active Texture? Issues with Australia region help...

[walterg74]

Hi, I recently re-installed my whole PC due to hardware upgrades, etc.

 

Started from scratch and had installed Global, Vector and the 2 available OLCs.

 

Today I decided to start installing the regions, and started with Australia and the two NZ ones.

 

After installing I also re-installed the libraries.

 

I decided to try them out.  First NZ by picking a small airport in/around Auckland, all looked nice at first sight.

 

I then decided to try Australia, and picked one around Sydney, which was Bankstown.

 

Right around the airport there is a mess of textures/incorrect tiles/ "drowned" Control tower...

 

Can you please check what could be the problem?  I do have Oceania set and active, libs up to date and installed last of all, etc., and no other scenery, with all AU/NZ entries at the top (right below libs).

 

I do not think it is my install, since this is happening exactly the same in both FSX:SE as well as in P3D v3.2 (I have both).  Just in case, both FSX and P3D are on their own separate SSD disc.

 

Attaching screenshot (attaching only one, as it-s the exact same issue in both sims)

 

Thanks for your help.

 

 

[walterg74]

Attching screenshot here, for some reason I kept getting the "only 4MB" message (first had tried with a bigger .png) even though the file is only 1.2MB...

[John Dow]

Hi

 

Vector does not work well with the Australian scenery due to the way the scenery was originally constructed.  The recommendation is to turn Vector off when flying in Australia.

 

Search the forums for the issue if you need more info.

[Ed Correia]

Also try unticking the Golf Course option in the Vector config tool (Various Fetaures tab)

 

 

[walterg74]

2 hours ago, Ed Correia said:

Also try unticking the Golf Course option in the Vector config tool (Various Fetaures tab)

 

 

 

So you mean to first try that, and if it doesn't work turn off vector completely as John said?

 

Thinking about how all this works amd that the regions don't need them anyway, wouldn't it be smarter/more efficient to turn off ALL global products when flying within a region..?

[Ed Correia]

Couple of things in the pipeline to make things easier, we are moving away from the need to select a region, so basically all Global products and a regions will coexist.  

The other is in the next Vector update, there will be a option to disable parts of Vector if you have Australia installed. 

So yes, try the golf course option first but as John said and which I do as well, is untick the Vector scenery library entries when using Australia. 

[walterg74]

1 hour ago, Ed Correia said:

Couple of things in the pipeline to make things easier, we are moving away from the need to select a region, so basically all Global products and a regions will coexist.  

The other is in the next Vector update, there will be a option to disable parts of Vector if you have Australia installed. 

So yes, try the golf course option first but as John said and which I do as well, is untick the Vector scenery library entries when using Australia. 

 

 

Ok, just got home. Will give it a go...

 

Out of curiosity, I get you're reworking all products etc. and the new versions like you say will remove the need for this, but I was thinking...

 

The regions are self contained for all scenery layers right? So if that's the case, how come it was never the case that when you set FTX Central to a Region (where the idea is you fly within one) and therefore you will not need the rest, that all Global Products are not just automatically disabled..? Doesn't seem to make sense to keep them active if they're not even needed in the first place, and you would save up some resources?  And if you were to go to another location, well that's what hybrid mode is for, right?

[Stewart Hobson]

Even though the regions and all the airports might be enabled, FSX/P3D won't load them for use by the sim until they are needed.  If you don't want the regions outside the one you are flying in, then there are programs available which will allow you enable only the region you will be flying in, for example, only NA, or only Europe, or only Oceania.  I use SimStarter for this task.  I imagine you can fine-tune it to enable only SCA or NCA or PNW, etc., but I haven't bothered with that refinement.  But it's possible.

[walterg74]

22 minutes ago, Stewart Hobson said:

Even though the regions and all the airports might be enabled, FSX/P3D won't load them for use by the sim until they are needed.  If you don't want the regions outside the one you are flying in, then there are programs available which will allow you enable only the region you will be flying in, for example, only NA, or only Europe, or only Oceania.  I use SimStarter for this task.  I imagine you can fine-tune it to enable only SCA or NCA or PNW, etc., but I haven't bothered with that refinement.  But it's possible.

 

 

Hmm.. I think either I didn't express myself correctly or you didn't get what I wrote...

 

I wasn't talking about disabling other regions, I was talking about disabling the *global* products (ftx global, vector and OLC) 

[walterg74]

3 hours ago, Ed Correia said:

Couple of things in the pipeline to make things easier, we are moving away from the need to select a region, so basically all Global products and a regions will coexist.  

The other is in the next Vector update, there will be a option to disable parts of Vector if you have Australia installed. 

