Both are superb products. I have both REX OD & AS2012 -and am extremely satisfied with the effects they produce. I never thought weather to be exciting but now I know better.
I deleted all but two joystick functions in FSX in favor of using the EZCA studio option to map cameras to specific buttons on my Saitek X52pro. Works great for me. Also, I try to maintain commonality of function among all my simulated a/c.
I have considered leaving the VFP on, but it seems to pick up stray frequencies and plots an intercept to wherever its pointing. Good suggestion, though.