announcement Effective immediately - restrictions on downloads of FSS transferred licenses

[NoLonger]

3 minutes ago, Perk said:

So out of curiosity... I have 170gb of Orbx products installed into P3Dv3.4.  I have copies of all the individual installers from FSS on network attached storage.  I'm also planning building myself a new PC for Christmas.  Why in Trump's name would I need to download anything to move to the new PC?  Can't I just copy the \Orbx directory up to the NAS, then back down into a fresh P3D installation on the new PC, install FTX Central 3, sign in to my account, and be good?  Surely FTX Central 3 can handle scenery library insertions and individual file validation without installer wrappers for every product?

 

I think John just explained you can do this, yes. No need for downloads, backups of installers, whatever. Life can be so easy. Problems solved. Now lets work on some real problems we have in this world.

[dominique]

6 minutes ago, John Venema said:

 

You are 100% correct. There is no need to backup installers if you backup your entire ORBX directory before a sim re-install, system rebuild or OS re-install. Just copy the Orbx folder back into the sim root folder, run FTX Central V3 and everything is taken care. The only thing that needs a re-install is FTX Global because it replaces default textures.

 

As I've said many times, this is the preferred way to reinstall ORBX on a sim and FTX Central V3 is designed to detect everything in the ORBX directory and do all the management for you. That's the beauty of the new system.

 

You may have said it many times bit it has escaped me so far. I was not attentive enough maybe... It could be useful to add it to your excellent  guide (which does not appear anymore in FTXC v3 by the way) and also add the info to the instructions to pass from v2 to v3.  That would refrain people to hoard zips. Maybe.

 

 

 

 

 

[NoLonger]

18 minutes ago, John Venema said:

 

You are 100% correct. There is no need to backup installers if you backup your entire ORBX directory before a sim re-install, system rebuild or OS re-install. Just copy the Orbx folder back into the sim root folder, run FTX Central V3 and everything is taken care of automatically. The only thing that needs a re-install is FTX Global because it replaces default textures.

 

As I've said many times, this is the preferred way to reinstall ORBX on a sim and FTX Central V3 is designed to detect everything in the ORBX directory and do all the management for you. That's the beauty of the new system.

 

You should make this a sticky on every subforum.

[CrownCityMisfit]

Do what you need to do JV. I read the notification email and was like, "Yeah, of course."

 

As a company, I understand you need to keep your customers happy and assured. But this is getting a little ridiculous. I am shocked that you are still getting questions and push-back in this thread. 

 

As far as I am concerned, everything was clear and easy to understand from day 1.

 

Well done.

[BradB]

When I am actively doing FS , I spend at least $100 per month in either new Orbx scenery or new AC to fly . So for me spending $30 to $50 a year for unlimited DL's is a no brainer .

 

Cheers

 

John

[Sante Sottile]

27 minutes ago, John Venema said:

 

In that case, backup your entire ORBX folder before you re-image. Simple. Instant Orbx re-install with just a directory copy. You just need to re-install FTX Global because it replaces system default textures. Everything else FTX Central V3 takes care of.

 

 

You did not read my OP closely enough. There are NO download restrictions or caps on new purchases made from OrbxDirect from November 1st.

 

Thanks John. That clears it up. Appreciate the clarification. 

 

Cheers,

[ArtFlyer]

2 hours ago, John Venema said:

We're all adults here so let's not be precious about condescending posts or political correctness. I also won't pull punches about blaming people who are downloading every product when there is no need to.

 

 

Customers ARE precious, if you know anything about business. Its not the customer that should be "blamed" for your lack of bandwidth and foresight. 

[GlennH]

i just dont see the need to have all these "backup'' installers saved on HD's

 

Unless you have a new system build or a total HD crash there should be no need or use to be downloading installers of all these files. Its bonkers.

 

The announcement makes no difference to me and if all the users who want to download GB's of backup data then let them pay the $30 and leave the 'normal' users with the system as is.

[NoLonger]

Just now, GlennH said:

i just dont see the need to have all these "backup'' installers saved on HD's

 

Unless you have a new system build or a total HD crash there should be no need or use to be downloading installers of all these files. Its bonkers.

 

The announcement makes no difference to me and if all the users who want to download GB's of backup data then let them pay the $30 and leave the 'normal' users with the system as is.

