Active Sky review

[Bobsk8 12,929]

Been flying for many hours with Active Sky since the day it went on sale. Clouds look great, no issues, love the thunder and lightning which I haven't heard or seen in over a year and a half with default weather. No more towering cumulous clouds everywhere, and nothing else.  

[Lars-Contrail 14]

I was also interested in seeing the difference between Active Sky and MSFS Live Weather. So I chose a few spots around the globe and took comparison screenshots. I especially like the Stratus cloud type, rarely or never seen this with the default weather.

Results can be seen here, included the current METAR and a comparison slider.
https://contrail.shop/products/hifi-simtech-active-sky-msfs

Disclaimer: Not intended as self promotion, but figured I would post it anyway since it's the best form of comparing screenshots

[UAL4life 251]

7 hours ago, Bobsk8 said:

Been flying for many hours with Active Sky since the day it went on sale. Clouds look great, no issues, love the thunder and lightning which I haven't heard or seen in over a year and a half with default weather. No more towering cumulous clouds everywhere, and nothing else.  

It’s a joke that Asobo can’t get the weather right. 

[mmcmah 448]

59 minutes ago, Lars-Contrail said:

I was also interested in seeing the difference between Active Sky and MSFS Live Weather. So I chose a few spots around the globe and took comparison screenshots. I especially like the Stratus cloud type, rarely or never seen this with the default weather.

Results can be seen here, included the current METAR and a comparison slider.
https://contrail.shop/products/hifi-simtech-active-sky-msfs

Disclaimer: Not intended as self promotion, but figured I would post it anyway since it's the best form of comparing screenshots

Love the comparisons - thanks!

[fppilot 4,421]

15 hours ago, Lars-Contrail said:

I especially like the Stratus cloud type, rarely or never seen this with the default weather.

+1
In full agreement!. Here are a couple of shots from different flights.

Edited May 16 by fppilot

[Juan LLobera 15]

I've purchased ActiveSky mainly looking for more type of clouds (which IMHO delivers along better visibility/humidity depiction) and also to show some support to a piece of software thats been with the FS community since forever.

My main issue right know is turbulence effects . I find them to be event more unrealistic that MSFS default. Anybody knows if Active Sky overrides MSFS turbulence or works along with it? I mean if I set all turbulence effects in ActiveSky to 0, would I still be getting MSFS turbulence? 
I've tried a couple of flights doing this but it seems ActiveSky either cancels all effects or I was unlucky (lucky) to hit a smooth ride.

 

[mmcmah 448]

7 minutes ago, Juan LLobera said:

I've purchased ActiveSky mainly looking for more type of clouds (which IMHO delivers along better visibility/humidity depiction) and also to show some support to a piece of software thats been with the FS community since forever.

My main issue right know is turbulence effects . I find them to be event more unrealistic that MSFS default. Anybody knows if Active Sky overrides MSFS turbulence or works along with it? I mean if I set all turbulence effects in ActiveSky to 0, would I still be getting MSFS turbulence? 
I've tried a couple of flights doing this but it seems ActiveSky either cancels all effects or I was unlucky (lucky) to hit a smooth ride.

 

Works along with and supplements the MSFS setting. I'm asuming that you're using the Preset more rather than the Passive mode?

Many have complained of turbulence being too high and so the slider defaults tend to be a good place to start. Did you choose REALISM or EASY as your starting mode? The dev has indicated that the app was developed with Low turbulence in MSFS, but I've seen others mention that they're using up to Realistic in MSFS. You'll have to try different situations and tweak the various options.

The nice thing about historical weather is that you can always look for a storm or condition you want and then roll back and try it multiple times.

[Juan LLobera 15]

14 minutes ago, mmcmah said:

Works along with and supplements the MSFS setting. I'm asuming that you're using the Preset more rather than the Passive mode?

Many have complained of turbulence being too high and so the slider defaults tend to be a good place to start. Did you choose REALISM or EASY as your starting mode? The dev has indicated that the app was developed with Low turbulence in MSFS, but I've seen others mention that they're using up to Realistic in MSFS. You'll have to try different situations and tweak the various options.

The nice thing about historical weather is that you can always look for a storm or condition you want and then roll back and try it multiple times.

Yes. I'm using the preset. I understand Passive will only apply effects but no depiction. I've been only using Realism as starting point. But I'll double check. 
Thank you for the reply.

Edited May 16 by Juan LLobera

[Bobsk8 12,929]

The turbulence in Active Sky is much more realistic than it ever was with default weather. I have my turbulence in MSFS set to Low. 

[MarcG 3,051]

Just to clarify; Should I fly in Australia with historical weather, does that include turbulence fitting for daytime flights?

[mmcmah 448]

4 minutes ago, MarcG said:

Just to clarify; Should I fly in Australia with historical weather, does that include turbulence fitting for daytime flights?

Flying with historical weather includes the global weather data for that date/time. As such, if ASFS would inject turbulence in live weather due to the conditions, it would also do it in historical mode under the same conditions.

[MarcG 3,051]

Awesome thanks, just needed clarification 🙂

[rob0203 701]

On 5/15/2024 at 11:26 PM, UAL4life said:

It’s a joke that Asobo can’t get the weather right. 

I don’t know about that: Do you remember Prepar3d / FSX?

[El Diablito 338]

I may buy this later on but have a question before I do...

What is the best balance when using the settings Download Interval, Smoothing Rate and Theme Reload Interval to produce the most realistic effect of cloud population into the sim?

I can work out turbulence myself but it seems those settings are the most important when it comes to the most accurate depiction of clouds when sing the app.

Cheers.

edit: I forgot to add I don't fly GA, only tubeliners.

Edited May 17 by El Diablito

[Fiorentoni 4,458]

1 hour ago, El Diablito said:

I may buy this later on but have a question before I do...

What is the best balance when using the settings Download Interval, Smoothing Rate and Theme Reload Interval to produce the most realistic effect of cloud population into the sim?

I can work out turbulence myself but it seems those settings are the most important when it comes to the most accurate depiction of clouds when sing the app.

Cheers.

edit: I forgot to add I don't fly GA, only tubeliners.

I set download interval to 15 min, theme reload interval off, smoothing rate to 25. With these settings the weather is mostly "in transition" from interval to interval, creating a believable effect of "flying into weather", but also updated weather every 15 min.