1Wolf

Yup. Flying BasicInst2...I could do it and it was easy enough, but the way the mission was having you do it just didn't seem to make sense to me when looking at the IAP. To go all the way out to TROJN just to make a hard nearly 180 deg turn to come back inbound on the recipricol didn't seem right. So I wanted to find out the "correct" way to do it. Understood. However, usually Procedure Turns are specified within 10nm of the field and its not technically a Procedure Turn, its a Hold out at the IAF (TROJN). So my question is largely concerned with what is correct. My understanding is that if a Procedure Turn isn't specified on the IAP then its not authorized. No Procedure Turn is specified but there is a "Hold" depicted at the IAF. So my question is....when approaching TROJN from the South...what is the correct procedure? 1) You MUST use the Hold to use it to get yourself turned back around. Thus, from that direction and position you'd use a Teardrop entry exactly as was specified earlier in this thread. i.e...over TROJN turn to HDG 337, fly it 1 minute, then standard rate turn to the left to get established on 127 inbound. 2) You MUST NOT use the Hold because a controller didn't instruct you to do it, and no actual "Procedure Turn" is depicted on the IAP, and thus, no Procedure Turn is authorized. So instead, you must ignore the Hold and make a pretty hard turn from HDG 345 to get turned back around over TROJN and established on 127 inbound. It would have to be a fairly hard turn. 3) You "May" use the Hold, "In Lieu of Procedure Turn" at pilot's disgression. It doesn't require any special instruction from ATC, and because its not an actual "Procedure Turn"...you can use the Hold as necessary to get yourself established on 127 inbound. So, as Ryan mentioned, perhaps you'd use the rule of thumb that if you need to turn tight like that...then thats when you should be using the Hold. And thanks for the link...I'll definitely check that out! Yup...you guys did a good job of answering my question on "how" to use it. That teardrop entry makes perfect sense...I tried it in the Sim...and it worked well. Thank you! I'm still trying to determine what the 'correct' procedure would be..whether its Mandatory to use the Hold, Mandatory to NOT use the Hold, or Optional. Gotcha. Thanks Ryan! Makes sense. I understand that if ATC cleared me for that approach and added "straight in" that I would not need to use the Hold....however....if you're aircraft is out nearly at the IAF (TROJN) and on a heading of 345....you still need to get turned around to come straight in. So the question remains...whether its mandatory to use the Hold because its depicted on the IAP, its mandatory NOT to use the Hold, or its a pilot's disgression sort of thing. Maybe there is no real "procedure" that you're supposed to do and your only job is to get established inbound on course 127....whether you do that by a hard turn from HDG 340ish to HDG 127 or whether you use the Hold to get turned around is up to you. Just for the sake of simplicity, maybe we can take ATC out of the equation and assume that the field depicted is an uncontrolled field.

I don't know squat about ENB series or shaders or what not. I'm not even 100% sure what "Shade" or "ENB" is....I know it has something to do with lighting or graphics. However, I stumbled upon this thread over at the REX forums a few moments ago. It caught my attention because the screenshots were gorgeous. so maybe this might help... http://www.realenvir...nload-included/

Thanks! That's exactly the info I was looking for. I've got a little diagram in the FAA Instrument Handbook that I'm supposed to use to determine which entry to make...so when I read what you guys said, and then tried to imagine flipping that diagram to match in my head (Its always tricky for me to spatially imagine some of these things), it made sense why you chose the Teardrop. Initially I had chosen the Direct entry because I was focusing on the far fix (The 15 DME one) instead of near fix (TROJN). When I saw what you guys chose (Teardrop) and realized you were basing it off of the near fix...when I compared it to my diagram it made much more sense. Also, thankyou for including even the headings that you'd fly. That really made it easier to see in my head. Do you "choose" to use the Hold and do a Teardrop entry because you WANT to? Or is it required? Is there any situation where you'd just make the hard turn to the right to try and intercept the radial instead of entering the Hold? If using the Hold is indeed optional (you can ignore this question if its mandatory) what are the guidelines or rules of thumb you'd use to determine when you'd use the Hold and when you'd just intercept the radial directly without any sort of Hold? There isn't an actual "Procedure Turn" on the IAP and there is no "NoPT" notation on the IAP to preclude one. My understanding is that a Procedure Turn is not authorized unless its depicted on the IAP...however...on the IAP I chose as an example...its not really a Procedure Turn...its a "Hold". So is choosing what you guys selected (Teardrop entry into the Hold to use it as a Procedure Turn) what one might call "Hold in lieu of Procedure Turn"? Thanks! Hopefully that makes sense. Sometimes the stuff in this FAA Instrument Handbook is a bit dry and hard to grasp

