What non-scenery addons would you recommend

[Blasb 55]

Hi all! 

Just got X-Plane 12 to complement my P3Dv5.4 (which I use as my main sim) and I am thoroughly enjoying it (I love the clouds, the default airports and heck even the default scenery). I therefore thought I would check in with some of you more experienced X-Plane enthusiasts to see what some of the must-have non-scenery addons to get are (since I understand basically ortho and simheaven is a must if you wanna upgrade in that regard).

Thus far I understand that Activesky, XPrealistic, Groundhandling by Jardesign and better pushback should be on my to-get list but anything else? Please note that I will mainly fly old/new commercial aviation (think planes such as Felis 747, A300, A350, etc.) if that impacts the type of addons I should prioritize. Thank you in advance for any input!🙂

[Dirk.M 84]

Hello,

When you prever older Planes then Aeroworks Douglas C47 dakota with the KLN90b GPS-System as a plugin for the C47. 

Otherwise see here: Freeware or Payware

You asked not for Sceneries but look at this:

I use X-World from Simheaven and if you fly in Germany then VFR Germany.

The next ist Autoortho vor the best scenerie.

 

Greatings

 

[Blasb 55]

14 minutes ago, Dirk.M said:

Hello,

When you prever older Planes then Aeroworks Douglas C47 dakota with the KLN90b GPS-System as a plugin for the C47. 

Otherwise see here: Freeware or Payware

You asked not for Sceneries but look at this:

I use X-World from Simheaven and if you fly in Germany then VFR Germany.

The next ist Autoortho vor the best scenerie.

 

Greatings

 

Thanks Dirk! Will have a look at the provided links!🙂

[MrBitstFlyer 3,896]

51 minutes ago, Blasb said:

Thanks Dirk! Will have a look at the provided links!🙂

More scenery I'm afraid, but you must also have Global Forests in XP12.  Along with AutoOrtho and SimHeaven sceneries, XP12 is transformed.

[Blasb 55]

5 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

More scenery I'm afraid, but you must also have Global Forests in XP12.  Along with AutoOrtho and SimHeaven sceneries, XP12 is transformed.

Thanks for the suggestions! A follow-up question: What is the FPS impact of adding all of these? Haha I would want avoid to large decreases in that department 😁

[Dirk.M 84]

The suggestions i gave are Freeware, try is and you will see.

On my rig it works very well, but fps and smoothness is a personal feeling. I think that 25 - 30 is fully ok, i get mostly more then 50 fps.

Edited October 20, 2023 by Dirk.M

[MrBitstFlyer 3,896]

1 hour ago, Blasb said:

What is the FPS impact of adding all of these?

I rather judge performance in smoothness, rather than chasing FPS.

[Blasb 55]

33 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

I rather judge performance in smoothness, rather than chasing FPS.

Haha good point. I just want to avoid the smoothness being impacted by fluctuating fps (due to scenery loading) 😄

[mSparks 2,094]

3 hours ago, Blasb said:

Thanks for the suggestions! A follow-up question: What is the FPS impact of adding all of these? Haha I would want avoid to large decreases in that department 😁

You will get better performance switching to ortho - trade cpu time for disk space. 

depending on what you want.

littlenavmap can be handy

https://albar965.github.io/littlenavmap.html

there are a few landing rate displays around e.g.

https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/43586-a-new-landing-rate-display/

avitab is a must for tubeliners

https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/44825-avitab-vr-compatible-tablet-with-pdf-viewer-moving-maps-and-more/

as is terrain radar

https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/37864-terrain-radar-vertical-situation-display/

zibomod for logging your 737 hours. (I dont have a link for that to hand, its a google drive I think)

I do a lot of dev on the 744, sparky744

https://github.com/mSparks43/747-400

For "xp flight planning" the website

https://www.airports4xp.info/

Is great for getting xplane specific airport details.

Oh, of course, SteamVR and a decent VR headset highly recommended. 

Edited October 20, 2023 by mSparks

[coastaldriver 920]

Blasb - like yourself I was a dedicated P3DV5+ user but I switched to XPlane and that is where I stay for lots of reasons anyway my experience with XP is that you get a load of standard features that is - the sim is built properly the use of the combined talents of the community means you have default scenery that is amazing - in fact I have only bought 2 scenery addons. There are of course a load of sceneries about done by keen locals or passionate about some place and my only advise there - do not use addon scenery older than for XP11.5 on I only use two main scenery addons - Simheaven and Global Forests by ORBX - that it. Between the sim looks brilliant (Yes there are some minor blemishes or areas that will need to be fixed but overall excellent. 

I have Ground Handling Deluxe (GHD) because it gave me access to a variety of ground handling sets configured for different aeroplanes. It is a pain to use otherwise - shame. There is a simple ground handling addon for free which does fine actually.

A must is X-Organiser this will keep your scenery ini in order and properly sequenced and tell you about problems - availabe via XPlane. Org - a must. 

Fly with Lua should be installed as well - lot of good stuff about for those who like it and does nothing if your not using a script!