 

Indeed. And as John just explained, even with a new system build there is no need to download installers. An HD crash may be a problem unless you simply create a backup or your /Orbx folder (from within the sim folder). Reinstall the sim, the PC, whatever, put the backup of the Orbx folder in the sim folder, install FTXC3, run it, log in, and everything will be working again. Only Global needs a reinstall because it replaces files in the sim itself.

[Trevor Bagnell]

Doesn't HD Trees also require a reinstall? Does it not also replace files in the sim?

[John Venema]

17 minutes ago, Kimo said:

50TB for 8000 users does not sound that bad. That is only about 6GB per user.

Does not look like hoarding but more like testing the new V3 central.

I installed a few sceneries when V3 came out. It was so easy and fast.

 

Incorrect. Only a small minority of those 8,000 customers download 100's of GB each, causing the problem. Most people have not been on a download frenzy. If they had I can assure you we would possible be in serious strife with data bandwidth bills.

 

9 minutes ago, aurel42 said:

 

Let me reply this way:

 

The new FTX Central made purchasing a product so comfortable that, last night, I "impulse purchased" a region and an airport. (That was more than 30 bucks.)

 

I wouldn't have considered that purchase from FSS because of their cumbersome DRM wrapper.

And I would not have considered that purchase if you had changed the rules yesterday instead of today.

 

Or, to put it more bluntly, for a short while, I was a happy OrbX customer, because it felt as if you had mitigated the problems that come for the customer with any DRM solution. (Just like I am a happy Steam customer.)

 

But now I have to realize that, thanks to DRM (ie. the migration from one DRM service to another DRM service), I have just lost access to a service I paid for ("reinstall any of those products from network at any time"). That's not as bad as Amazon "recalling" a book you purchased from your Kindle, but it is an unexpected restriction, that reminds me harshly that DRM is always bad for me as a customer and not to put too much trust in any company that feels the need to use it. It reminds me that if OrbX goes belly-up and the DRM server is offline, I have to go search for the products I purchased on pirate sites to be able to continue to use them.

 

Also, I put myself in a worse position, because I trusted your promise so much that I deleted all the FSS files I had backed up ("I won't need them any more, I can just install everything at any time from FTX Central now!"). Of course, I will now start downloading stuff from your servers I wouldn't have to download, because nobody can predict whether that new rule will still be in effect when there is a need for me to reinstall P3D, so actually having the local copies is the only sensible alternative. But I'm sure you considered that when you discussed those measures, and you won't care about the extra traffic.

 

I only speak for myself, of course, but I don't trust OrbX as much as I did yesterday.

 

By the way, a more sensible way to handle this problem might have been to communicate the issue openly and friendly to customers without blaming them for OrbX's shortcomings in communication and client design, and suspend FSS migration until you added P2P support to your client (enforced for downloads, encouraged by default, with options to limit bandwidth or opt-out entirely). I would've been more than happy to support you that way. But $30 to get at what I should get anyway because I paid for it? Right. Better not hold your breath for my next impulse purchase.

 

Cheers,

Marc

 

 

Marc, you have not properly read my OP. I expressly said any new purchases have NO download limits or caps. You impulse bought a region and an airport from OrbxDirect yes? Thank you! Now you can download them as much as you want, no limits.

 

Having local copies is not necessarily a sensible alternative at all, if you already have everything installed into the ORBX folder. Why have backups of installers for something which is already installed and can simply be moved to another HD?

 

33 minutes ago, dominique said:

 

Since you asked, one doesn't take such a decision on public polls and certainly not taken during a PR disaster and bad psychodrama that we see unfolding now.

 

 

You see it as a PR disaster. I see it as being proactively engaged with our customers and having a conversation about how to fix it. As I said, too much political correctness around these days, bores me to tears. Roll our sleeves up and get the problem sorted.

 

 

27 minutes ago, fueliehead said:

I would have no problem with upping prices across the board for new purchases.  For the products that I currently own, part of selling ORBXDirect and FTX Central was the promise that you would be entitled to unlimited downloads and that the download speeds would be sufficient.  There were several threads before ORBXDirect and FTX Central with users concerned about backups and download capacity, we were assured this would not be an issue.  Personally, I understand the dilemma, I don't use the backups in this manner (although I may start).  But, it seems ORBX ignored or overlooked this "need" by several customers to backup.  Maybe limit backup downloads but not installs?  I've followed all the instructions and am trying to do it the ORBX way, I'm not sure why I have to suffer, or pay more for doing so. 