I was hoping I could get some help understanding the following approach plate and how to handle performing the procedure under the set of circumstances I'll mention below. Its been years since I've flown a real aircraft and I never did continue to get my instrument rating. I've always stuck to VFR in FSX and so IFR flight is a bit new to me. My interest in FSX though has given me the desire to use FSX to learn. I've been reading the FAA published Instrument Handbook along with the tutorials in FSX. I'm a little confused by this IAP... http://skyvector.com/files/tpp/1302/pdf/00602T14.PDF Let say, for sake of example, that I am located somewhere near those two towers just west of the KNSE field (Height of the two towers I refer to is 644 and 660. I am currently flying a heading of 345 towards point TROJN to conduct the non-precision approach for RWY 14. My understanding is that the procedure starts over the IAF (TROJN) at or above 3000'. At that point, I should be flying an inbound course of 127 on R-307 and proceeding to the FAF (ALANS) while descending to reach 1700' before the FAF. My question is.... If my heading (as described above) is 345, what is the proper way to get turned around and intercept R-307 inbound? Its kind of a tight turn as I'm coming at it from south of it. Should I just carefully time my turn to intercept that radial? Or should I NOT be turning that tight, and instead using the "Hold" depicted on the IAP to get turned around? That is the part that confuses me. Its not a "Procedure Turn" and its outside of 10nm from the field, according to the legend its a "Hold". I'm not sure if I should NOT be using a "Hold" unless ordered to? If I am indeed supposed to use that Hold to get turned around, the FSX Learning Center lessons teach you how to perform a "Direct" entry into a Hold so I think I understand how I should enter. It looks like I should cross the 15 DME fix on the north edge of the Hold and perform a left standard rate turn to get turned around to intercept R-307 inbound on a course of 127. Then, once I cross TROJN I should begin descending down to 1700 for the FAF (ALANS). So, in a nutshell, if you were over those towers I mentioned (The ones west of the field) on a course of 345 heading towards the IAF (TROJN), what would be the correct way to conduct the procedure for RWY 14? Thanks!

Actually....D) All of the above My FSX drive is an SSD and my OS/Programs drive is a separate SSD. However I also used a small SSD (64 GB) to cache my platter drive (HDD) just to experiment. My motherboard is an ASUS board that has the caching built in through the ASUS Suite utilities. I really didn't need to cache the HDD but I wanted to try it just to compare. I'm sure other folks will rave about how great it is but based on the benchmarks and the real world performance I've seen....I really didn't think the SSD caching of the HDD was worth the additional money and effort. I don't pretend to understand the way the cache works but supposedly it looks at frequently used data, caches that to the SSD, and thus improves speed. However, due to me using the HDD as a 'storage' drive...nothing there is really 'frequently' used which is probably why I don't see much in the way of bang-for-buck. If I could go back and do it again, I probably wouldn't have bothered. But I was curious

