ORBX

[TSR2]

Hi Chris,

there is an email address which used to be on the home page ([email protected]) but its seems to have got deleted off the home page, sorry about that, its probably something I did. I'll try and sort it tonight. The address is working, just no mention of it on the home page www.cbfsim.co.uk

[DaveB]

Chris..

The login problem is because we changed servers/address's months ago. It was published here and the old site was dual linked for a while but I guess you have to visit regularly to know that.

What you need to do is go to the home page (www.cbfsim.co.uk) then navigate to the forum from there. Login and save that page. Job done Your old link probably still goes to cbfsim.org so delete that
ATB
DaveB

[Airspeed]

G'day simmers!
Only folks with a validated order number are allowed to read the support forum at ORBX, so for those who don't have such ID, here's a selection from my exchanges with them:

[QUOTE]
Mike,
I think perhaps your understanding of this product may have been correct.A freudian slip by Dean?!
It is not a product that delivers satellite imagery for the whole of Australia... It is (basically) a product that replaces the default terrain texture tiles provided by Microsoft - which were rather "americanised" with a new set of textures based on aerial photos taken within Australia. So you wont see the same textures or similar "Real" located textures in FSX with this product like you see in Google Earth.
FTX Australia then uses this set of Australianised textures and places them more accurately... i.e. town texture sets where towns are approximately located, farms for farms, forests for forest area locations etc. It does also update coastlines, roads, rivers etc, and add custom native vegetatiion and houses for the autogen objects.
Looking at your screenshot, it does look like FTX Australia SP4 DVD has loaded fine.... Its just not a product that delivers real-world, located, imagery for the whole of Australia. (This would be majorly cost prohibitive and consume tens, perhaps hundreds of terrabytes of data to do something like that.
Hope that answers your question? [END QUOTE]

Well, Dean, It looks like when I read "TRANSFORMS YOUR PC INTO A VIRTUAL AUSTRALIA"......"PHOTO BASED TEXTURES SO REALISTIC IT'S LIKE BEING THERE"
I somehow thought that's what I was buying.
BTW, when I go across to Photobucket to copy the [IMG] detail, I lose my draft mail.
fly low, fly slow
**************************************************
[pix were here]
These shots show what I mean about the petrol storage area at Westgate Bridge.

fly low, fly slow
**************************************************
Hi Again... I am not sure where you read those comments about the product? I know we don't make those claims about the product on our product page... yes they could be a little misleading I guess if interpreted in a certain way. You should contact the owner of the site/author of that text and make it known that those claims can be interpreted the wrong way in this instance.

But please read my initial comments above. The FTX Australia package is simply not Google earth imagery transferred into the flight sim. So you wont see the same in FSX as what you see in Google earth or any other online satellite imagery service.

Hope that explains things a little more.
Manager - PC Aviator Australia
**************************************************
Thanks Dean, perhaps someone from ORBX, and not the retailer could read this.
The quotes are taken directly from the cover of the DVD box.
I thought that this forum was being read by the ORBX owners. Am I again misinterpreting the words "orbxsystems.com"?
I do not know where else to direct my comments.
fly low, fly slow

The previous post indicating that those with the temerity to question are given short shrift is oh, so true.
If anything else crops up, I'll let you all know.

[ChrisHunt]

Thanks Dave and Ben, I have been lurking (honest) but perhaps not paying as much attention as I ought!

Mike re Orbx I think it is accepted that it is not close to photoreal however some of the screen shots of England do show a remarkable similarity to the area depicted (St Ives is a good example). TBH nothing beats it and it does seem to get better with each new area added.

Regards,
Chris

[Airspeed]

Yes,
I've started to accept that what I've got is all there is.
It should not be that things are improving with each release, they claim to be great already, not learning as they go.

[speedbird591]

It seems to me that you've made the mistake of reading advertising literature, Mike

Regardless of the product, every advertiser is trying to create a desire for their goods by flattering it's capabilities up to the point where the claims are blatant lies. There are consumer protection laws but 'caveat emptor' still applies as much as it always has. So asking around, reading reviews and studying the goods objectively is still the best buying advice, although still not foolproof!

