tunnelcat

Ronald,This may be a long shot, but you might what to try this if you don't have it set already.Go into PMDG options when you bring up the menu while in FS. Go to the AFDS section and make sure that BOTH throttle and control override selections are UNCHECKED.This can be a problem if your controllers are putting out spurious noise inputs. Another way around this is to make sure your controllers have a bigger dead zone when you calibrate them.Kim

Ken,I'm using the 93.82 Nvidia driver and find the following problems on my 7950GT card with Win XP. All of these problems show up in full screen mode only.FSAA below 4X, the aircraft preview screen is visible on the menu selection screen but a lot of menu flashing when going between menus or windows within FS9, the PMDG AIRAC load time takes 2 minutes or longer.FSAA 4X or 6X, aircraft preview picture goes black, the PMDG AIRAC load time takes 2 minutes or greater, still a lot of menu flashing going on when switching menus.FSAA at 8X (max), no more menu flashing, PMDG AIRAC load time around 10 seconds, but the aircraft preview screen is still black.If I want to see the aircraft in the preview screen when in 8X, I have to switch to windowed mode. Do you have any of these problems?Kim

My system also has problems with clouds and frame rates.Windows XPIntel 3.2 EE single coreNvidia 7950GT 5122G of RAMI use Flight Environment for my clouds and my system is several years old, so clouds are what really drop my frame rate, but no so much as to make flying uncomfortable. Frame rates are around 12 FPS at the worst times with a PMDG aircraft in VC with weather being generated at a busy airport.But if you REALLY want to see frame rates tank, load up the 9 Dragons Kai Tak scenery. Even with detail set to medium, using the PMDG 747 in VC mode will get me a slide show of 6 FPS! EEEEEEK!One trick you might try is to set 'visibility' to around 20 to 30 miles and see if that helps. I know it's hazy, but hey, the sky's a dirty place anymore and it helps to hide the short draw distance for clouds in FS.Kim

Ultimate Night Environment and Flight Deck 4 (Abacus). The first one didn't back up the original FS texture files, so they were overwritten and lost, also the lights seemed too bright at night. The second one had a serious case of the blurries that couldn't be resolved, no matter what you did. Even the VC cockpit textures blurred within the aircraft! Iiiiiiiick!Kim

Oh for crying out loud! They installed them automatically. When I read the PDF, the instructions indicated that you had to manually copy the files into the 'Flights' folder. I should have looked in there in the first place! Thanks. :-eekKim

I just installed the fantastic Kai Tak 9 Dragons V2 and I'm blown away by it! One question though, they indicated in the PDF that the package came with some flights that you could install in FS9's 'Flights' folder. I haven't been able to locate these in my 9 Dragons directory and was wondering what folder they are located in so that I could try them out?Kim

FIRST: Bandwidth reduction suggestion for AVSIM:The 9Dragons Version 1 parts should be more clearly labeled in the header and description. The only way I could tell was by the January file dates. I mistakenly downloaded two >80Mbyte Version 1 parts because they are intermixed in with Version 2 in the file library list. Also, the Version 2 description would be more helpful if it said that Version 1 is not required and should not be downloaded. This information is available only in the 22MB PDF file.Sorry for wasting your bandwidth downloading some unneeded files!= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =SECOND: Install questions and issuesI downloaded the following ZIP files from the AVSIM file library:9dv2p1-4.zip 1 Feb 2008part_2of4.zip 1 Feb 20089dv2p3-4.zip 1 Feb 20089dv2p4-4.zip 1 Feb 2008kaitak_approaches.zip 28 Jan 2008QUESTION 1=> Are the files in kaitak_approaches.zip 28 Jan 2008 required for Version 2?QUESTION 2=> Why is the file "part_2of4.zip" 1 Feb 2008 named differently from the other 3 parts? This adds to the confusion over what parts to download.QUESTION 3=> Is there a preferred location for the dedicated 9Dragons file folder? (e.g. on the FS9 drive or within the FS9 subdirectory, etc.)QUESTION 4=> Is the file named "9Dragons V2 Installer.D03" missing from the AVSIM download zip files? It's listed in the PDF manual. NOTE: This question was already answered (THANKS) by Clutch Cargo's POSTING "There are only four parts to 9Dragons V2" at this link:http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...6&mesg_id=37936Here are the files I have after unzipping into a dedicated folder per the instructions:9Dragons Pilot's Guide v2.pdf 9Dragons V2 Installer.exe 9Dragons V2 Installer.D019Dragons V2 Installer.D02avsim.diz README_1.txt README_2.txt README_3.txt README_4.txt = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =This looks like it will be a fantastic add-on and I want to thank everybody who has worked hard providing this for all of us. I would also encourage donations to the AVSIM library fund.Kim