 

JV's tone does not help matters at all.

 

hank

 

Honestly, we really did not expect so many people to download all their Orbx products all over again, especially when they are already happily installed in the ORBX folder.

 

Tone? What tone? There is no tone to emails and forum posts.

 

27 minutes ago, neucoas said:

Even Airport elevation corrections on Scenery/World/Scenery?

 

Good point. You need to copy those across as well. My bad. I should make a sticky topic about the easiest way to move ORBX and/or do a reinstall.

 

12 minutes ago, Perk said:

So out of curiosity... I have 170gb of Orbx products installed into P3Dv3.4.  I have copies of all the individual installers from FSS on network attached storage.  I'm also planning building myself a new PC for Christmas.  Why in Trump's name would I need to download anything to move to the new PC?  Can't I just copy the \Orbx directory up to the NAS, then back down into a fresh P3D installation on the new PC, install FTX Central 3, sign in to my account, and be good?  Surely FTX Central 3 can handle scenery library insertions and individual file validation without installer wrappers for every product?

 

Yes it can, and it does - automatically.

[Expo]

Friends, I can't understand. Someone managed to install everything that is necessary from the manually downloaded archive? I have Central looking on the archive, thinks for like 30 seconds and starts downloading all over again. There are those who have everything was fine with the big components?

[pmb]

42 minutes ago, John Venema said:

 

You are 100% correct. There is no need to backup installers if you backup your entire ORBX directory before a sim re-install, system rebuild or OS re-install. Just copy the Orbx folder back into the sim root folder, run FTX Central V3 and everything is taken care of automatically. The only thing that needs a re-install is FTX Global because it replaces default textures.

While this idea has something, it's not without a backside. Actually, I still have a backup of the ORBX filder from my previous machine. However, as always the devil may be hidden in detail. Where did I rename those .bgl to .off files? Will I install the same 3rd party sceneries as before? Plus, I installed Vancouver 3+, Victoria+, Tongass Fjord. I don't excactly recall how I did it, but they worked and their installation hand some relation to ORBX (after all Vancouver 3+ is called "for PNW"). Thus  I might probably copy their folders, too. Or not? 

 

Make your way through the compatibility forum. How many renamings / substitutions are there? Will you be able to reproduce the very same 3rd party addons infrastructure? Moreover, perhaps I even don't want to? 

 

There are several loose ends in this approach, and I would have preferred a clean start.

 

Kind regards, Michael

[dominique]

15 minutes ago, John Venema said:

 

 

 

You see it as a PR disaster. I see it as being proactively engaged with our customers and having a conversation about how to fix it. As I said, too much political correctness around these days, bores me to tears. Roll our sleeves up and get the problem sorted.

 

 

 

 

I don't exactly understand how the dreaded Political Correctness comes into play here  ! I would agree though that opening and engaging a lively debate is certainly a great thing.  

[gregmorin]

23 minutes ago, Expo said:

Friends, I can't understand. Someone managed to install everything that is necessary from the manually downloaded archive? I have Central looking on the archive, thinks for like 30 seconds and starts downloading all over again. There are those who have everything was fine with the big components?

Expo

 

You are dealing with a nomenclature issue. When you point FTX 3 at a manually downloaded file it:

 

1. Reads the zipped file

2. Checks your license with Orbx Direct

3. It does say that it is re-downloading the file but it is actually installing the file.

4. The progress bar will hang at about 20% but will then quickly move to the right as the product is installed.

5. You will get a window message that your product has installed.

 

This method is quick and works flawlessly every time.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Greg

[aurel42]

1 minute ago, John Venema said:

Marc, you have not properly read my OP. I expressly said any new purchases have NO download limits or caps. You impulse bought a region and an airport from OrbxDirect yes? Thank you! Now you can download them as much as you want, no limits.

 

I have properly read your OP. You have not properly read my response, or you would have understood that the fact that I won't purchase as light-heartedly from you in the future as I did last night has nothing to do with how easily (or not) I can re-download these two products right now, and everything with trust, with the fact that you changed the rules for products and services I already paid for after I bought them.