The thing is, if you really feel that those statements on your packaging ( "TRANSFORMS YOUR PC INTO A VIRTUAL AUSTRALIA"......"PHOTO BASED TEXTURES SO REALISTIC IT'S LIKE BEING THERE") were positioned as a technical description rather than acceptable advertising license, then you should put your complaint to the advertising ombudsman and get a legal opinion.

Without a ruling it comes down to personal opinion and you'll get no end of different ones if you ask us

Have you asked for a refund in view of your disappointment at the misleading claims?

Ian

[DaveB]

Hmm.. sri to read of your disappointment Mike

Difficult to comment any differently to how Ian has I'm afraid. I read the blurb on this a while ago and was of the impression that while it wasn't 'photoreal' in the true sense, they'd built the scenery using sat images as reference and repainted the stock textures to closer match reality rather than 'simply' use sat imagery. That doesn't help you of course and statements like 'photo based textures so real it's like being there' are stretching things just a tad perhaps.
However, they're obviously 'not so real it's like being there' so I think you probably have justification in sending the product back and asking for a refund if that's the way you want to go.

I always work on the asumption that 'As real as it gets'.. the slogan used by MS, doesn't mean it looks real but it's as good as you can get for the few dollars it costs Having witnessed first hand what our RAF pilots see in the VC10 sim, we get a far better deal and it doesn't cost £2000 per hour to run. We don't get full motion though

ATB
DaveB

[emfrat]

One comment from NZ was that NZ by OrbX looked prettier, but VLC was more accurate... I have never been across the ditch to NZ, so I don't really know what I am looking at - but what I see is very nice scenery. There was some real-life video taken from the Mosquito in the circuit at Ardmore. I was very pleased to find that some very distinctive features visible in the video were there in my FSX VLC scenery, when I took the DG Beaufighter up for a spin. I think they are hedgerows used for windbreaks - evidently an NZ thing.
The Orbx Australian stuff is good - I don't expect to see the next door neighbour's dog in any scenery (though it won't be long, I suspect) - but it was a big disappointment to find the only tile (maybe four tiles) in the whole scenery which I really wanted to see, were wrong. And all the more so, when you see that many of the adjacent tiles are spot-on.
As I said, I don't expect to see every last little shrub, but the railway line just vanishes, and the local roads, which were well represented in VOZ, are very confused. Those things could be easily checked. That said, VOZ doesn't show Lake Dyer at all, but it is present in FSX.; and the four very prominent grain silos, just across from my house and beside the railway, do not appear in any of the sim sceneries.

Cheers
MikeW

[DaveB]

Hiya Mike

I think the same can be said for GenX and Treescapes in the UK mate and this is using photo tiles and accurately placed trees. What you don't have are the buildings (in rural areas) and I guess you wouldn't expect to see them but even with photo tiles and trees in the right place, it's far from looking like 'being there'. The obvious advantage of photo tiles (easy for a little pee-pot place like the UK) is that you can pick out 'flat' landmarks like roads and buildings and follow them wherever they go. The addition of trees turns the bumpy but flat, featureless countryside into something more.. something much more but real it most certainly isn't, even with the trees in the correct place!

ORBX/FTX seems to be a very good compromise and looking at it from afar without first hand experience, it looks very good though to you guys who live there.. mistakes/omisions will be rather more obvious. You've all seen screenies of GenX and Treescapes.. many of you may have them installed. What I'll do some time is take a shot from the back of my house and then show you how it looks 'in sim'. You'd be hard pushed to tell the locations are the same
ATB
DaveB

[emfrat]

Dave, my FSX Australia is FTX plus OZx and overall it is bl**dy good, considering the size of the place.
I don't know if you have those sceneries installed, but if you do, go to Google Earth and ask for Forest Hill Qld 4342, and then compare.
I finally tracked down the pics I mentioned at the start of this thread, so I will put something up on the 'Net tomorrow, all being well.

ATB
MikeW