The 'Official' Screenshot & Tips thread 4 FSX enthusiasts & flight simmers.

[FBi7]

Hi fellow simmers,

Just wanted to let you all know that the annual Mid Summer Madness event takes place this weekend (19th/20th August) at EGBB Birmingham on the VATSIM network. EGBB will be fully staffed from Delivery right up to London Control from 1100-2000 BST both days. No flight bookings this year: any aircraft, any time to and/or from EGBB.

!BlueTonic! and I, as fell as a few others, will be in a hotel conference room enjoying a few beers at the same time! Hopefully you can fly in and out of EGBB this weekend.

There's some prizes on offer - make sure to have MSMXI in your flight plan remarks to be entered into the prize draw.

More details here: https://forums.vatsim.net/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=74352

Cheers,

Stu

Edit: Follow on Twitter: @vatsimMSM

 

[Woodsta888]

Apologies if posted earlier.

FLightstore have sim stuff in the clearance. Not a simmer myself

https://www.flightstore.co.uk/season-end-clearance-t4932#m133:m165:m89:m44:b1

 

[Digital X]

May have to have a dabble there!

 

[djg85]

Been drooling over all the screenshots in this thread for what seems like forever now and finally have some time to try and get my FSX set up. Got the Steam edition on the recent sale and hoping it's going to be a bit more stable than the original. I'm having issues with my Orbx scenery where I'm just not happy with it. Looks very base game like to me . I got a few missing bits on the current Orbx sale and should have FTX Global (openLC Europe, Trees HD, Vector) and Scotland enabled in the below screenshots above Glasgow airport. They are taken between 2000-3000ft.

Settings wise, everything is as recommended in the Orbx docs. Is this basically all I can get from FSX or does something look really wrong? System spec is a GTX 980Ti, 16GB RAM and a i6700k (no oc) @4GHz. OS is Windows 10.

Spoiler

 

[Fireblade2K4]

I'm just looking for a bit of advice. I've recently started playing FSX:SE again after owning it for ages I finally decided to sit down and work out how to competently (maybe not correctly as in real-life terms) fly a plane from one airport to another and land, that was all I wanted initially to set out to do, so I scouted around, read a lot and watched a lot, I got a decent freeware aircraft with a working FMC and a few other addons to make FSX:SE look and run a little better and off I went.

After a day of trial and error I managed to successfully fly from Aberdeen airport to Birmingham, taxi from a gate to the runway using the ATC, take off and then fly with the autopilot near to Aberdeen and used the ATC for guidance towards the airport and runway and carry out an ILS approach and landing successfully. I know this doesn't sound like much to many of you however to me, having just messed around with FSX:SE before, I wanted to actually try do something somewhat properly, and after so much trial and error having successfully done this in a day, well it gave good sense of achievement.

So this brings me onto the advice part. Now I know FSX:SE is very dated and limited in many ways and I could spend my money on making it look great with addons and and so on however being as currently I have nothing other than FSX:SE itself would I be better off going for the latest version of P3D or maybe X-Plane 11 and going from there or sticking with FSX:SE for the time being and just get a few addons..? I know some are transferable to the likes of P3D (not sure about the new V4) so I guess that would be an option.

What I want to do now is continue learning and building upon what I have learnt so far and to be able to fully simulate a flight from place to place as I guess many of you who have been doing this for years already do.

What would be the best way to go about this...?

 

[BrianT]

I've been a life long fan of FSX but if you're intending to get deep into scenery and 3rd party aircraft then like all of us you're eventually going to run into the dreaded OOM (out of memory) issue that comes with FSX being a 32bit product. If you have a fairly modern computer and you stick to default scenery then FSX will do everything you need. If you are planning on buying 3rd party scenery etc then personally I would go for P3Dv4 as it's 64bit and the OOM's are a thing of the past.
As I'm typing this I can hear teeth gnashing from the X-plane crowd as they will tell you that X-plane is the way to go. Well I've not tried it so I can't recommend it.
the other advantage for you is that P3dv4 (you only need the academic version) has an interface that is very similar to FSX and so the transition would be easy.
The biggest tip I can give you is get comfortable flying/navigating around and then decide if you want to start spending any money. Like all hobbies they 'aint cheap once the bug bites!
Good luck whatever route you choose.

 

[Fireblade2K4]

Thanks for the info BrianT, at least I'm thinking pretty much along the right lines, I'm going to play a little more with FSX as it is, and to be honest even with just a few freeware addons I've got it looking pretty nice in DX10.

I took a flight last night from Birmingham Airport to Diagoras Airport on the Greek Island of Rhodes which took just over 4 hours I think or there about, I flew over The Alps on the way there which was pretty nice even though it was with default scenery, and continued out into the Aegean sea seeing the change in the sea colour into more of a nice mediterranean blue especially around all the tiny islands in that area and finally got the airport in sight after being guided and directed in via the ATC.

The only issue I had during the entire flight was getting the ILS system to lock onto the glide slope for the landing, so I just did it manually . The reason for this was that I tried a new plane which was a very detailed freeware Airbus A321, that was the only thing I couldn't figure out whilst I was flying there, other than that the flight went pretty much without issue.

Here are a few screenshots I grabbed during the flight at various stages.

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[BrianT]

I took a flight last night from Birmingham Airport to Diagoras Airport on the Greek Island of Rhodes which took just over 4 hours I think or there about, I flew over The Alps on the way there which was pretty nice even though it was with default scenery, and continued out into the Aegean sea seeing the change in the sea colour into more of a nice mediterranean blue especially around all the tiny islands in that area and finally got the airport in sight after being guided and directed in via the ATC.