 

If you decided right now that the same download restriction became active for the products bought through OrbxDirect, there would be nothing I could do about it (except complain here on the forum, which obviously doesn't help). There is only one thing you can do to make the customer trust that you won't change the rules arbitrarily to their disadvantage, and that is to never change the rules arbitrarily to their disadvantage. The rule has been broken, there are no signs that the impact of this has been understood, so I can safely assume that, from now on, OrbX reserves the right to change the rules to my disadvantage at any time, if it suits their business plan better.

 

You made me transfer my products to FTX Central by explaining to me how much better my experience with your service would be if I used your new platform, I did, and now I'm worse off than before. I hate to spend my time discussing stuff like this. Yet, I felt the need to express how much impact your decision has on the way I perceive your company, even though my SSD might never die, my P3D installation might never become corrupted and I might never have to reinstall any OrbX product.

 

You had my trust, I bought some stuff and felt good about it. Now I'm back to where I was before: I will buy stuff that I feel is essential, after pondering over it for a long time, because DRM and download restrictions and customer experience. Feel free to ignore this part of my response. I'm probably an edge-case anyway, and everyone else will forget about this incident soon enough.

 

1 minute ago, John Venema said:

Having local copies is not necessarily a sensible alternative at all, if you already have everything installed into the ORBX folder. Why have backups of installers for something which is already installed and can simply be moved to another HD?

 

The fact is that I haven't checked whether this does in fact work. Has anybody else here?

 

I know it doesn't work with other products with similar DRM methods (like the Flight1 system - backup everything, change your hardware, e.g. by replacing a failed harddisk, restore from backup, nothing works). So you ask me to trust you when you're saying that a backup of the OrbX folder will be enough, and while you were typing this, you already thought of the first exception (OrbX Global, because it replaces textures). And I immediately thought "Doesn't HD Trees replace textures as well?" Perhaps there are other exceptions that you didn't think of. Effects for airports or whatever. What would you do in my place? Trust that your SSD never dies and your P3D installation never is corrupted? Trust that the rules have not been changed again to your disadvantage? Trust the guy who tries to calm down a shitstorm with information that might or might not be entirely accurate? 

 

I don't have a long history with OrbX. I'm sure if I was a customer that has been with the company for ages, it would be easier for me to judge that whole situation. As it stands, I feel like I'm being punished for something I didn't do by someone who I had a contract with that has just been changed without my consent.

 

[darem]

This is a very important question to ORBX for me:

 

As you might see (if you check my account, John), I have nearly all your products. Recently, after some absence from Flight simming, I am reinstalling P3D and the sceneries. I DO have most of the wrappers present on my hard disk, but most of them are outdated and have lower Version numbers than those in FTXC3.

 

What happens if i install These outdated addons? Will they get updated or will only one get updated per day? Will an update be counted against a download?

 

Thanks.

[Expo]

15 minutes ago, gregmorin said:

Expo

 

You are dealing with a nomenclature issue. When you point FTX 3 at a manually downloaded file it:

 

1. Reads the zipped file

2. Checks your license with Orbx Direct

3. It does say that it is re-downloading the file but it is actually installing the file.

4. The progress bar will hang at about 20% but will then quickly move to the right as the product is installed.

5. You will get a window message that your product has installed.

 

This method is quick and works flawlessly every time.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Greg

Thanks for your answer.

My English very bad))) becouse i learn other languages)

Ok.

1. i downloading zipped file

2. Central find him

3. Central cheacks my license

4. and...... downloading 12 hours to this position (see attacment). 

the same thing happened with other products

 

 

 

 

[Perk]

43 minutes ago, John Venema said:

1 hour ago, Perk said:

So out of curiosity... I have 170gb of Orbx products installed into P3Dv3.4.  I have copies of all the individual installers from FSS on network attached storage.  I'm also planning building myself a new PC for Christmas.  Why in Trump's name would I need to download anything to move to the new PC?  Can't I just copy the \Orbx directory up to the NAS, then back down into a fresh P3D installation on the new PC, install FTX Central 3, sign in to my account, and be good?  Surely FTX Central 3 can handle scenery library insertions and individual file validation without installer wrappers for every product?

 

Yes it can, and it does - automatically.

 

Well shoot then... I can't see why anyone would need to archive the installers except maybe to have to copy to an slow or limited bandwith PC.  Just backup your \orbx directory people!