So yes, try the golf course option first but as John said and which I do as well, is untick the Vector scenery library entries when using Australia. 

 

 

Ok, so I gave it a shot and this is what I found.  Disabled golf courses, and the weird squares disappeared and were replaced by a more uniform  lot of land like in the attachments.  Now I know there isn't a "full" airport here, but just in case, does that look right to you?

[walterg74]

I decided to also check out Sydney proper and the international airport, and well.. I think something is still off... Check this out, first with just that golf courses option unselected, and then I tried disabling vector from the library. But I still see things that don't look right:  A road going through the runway? (well, runway cuts it off, roads on either side), does the river really stop there like that heading towards the city? Etc..  Is it supposed to be like this, or might something still be wrong with my setup?  (and remember  it's not just one sim, I see the same in both FSX and P3D).  Splitting the screenshots due to size limitation.

[walterg74]

Ok, cannot add more files, so here go links...

 

 

 

 

[Tim Harris]

Yes the river stops like that, and yes the highway goes under the runway (tunnel), always check Google Earth for these things: https://www.google.com.au/maps/@-33.931244,151.1672083,14z

 

And the airports are default FSX airports in Australia, so WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get), it was only since PNW that we started enhancing all the airports within regions

[walterg74]

1 hour ago, Tim Harris said:

Yes the river stops like that, and yes the highway goes under the runway (tunnel), always check Google Earth for these things: https://www.google.com.au/maps/@-33.931244,151.1672083,14z

 

And the airports are default FSX airports in Australia, so WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get), it was only since PNW that we started enhancing all the airports within regions

 

 

Thanks for that info Tim! I guess it's all as it should then. I do have to say it looks somewhat nicer in P3D...  

 

And from the tiny little tests I did so far I must say I live NZ better!  Unless you can suggest some nice spots to check out in aussie land...?

 

Not too worried about Sydney though, I recently caught the SimMarket sale and got FlyTampa's airport

 

 

 

 

[Tim Harris]

Some of my favorite locations in Australia are in what used to be known as AU_Green, which is up the top end of Australia, so Cairns, Darwin, Broome, Cooktown, Bundeburg etc, thats just me though

 

I suggest grabbing the OZx freeware package, and all the Orbx AU freeware (including the AU Holgermesh), then go from there, there are also plenty of Orbx Australian payware airports if you get the Australian bug

[walterg74]

9 hours ago, Tim Harris said:

Some of my favorite locations in Australia are in what used to be known as AU_Green, which is up the top end of Australia, so Cairns, Darwin, Broome, Cooktown, Bundeburg etc, thats just me though

 

I suggest grabbing the OZx freeware package, and all the Orbx AU freeware (including the AU Holgermesh), then go from there, there are also plenty of Orbx Australian payware airports if you get the Australian bug

 

Thanks for the tips! I will definitely check those places out and have a look.  And don't worry, I do give love to ORBX as well, purchased Queenstown and Melbourne

 

One last one though, because I think I may have done something wrong...

 

Continuing with the installs of my regions, I did the following:

 

- Set the sim to "GLOBAL" in FTX Central (not sure if this is necessary or not, or it was something just when you apply updates that it has to be set to the same region as the one you're updating)

- Installed England, Wales and Scotland, applied "Europe" after each install

- Installed the latest libraries

 

When I launched FSX, I went to the scenery library (because I didn't remember if I had turned Vector back on or not), and to my surprise, the library entries for Australia and NZ regions were still there and active!  WTH?  I quit, went back to FTX Central and re-applied "Europe" just in case, but going back to FSX, Oceania entries are still there...

 

Now what?

 

[Stewart Hobson]

If you apply Global in FTX Central, all the region entries (for NA, Australia, NZ, Europe, etc.) will be disabled.  That's the reason for selecting Global in the first place, to deactivate the Regions.

[walterg74]

27 minutes ago, Stewart Hobson said:

If you apply Global in FTX Central, all the region entries (for NA, Australia, NZ, Europe, etc.) will be disabled.  That's the reason for selecting Global in the first place, to deactivate the Regions.

 

Hi Stewart, thanks for answering but I'm not really sure I understand your answer...

 

I appplied Global prior to installation of the Europe regions. That should have set the FSX scenery file to contain just global, and remove the Oceania entries, afaik. 

 

I then installed the three Europe regions mentioned above, and set "Europe" in FTX Central. This should have enabled them in the scenery library, and not have any Oceania ones. 

 

 

For some reason the sim is showing both Europe AND Oceania files in the library. 