I'm sure someone else will step up and correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think there is any issue at all. As far as I know, once you are cleared for that runway....you own it (Provided of course the controller hasn't specified that there is traffic on a crossing runway operating simultaneously or what not). I believe that its more a manner of efficiency of the traffic and common consideration than anything. Sort of like, after landing, taxing clear of the runway as quickly as possible so that the controllers can move the traffic efficiently. Of course...I've never flown anything but small GA aircraft. When I learned to fly, I was always taught to try and make the first taxiway. If you floated long and couldn't stop normally by the first taxiway, it was considered 'long'. You want to have as much of the runway in front of you as possible. Runway behind you is useless. I'm sure someone else will step up and correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think there is any issue at all. As far as I know, once you are cleared for that runway....you own it (Provided of course the controller hasn't specified that there is traffic on a crossing runway operating simultaneously or what not). I believe that its more a manner of efficiency of the traffic and common consideration than anything. Sort of like, after landing, taxing clear of the runway as quickly as possible so that the controllers can move the traffic efficiently. Of course...I've never flown anything but small GA aircraft. When I learned to fly, I was always taught to try and make the first taxiway. If you floated long and couldn't stop normally by the first taxiway, it was considered 'long'. You want to have as much of the runway in front of you as possible. Runway behind you is useless. In situations like Lowflyer described above, it would make sense to float it long so that you didn't end up spending an inordinate amount of time taxiing on the runway to get to the Taxiway.

I'm currently set up as your Option 3 and that works out really well for me. If you can afford the other SSD then thats what I'd recommend. Then you don't have to worry about partitions either. One SSD for OS/Programs. A separate SSD for FSX and AddOns. All your FSX stuff is in one handy spot and you don't have to worry about defragging that drive or anything. Also, if you want to back up your FSX stuff you can just image that drive and have a nice snapshot-in-time of your FSX and all of your goodies. The 1TB drive works nice for bulk storage, pictures, music, videos, and as a backup drive (Of course, you'd want to have another set of backups on a drive outside of your machine).

I'm sure mine would have been a trivial experience for most of you guys today, but back then in my early twenties it was not a good day. Mine was in the early 90's. My training syllabus had my first solo labelled in the next few lessons so I knew that it would be soon. That morning my instructor and I had been out in the practice area and it all seemed like a normal lesson, we taxied back to the school, shut down the aircraft just like we always had. Then, he turned to me and simply said "Take it around the pattern, 3 takeoffs and full-stop landings with taxi-backs...then bring it back here." I said "Do you really think I'm ready?" and he said "Student pilots are never ready". Then he proceeded to shut the door on my as I protested and walked back into the school. I was really nervous, but did everything by the numbers. Now, at the time that my instructor hopped out of the aircraft...the airport was pretty quiet. Unfortunately that didn't last long. The airport I was flying out of was a controlled field and it could be a really busy place. My instructor had likely chosen that moment for my solo partially because the pattern was empty that morning. However, by the time I'd finished my run-up....I would be number 3 or number 4 for takeoff. I had been so nervous and so focused on doing everything right, I hadn't noticed that things were getting really busy really fast. Taxied into position, advanced the throttle, eyes focused down the runway, nosewheel on the centerline, airspeed was alive, engine instruments in the green...doing everything I'd been taught. I kept looking over out the corner of my eye expecting to see the instructor and having mini-freak-outs over and over as each time I'd realize "Holy crap I'm alone". So I took off, and as everyone else here, I was amazed at the fact that my little Cessna 172 felt like a rocket without my instructor on board. Now, back then, I weighed all of about 120 Pounds. So you can imagine how that aircraft suddenly felt when it was just me. Upwind went fine.....but as I got over the freak-out factor I was realizing there was ALOT of traffic on the radio. I don't remember if it was coming off the Crosswind leg or off the downwind leg...but I remember the controller telling me to perform a 270 in the pattern for spacing. Like a robot...I acknowledged his command "xxx will perform a 270 for spacing" (insert long pause here) "Whats a 270?". I had NO idea what he was talking about and it became quickly apparent that he had absolutely NO patience for a student that didn't know what he was doing. I explained that I was a student pilot on my first solo and that really seemed to upset him. He took the time to chastise me and give me a brief lecture that I should have known these things first. After that...I was on the edge of extreme panic. He told me he wanted me to do a standard rate turn....and unfortunately...I had no idea what that was either. This, of course, aggravated him further. Fortunately he held his temper and walked me through it...and I was absolutely terrified. I was afraid to turn so that my back was to the airport. That particular airport didn't have runways on the cardinal points....so for a newbie...it made it more difficult to understand where your airplane was in relation to the runways. From the distraction, the panic, and the embarassment it didn't take me much to get nearly lost in the pattern. Once I began that turn I had no idea where I was, or where my airplane was in relation to the runway. Lucky for me, the controller realized he was just making things worse and calmed down...and calmly walked me through the turn. When I came out of it I freaked out a bit because I couldn't tell which of the runways was mine....but eventually it fell into place. I just felt so far behind the airplane at that point. Everything was happening so quickly and I'm trying to get caught up and it seemed like every 10 seconds someone was asking me if "I have the traffic" and I kept having to answer "xxx is looking". Even when I was finally on final....it was a long final due to traffic spacing and I wasn't quite used to that. That was still fine though, except for the fact that there was an aircraft in front of me and I was gaining on him. I just wanted to get back on the ground and it was driving me nuts that this aircraft in front of me just seemed to be in slow motion. I did NOT want to have to go-around and do this again. So I started some S-Turns on Final and luckily that bought me enough distance for the aircraft in front of me to get down and clear the runway. All things considered....my landing was pretty decent. Still made the first taxiway. Regardless, for me, that was it that day. 3 circuits of the pattern my eye. No way. That would have to wait for another day when things were a bit calmer. One and done. I was so happy it was over with and I went back to the flight school really embarassed and with my tail between my legs. Quite honestly it rattled me pretty good, and it took some more dual work with my instructor before I had the confidence to try it again. My second time around it went MUCH smoother. There was still traffic, but not like the first time.