[John Venema]

They'll get updated. We're talking about downloading complete products which were license transferred from FSS, not FTXCv3 applying updates.

[gregmorin]

15 minutes ago, Expo said:

Thanks for your answer.

My English very bad))) becouse i learn other languages)

Ok.

1. i downloading zipped file

2. Central find him

3. Central cheacks my license

4. and...... downloading 12 hours to this position (see attacment). 

the same thing happened with other products

 

 

 

 

 

Sorry I was unable to help I suggest you post in the FTX 3 support forum and let the professionals help you. 

 

Greg

[Neil]

At the start of the the FTCentralV3 implementation, I deleted all my old backups. I was tired of being an archivist! A full system backup, was my solution. If only backing up the Orbx file directory, and letting FTXCentral  manage the rebuild then this is the preferred solution. John you may want to  think about including a small utility in V3 to encourage this.

 

Just remember you are only as good as your last screw up! I have been there, have a better day tomorrow!

[bcrawley57]

I purchased two new PCs at Cosford, one for me and one for my friend who is brand new to the hobby, (Chillblast if verification was ever required)..  The PCs were delivered the day before Central 3 went live.  I asked on the forum, which would be the best option, to use FSS backups or to migrate over to V3 and install on the new PCs.  I actually used FSS for my friends PC as he only has Global Base, Global Vectors, LC Europe and Scotland, England, Ireland, Northern Ireland and Wales so far.

 

The advice on the forum for my new PC built was to take advantage of V3, so I transferred my account (thinking I was doing the right thing), and used Central 3 to install my PC over three days.  I now find myself feeling as if I unwittingly contributed to this problem as a result.  I have taken no backups , merely installed the many products I own and love.

 

I do like the idea of copying my entire ORBX folder to my NAS, I can replace my FSS purchases with that.  I was unaware that this was even possible until John mentioned it.  I also would not object to paying $30 a year as an insurance against losing everything I own and avoiding what I think would be something like 60 days to recover all my products.

 

John... I love your products, feel for the situation we are in at the moment, but am sure you will find a decent solution.  Its in the interests of us all.

[noels7]

I would like to add my comments to this topic

 

I cannot believe that at this time  people are still not backing up their data etc.

My working HD I image approx every 5 days. Close to 500gig and it takes 55 minutes and

I still can surf the nett , watch movies and use my computer as normal while this is being imaged.

 

The new system OrbxDirect works perfectly for me and many others. I have no need to d/load backups of Orbx products as yet

(approx 100gig) and when necessary will do it in an orderly manner. Commonsense I would think.

 

For those users "bitching about JV's email  and are offended by the temporary download restrictions

I have a solution. Send me your email address and (if I knew how and had the facility) I will send a return

email to you with some ransomware coding attached.. You will soon get the message. Protect yourself and keep a CURRENT IMAGE 

of your computer or your Flight Sim directory. Please yourself which route you take.

 

Regards

 

noels7

 

[John Venema]

You've done nothing wrong, if everyone who needed to do a fresh new install did what you did it would not have been a blip in the bandwidth quota.

 

The issue is those who decided to download 100's of GB of products purely for the purpose of creating installer backups; products they already had installed in their ORBX folder.

 

It's similar to me downloading my entire Steam library of games (about 250GB worth), just in case I might have a crash or failure in the future. Something I'd never do and nor do I understand why anyone would either. Actually no - it's more bizarre than that. It's like me downloading all my Steam games *again* even though they might already be installed on my HD. You know, for a rainy day or in case the sky falls on my head

[Captain Z]

4 hours ago, John Venema said:

I'm really sorry guys, I knew it was going to cause pain but the bandwidth that was being used is unsustainable.

 

Sorry also for the bluntness of the email and post; that's the way I roll - I say it as I see it. We're all adults here so let's not be precious about condescending posts or political correctness. I also won't pull punches about blaming people who are downloading every product when there is no need to. Think about it for a moment won't you?

 

We can work through this issue together. Perhaps we need to establish a ticket system for people who are doing system rebuilds or complete reinstalls can provide us some proof of their system state so we can lift the download cap for those in crisis without Orbx addons installed. I would imagine that is the vast minority of you.

 

I am more than happy to work on a solution that works for everyone. We're not a bunch of a-hole dictators here, so any productive, sensible, consultative, non-aggressive, non-trolling suggestions are welcome. We are all ears.