I'll have to admit that I've been tempted to hit those 'X' shaped buildings in Redmond, especially after a few aggravating flying lessons or a 'CTD' in the middle of a long flight that took a lot of preparation.The only reason I heard of that the crash graphics are not being rendered very realistically was due to 9/11. Didn't Microsoft remove those after that? All the graphics in flight sim have been gravitating toward a more realistic look, except for the crash effects.Kim

Why???? The crash animations in FS9 are not even realistic looking or fun to watch!Kim

Hey guys, I'm female and I don't like to crash while flying my aircraft in FS. The whole point is NOT to crash, where is the skill in that! I get great satisfaction in being able to complete a flight with a complex airliner without any mishaps, especially trying to get the best takeoffs and butter smooth landings with few errors in between. A crash just shows that you made some mistake in a procedure or need more piloting practice.I even had a collision with another aircraft (approach in the clouds, no TCAS, bad ATC) that disabled my landing gear, but I still wanted to successfully land the aircraft in one piece. In fact, I'd like to do that scenario again, but I've never been able to replicate it. I also like to play first-person shooter games, but I haven't let that mentality creep into my flight simulation, except once. That ONE time I deliberately crashed the aircraft when I was taking one of Rod's lessons and got ticked off when it terminated prematurely (several times) thanks to Microsoft's built-in short time constraint. Oops, sorry Rod, but I felt I needed to auger you in just once. :-violin Kim

I actually got to land there with a friend in his Piper quite a few years back. Talk about a HAIRY landing! There are (or were, it's been awhile) trees at the approach end of the runway and mountains on the back side. You have to perform a very steep landing approach to avoid the trees, very white knuckle.There were a couple of wreaked aircraft alongside the runway then, a testament to the difficulties landing a plane there.Kim

According to Sound & Vision magazine, my Sony Bravia 40" diagonal LCD TV (with 1920x1080 pixels in the display) has a contrast ratio that is good as the plasma HDTV sets that used to be much better than LCD sets. High-end LCD sets have good contrast ratio provided they are adjusted correctly (the default settings are usually meant to look good only in the showroom with bright lights).NOTE: In America the broadcast networks are not all in 720P. NBC and CBS are mostly broadcasting prime time shows (not most game or reality shows) in 1080i. FOX, ABC and ESPN are mostly 720p -- they chose 720p because it does a better job with fast moving sports action than 1080i, which requires more digital compression. 1080i will give more detail in slow moving pictures because the digital compression software can use more of the same pixel information from frame to frame.However, some local TV stations are choosing to compress the HDTV network picture further so they can squeeze in more than one virtual channel on their over-the-air broadcast channel. For example, my local PBS station has 4 virtual digital TV channels squeezed into their one physical broadcast channel. (1 is HD and the other 3 are SD or standard definition TV pictures)But for computer games it is the pixel count that matters, not the TV broadcast standards of 720p or 1080i. The more pixels the better on a computer game, provided your video card is fast enough to handle it. 720p is 1280x720 pixels and 1080i and 1080p are 1920x1080 pixels, however some sets will have more or less pixels than this in the actual display because the standard does NOT specify the number of horizontal pixels, only the number of lines 720 or 1080. For example, plasma sets mostly had only 1024 pixels across by 720 pixels vertically, but this is now true only on the cheaper plasma sets. 720p LCD sets sometimes have 1366x768 to be compatible with standard 1024x768 computer display resolutions.NOTE: On one of my older HDTV sets (not my high-end Sony), as with many sets, the VGA connection is not able to give the full 1920x1080 pixel display. On some HDTV sets you must have a computer video card with an HDMI output to get the full 1920x1080 pixel resolution with a computer game. Likewise, the DVI connections that are common on computer video cards and a few older TV sets are limited in resolution unless they have a dual-link DVI connection. (Few people spec this in a way that you can find out which one you have -- you must actually try it out in the showroom with your portable computer to see what the set can do.)Fewer sets are being made with DVI ports, and VGA ports are vanishing from HDTV sets in favor of HDMI. The computer video card makers are slow in adopting HDMI as an output because HDMI can either have copy protection or not, but many things won't work without the copy protection, such as watching a DVD!Kim

