chris41

Thanks again everybody for your input. I will put it to use. FS Flight Keeper looks very handy as well. Thanks for the suggestion. I will make it a priority come birthday/Christmas time.Chris Porter

Thanks for the comments. I don't usually put a STAR into my flight plan (I'll probably change that) but do have one preselected based on where I am coming from so that I can input those points into the FMC as I get closer to the arrival airport. Unfortunately (and I understand why) Radar Contact doesn't assign one to you but you can request an approach (in general, not a specific one) after being told which runway to expect (I wonder why you can't request a STAR before reaching TOD).I don't fly online using real world weather but I do go online to get weather information for each departure/arrival airport and manually input that into default weather and then while I am en-route I can use that wind information to predict which runway to expect. I pull up the charts for that runway and have it readily available so that when I am cleared for that runway all I have to do is select it from the FMC. My initial question of finding landing information before reaching range of ATIS (75nm) I asked because I was wondering if the flight crew could place a call to dispatch or somewhere before reaching TOD to get that information in preparation of going over the approach briefing, which according to FS2Crew (a great program by the way), is to be done before beginning the descent into your arrival airport. If anyone has anything else to add I appreciate it. Thanks again for the those who have already replied.Chris Porter

I was just wondering how far out from an airport will a STAR approach be assigned. Does this happen before the descent phase of flight? I was also wondering how far out from an airport you can get ATIS information. I know that with using Radar Contact you won't be able to find out which runway is in use until you are within 75nm from the airport. Do pilots get this information from other sources besides ATIS? I've noticed in a 737-400 youtube video the crew began the Approach briefing before beginning the descent. With FS2Crew, in that briefing, the STAR,IAP and runway condition are all discussed.Thanks,Chris Porter

I would say read the manual but there is also a lot to learn on youtube. Go there and type in . There are quite a few videos on how to work the FMC. One in particular has about 7 parts to it going into great detail on this.Chris Porter

Sorry, a "simism"?Chris Porter

I did another flight but there is no place to put the lower altitude to get the CRZ or cruise page to come back up. You can only look at the DES page not the CLB or CRZ pages.Thanks,Chris Porter

I'm not using any weather programs other than setting the weather up myself based off what I find online for weather for given airports. "AI after a refresh will arrive in clumps playing catch up to their schedule within a certain time window" sounds like a good explanation. Maybe the weather is getting refreshed putting ai aircraft in clumps around my aircraft. Thanks,Chris Porter

Entering a higher cruise altitude using the MCP doesn't put the plane into descent mode but in my case by entering a higher cruise altitude in the Cruise page it did put the aircraft/FMC into descent mode. Then when I would reselect VNAV I would get a message but I can't remember what it said. Something about MCP cruise altitude which I checked several times to make sure I had the correct FL there. Thanks,Chris Porter

I used to disconnect from VNAV during my initial descent but in using Radar Contact and usually getting crossing restrictions to be around FL110-120 at or around 240 knots within 40 NM of the arrival airport I would just program that into the FMC and let VNAV control the descent, not that I didn't handle it manually before I started programming the FMC to do it (it wasn't difficult, just a little tedious). I don't know, I just like to let VNAV control the cruise phase of the flight. That and I hadn't even arrived at cruise level before making the mistake. Don't like the FMC being in descent mode while still 1400nm out from the arrival airport.As for the other comment I will give it a try. Time to minipulate the FMCThanksChris Porter

I was climbing to cruize altitude 330 and I made the mistake of changing my cruising altitude to 340 (per request of ATC) in the FMC. I now realize I should have instead changed the MCP altitude to 340 not the FMC. By doing so my aircraft went into descent mode and that is not what I wanted. Now I can't get the cruize or climb page. I do realize these become inoperable once cruize altitude is reached but that was not yet the case. My question is: is there anything I can do to correct my mistake or do I just have to live with it and continue the flight without the use of VNAV (at least until I reach the descent phase of the flight)? I don't wish to guess what the optimal cruize level should be and at what speed I should be at at the FL.Thanks,Chris Porter