 

Remember, we've asked Adrian to turn the FSS wrapper validation server for you if you have the old installers. Again, the only people feeling pain right now would be those doing full sim re-installs, which should be an absolute minority.

 

Sigh....lol. I said in previous posts on this forum I had planned to coincide the move to FTX 3 with my move to P3D v3. I figured if I had to reinstall everything anyways with P3D v3, it was a good move. I waited a few days, to give the kinks in a newly released system to be worked out. There are always bugs, and I knew ORBX would deal with them in a fast and professional manner. All the FYI posts about the new system clearly stated that once I moved to ORBX Direct, my old wrapper stuff would no longer work, so I got rid of it. I've always trusted ORBX, and they always deliver. A day ago, I figured the release bugs were worked out, and I could get things rolling. I installed my fresh copy of P3D v3, and downloaded the latest ORBX libraries and Global Base. Today I was going to knock out Vector, LC eu and LC NA. Apparently, that won't be the  case........

 

I understand that something unexpected happen. I also understand that business hates to see less profit. But it was constantly reiterated that the old wrapper system was no longer needed, that when we made the move to Direct, all our old wrapper files would no longer work. I'm certain I'm not the only person who no longer has them, so unfortunately, the reactivation of the FSS wrapper server won't help much, unless all of the ORBX library will also be available to download from FSS again. Even then, I know it would be waste of time to download all the ORBX products again in a temporary wrapper form.

 

So, now I am faced with the fact that it will take months to get my new sim going with all my ORBX products, and it's a bit disappointing. I'm afraid my pain isn't any less because I am a "minority". I've been looking forward to my new sim and the new FTX Direct since it was announced, and this hits hard.

 

Again, I understand business and money. Am I currently disappointed ? Yes. Am I stark raving mad, and think the world is ending ? Certainly not.

 

I'm hoping a system can be employed to help those of us that orchestrated moves to a new sim or full reinstallations with the release of ORBX Direct and FTX 3.

 

*My suggestion for a possible solution*

Perhaps we can be given an email address to send screenshots of our FTXC 3, showing all the products are not installed. I would not want to post those shots in the forums, as they would show personal email, and other account info. But the photos would clearly show what's installed and not, and would take no extra work in implementing a system, besides giving an email, and having someone review the photos clearly showing the account and all the products not installed. If we set FTXC 3 to only show products owned, it should also reduce the number of screenshots needed. This is my suggestion at a possible solution to help those of us faced with it taking months to get our sim up and running with all the ORBX products we payed to use.

EDIT- I wanted to amend the "extra work" statement, in that I understand it would take some extra work to adjust the system to allow the people who have proven they have nothing installed the ability to download more than one product per day.

 

So currently, I am sad, disappointed, etc......But hopefully we can figure out a way to fix this mess that has happened, and reduce the pain for those of us who trusted in the new system, and moved to new sims or started full reinstalls, while discarding the old wrapper files we were told would no longer work anyways.

 

ORBX has always done right by us, from what I've seen. I'm sure that will continue.

 

 

[Stillwater]

I still see it as a good decision that I have NOT moved from FTXv2 to v3 yet. But I have to add my 50 cents to two points here:

 

1. The customer is never, never ever to be made guilty for any move by a vendor. Any such trouble is an expression of bad information transfer. We all know that such info transfer by reading makes just about 5% of the info being understood fully. Higher is the percentage by seeing, the highest by practical training (which is, in our case, just repeating what you did for years [= making backups]).

 

2. Never I would pay additional 30 bucks for a service that I usually buy with my regular purchase. I´d rather spend more for kids, schools or so.

[Matthew Kane]

Wilco

 

I don't have all my of my regions and airports installed because I mostly use Global Only with PMDG. When the next update of FTX Central has the ability to disable regions I don't need to install them for now. If we can still install from the FSS Installers by then I have no reason to download anything. Backing up the ORBX folder works great when eventually I have everything reinstalled, for now I only have a fraction of things installed and that is fine.

