oh and i didn't mean to be so very irritating. but i am not so very smart with PC sorry!!!

I will when i get fs2004. Oh and i will watch my pc for any flames!

alrot wrote on Jan 27^th, 2012 at 2:29pm:


Alex... ...!

I suspect that Raoul will be starting off in the simple Cessna 172 Trainer first...

Big Boeing Passenger Jets come much later..Very much later...! ...!

Paul...I'm still in my Cessna 150 Aerobat, even after 14 years!... ...!

I am still running FS2004, after running FSX, X Plane, Beta testing Flight and a whole bunch more.  With all my stuff, I liked FS2004 better.
Cheers

I have abstained from answering because it should be clear to everyone who ever read one of my posts I'm a staunch FS9 supporter...

...yet not a stupid man (at least I don't think I am)...

After all this time I've come to believe this kind of discussion to be barren of any usefulness, since some people never really listen, yet I've decided to simply pitch my ball in. It you catch it or not, it's your problem. What follows is merely my point of view. If you do not share it, do as you like and forget these lines written in a sleepless night to while the time away.

Is FS9 still worth it? Is FSX worth more?

I think it's moot.

See, we've flown in and beyond the four corners of the world (which, being or roughly spherical, doesn't have corners to begin with, thing that makes me wonder exactly WHERE have we flown and when... and especially at the degree of alcohol or drug consumption on our part when thinking we were overflying a corner of the world) in FS9, and it has its downsides... the world simulated by FS9 is not a sphere but a... sort of squeezed-at-the poles cylinder... kind of two cones joined at the base, in a way... and its graphics are dated... and the sky has a 100.000 feet glass ceiling limit...

...while FSX has a spherical geography... thing this relevant only if you use to pass lots of time on the poles or their immediate whereabouts, though... but then, the better graphics (a point of FSX) are dumped right down the bog, since there isn't anything really worth seeing at those latitudes... and those thing that ARE... are unimpressively similar between the two sim versions.

In FSX the glass 100.000 feet ceiling is absent... alright... so? Is it so ground-breaking exactly why? Since the dynamics of the FS franchise's software as a whole do not allow for sub-orbital flight, why is it so important?

The graphics are better... all right, but the price you MUST pay for better graphics is... it is just not worthy to return on those arguments WE ALL know by heart by now.

A thing I've noticed... most of the people advocating about FSX better graphics ALWAYS, and I stress , bring about the better graphics inside the DEFAULT PLANES.

Planes that the advanced user gets up in the simulated sky just to jeer about their pitiful dynamics once or twice when the sim is ... and then forgets about them. Confining them from that moment onwards to the duty of AI, and those who install custom AI MUST resign to keep as HD ballast even if they never use them, because if they try to get rid of their unwanted presence the sim starts acting weird.

Another thing I've noticed is that FSX highlights the absence of things that in FS9 we

NEVER

felt the need of.

Reflecting glass in the VC...

...since there's no simulation of frost, nor active heating, nor simulation of damage for low temps brittleness, its' only eye candy and on lower end rigs only slow things down...

...the wings cast shadows on the plane...

...since I'm inside trying to avoid to crash the damn thing, could not care less... not to say it slows things down even on some medium-high end rigs...

...better designed VC...

...but only in the defaults, since add-ons, sometimes even not payware, are always on another plane of existence... for references see above.

So.

Why is it FSX better? by the point of view of someone who simply wants a decent simulation of an aircraft?

...

...dynamics are the same... with external advanced weather program controllers (a MUST, if you are an advanced user) the weather behaves the same...

...

The programs in themselves then add another layer. FSX was objectively coded in a hurry and without giving any attention to the beta testers points of view, all in the Sacred Name of the Deadline. This makes FSX a lot... no, even WAY less stable than FS9...

Case in point, I have the same installation of FS9 ever since 2004, inherited over three (3) different rigs with little problems, while the kid's FSX installation, in absolute spite of all the attentions to it and the absolute rule of no add-ons if not installed by me, went through the third reinstallation in less than a year last month...

...

The difference, in the end, exists only for the NOT advanced users, I reckon. Those who enter in a plane (most of the times default), make it take off (most of the times badly and without following the correct procedures), and then pass the time cycling the outside views gawking at this graphic particular or that... that the old and obsolete FS9 didn't have.

For someone like me, who's still diabolically angry at M$ to never have put hands on some too long a list to be written here realism variables (not to talk about the dogged refusal to make clouds that actually project shadows), preferring to develop badly coded graphics instead, only to keep FS stupid and unrealistic so not to spoil the party of those not gifted under the point of view of piloting skills who like to gawk at meaningless shiny 3D graphics while deluding themselves they can make a plane fly along the way...

...a slice of the market this last towards which M$ has absolute and total respect, while we sim-pilots they treat like sub-human scum that should have never been created in the first place...

For someone like me, who likes his planes to behave like planes and not like train engines that just happen to be shaped like a plane running on invisible tracks in the sky...

...I mean... default planes... really... please...

For someone like me who feels that even FS9 is a poor sim because gives too much importance to graphics over realism...

...and yet, at the same time, if forced to make a choice, someone like me would prefer a lighter, more stable platform to make his simulated planes fly... and this, definitely, IS FSX.

There's some people that are mesmerized by the better graphics of FSX in themselves alone... but oddly enough the almost totality of those people, when faced by simulators with EVEN BETTER GRAPHICS like, say, X-plane 10 have a quiet nervous breakdown since they can't really get their minds around the fact FSX is not all that great anymore and build mental fortresses to defend their dear choice... when they do not decide to do virtual harakiri throwing themselves to absolute trash in the making like Flight, forever defining themselves as mere gamers and NOT virtual pilots.

For the archive... speaking of x-plane I prefer the 9, as it is only slightly less graphic shiny than the 10 and quite a bit lighter on the system... then again, I always gave higher priority to the usefulness and ease of use than the good looks, when considering a tool...

As I said above, moot.

My point of view. If you do not share it, simply continue your life disregarding it. I am not trying to make you change your mind. I am simply... allowing my thoughts to flow into my fingers and then the keyboard (computer-ese for thinking out loud).


PS
For those who may have not gleaned it from the above writ, I divide the users of the FS franchise between the sim-pilots and the gamers. The firsts are interested in the simulation first treating the graphics as a side dish (good to have it if the main course is good too), while the seconds live for the graphics and treat the simulation like an afterthought (if there isn't any of it... who cares).

I hold no respect for the seconds, since they are unwittingly guilty to have ruined the fun for the firsts, given that M$ treat them like the favorite offspring and would rather satisfy their shallow wishes over the requests of the firsts (for references see: Flight).

Lets just say this to sum it up:
If you got a really good system, get FSX
If you got an 'ok' system (or are using a laptop like me) get FS2004
If you got the cash, why not get both?
If you got the hard-drive space, why not install both?
I have both installed, because my system is average, FS2004 actually looks better and runs better than FSX. HOWEVER, I run both because some planes I want to fly are in FSX, some are in FS2004.

Tailwinds,

Adam....multi-tasking!

I have both Sims on my Hard Drive... ...!

..and every morning, I have this constant battle with myself as to which Sim I need to fire up for today's exciting flight into the unknown....

...sometimes FS 2004 wins... ...

...sometimes FSX wins... ...

..and sometimes I just go back to bed, and forget the whole she-bang!.... ...!

Paul... ... ...!