Classic British Flight Sim

I see this is out now and apart from Guy's excellent Comet which is the driving force behind looking at it I know nothing about it and since MS Flight is leaving me with an overwhelming sense of ambivalence I thought I might give it a go as the engine will obviously be newer than FSX, use modern hardware better (I hope) and I have a new 1TB slave drive desperately needing something to do with itself.

Anyone have it yet?

I've never been impressed with x-plane, because in the past I've found those who used it, who i tried to get help from, arrogant and rude. While technically superior to MSFS, IMHO the geeks behind it have only ever been interested in the sciencey bit and not about making it look like a great simulator. Guy's model is absolutely phenominal, but from what I've seen there are very few good addons for it that would resemble this quality or of the quality produced for FSX (even some of the newer FS9 stuff) It might be worth giving it a go. I tried 7 and 8 and hit the same problems with lack of content and people who were just bad mannered and that put me off for a lifetime. In saying that, there do seem to be more of the big payware developers producing stuff for it, so maybe its turned a corner.

Just don't seem to like the look of Xplane and as for Flight well, the jury is still out on that one although I do expect to be hugely disappointed. I have both FSX and FS9 but hardley ever use FSX at all. Feels to 'gamey' for me.

It comes to something when alot of us are still using an 8 year old sim as the preferred software!

I do fear for our hobby and it's future however.

Neville

As a long-time X-Plane user I actually agree with most of the sentiments expressed above. As a Mac user, my exposure to FS is limited to using it in conjunction with a real 747 simulator a friend of mine has set up in his garage - yes, a real simulator! - a desktop installation of FS9 with the same friend and older versions on a 2001 PC. I've never got FS to run successfully - or at least satisfactorily - on a dual boot system. It's very disappointing, but there is an amount of hostility between the XP and FS communities that benefits no-one.

XP10 is a buggy and far from satisfactory product that IMHO is far from ready for release. The fact that it was already over a year behind schedule, and that MS Flight's release was imminent, presumably made the developers rush it onto the market. I think it is several revision cycles from being ready: but unfortunately this is normal service from Laminar and XP9 didn't "mature" until at least v9.4, well over a year after it went on sale.

I must declare an interest here and say that I am on the beta test team for the Comet but still have to say that it's one of the most impressive simulator add-ons I've ever seen. The quality of both freeware and payware add-ons for X-Plane is of very variable quality. There are many very impressive 3D models being published but the people behind them don't necessarily understand flight dynamics, etc and consequently while the models many look lovely they don't make for accurate simulations of real aircraft. The situation is improving all the time as more mature developers work on extremely sophisticated projects: have a look at http://www.ixeg.net for an impressive 737-300 simulation.

I am by no means a zealot for X-Plane: each to his own - there is plenty of room for everyone and antagonism from either side is pointless. But I cannot currently recommend XP10 and don't see myself upgrading until at least the autumn and possibly later. It simply isn't ready. In the meantime, download the beta and see what you think.

Thanks for that

The situation of good models with poor performance is a general Flight Sim thing.

People need to realise that in order to get quality they need to specialise which means a team not an individual although there are some very good single developers still.

I was disappointed at the low quality of X Plane models but there was a low limit on cylinder sizes etc which immediately disadvantaged it against FS.9 and FS.X leaving it somewhat on par with FS.98

However that no longer applies and the Comet is a good example of the beast being unleashed and the potential seems to be up to or above the latest MS.

Of course these take time to make and so it will be a while before things truly catch up but it looks worth the wait.

Like FS.9/FS.X it has it's advantages and it's pitfalls and really the best option is to use all three as the mood take you.

XPlane seems to be turning a corner on as much as the main area of criticism has been addressed and with the potential to get better and still support add ons by anyone could swing a few over

One thing is for certain, if X Plane doesn't float your boat now, keep an open mind, that might well change.

While keeping my eye on it over the years, time to time, I've not found a justifiable reason to buy it based on what I'm needing from a sim.
I Have had limited use of it helping a CFII install some scenery and aircraft. Now, His decision to buy X-Plane over FS was based on the fact that it is FAA approved for flight training*. ...So their is that, as far as it's appeal "for some" of it' users.

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There is one thing I'd buy something of I already have that works different from what I already have. A better speech to text program!
I used it to create this post and 1 of the census came out like this.. sentences I said!



Ebay sisters in on my neck playing on the fact that it is faa approved for flight.

The problem with that is that with the same equipment as required for XPlane to be "approved", FSX and FS9 are "approved" flight simulators as well in the same category and for the same eligibility for logging hours. That's the problem I have with Laminar's advertisement. They claim that they're better than FS because they're "approved" when in fact, they're not. You have to have certain peripheral equipment installed for it to be approved and that same equipment will make MSFS and several other flight simulators approved (although those can cause significantly more as they're from Frasca and other specialized companies).

Problem?

No problem here

I just got an email from JustFlight advertising XP10 and I didn't realise it was so expensive.. rrp of £59.99 with JF offering it at £49.99 !!!

ATB
DaveB