???hello again fellow simmers, it's captjim once more.  so far my expierence with flightsim has been somewhat frustration.  I have, with the help of some of you, been able to download my aircraft.  however, I am still unable to get the gauges to work.  I just found the PANEL site and have downloaded some great panels.  They download onto my desktop and then I zip them into a file I call junk.  NOW the question is, how do I get the panels into the correct aircraft???? I need a very simple explaination on how to do this.  anyone care to tackel this problem????  thanks. captjim

The easiest way to explain it is to send you here....
http://www.simviation.com/paninstall.htm

Just one of many tutorials available from the 'Help' link on most Simviation download pages.

Only one suggestion I would make is, before copying or moving the new Panel folder to the appropriate aircraft folder go into the aircraft folder and rename the existing Panel folder to something like Oldpanel.

That way if you wish to restore the original panel its as simple as renaming folders.  Easier than trying to remember where you put the backup or what aircraft it belongs to.

One other thing. Make sure whatever unzip utility you are using it is set to 'use folders' or a similar term depending on what utility your using.

If not you might end up with just a jumble of files with panel.cfg, .bmp's and .gau files all mixed together.

Also, most .zip downloads include install instructions in a readme.txt file, explaining what folders/files go where.

Cheers,
Dave

I had thought of systems similar to maskriders, but I have to say thats pretty impressive! How well does it work?
Dan

Quote:


Hi Dan

It works fine. I agree with Hagar though that it is best to learn it the "right" way before starting to cut corners and take short cuts.

I do the same thing with my CFS2 set up. A friend once sent me a wonderful collection of sounds that he had put together for WWII piston driven engines. So, that is when I started getting into the aliasing thing seriously- with the sounds- it was just too cumbersome to transfer all of those sound files into the aircraft sound folders.

Started doing it with panels shortly thereafter. Did it right away with FS2002 since good panels are so much more important in FS2002 than they are in CFS2. It works great- actually a very standard procedure.

Cheers,
Chris

hey guys,  I really appreciate all the comments on this problem.  I will try and make it work.  good luck to all, captjim

Hi Chris. We each have our own way of doing these things & this is purely my opinion. Aliasing was first introduced with FS98 & the idea is hardly new. It can be very useful & I was a big advocate of it for many years. I still use it myself when convenient. Any system has its drawbacks & aliasing can be confusing if you don't know exactly what you're doing.

That was then & this is now. Things have changed dramatically in a few short years. I find that nowadays with no worries about conserving HDD space it's generally easier & more convenient to install panels & sound to each aircraft separately. Then deleting the aircraft can't possibly cause a problem. Huge downloads of 3rd party aircraft including their own panel & sound files are very common & popular these days. I don't think too many people realise that many of these packages (that can take someone like me on dial-up hours to download) contain duplicates of files they might already have several times over. I'm not convinced they worry about it even if they do realise it.

I can't be bothered with these huge downloads myself even if it involves missing out on a superb aircraft. I often think the old system was better & modifying an aircraft yourself with separate panel & sound files, resulting in a custom-built model to your own preferences, was far more enjoyable - but that's purely my opinion. I seem to be outvoted.