Why would anybody even THINK that an aircraft couldn't take off from a moving belt. The engine's thrust is not in ANY way connected to the ground, so of course it will provide thrust and cause forward movement of the aircraft through the air, thus providing lift when the proper speed is achieved, no matter what the wheels were doing. The only exception would be if the wheels had a substantial amount of friction and caused drag, impeding forward motion, i.e. bad brakes or bearings, causing the plane to slow or move backwards with the belt. The only case were this myth would be true is if the aircraft got it's forward thrust through the wheels only, which wouldn't be very practical for flight.This is one of those old trick questions that physics professors used to ask a class. One example is the balloon in the car scenario. The question was what would happen to a balloon in a closed car that starts to move forward. Would the balloon move backwards as the car accelerated or would it hold still? Think about it. There are many influencing factors.Kim

John,Adding more RAM will not get you any boost unless you have the 64bit version of Vista.Here are some tweaks from the February 2008 PC GAMER that might help.Turn off Desktop Search by right clicking on your hard drive in Windows Explorer and UNCHECK "Index this drive for faster searching". This one could be causing the occasional FPS drop. Turn off the Sidebar by right clicking on the tray icon before you launch FSX.Here's a really weird one they recommended. You can use a USB storage device with ReadyBoost in Windows Vista. They say to plug in your flash drive, right click on the device in Windows Explorer, select Properties, click on the ReadyBoost tab, select Use This Device and then select the amount of space you would like the OS to use.I have no idea if this one even works. I haven't tried it out yet.Kim

Sorry Rick. You wouldn't want my sister. Totally clueless about anything to do with computers, aviation and simulation. Besides, she's taken. :-outta

Jonathon,We females can pick up a thing or two. My husband and I are about to celebrate our 30th and he's put up with my sim hobby since Chuck Yeager's Combat Sim and everything after. He couldn't tell me what a GPU, EICAS, PND, FMC is if I asked him, he's just not interested. At least he tolerates my desire to fly simulations on the computer. I especially tweaked him when I wanted to purchase a $60 aircraft (747 Queen of the Skies) from PMDG! But I convinced him that it was far more realistic and superior to the default aircraft in FS and he saw the value in it.You'll find it's not an all male pursuit. There must be more females out there that like flight simulation.Kim

You have a good point. Flying a real aircraft and flying a sim aircraft are very different animals. I have flown real aircraft (Cessna and Piper) and the tactile feedback, weight, mass, wind and gravity are things that are very much lacking in simulation flying. They can either help or hinder your control of the aircraft if you are not used to it.However, with an airliner, if you have gained proficient knowledge of the flight control systems from a simulator experience, especially a PMDG or Level-D product, I think that such a person could land an airliner using the autopilot and autoland features of the aircraft and succeed. But it would only work if the 'pilot' was very familiar with the autoflight systems.Kim