Thanks again guys. And Labrador, thank you very much for posting those panel.cfg coordinates. Greatly appreciated! I think I'll give a set of these gauges a shot. Thanks!

Thanks Ryan. I hate to say it but unfortunately I didn't quite follow some of that. You'll have to forgive me but I've only been at this a few months now so I'm still learning. I'm not sure what 2D smooth gauges versus 3D smooth gauges are. I only use the VC and TrackIR, never the 2D panel. At this point, I don't really have any payware aircraft yet and am still enjoying the default C172. I used to have the Flight1 C172 back in FS9 but in FSX right now all I've got is the default aircraft. I'm waiting patiently to pick up the A2A and/or RealAir C172 when they come out So I'm guessing, based on your statement that the payware aircraft are so good today....that the RealityXP stuff will be really great for me in the Default aircraft but probably won't be necessary in eventual payware aircraft that I might pick up. Thanks Barry. As I mentioned above to Ryan, unfortunately I don't understand some of that stuff you just mentioned. I only use the VC and TrackIR, never touch the 2D panel. So I'm guessing they'll really help the VC of the default aircraft but won't help me much in the future with really high quality payware aircraft. Does that sound like I'm understanding you correctly? Wow...great images. Thanks for posting those Labrador. The default FSX C172 is all I fly right now so thank you so much for posting those pictures. Maybe I'm wrong but I think those gauges look really nice in the default C172. How do they function during flight compared to the default gauges? Do they have the same functionality, more functionality, or less? Have they caused any FPS hits that you could notice? How difficult were they to set up? Its really funny that you posted that pic of the DreamFleet Baron. I was flying FS9 back in 2006 and I only owned 2 payware aircraft. The Flight1 C172 and the Dreamfleet Baron. I really liked that baron. I think I've still got the Baron and the Flight1 C172 zipped up on my drive somewhere...I just never unzipped and installed them in FSX as I didn't know how well it would translate over to FSX from FS9 and I didn't want to have any issues and I didn't know if they'd be better or worse than the default FSX Baron and C172.

Thanks Barry. Do these only work and function well with the virtual cockpit? Or only for the 2D Panel view?

Actually I was inquiring about any and all of the add-ons from Reality XP, but especially their instruments. I was also curious about their GPS, but the regular replacement instruments was what I was most curious about with regards to my questions above.

