…and having a complete blast. It behaves and operates very much like I remember another “functioning” 747-8 from another simulator.  Looks like my weekend will be full with transcontinental flights galore!

Anyone else?

-B

Edited May 12, 20233 yr by btacon

It does not even come close to the PMDG. 

Edited May 12, 20233 yr by Ponymetzger

Just now, Ponymetzger said:

It does not come even close to the PMDG. 

Well Ok then. You most certainly can have an opinion. I own every PMDG product made, some twice (P3d/MSFS).  I agree with you that they make outstanding deep level aircraft no doubt. That said, it in no way negates or rebuts my statement. I said this plane is functioning (behaving and operating) much like another 747-8 I own. Does it have a functioning LNAV?  Yes.  Does it have a functioning VNAV including managing altitude restrictions both on assent and descent?  Yes.  Does the FMC act and behave accordingly to other Boeing FMCs including the ability to add, delete, and edit waypoints? Why yes it does, so your statement is a bit hyperbolic in my opinion but in this case we are discussing opinions not facts.

But here is an indisputable fact. The WT AAU2 747-8 is here and available right now. The PMDG 747-8 as good as it is and will probably be is not. And it will not be available in MSFS until 2024 at the earliest.

-B

1 hour ago, btacon said:

…and having a complete blast. It behaves and operates very much like I remember another “functioning” 747-8 from another simulator.  Looks like my weekend will be full with transcontinental flights galore!

Anyone else?

-B

Thanks for the feedback. I'm tempted to obtain the beta because I loved what they did with the Longitude

26 minutes ago, btacon said:

Does it have a functioning LNAV?  Yes.  Does it have a functioning VNAV including managing altitude restrictions both on assent and descent?  Yes.  Does the FMC act and behave accordingly to other Boeing FMCs including the ability to add, delete, and edit waypoints? Why yes it does,

Is it, effectively, free? Yes.

38 minutes ago, Ponymetzger said:

It does not even come close to the PMDG. 

Well, seems we did our job then, as that certainly wasn't the intention to. 🙂 Thankfully, it's not a competition, and we love all the other devs.

The intention behind these aircraft was to provide the best possible sim-included-aircraft level long haul experience. So, just as with the CJ4, the focus is on deep, accurate avionics and rock-solid LNAV and VNAV, so folks would feel confident and comfortable flying these without running into flight breaking issues. And then, on top, we want to provide reasonable systems interactions so that pilots can follow the normal checklists and do most or all of the things you'd expect. Failures, non-normal configurations, what happens when I power down just one hydraulic system, etc is not really the depth that was intended. This is why we said for systems, a bit above the CJ4 (as there are more of them), but under the Longitude (which has deep physical simulations of air systems, hydraulics, electrical, fuel, etc). I'm sure there will be third party project to bring things to that level.

But the vast majority of normal pilot interactions should be crisp, solid, with a super authentic avionics experience, a good flight model adhering extremely closely to book numbers; the stuff our actual long haul pilot testers cared and care most about. And, don't be fooled! There still is plenty of depth: TCAS is completely to the TCAS II spec, LNAV does all the crazy procedures you want with RF, we have our full GPS satellite simulation, RNAV and Boeing IAN, autoland, a nearly 1 for 1 HUD, pixel peeper accurate glass visuals (our guys are nerds too), a ton of the FMC, lots and lots of CAS messages, the list goes on and on. It's definitely still highly highly advanced.

But, just want to keep expectations in the reality zone. Hopefully folks enjoy the value that they're getting for the price.

7 minutes ago, MattNischan said:

But, just want to keep expectations in the reality zone. Hopefully folks enjoy the value that they're getting for the price.

Matt just won the Internet today.

6 minutes ago, MattNischan said:

Well, seems we did our job then, as that certainly wasn't the intention to. 🙂 Thankfully, it's not a competition, and we love all the other devs.

The intention behind these aircraft was to provide the best possible sim-included-aircraft level long haul experience. So, just as with the CJ4, the focus is on deep, accurate avionics and rock-solid LNAV and VNAV, so folks would feel confident and comfortable flying these without running into flight breaking issues. And then, on top, we want to provide reasonable systems interactions so that pilots can follow the normal checklists and do most or all of the things you'd expect. Failures, non-normal configurations, what happens when I power down just one hydraulic system, etc is not really the depth that was intended. This is why we said for systems, a bit above the CJ4 (as there are more of them), but under the Longitude (which has deep physical simulations of air systems, hydraulics, electrical, fuel, etc). I'm sure there will be third party project to bring things to that level.

