Hi

I have come across a weird problem in fs9 yesterday. Firstly all my saved flights did not show up when I went to Select Flight and secondly when I went to save a flight - typed in the name and hit save, up came a box saying 'Invalid name - Flight will not be saved', also no listing of my previously saved flights.

anyone any ideas of whats gone wrong please?

I have created a folder in the main FS9 Flights folder calling it my flights and copied all my saved flights to it from C/users etc. . . and at least I can now access them again.

Can any one help?

The only thing I did prior to this was to add an ai aircraft into my aircraft folder. All was working fine before that but I cannot see how that action could cause this problem.

Flight plans are kept in a file in your Documents folder named Flight Simulator Files.  Have you checked to see if that folder exists?  If not, try creating it and placing your flight plans in it. 

hrmm wonder if the file type has been screwed up or did the above fix it?

have a good day

The Fligh Simulator Files folder in My Documents is ok. That's where I copied the files from to my newly created folder in the FS9 folder Flights.

I have just downloaded Autosave so shall see if that helps any.

Thanks guys.

Autosave does not help. I can see in it's config file it is saving the flights but they do not appear in Select Flight.

Pity

Think I may have to uninstall then reinstall fs9 aagghh!

 

Try doing a global search of your whole drive for *.FLT files to see if FS2004 is saving the flight files somewhere other than expected.

The search may take a few minutes, depending on the size of your drive and the total number of files, but you might get an answer you weren't expecting 😉

Hi, It's also worth asking you:  Which Operating System are you using? Windows 11 (at the time of my 'Upgrading') did a number of things that caused confusion. Even today I found yet another Program I use had mysteriously disappeared - Nothing to do with Flight Simulator but worth a mention as if you have updated any Hardware that may have caused a problem.

Something also worthy of note as I'm Posting - I am something of a Computer Numpty being of a certain age but, when I quite recently updated my Flight Sim Computer - upon which are a number of Flight Sims including MSFS2020 and FS9 - I found that FS9 (a much prized Flight Sim and still regularly used & a really excellent 'Game' of it's time )  - just wouldn't function at all - it refused to load!!  When I enquired into this I found that FS9 is no longer catered for by the more modern Graphic Cards!  I had no idea as my FS2004/FS9 had been through a number of updates/upgrades to my systems over the years.  There was no 'Fix' and that 'Upgrade' necessitated my moving my whole FS9 setup to another Computer - using incidentely, the card previously used in the 'Upgraded/Updated Computer!!?? 

The positive of this is that the other Flight Sims benefitted from the new gubbins including the new Nvidia RTX 5070 card - but I was not at all impressed. 

Regards, 

Blue

A couple of thoughts from this end:

• Make sure FS9.exe is "Run as Administrator"
• Make sure the destination directory for the flights is not "Read Only"

John

Blue:

To get FS2004 to run with modern GPU's & Operating Systems!

1. Install the sim - NOT in it's default 'Program Files' folder but in another. 

2. Download & install & run the fs9.1 update

3. Download & install & run the fs9.exe patch (Replace the existing fs9.exe with the new one)

4. Right-click the (new) fs9.exe & select 'Properties'

5. Click on the 'Compatibility' tab & select 'Windows XP)

6. Then click 'Run as Administrator'

Run FS2004

That's it!!

P.S. You can have multiple FS2004 installs, but that is for another time.

FS2004 WILL & Does run with modern graphics cards once the above update & patch is installed.

Link for Update:

Flight Simulator 2004 Update v9.1

Link for Patch:

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 v9.1 No-CD Patch for FS2004

Edited April 13Apr 13 by Wobbie

Hi all

Thanks for all the thoughts. 

I am running Windows 10 64 bit. Have been running FS9 successfully on this platform for 4 years with no problems up until a few days ago.

What is really annoying about these two problems is the one where I cannot save a flight no matter what title I give it, FS9 comes up with a box that states '' Invalid Flight Name ; Your flight will not be saved''

everything I have checked as per all your instructions above. 

I do have FS9 on another drive. Not in it's desired position on C:\

 

During the search for the *.FLT files it found all my .FLT files on my C drive in My Documents under the folder Flight Simulator Files and all the .FLT files I had copied to #\:Flight Simulator 9/Flights/My Saved Flights (I created that folder for this task to see if I could run my saved flights and I can) The search did not find the Autosave saved .FLT files though.

I may just install ano copy of FS9 on ano disc and start from there.

"Invalid Flight Name" often refers to the use of unrecognised punctuation or accented characters, possibly even filename length.

FS9 does have some limitations regarding stuff like flight and aircraft names ... an invalid aircraft name will simply not show up as a choice or work as an AI.

You've probably already tried, but, using the default Cessna or similar, try saving TEST at one of the default airfields and see if that works.

Hi chris_eve

No it doesn't want to know that either. 

In the next few days I shall install another copy of FS9 on another partition or disc that has enough room for it and see if that works. If it does then I shall copy or load up my scenery and aircraft I want (far too many I never use!).

Thanks for all your suggestions guys. If I come across a cure I shall post it here.

Cj75s

 

Before you install another copy, find & delete 'fs9.cfg'

Normally here: C:\Users\yourname\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\FS9

If you cannot find it, download 'Everything' from www.voidtools,com - it's a very quick desktop search engine that finds as you type.

The sim will rebuild a new on when it starts up again. You will probably need to redo you key & button assignments afterwards.

The has got me up & running again, after an oopsie!.

You just never know, it's worth a try.

Edited April 15Apr 15 by Wobbie

Hello again Wobbie  😉  It's a while since we communicated here - Glad you're still out there. 

Also, thanks for the information in your Post as to getting FS9 to run on modern hardware - it is of great interest. However, I did have a number of iterations of our Famous Flight Sim on my Upgraded Computer and I'm certain all were up dated to v9.1. I also have the 'No Disc' Software that I've used for many years. That said, I  (think) I left at least one Copy of FS9 on the 'Modern gear' machine and so I shall be checking out everything to see if I did indeed make a mistake!  It would still be far more convenient to have all the Flight Sims on my Flight Sim Computer obviously. 

If I manage to sort the Problem I will Post here for the benefit of anyone else with the same issue. My thanks again.

Regards, 

Blue

Nice chatting again.. 

I'm working on yet another FS9 install, beginning of flight, up to the 1930's. With suitable mods & scenery.

Best of luck sorting out the issue, & thanks, in anticipation, for your sharing the solution.

 

Regards

Robin