Here and there on these forums I'd read mention of RealityXP gauges. Over the past months I've slowly been building up my FSX Add Ons and I've got to the point where I'm curious about this RealityXP stuff. So I hopped over to their website and read what was available about them. I understand that they are somehow "replacements" for the gauges in other aircraft with a more realistic version. I was just wondering if you might share your opinion on a few things: How much different than the default gauges are they? I've only ever used the default aircraft in FSX and its hard for me to have a frame of reference to understand how the experience might be different with RealityXP gauges. How hard are they to use and set up for a novice? How big of a performance hit are they? I'm guessing that if they look a whole lot better than the default...maybe they are performance hogs? Can you use them in any FSX aircraft...default FSX or payware AddOns? Or do the aircraft have to have been specifically built for RealityXP Gauges by the creator? Any other opinions, observations, of information you'd care to share on it would be terrific. Thanks!

Thanks Hook. Yup...I'm aware TrackIR doesn't require keystrokes and you can map it direct to controller buttons. However, for my own setup and use, I need to use keystrokes. I prefer to map nothing but the axis in FSX and leave everything else at default key assignments, then map keys to buttons in my controller software. I use several different controllers, and several different controller profiles, so that just works out best for me. I was just curious about the CH Products software as I'd never installed or used it and was wondering if it would do what I need it to.

Logbook is only in *.bin format. The logbook editor in the AVSIM library that Simmerhead mentioned is a Java based editor and works pretty well. If you need to view or edit your logbook I'd recommend backing up the logbook.bin file often. For whatever reason, you can look at it funny and it will get corrupted. Same goes with your GrantedRewards files that are out in your AppData folder along with fsx.cfg. I'd back those up often too.

Hook, Does the CH Control Manager software allow you to program keypresses to the CH Yoke's buttons and hats? Also, how big is the memory footprint of the software? Do you need to load it at windows startup (The Saitek Profiler stuff and MFD Stuff always wants to install to load at startup and I always need to end up disabling it through the Windows Config panel) or can you set it up so that you can just run it when you need it? I've never used the CH Control Manager before but I'm thinking of ditching the Saitek yoke and going back to my CH...but it would be nice to program my TrackIR controls and a few other things to it. Even for FSX related keypresses, I don't like setting them up through FSX...I prefer to use a control profile.