[Tim Harris]

That is as intended,

 

The regions are either all active, or when in [Global] (the old default) disabled, what changes between Europe and Oceania is the lclookup and other crucial landscape control files

 

However the new unified system currently in development will make all that redundant soon

[walterg74]

1 hour ago, Tim Harris said:

That is as intended,

 

The regions are either all active, or when in [Global] (the old default) disabled, what changes between Europe and Oceania is the lclookup and other crucial landscape control files

 

However the new unified system currently in development will make all that redundant soon

 

Ah, ok. Then it was a misunderstanding on my part... I knew that when you picked global the region ones went away, but I thought when you selected a region only that region appeared. 

 

Ok then thanks! Having another issue with weird scenery popping up (it's not a region), but I guess I should open a different thread for that (on one hand it's textures/tiles, but it's in Italy, Mattarello, where there are entire patches of fields and houses on the sides of mountains...

[walterg74]

On ‎4‎/‎14‎/‎2016 at 8:06 AM, Tim Harris said:

Some of my favorite locations in Australia are in what used to be known as AU_Green, which is up the top end of Australia, so Cairns, Darwin, Broome, Cooktown, Bundeburg etc, thats just me though

 

I suggest grabbing the OZx freeware package, and all the Orbx AU freeware (including the AU Holgermesh), then go from there, there are also plenty of Orbx Australian payware airports if you get the Australian bug

 

 

Hey Tim, sorry forgot something I wanted to ask...

 

You recommend also getting the AU Holgermesh, so I want to know:

 

1) Being that the regions contain all elements, including mesh, why would I need/want that mesh?

2) Besides point 1, if I already have Pilot's Mesh (In my case the Global Ultimate series), same question, why would I need/want the Holgermesh?

 

 

Thanks!

 

[John Dow]

If you have Pilot's mesh you don't need Holgermesh.

 

The only exception is PNG, where a couple of airports work better with the Holgermesh.

[Tim Harris]

6 hours ago, walterg74 said:

1) Being that the regions contain all elements, including mesh, why would I need/want that mesh?

2) Besides point 1, if I already have Pilot's Mesh (In my case the Global Ultimate series), same question, why would I need/want the Holgermesh?

 

 

1, FTX Australia does not have a terrain mesh included

2, All the scenery Orbx and Ozx ever created for Australia was made using AU Holgermesh as the base, the other meshes probably work OK, but just be aware should you have any elevation issues

[walterg74]

2 hours ago, John Dow said:

If you have Pilot's mesh you don't need Holgermesh.

 

The only exception is PNG, where a couple of airports work better with the Holgermesh.

 

Thanks, I'll keep that in mind! Do you mean PNG just the area, or the "experience" addon by ORBX?  In case I wanted to add it for that it would just be placing it above Pilot's, right?

[walterg74]

29 minutes ago, Tim Harris said:

 

1, FTX Australia does not have a terrain mesh included

2, All the scenery Orbx and Ozx ever created for Australia was made using AU Holgermesh as the base, the other meshes probably work OK, but just be aware should you have any elevation issues

 

Hmm.. Well thanks for the info, guess another misconception on my part, although this time I was going by what it says on the ORBX guide itself, where it states that the region products *do* contain mesh. Any other regions that don't?

I would think anyway that FS Global Ultimate would be good enough, being it's the most precise one out there anyway. 

[Tim Harris]

In total 3 regions do not contain mesh: Australia, Northern Ireland and Ireland

 

The thing about terrain mesh is this... its not just about which is the most precise or the highest resolution, its more about what source data was used and how it was configured and compiled, this will then determine if there are clashes with existing software or not

 

In the case of Australia, all of our scenery was created to the elevations determined by the AU-Holgermesh, as we test thoroughly to ensure our software works perfectly with this mesh, Pilots-Ultimate may have slightly different elevations depending on the source and methods used to compile, but we cannot produce multiple version of all our software to cater for every single mesh product on the market, we do however make our stuff mostly compatible with the Pilots FS2010 'FTX' version for the Orbx Global products

 

With regards to PNG, we make all our scenery conform to the PNG-Holgermesh elevations and contours, and test to make sure it works perfectly with this mesh, we do this because we do not want to have it so people must buy a very expensive mesh just to use our product, if you do have Pilots-Ultimate and wish to use our PNG scenery packages we have a small compatibility fix here http://www.orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/111921-terrain-mesh-issues-in-papua-new-guinea/#comment-1007688

 

Cheers!

 

[walterg74]

Thanks! Will take a look and apply appropriately. 

[TreeTops]

FlyTampa Sydney contains a land class tile that needs switching off for compatibility. I think there is a thread on that here somewhere.