Cognita

With the delay by FSS, I also went for the BMWorld/AMSim version given the price they were offering and to be honest I am quite happy with it; unlikely I will purchase another Montreal.

I have pretty much everything uninstalled except the aircraft I fly, which is about 8 aircraft 6 of them pay ware, and I notice no discernable difference in loading time. I also removed the discovery flights and bush trips and all such things I do not and will likely never use, but it is still around 5 minutes to load, just as it was when I had all those things installed. I think this is what is behind comments related to 2024 about storing more on the cloud, downloading less and speeding up the loading process.

Yea, that took less than 15 seconds. Quite impressive implementation by A2A.

To be honest, I really wish another developer would step in with a version of KSFO. I don't require the supper accurate FlightBeam model with all the accurately placed placards and scuff marks, and would really just appreciate having a more accurate and authentic rendition to use. I am starting to support developers that release moderate quality airports in reasonable time frames -- and I don't consider 3 years to release KSFO as reasonable. But I am encouraged that developers like ini are just taking these on; I hope more do so.

Wow, yea, I was waiting for FSimStudios too but at this price I may just go ahead and pull the plug. I have been wanting CYUL since the sim was launched and have grown tired of waiting. For me who also does not care much for interiors the BMWorld one looks great.

I think this is quite well said and makes a great deal of sense. There is a continuum between understanding something abstractly and its actual practice. To really understand something you need to transverse that continuum over and over again. Spend too long at that abstract, generalized level or too long in the practical, doing level and your understanding will be superficial. So, yea, discerning between accurate and realistic is helpful. I think I have learned a great deal about so many aspects of aviation and I really enjoy that. And I enjoy pretending to work through the process of carrying out a flight mission successfully, from planning to execution. But I have never once thought that my experience on my desktop computer -- sitting in my comfy office chair, in my HVAC controlled office, with a nice cup of coffee -- is anything like reality or realistic, in fact it is pretty far from realistic.

I had the pink patches inside the cockpit as well... But only on the 739, not the -8 or -7.

Just to confirm that a fresh download of the 739 corrected the problem However, the latest update on the Ops Centre did not correct it; in fact, I skipped 3.071, the update where the issue was introduced, and went right to 072, which actually introduced the barbie patch problem on the 739. Seems we are all better off just redownloading and bypassing Ops Centre. What I will probably do going forward.

Updating using the Ops Centre also did not solve the issue for me, despite it showing the latest version. The 737 is fine but the 739 still has Barbie patches on it. I will see if a fresh install helps. Seems PMDG may have some more work to do on the Ops Centre updater.

Who is Captain Blackbird? Is this an attempt to build hype? (I am not sure it is working well)

I think the sun has basically set for the consumer/public/hobbyist; or we are at least well into dusk. But even for the commercial side, I assume LM is actively recruiting new clients to version 6 and trying to encourage those on earlier versions to move up and it is unlikely there will be any further upgrade development done on version 5, which is why I thought of it as essentially in a sunset phase. Beyond the version change, if I have read the news correctly, it seems that LM is planning on moving from the old ESP code at some point, so even for the platform as a whole, whose code is up to 25 years old, it seems to be drawing near the end of the day.

I think it will be a stretch for them to sell many copies if the price was any higher. How much are you going to invest into a platform that is in its sunset phase. I am sure they are hoping that at a reasonable price -- and that certainly is for the level of detail they have given this aircraft -- that people will be willing to buy and use it while they focus on MSFS. I would not at all be surprised if the price for MSFS is considerably higher.

I really have not flown anything else since its release, nearly a month ago! It really does feel alive and I will spend many, many hours with it. It has taken me away from the airliners, that I have basically lost interest in for the time being with all their present issues, and as others have said my other GA sit idle. I have left only the 310 and 414 installed, but neither has left the hanger since the Comanche released. I hope this inspires other developers to give their products this level of detail. It sets the bar pretty high now and I won't purchase anything else that is not in the vicinity of A2A. The same thing happened in P3D -- purchasing an A2A aircraft saved me a lot of money on other addons.

I think a few dozen might be optimistic...

They have started off with an impressive 22 followers! Will check back next month to see how their numbers are doing.