I've got both the CH Flight Yoke (Not the Eclipse) and the Cessna Branded Saitek Pro Flight Yoke. For me, the jury is still out on which one I like better. They both have good and bad points. Rather than saying one is better than the other, I'll just point out my own opinions and findings and maybe they'll help you out. As far as realism goes, I can only compare to small GA aircraft....Cessna 172, Piper Warrior, that sort of thing. Thats all I have hours in. I've never flown a complex/high performance aircraft or a twin. Overall, in general, as far as "Feel" goes, when flying in FSX the CH Products actually does a pretty decent job of creating the illusion of a small aircraft at speed. What I mean by "at speed" is that, in a real aircraft, as your airspeed increases so does you control effectiveness. As your airspeed increases there is more resistance in the yoke and smaller movements translate to more movement of the aircraft. The controls are much stiffer at cruise. The CH Products kind of feels that way. It does a decent job of it. On the other hand, when an aircraft gets slow...like on final....the controls have little resistance, alot of play, and it takes alot of movement to translate to much control of the aircraft. For example, when landing a real Cessna in a crosswind and throwing cross-control in there....you might find yourself really working that yoke. If you touch down in the correct attitude...holding that nosewheel off the runway until it drops on its own...you'd have that yoke pulled all the way back to its max travel. So, with this respect, at slow airspeeds I suppose the Saitek is more authentic being that it offers less resistance and is...for lack of a better term..."mushier". However, when it comes to realism its those 'detents' that people keep mentioning that blow it for the Saitek. Real aircraft (at least the ones that I've flown) don't have detents. And while some might make the argument that forward movement through the air, exerting pressure on the control surfaces, stabilize a real yoke and make it stay centered....those people would be more or less correct. However, in a computer yoke on a flight sim it just doesn't translate well. It doesn't "feel" right. Also, even for an aircraft going slow on final, the Saitek is WAY too mushy. My understanding is that some rather ingenious fellow here on AVSIM posted a "fix" for the Stiction issue with the Saitek Yoke. However, its going to make it MORE mushy when it is already far too mushy. When it comes to convenience it really depends on what you are mounting it to. I just use a run-of-the-mill office desk and the leading edge of the desk is bullnosed. The CH Products Flight Yoke doesn't seem to like to mount to it due to the bullnose. I have to insert a piece of plywood between the yoke and the desk to make a right angle at the front of the desk for the CH Product's clamps to get a better purchase on. Even then, the clamps don't hold it very well and it'll move on the desk. I have to use a set of C-clamps from my woodshop to hold it in place tight. This, in my opinion, is where the Saitek wins points. It shines here. The mounting system for the Saitek yoke works great with my office desk's bullnosed front. I have to hand it to Saitek here, they really came up with a pretty cool mounting system. The other benefit the Saitek has is that the yoke's casing is flat on the top so I can set my keyboard right on top of it. For me, that works out great. Using the CH Products yoke I'd always either have to stretch the keyboard around the side of the yoke or leave it behind the yoke and reach around to get to the keyboard. Its also nice that the Saitek Yoke comes with a throttle quadrant. Its much nicer than the tiny "mini" throttle/prop/mixture controls on the CH Products. The only downside is that the Throttle Quadrant for the Saitek uses a PS2 styled plug that plugs directly into the Saitek Yoke instead of a USB. So...that means you can't use the quadrant with another controller. I couldn't use the Saitek Quadrant with my CH Products yoke. I believe that the separate standalone Quadrants that Saitek sells have the USB plug and can be used alone....but NOT the one that comes WITH their yoke. The other nice thing is the software. I happen to like the Saitek SST programming software. I prefer NOT to map anything within FSX. For my own uses, I prefer to map things using the controller's software so that I can map any FSX Buttons AND my TrackIR controls all in the same profile. I can't speak for how robust the CH Products software is because I've never used it. For the CH Products yoke I've always just plugged it in and used the windows default drivers. I've never installed any sort of software for it. I can't speak of any of the more expensive boutique options folks have offered here. I'd have to sell a kidney for one of those So hopefully some of those issues will help you with your decision. For my own preference, it really comes down to perceived realism and the illusion of flight (CH Products) to features, software, and mounting system (Saitek). Hope that helps!

Using TrackIR, I always keep it at 1.00 for all the reasons Hook mentioned above. On my own 27" 1920x1080 with TrackIR, based on the default C172; the size of the instruments, the cockpit, the dash, and the controls "feel" the most like real C172's. Its probably still a tad off at 1.00, and somewhere between 1.2 & 1.5 would probably be about right. To me, 1.00 seems the best compromise between realism with the TrackIR and view angle.