I use Navmap for my planning and data base reference capacity works fine with XP just as it did with P3D. I am not convinced about ActiveSky from HIFI - reason apart from probably a more frequent weather update function and some other stuff - does not do anything more than what I can get from NAVMAP and the sim itself (the Map Function) The weather function is about 90% and is fine by me also. 

That's it the rest works flawlessly out of the box - XP12 is very credible visually and has quite a few tricks up its sleeve once you use it a bit - always pleasant gotchas and surprises! From the rain effects the way water behaves at the ocean or lake edge, sloping runways - animated world on an off the airport and all done at a scale that keeps the perspective constant remarkably. 

I have had some very very pleasurable simulation flights that just well - make you stop and say Wow!

So apart from good quality models which is a matter of taste and your type of sim flying - compared to say P3D I have nothing added no special scripts no FSUIPC no special data connections etc it is refreshing to just use a high quality simulation like this out of the box with some minor changes to improve the visuals at no expense to performance. 

Have fun. There are some amazingly good simulation models in XPLane - and the flight physics - pretty true all up. Even a Cessna C172 make you sweat for it some days!

Edited October 21, 2023 by coastaldriver

[UKflyer 630]

autoortho and 3jfps which keeps the fps high in object dense areas

[Blasb 55]

Thanks all of you for taking the time to provide input! It is very helpful and much appreciated 🙂

[Blasb 55]

7 hours ago, coastaldriver said:

Blasb - like yourself I was a dedicated P3DV5+ user but I switched to XPlane and that is where I stay for lots of reasons anyway my experience with XP is that you get a load of standard features that is - the sim is built properly the use of the combined talents of the community means you have default scenery that is amazing - in fact I have only bought 2 scenery addons. There are of course a load of sceneries about done by keen locals or passionate about some place and my only advise there - do not use addon scenery older than for XP11.5 on I only use two main scenery addons - Simheaven and Global Forests by ORBX - that it. Between the sim looks brilliant (Yes there are some minor blemishes or areas that will need to be fixed but overall excellent. 

I have Ground Handling Deluxe (GHD) because it gave me access to a variety of ground handling sets configured for different aeroplanes. It is a pain to use otherwise - shame. There is a simple ground handling addon for free which does fine actually.

A must is X-Organiser this will keep your scenery ini in order and properly sequenced and tell you about problems - availabe via XPlane. Org - a must. 

Fly with Lua should be installed as well - lot of good stuff about for those who like it and does nothing if your not using a script!

I use Navmap for my planning and data base reference capacity works fine with XP just as it did with P3D. I am not convinced about ActiveSky from HIFI - reason apart from probably a more frequent weather update function and some other stuff - does not do anything more than what I can get from NAVMAP and the sim itself (the Map Function) The weather function is about 90% and is fine by me also. 

That's it the rest works flawlessly out of the box - XP12 is very credible visually and has quite a few tricks up its sleeve once you use it a bit - always pleasant gotchas and surprises! From the rain effects the way water behaves at the ocean or lake edge, sloping runways - animated world on an off the airport and all done at a scale that keeps the perspective constant remarkably. 

I have had some very very pleasurable simulation flights that just well - make you stop and say Wow!

So apart from good quality models which is a matter of taste and your type of sim flying - compared to say P3D I have nothing added no special scripts no FSUIPC no special data connections etc it is refreshing to just use a high quality simulation like this out of the box with some minor changes to improve the visuals at no expense to performance. 

Have fun. There are some amazingly good simulation models in XPLane - and the flight physics - pretty true all up. Even a Cessna C172 make you sweat for it some days!

Yeah I got some of the Simheaven scenery yesterday and it was a huge improvement! I will also have a look at the Global forests by Orbx (I am huge fan of Orbx myself so nice to hear they have a good scenery enhancing products for X-Plane 12!) + As you mentioned, I am also a big fan of the fact that with X-Plane 12 I am able to avoid tons of addons (and that a lot of the good ones are free!), which would be required to have a enjoyably experience in P3D (hence why I love the fact that I know kinda have two high-end flight simulator games to the cost of basically one). 🙂

[coastaldriver 920]

Apart from a few aircraft I do not miss much now from P3D. I have not used it all now for over a year! Swings and roundabouts lot of aircraft I have now in XP did not have in P3D I guess if there is one addon that I do miss it is Heinrichs Global Ship Traffic nothing like that yet available in XP (lack of ship models that is all). The only ORBX addons I now have are their basic library and the Global Trees/Forest. Lighting and clouds are better handled in XP as are sloping runways etc overall I think the lights/lighting in XP is superb really. Basically no need for most of what I had ORBX for in P3D. Airports and Scenery!

Now I spend the odd dollar on a top tier model like the Tolliss Airbus or the XCraft EJet but that said the offerring by some of the amateur or hobby built models are equally impressive. What is a matter of taste I guess. 

[mSparks 2,094]

2 hours ago, coastaldriver said:

Heinrichs Global Ship Traffic nothing like that yet available in XP (lack of ship models that is all).

I take it you are aware of

https://github.com/Marginal/SeaTraffic

It was recommended to me, but isn't something I have on my current install.