On 8/27/2024 at 10:46 PM, MarkW said:

The big question for me is how much disk space will it take up.  I hope most of the World Updates are on the server and not on the disk anymore.

From what I gleaned from several podcasts, all scenery including World Updates will be streamed. Even airports and aircraft if they are purchased in the Marketplace.
At least the marketplace items can be downloaded as well.

For those with less than ideal network bandwidth, hopefully the local cache will be sufficient to allow for a smooth experience.

Ok.  I didn't buy much from Marketplace.  I meant stuff like from flight sim .to and things like the PMDG 737 and FS2Crew.  

3 minutes ago, Abriael said:

Unless you REALLY need something immediately, wait for January. 

I concur. AMD will release its new 9000x3D chips then, and Intel will also be releasing new CPU's by then. Hopefully we will hear from Nvida when they will launch their 5000 generation GPU's soon.

56 minutes ago, kevinmdavis2010 said:

Thanks!  I thought I heard that 2024 would just refuse to install if 2020 was on the same computer.  Now I just need to figure out how to go about transferring my Community Folder stuff from 2020 to 2024.  Do you just copy/paste it from the two folders, or should you get an external hard drive to back the original stuff up?  

If you only want to keep 2024, you should be able to just move the addons over. If you're like me and want to keep 2020 for a while, it might be possible to use two separate installations of Addons Linker which then create symbolic links to each of the community folders. 

I meant to test that during the tech alpha, but forgot.

Realistically, assuming bad internet bandwidth, how much hard drive space should one plan for?

10 hours ago, Cpt_Piett said:

If you only want to keep 2024, you should be able to just move the addons over. If you're like me and want to keep 2020 for a while, it might be possible to use two separate installations of Addons Linker which then create symbolic links to each of the community folders. 

 

There is no reason to store add-ons on the same drive as MSFS, and never was. Placing them on a separate drive is the sensible thing to do for a variety of reasons.

In a few weeks I plan to go onto Windows 11 with 24H2 patch.

I do want to upgrade the GPU. Considering I have an AMD 5800X3d I think the best GPU I prefer, in terms of power and efficiency will be the RTX 5070 Ti with rumoured power draw of 220-250 watts. However there's likely to be a delay and only the 5070 will be available initially. So yeah.

Edited October 15, 20241 yr by Greazer

11 hours ago, Allard said:

Hopefully we will hear from Nvida when they will launch their 5000 generation GPU's soon.

the bottom line is throughput, the chart shows how much better 5090 will be compared to 4090. 1792 vs.1008.

https://www.pcgamer.com/hardware/graphics-cards/the-latest-nvidia-rtx-5090-specs-rumour-makes-the-ol-rtx-4090-look-like-a-goddam-clown-card/

But it draws 150 more watts.

2 hours ago, cobalt said:

There is no reason to store add-ons on the same drive as MSFS, and never was. Placing them on a separate drive is the sensible thing to do for a variety of reasons.

That’s what I’m doing. 

Nice checklist. As others have mentioned I would ditch the  "defragging". Its a holdover from old systems, old spinners running old OS's. You cannot defrag SSD, Win 10/11 wont allow it.

However 🙂 if you miss those colored squares theres a sim for that!

https://defrag98.com/

9 hours ago, cobalt said:

There is no reason to store add-ons on the same drive as MSFS, and never was. Placing them on a separate drive is the sensible thing to do for a variety of reasons.

I would be interested to know those reasons.

2 hours ago, Christopher Low said:

I would be interested to know those reasons.

If the drive dies you don't lose everything, for one.

3 hours ago, Christopher Low said:

I would be interested to know those reasons.

Storing add-on files on a separate drive from MSFS, and using Addon Linker to place links to selected add-ons in Community, avoids issues that can arise with updates and during reinstallation of MSFS, and keeps the MSFS drive from filling up with add-ons. Moreover, loading times for MSFS are reduced since your add-ons are stored separately. With AL, you never have to worry about what to do with the Community folder in various operations because your add-ons are never stored there -- only links. 

10 hours ago, Cpt_Piett said:

That’s what I’m doing. 

I assumed you were. My post was aimed at the still-numerous MSFS users who worry about storage space on their MSFS drive, what to do with their Community folder during updates and reinstallations of MSFS, etc. 

Edited October 15, 20241 yr by cobalt

On 10/14/2024 at 9:15 AM, Cpt_Piett said:

If you only want to keep 2024, you should be able to just move the addons over. If you're like me and want to keep 2020 for a while, it might be possible to use two separate installations of Addons Linker which then create symbolic links to each of the community folders. 

I meant to test that during the tech alpha, but forgot.

On 10/12/2024 at 7:59 PM, Bad_T said:

Hello 🍻

With the current AL version, you can already have 2 separates shortcuts, for example one for v2020 and one for v2024 if you plan to use both sims for some time.

You need to install AL only once :

- by default the shortcut has no command line parameter and AL creates its configuration files here for v2020 -> C:\ProgramData\MSFS Addons Linker

- if you want to use it for v2024 before a specific 2024 version of AL is released, you can create another configuration folder (create it manually), for example -> C:\ProgramData\MSFS Addons Linker 2024

- Then create a new shortcut, in the shortcut set the command line parameter configfolder="your folder" .. so in my example it would be configfolder="C:\ProgramData\MSFS Addons Linker 2024" like shown in the image below

- When you launch the new shortcut for the first time, you will get redirected to the options screen, there you will be able to set your custom addons folders (some folder could be shared with msfs2020 if the addons are 100% compatible), then you would need to set your msfs2024 community folder. You can also set a new folder for the presets if those should not be shared between the 2 sims.

So then you have 2 shortcuts, the one you already used for v2020 that will stay the same, and a new one with the command line parameter for v2024 that will have a few different parameters and will create the 'links' in the 2024 community folder. Obviously some features will require a new specific version for 2024 like for example the 'launch sim' option which is for now tied to the 2020 version.

When v2024 is released, i'll certainly try to to improve all that and make a specific version for 2024 (either a different EXE or something to switch sim within the same EXE). A different EXE will probably be easier but I'm still a bit unsure what would be better and how all this will be done but i'll try to get it done quickly (although i'm not sure v2024 will run on my oldish pc which is slightly below min specs 😱 😱).

But even on day one it should be possible to use the current version to create the links for both v2020 and v2024 if needed with this little command line trick until the new version of AL is ready.

If you have ideas or remarks about all this or if something is not clear, let me know, thank you. 🍻