I also own the 3 weather engines, and am still going back and forth between them trying to determine which ones I like the best for my own needs. I usually do only GA flying. No airliners or anything. I'm very curious to read about what the folks say who have tried and compared the three and see how that lines up with my own observations. My own observations seem a bit different than the others here. But I'm still learning so maybe I'm just plain wrong...lol. For me, using REXE+OD for both the weather engine and the Textures provides the best and most realistic depiction of clouds and the environment. The word "Realistic" bears further definition here. REX's depiction of the way clouds appear and the environment has been absolutely excellent and amazong. For me...its head and shoulders above the others. However...on the flipside, sometimes its not "accurate" when it comes to comparing it to the outside world. If I compare what REX depicts to the METAR or whats happening outside my window....REX is reasonably accurate. I have had alot of problems with the software theough. They've provided excellent support, however, I fly almost exclusively with historical weather and sometimes the data is there in REX...and sometimes its not. The new Public Beta they have is supposed to fix alot of these. Using OpusFSX with REX Textures seems, as others have mentioned, to provide extremely accurate weather for me. And, hands down, OpusFSX is the easiest to use. Its literally almost "Set it and Forget it". It just works. Its that simple. OpusFSX seems to have gone with a K.I.S.S. concept and its working for them. The weather seems pretty accurate compared to what is going on out the window. The updates are extremely fast. However, at THIS time only the past 24 hours of historical weather are available. I've heard that they are working on going back further than 24 hours and that will be great for me when they do. OpusFSX seems to do an absolutely awesome job of portraying dense, low vis, IMC conditions. If you want to fly through multi-layered thick soup....Opus seems to do that really well. On the other hand, for fairer weather situations, I've used it with both the REX textures and the freeware HDEv2 Textures and, for whatever reason, I just don't like the way the clouds and environment are depicted. The clouds appear to "puffball" or "cottonball" to me. Even though I'm using the REX textures, REX seems to provide that "wispy tendrils" and "floating tendrils" effect better. Everything from OpusFSX seems "Puffy" to me. I don't know if this will make sense to you but the clouds seem to have a kind of 'cartoon-like' feel to them, whereas REX's appear very 'real' to me. But thats just me and opinions vary. OpusFSX also does alot of cloud popping on me. I'll be floating around and "Pop"...cloud change. For OpusFSX though, don't discount that "Works simply, works reliably, and works well" bit because NOT becoming frustrated by something, overwhelmed by features, and not having to futz with something so you can spend more time flying and enjoying it is worth alot of brownie points AS2012 I've just started using and when it comes to complete weather 'packages', IMHO AS2012 is the most 'robust' and full featured package. At first the user doc is a bit intimidating but that weather map that they use is really terrific. I'm still trying out different features and learning to use it but so far I like the "Cloud Smoothing" preset the best for my type of flying. Right now I'm using it with REX textures...I haven't tried out the AS2012 textures yet. Using those REX textures and the AS2012 engine seems to produce a "Cloud" and "Environment" realism that, to me, is somewhere between OpusFSX and REX. Its cloud depiction isn't quite as good as REX but is far better than the puffball effect I get with OpusFSX. Once again, the clouds seem kind of 'cartoon-like' to me compared to a more 'realistic' feel when the REX weather engine depicts them with the same textures. The updates for AS2012 seem much smoother to me. I'm still playing with it so I can't speak for the "out the window" accuracy of the depiction though. The Historical Weather is great. I'm also still playing with the options so I'm still not quite sure what they all do and how they relate. For me, the downside of AS2012 has been performance related. I can "feel" a in smoothness when I have AS2012 running. In the defense of AS2012 though, the default options in AS2012 update like every 10 minutes...while I have both Opus and REX set to update every 30 minutes. Its probably that frequent update that I'm "feeling" as a disruption in smoothness.

I run two SSD's on my rig, one for the OS and one for only FSX and AddOns. I use a large, 3 TB Platter Drive for "storage". That setup as expensive but I really like it, and for me, it was worth it. SSD's run best and last longest when they are not jam packed "full" to the point of bursting. The more free space you can keep available on it, the more flexibility your OS has to best manage the SSD's. SSD's work a little different than platter hard drives. The data on them is always "moving" instead of in a static place like on a platter HD. As such, for wear levelling, your OS will make use of the unused space on them. If you're going for just one SSD...I'd make sure its plenty big enough for your OS, FSX and AddOns, and anything else you may want to install with plenty of room to spare. If you're going with two SSD's, you could put your OS and everything else on one and FSX and AddOns on the other. I'm sure someone here will correct me if I'm wrong, but SSD's are fast already and I don't think you're going to get much advantage from putting them in RAID 0. Lots of guys do it, but in my own opinion I don't think the bang-for-buck value is there.

I apologize if you've already read a similar post. I put a similar request for recommendations for camera AddOns a little while ago and either my thread was eaten in the rollback or I just plain lost it. Anyhow...I'm trying again. The short version was that a few years ago, in FS9, there was a camera AddOn that I really liked called "Active Camera" The website is here.... http://www.anticyclo...amera/Home.html An AVSIM review can be found here... http://www.avsim.com...ctiveCamera.htm One functionality I really liked about Active Camera was that it allowed me to do a Pre-Flight Walk-Around around the aircraft. You could actually get out and stroll around the airport and walk around your aircraft. That is the feature I'm trying to find in an FSX AddOn. See the snippet from the AVSIM review below that describes this... This AddOn isn't available for FSX so I was wondering if I could get some recommendations of roughly equivalent Camera AddOns for FSX that might allow me to ?

