If your hardware is capable...definitely V5....

Marcus

Since a few have asked, my hardware really isn't what I would want to throw at v5. I built an "interim" machine last year as my very old machine simply died of old age (was nearly 10 years old) but I did not really wish to devote a lot of funding to it due to the economic uncertainties we have suffered lately.

So I just built a middle of the road machine using decent midrange parts - Ryzen 2700+ and 2060 Super being the main protagonists.

My intention is to go to P3D when I build my next machine which this time round will be just one rung down from the absolute state of the art (which is normally what I would have built in the past).

I realise v5 is probably GPU intensive so the GPU is something I am particularly going to concentrate funding on. Looking back, the last time I ever bought  a "high end" GPU was a 3DFX Voodoo 5500 back in early 2000! It's been midrange stuff since then but next time around I want to get something one step down only from the absolute best (which is where I think you hit the sweet spot if you are a keen flight simmer).

The 2060 should run v5 just fine..

10 hours ago, JonP01 said:

Since a few have asked, my hardware really isn't what I would want to throw at v5. I built an "interim" machine last year as my very old machine simply died of old age (was nearly 10 years old) but I did not really wish to devote a lot of funding to it due to the economic uncertainties we have suffered lately.

So I just built a middle of the road machine using decent midrange parts - Ryzen 2700+ and 2060 Super being the main protagonists.

My intention is to go to P3D when I build my next machine which this time round will be just one rung down from the absolute state of the art (which is normally what I would have built in the past).

I realise v5 is probably GPU intensive so the GPU is something I am particularly going to concentrate funding on. Looking back, the last time I ever bought  a "high end" GPU was a 3DFX Voodoo 5500 back in early 2000! It's been midrange stuff since then but next time around I want to get something one step down only from the absolute best (which is where I think you hit the sweet spot if you are a keen flight simmer).

I your case I would still go for v5. You are able to influence the VRAM, CPU and GPU very well by using the in sim options. And we all expect some improvements from LM regarding a better VRAM management because lots of users had or have initial issues. 

V5 is just the up to date version and uses DX12...wich is promising for future updates. 

Don't hesitate to ask for further information if needed. 

The most community members are glad to help onboarding new users and share thoughts. The good and the bad ones sure. 

But I am sure you will have more joy on V5......and v5.X is still in development...

Recent posts from LM devs over at their public forum stated that some updates are planned for the next release.....

Marcus

Edited April 19, 20215 yr by mpo910

9 minutes ago, mpo910 said:

Recent posts from LM devs over at their public forum stated that some updates are planned for the next release.....

Marcus, without the need to search through all latest topic posts could you tell in a few short words which the updates are ?

Thanks.

Regards, Gerard

The only reason I can possibly see for going to 4.5 as a new user (as opposed to sticking with it when you already have it) is that you want to use add-ons that are absolutely not compatible with v5. Thankfully that's now a pretty short list. Or you have a GPU that just can't run DX12 or that has <6GB VRAM. P3Dv5 is certainly capable of overwhelming your hardware no matter what spec you have - it's all a question of settings. But frankly you can say the same about 4.5 and every version before that. About the only true significant difference is the DX12 vs DX11 issue and that primarily hinges on whether you have a card that can do DX12.1 and how much VRAM you have. At lower settings, even 6GB should be fine although 8GB would be better. 

(I can maybe better understand the desire not to update from an already well-running 4.5 system. But even that is overly-cautious in my view when there are such dramatic performance gains to be made from moving to v5. And you can always run them side-by-side for a while.)

3 hours ago, GSalden said:

Marcus, without the need to search through all latest topic posts could you tell in a few short words which the updates are ?

Thanks.

Regards, Gerard

The feedback came from Beau Hollis in Public Forum  and where mainly related to layering issues (Water, Coastlines, Shadows and Reflections, Taxilines). 

They where visible very good in VR but count also partly for 2d Screen (shader issues by transferring\changing CODE from DX11 to DX12)

Answers this your question Gerard? Or did you ment something else?

I am only allowed to talk about those public topics. 

Marcus

Edited April 19, 20215 yr by mpo910

56 minutes ago, mpo910 said:

The feedback came from Beau Hollis in Public Forum  and where mainly related to layering issues (Water, Coastlines, Shadows and Reflections, Taxilines). 

They where visible very good in VR but count also partly for 2d Screen (shader issues by transferring\changing CODE from DX11 to DX12)

Answers this your question Gerard? Or did you ment something else?

I am only allowed to talk about those public topics. 

Marcus

Thanks for mentioning this Marcus 👍

8 hours ago, neilhewitt said:

P3Dv5 is certainly capable of overwhelming your hardware no matter what spec you have - it's all a question of settings. But frankly you can say the same about 4.5 and every version before that.

So is it possible to directly configure v5 to basically "emulate" what v4 would have delivered by simply turning off or reducing options? And then turn them up again when the hardware can cope better?

12 minutes ago, JonP01 said:

So is it possible to directly configure v5 to basically "emulate" what v4 would have delivered by simply turning off or reducing options? And then turn them up again when the hardware can cope better?

Not exactly. V5 is DX12 and V4.x DX11. You can't go to DX11 in V5. DX12 is more GPU bound. So with less powerful GPU and less VRAM you can ran into performance issues.

But those VRAM hungry options can be tuned quite good in v5. One of them is the new TrueSky enhanced Atmospherics. Also known as EA. This can be turned off to use legacy 2d clouds and less performance hungry sky textures....if needed! 

I am quite sure P3D V5 will give you more joy and better FPS also. Also this is the platform wich will be updated with further releases. 

Hope this helps. 

Marcus

59 minutes ago, JonP01 said:

So is it possible to directly configure v5 to basically "emulate" what v4 would have delivered by simply turning off or reducing options? And then turn them up again when the hardware can cope better?

With your 2060, you really do not have much to worry about

V5 will make good use of your GPU and in the process, less is required of your CPU to produce smooth flight.

And as mentioned above, you can turn off EA if you like... I leave it on. (On a GTX 1070).

Prepar3d V4.5 vs V5 | Aerosoft Heathrow + A330 | Orbx Global Vector + Open LC - YouTube

Worth a look to make your choice.

16 minutes ago, G-RFRY said:

Prepar3d V4.5 vs V5 | Aerosoft Heathrow + A330 | Orbx Global Vector + Open LC - YouTube

Worth a look to make your choice.

Have been looking at this myself, as much as I prefer the sky & lighting in p3d5 I am reluctant to make the jump since 2 of the 4 aircraft I fly in p3d don't work in v5.

 

G