But the vast majority of normal pilot interactions should be crisp, solid, with a super authentic avionics experience, a good flight model adhering extremely closely to book numbers; the stuff our actual long haul pilot testers cared and care most about. And, don't be fooled! There still is plenty of depth: TCAS is completely to the TCAS II spec, LNAV does all the crazy procedures you want with RF, we have our full GPS satellite simulation, RNAV and Boeing IAN, autoland, a nearly 1 for 1 HUD, pixel peeper accurate glass visuals (our guys are nerds too), a ton of the FMC, lots and lots of CAS messages, the list goes on and on. It's definitely still highly highly advanced.

But, just want to keep expectations in the reality zone. Hopefully folks enjoy the value that they're getting for the price.

I have never really touched the 787 and 747 in MSFS  and after last night's first flight will be back. 

And I started simming with 747's using Aerowinx's first gen 747 product Precision Simulator which PMDG wrote the manual for.

The expectation for the final release (out of beta) for this AAU2 is when?, end May?, June?.

1 hour ago, Ponymetzger said:

It does not even come close to the PMDG. 

Which still doesn't function properly in MSFS.

57 minutes ago, MattNischan said:

But, just want to keep expectations in the reality zone. Hopefully folks enjoy the value that they're getting for the price.

Expectations exceeded by miles for default aircraft that's for sure... with high fidelity avionics and non-avionics systems and flight model depth for a 747-8 which still is much more than the default aircraft. Bang for buck here is off the charts, and looking forward to future AAUs and whatever else WT touches in MSFS!

This counted together with the even higher fidelity 787, Longitude, iniBuilds A310 ... and the high fidelity G1000 Nxi , G3000, G5000 avionics (unprecedented for default avionics in any sim ever and easily could be payware)... again all for *free*, in the *default* sim ... unprecedented.

Edited May 12, 20233 yr by lwt1971

1 hour ago, Ponymetzger said:

It does not even come close to the PMDG. 

‘This freeware doesn’t come close to this $140 product’ may not be the take you imagine, particularly when, in many important areas it seems that it does, actually, come very close.

1 hour ago, MattNischan said:

Well, seems we did our job then, as that certainly wasn't the intention to. 🙂 Thankfully, it's not a competition, and we love all the other devs.

The intention behind these aircraft was to provide the best possible sim-included-aircraft level long haul experience. So, just as with the CJ4, the focus is on deep, accurate avionics and rock-solid LNAV and VNAV, so folks would feel confident and comfortable flying these without running into flight breaking issues. And then, on top, we want to provide reasonable systems interactions so that pilots can follow the normal checklists and do most or all of the things you'd expect. Failures, non-normal configurations, what happens when I power down just one hydraulic system, etc is not really the depth that was intended. This is why we said for systems, a bit above the CJ4 (as there are more of them), but under the Longitude (which has deep physical simulations of air systems, hydraulics, electrical, fuel, etc). I'm sure there will be third party project to bring things to that level.

But the vast majority of normal pilot interactions should be crisp, solid, with a super authentic avionics experience, a good flight model adhering extremely closely to book numbers; the stuff our actual long haul pilot testers cared and care most about. And, don't be fooled! There still is plenty of depth: TCAS is completely to the TCAS II spec, LNAV does all the crazy procedures you want with RF, we have our full GPS satellite simulation, RNAV and Boeing IAN, autoland, a nearly 1 for 1 HUD, pixel peeper accurate glass visuals (our guys are nerds too), a ton of the FMC, lots and lots of CAS messages, the list goes on and on. It's definitely still highly highly advanced.

But, just want to keep expectations in the reality zone. Hopefully folks enjoy the value that they're getting for the price.

Well done can't wait to fly the 787 finally.

So as a coda to this topic, here are the final 19 minutes of a 2.5 hour flight, KBABKMIB one of my standard flight-test routes.  Watch it all or watch the last 3 minutes but watch something because it clearly demonstrates what a graceful gift this is to the Flight Sim Community (Available in basic MSFS 2020)

 

 

Edited May 13, 20233 yr by btacon

3 hours ago, btacon said:

I said this plane is functioning (behaving and operating) much like another 747-8 I own.

It is obvious that you have the PMDG 748. I think that you might have some issues with the PMDG installation or you are not quite up to speed with what the airplane should do.

I have noticed several issues with the MSFS (beta version) while watching the short clip. It does not seem to function like another 748.

It is our hope that the major issues will be addressed, but we cannot be certain of the outcome. We remain optimistic for a positive resolution.