Thank you for the responses, advice, and opinions. I had typed up a longer response, but unfortunately it got eaten when the forums got rolled back. So I'll just post the short version... I've taken a look at the websites for the AddOns that were suggested here, and narrowed it down to those that seemed like they'd best serve my purposes: MCE, VoxATC, and possibly RC4. By my understanding, MCE focuses on handling crewed aircraft, but also will provide a Vox interface with Default FSX ATC. VoxATC is a complete traffic replacement (I would disable FSX ATC) as well as a Vox Interface to ATC. RC4 is IFR only. And would do me any good for VFR flight. However MCE Vox does work with RC4. So, given the above, it sounds like either MCE or VoxATC would probably best meet my needs. Is there anyone who has used both, that does the same sort of virtual flying I do (Small Twin or lighter GA VFR & IFR) that might have some further observations or advice to narrow those two choices?

When I asked this question, I never would have thought it was so complicated. I'm really enjoying the screenshots and images though. Thanks for sharing your experiences with FS Global and FSGenesis. Its interesting to see the comparisons. There is an article in the Avsim reviews section that is a review on the FS Global Ultimate America's mesh...but no "compare and contrast" article between the two. I'm pretty new to FSX, and don't pretend to understand all the ups & downs of resolution and such. But I'm learning alot by reading this. If it is true that, if both products are based on the the same resolution of data that they will look the same. Is that a correct assumption? Or can one product still look better than the other even though they are based on data that is the same resolution? If both products end up looking the same...maybe its how many errors there are in the product (Plateau'd airfields and such), how well those errors are "fixed", how often they occur, ease of installation and management, support, and price. Sounds like for Price, FSGenesis wins hands-down with this 70% off deal. I'm curious about the other factors though. With regards to performance. I've read several mentions of frame rate hits for high resolution mesh in this thread....but I've also read articles other places that say that terrain mesh shouldn't cause a FPS hit. Which is the correct answer? Will it affect your FPS? And if it is the case that it will affect your FPS...is it possible to activate and deactivate the mesh at will so that...if you ARE having an FPS problem...you can easily de-activate the mesh if you need to or try to run it without the mesh.

I've seen the exact same. Under VFR eyes should be outside flying by reference to the horizon, watching for traffic, watching the weather, making sure you know where you are, etc. Any time eyes are inside would be just for crosschecking instruments with what you are seeing, communicating, and checking engine instruments. I think thats one of the 'bad' habits that folks pick up from Flight Sims when transitioning to real world flight...too much eyes inside, and too much watching the instruments, and not enough eyes outside. Someone picking up their PPL actually learns the opposite, their instructor wants their eyes out of the cockpit. I haven't flown in years...since around '94 or '95, and never had the opportunity to fly with a GPS. They do all these nifty things and for me, it would probably just be tickled pink by the fact that its a map that I don't have to know origami to be able to fold, unfold, and still fit in the little Cessna cockpit. It always gives me a chuckle because those who haven't flown in a tiny plane have no idea how difficult it is to maneuver those big maps in such a confined space, actually be able to read anything much less use a plotter, and still fly the plane and scan for traffic

PE is definitely something I'll eventually check out. That really does seem like the ticket for realism and doing things the right way. However, for my schedule at the current time I really need to stick to some artificial intelligence (like Radar Contact). I'm just looking for something that is similar but significantly better than the built-in FSX system (i.e. It doesn't use VOX but instead uses key presses). I think I've actually got a copy of Radar Contact v4 on CD sitting around my office somewhere. It never left that CD case and I never actually installed it though because it was really complicated. That was a few years ago that I ordered it and I seem to remember the documentation being immense. I was hoping that maybe something better, and more user-friendly had come out. I was wondering if there were other people like me, looking for a replacement/enhancement for the FSX system that didn't utilize VOX but was several significant steps up.