The only issue I had during the entire flight was getting the ILS system to lock onto the glide slope for the landing, so I just did it manually . The reason for this was that I tried a new plane which was a very detailed freeware Airbus A321, that was the only thing I couldn't figure out whilst I was flying there, other than that the flight went pretty much without issue.

You seem to be doing really well, the only advice I can give with the Airbus is to read the manual and then read it again. even though it's a freebie you should be able to lock onto the ILS without a problem.

Well done and nice screen shots!

 

[SpitfireTT]

Hello All,

I'm a avid P3D V4 Simmer but my pc has given the ghost so i'm thinking of upgrading

my original specs were

i5 3750 @ 4.4GHZ
4/8GB Ram
ATI 7950

I'm thinking of a complete upgrade to

I7 7700k
GTX 1080 or TI Version
16GB RAM

Can can anyone given an indication how P3D V4 would run on the above setup ?

 

[Litmoose]

Hello All,

I'm a avid P3D V4 Simmer but my pc has given the ghost so i'm thinking of upgrading

my original specs were

i5 3750 @ 4.4GHZ
4/8GB Ram
ATI 7950

I'm thinking of a complete upgrade to

I7 7700k
GTX 1080 or TI Version
16GB RAM

Can can anyone given an indication how P3D V4 would run on the above setup ?

It'll be ok, I have similar spec albeit a 3770k @ 4.6 and last gen RAM. I run a 1440p display and in busy airports(like KSFO) with a complex aircraft I can get as low as 20fps on the ground. But as soon as you get in the air and start gaining altitude the FPS goes up massively, i hit 100fps in the outside view sometimes.

If I would change anything about your choice it would be the CPU, maybe get the new hex-core intel? I know P3D doesn't exactly utilise multicore at the moment, but who knows in the future?

 

[Litmoose]

Random screenshot

Spoiler: pic

 

[Judge Mental]

Well it's finally happening...

https://orbxsystems.com/forum/topic...b-barton-for-x-plane-11-teaser-trailer-video/

 

[Cavallino]

Wow nice!

So ix Xplane 11 worth getting on board?

 

[Judge Mental]

Wow nice!

So ix Xplane 11 worth getting on board?

P3D and FSX still have better third party support, but there's been a gradual improvement for X-Plane: UK2000, Active Sky, Fly Tampa and now Orbyx are supporting X-Plane. Spend a little time with OrthoXP and W2XP and you can get it looking okay for nothing.


For the record I have P3d and X-Plane and enjoy them both for what they are.

 

[Devrij]

Vanilla, which is better? I did hate fiddling around with configuration files to try and get fsx to run smooth, stream textures quickly etc. Does xplane run better (eg across more than one core?)

 

[Charlie Bravo]

I've dropped FS9/FSX for X-Plane 11 and couldn't be happier.

I loved FS9 back in the day and bought numerous packages to enhance it further but I felt that it it's time had come. I spent quite a while looking at the options... P3D, X-Plane, FSW and FS2 but came to the conclusion that P3D was just a polished FSX that still looked like it had seen better days and FSW/FS2 lacked any real expansion options. I therefore downloaded the X-Plane 11 demo and was suitably impressed with both its looks and performance.

Fast forward a couple of months and I'm still pleased with my decision. One of my friends has both FSX and P3D and after speaking to him about X-Plane, he has also made the move and hasn't touched the other two since.

Granted there aren't anywhere near as many extras for X-Plane but the big developers seem to jumping on the X-Plane bandwagon having seen its potential.

Vanilla wise, X-Plane is far superior.

 

[Devrij]

I've dropped FS9/FSX for X-Plane 11 and couldn't be happier.

I loved FS9 back in the day and bought numerous packages to enhance it further but I felt that it it's time had come. I spent quite a while looking at the options... P3D, X-Plane, FSW and FS2 but came to the conclusion that P3D was just a polished FSX that still looked like it had seen better days and FSW/FS2 lacked any real expansion options. I therefore downloaded the X-Plane 11 demo and was suitably impressed with both its looks and performance.

Fast forward a couple of months and I'm still pleased with my decision. One of my friends has both FSX and P3D and after speaking to him about X-Plane, he has also made the move and hasn't touched the other two since.

Granted there aren't anywhere near as many extras for X-Plane but the big developers seem to jumping on the X-Plane bandwagon having seen its potential.

Vanilla wise, X-Plane is far superior.

Thanks that's good to hear. I have a good few add ons for fsx so I'd be sad to see them go, but I just found I was only flying areas where I had the best ground textures or airport add ons, and only flying those planes, because the rest of the content looked terrible. If xplane has better base content then I think I would mix it up more.

 

[squerble]

I'm still waiting for a bit more third-party support for XP before I'd consider getting/moving over to it, mostly from the top-end developers like PMDG, Majestic et al. I'm particularly interested in what PMDG will unveil in Vegas at the FSExpo - it'll either be a 787 or A380 but they could offer it for XP too and it could start a big shift in the community.

 

[andy_mk3]

I have just switched to P3dv4 from FSX, very happy with it. XP11 does look very pretty though!

 

[FBi7]

I'm particularly interested in what PMDG will unveil in Vegas at the FSExpo - it'll either be a 787 or A380

I've a mate who's convinced it's the A380
He knows a guys that knows a guy, etc. Apparently it's been in development since 2008.

Time will tell I suppose .