"if there are no ai in the air when you get your runway assignment, and then all of a sudden a whole slew of the appear out of thin air to land, not much i can do there".The above quotation was from JD. I was having a problem in the air with TCAS having to tell me to descend immediately due to traffic and not RC. I think I fixed it. My ini file also read 40 instead of 0 like what was addressed earlier in this posting. I've changed that. My immediate question is why do aircraft automatically "appear out of thin air"? That seems to happen to me quite often. I'll be flying along and all of a sudded FS will refresh/reload and as soon as everything comes back up i'll be surrounded by 3-4 aircraft, some of which are coming right at me.Thanks,Chris Porter

There was a document that came with PMDG purchase that gave an ILS approach monitored procedure diagram and on it at minimums-go around it shows that if A/T is off the first thing to do is "straight-arm throttles to cursors". Does that mean push throttles to takeoff power?Thanks,Chris Porter

I can't seem to find any charts for this big airport. I've searched vatsim and fscharts.com but neither have them. Wondering if anyone could direct me themThanks,Chris Porter

I have had several quite a few freeware sceneries that have used a docking system (most cases the exact same system). Can anyone point me to the program that has it. I was also wondering if there is a way to change things so that the docking system for some of the gates in some of those sceneries would be more accurate. Sometimes it tells you to stop too soon and other times too late.Thanks,Chris Porter

where can one go to find what the winds are doing at high altitudes. I'd like to be able to set the winds correctly. I know winds can get pretty fast up at high altitudes and I'd like to how fast on any given day. Finding this information for lower altitudes is no problem but I can't seem to find anything for high altitude. Thanks, Chris Porter

I use nothing but FS9.. It works great and I don't have a good enough computer to run FSX.Chris Porter

FSX is great. I own it and would love to be able to use it on my computer but unfortunately my system can't handle it and I don't have the money to get a better system. I imagine most out there in the world who still use FS9 only do so because of this reason. I'm just glad that there are so many freeware and payware still being created for use with it. I think by looking at the many download sites and fs stores out there and how much is still being created for fs9 that the number of people still using FS9 is apparant. I hope that they will make this new version of PMDG 737NG availiable for use with FS9. If not I will have to remain thankful that I still have the latest version of the PMDG 737. Here's hoping the decision to make this aircraft for use with FS9 will be made.ThanksChris Porter

Where is this survey found? I'd like to add myselft to that percentage of those who are still using FS9. FSX is great but I my computer doesn't do to well with it and I don't have the money to upgrade.Chris Porter

Thanks for the advice all. That's what I needed to know. I'll go ahead and use the drive as a backup of everything on my computer and I will put other misc stuff on my C drive onto it as well. Too bad, was looking forward to flying on that drive--speed up/maximize flight sim settings.Thanks,Chris

I received an external drive with 500GB. If I copy and paste everything on my C drive related to FS9 onto that and then delete it off my C drive will FS run normally only better or do I need to reinstall fs9, radar contact, PMDG 737, FS Passengers etc? I would like to copy and paste everything on my C drive onto the external drive and then delete it off the C drive but I imagine that might do bad things to the computer.I would appreciate any advise you could give me.Thanks,Chris Porter

I have had that happen to me before as well flying the PMDG 737-800/900. I however did not have the cockpit tips active. Some of the gauges went completely blank as soon as I turned the cabin lights off and then on again. I did not have to restart thankfully. Fiddling around with the cabin lights brought the gauges back up. Also when the gauges went out some of the paneling was illuminated by cabin lights whereas other parts of the paneling were not. This problem has happened and only happens when it starts to go dark and the cabin lights automatically turn on.Chris Porter

I found this freeware download online after watching a flight sim video where this download was being used. I was wondering if anyone had issues with it. On another forumn where it was talked about a little one guy had problems viewing other windows (overhead panel, throttle?). From the video it looks like a handy addon.Thanks,Chris

I've added a different sound set as well. There are several out there which I was able to narrow down to just one. Curious about the numeric trim indicator you have. Do you recall what the filename for that was?

Just curious what addons some of you have that you have added to your aircraft. Myself, one that I have found useful is a gauge called whazzup.zip found at flightsim.com. It shows the exact position of the spoilers, ailerons, rudder and a few other things. Always looking for others to add.Chris Porter