If you get an Nvidia, you'll run into the infamous 'no AA' driver problem and may have to resort to Nhancer to fix it. Right now, I have a Nvidia 7950GT and it works fine except for the AA issue. I don't have Nhancer yet but I have a workaround. I start out with FS9 in 'windowed mode' and set up my flight, otherwise I can't see the rotating aircraft in the selection screen (black window only in full screen mode). Before I hit 'fly now', I switch to 'full screen mode' (alt-enter). I have to switch back when I want to select a new aircraft. Others here have reported more serious problems with AA and Nvidia cards however.I set AA to 8X at the card's control panel and no AA within FS9. Anythings lower than 8X causes screen flashing when in the menus. I also set filtering to 'trilinear' in 'options' as well and leave the anti-aliasing set to 'off' in the card's control panel.You might be better off to find another ATI card to try out and see if the card is really your problem. I still recommend a separate drive for FS9. Best change I ever made.Kim

The only icing problems that I have seen so far is pitot tube freeze up and loss of the corresponding gauges, airspeed for example. I've never had any flight control or stall problems, i.e. wing icing show up, even in the worst conditions. Either it's not modeled very well in FS9 or I haven't flown in the worst of it yet. I did have my throttles stick once (no engine response) after a long climb in the 747 Queen of the Skies with icing set in FS9 (I was experimenting with this very icing question). When I turned on nacelle anti-ice, a short time later I was able to get throttle control back.Kim

I have FSGlobal 2008 and Holger Sandmann's Columbia River Gorge Scenery installed in FS9. FSGlobal has 76m resolution for this area and Holger's scenery has 38m and 19m in this area.Which one should have priority over the other in the scenery library? Should Holger's scenery be above FSGlobal (top priority at the moment) or does it make a difference?Also, should I set TERRAIN_MAX_VERTEX_LEVEL all the way to 21 since there is 19m mesh (Mount St. Helens) in Holger's scenery? Thanks.Kim

Have you tried a third party defragmenter program? I just installed FS9 on a separate disk drive (not the OS drive) and am using Ultimate Defrag (there are several others out there, O@O, Diskeeper) which allowed me to put FS9 on the outer ring of the drive. Since there are no OS files on this drive, FS is on the very outer edge of the disk and can be accessed at the fastest rate and vastly speed up texture load times! It also allowed me to defrag using 'name' for file structure placement and the fastest performance. What a difference!You may have other issues with your graphics card in your case, but you may want to give one of these third party programs a try, the one that came with Windows is useless. I used Ultimate Defrag because I like the graphical interface it uses for showing you where it places the files on the drive, but it has some limitations when it comes to daily OS file defragmentation. If you splurge for a new graphics card, also install a new separate fast drive to put FS on and see the difference!Kim

Mike,You've got something very weird going on with FS, some file or registry entry is out of place or lost. It sounds like you are going to have to bite the bullet and uninstall and reinstall FS.I am doing that at the present since I installed a much larger extra hard drive and I wanted to clean up my installation of FS anyway. It's a royal pain in the rear to do it, so what I have been doing is documenting down to the finest detail every add-on install procedure so that in the future, I won't have to search around and tear out my hair to get things right. My last documentation has already paid off in streamlining the present install task.FS tends to be a bit creaky when things start getting added on to in my opinion. Even after I reinstalled FS, patched it and added some freeware scenery that worked fine before (I'm only a third of the way done), when I then ran FS, I got PINK backgrounds on the splash screen. When I restarted it, all was normal. Weird! I'm going to make sure it works OK for a little bit before commencing more installs. Sorry I can't be of more help. :-eekKim

Thanks RF. I always try for butter smooth landings, but it's difficult when you don't have tactile feedback (no sense of G-force, motion or control feedback) in a simulation. I'll see if lowering the contact point numbers will make a mess of my landings. I have landed actual small aircraft many times without breaking anything.I gather that you have to change these numbers for each aircraft.cfg in FS.I have to confess to watching the movie "Snakes on a Plane" since it starred a 747-400. Give me a break! Talk about a stretch of imagination. Kim

I had that very error with another game, not FS, and had to reinstall their copy of DX9.0c (that came on their disk) to get it to work. My system actually had some missing dx files. It worked fine after that.Have you checked to make sure your anti-virus program isn't removing some needed dx file? Try a reinstall of DX9.0c again.Kim

Ground Environment looks the best so far to me. I didn't like Ultimate Night Environment, too bright.Kim