 

Cheers

[fueliehead]

I won't quote AUREL42's long post but I will say I agree 100% (although I do have a long history with ORBX products) and this is exactly how I feel about ORBX right now.  I've read and followed all of the FAQs and posts regarding moving to ORBXDirect and FTX Central 3 and was looking forward to it.  I can follow directions, I'm not planning on doing backups of every install file.  I do want to do a "clean" install of my OS and P3D, to include ORBX.  I want a clean install due to some of the issues raised above (don't want to copy over my existing folder).  If I understand correctly, as of now, you're saying I can only install one product that I have previously purchased per day.  This would take a few months to reinstall my ORBX products, I must be misunderstanding this.  Does this new rule really limit installs?  This is due to a few customers overusing the backup capability?  Why would everyone suffer?  I do have faith that ORBX will come up with a better and fairer solution(?) than this.

[John Venema]

Questions:

 

Why do you want to do a clean install? (Be specific)

What is the impetus for doing so?

Has any information we have posted prompted you to consider a new install?

Are your Orbx products currently installed and working in your sim?

Do you think moving to OrbxDirect will negatively impact your installation?

 

Providing those answers will give me some insight into whether we communicated effectively enough pre-launch.

[Nick Cooper]

I have written a short guide on how to re-install with the minimum of downloading, it is pinned

in the FAQ section of the Support forum

 

[Wills]

Nick, Which files from scenery/world/scenery need backing up? Surely blindly copying this whole folder (along with whatever other rubbish other scenery installers may have added there) might not be a good idea?

 

[Captain Z]

24 minutes ago, John Venema said:

Questions:

 

Why do you want to do a clean install? (Be specific)

What is the impetus for doing so?

Has any information we have posted prompted you to consider a new install?

Are your Orbx products currently installed and working in your sim?

Do you think moving to OrbxDirect will negatively impact your installation?

 

Providing those answers will give me some insight into whether we communicated effectively enough pre-launch.

 

I made in in-depth post a few posts before this one, with a possible solution. But, to answer this post....

 

-I didn't want to do a clean install, but P3D v2 had no upgrade path to P3D v3, so a clean install was my only choice.

 

-I did so, because P3D v3 made many improvements over v2, and is the new standard for P3D.

 

-It was posted that the previous wrapper backups I had would no longer work after I made the move to FTXC 3, and that if I didn't move, I would no longer receive updates. So it made sense to delete files that would not work, and only take up space.

 

-No. Save for Global, which I just installed last night in my newly purchased and installed P3D v3.

 

-I did not think so. My questions about the new ORBX direct system were asked and answered, and I believed the new system was a good thing. But, now that the new system will cause me to have to wait months to be able to use my ORBX products, I am disappointed at the moment.

 

EDIT- I wanted to add, things may backfire. By sending an email to all ORBX customers telling them about the DL restriction, people who weren't even bothering to DL stuff may suddenly start to do so facing the time it will take to get all their products. I hope it's not so, as I understand you are trying to fix a problem that happened, but it may go from a bunch a of people DLing a lot of stuff, to everyone DLing their "one-a-day" daily download.

 

[Nick Cooper]

9 minutes ago, Wills said:

Nick, Which files from scenery/world/scenery need backing up? Surely blindly copying this whole folder (along with whatever other rubbish other scenery installers may have added there) might not be a good idea?

 

 

It's the safest way to include all the files added by the installers.

Please don't continue here, it's not a support topic.

I have not locked the pinned topic.....yet 

[greggerm]

2 hours ago, John Venema said:

 

In that case, backup your entire ORBX folder before you re-image. Simple. Instant Orbx re-install with just a directory copy. You just need to re-install FTX Global because it replaces system default textures. Everything else FTX Central V3 takes care of.

 

Editing:

 

This space formerly had a bunch of questions related to the backing up of ..\Orbx, but Nick's post #151 in this thread and associated link from just a few moments ago has answered essentially all my questions... thanks, Nick.

 

Nick - I'm assuming this method will only work if you've transitioned your licensing from FSS to OrbxDirect?

[Nick Cooper]

Please see the brand new topic here

and please to everyone else, the topic is open, if you have any questions ask them there.

This is not a support topic but an announcement.

[Trevor Bagnell]

To answer JV's post as to why would I want to do a clean install:

1) Primarily, I had multiple issues with my OS to begin with that were not Sim related but were likely giving issues in the performance of the sim. This introduced the thought that it may be time to do a clean install. Backing up the registry to keep license information was not an option given the performance issues of the computer.

 

2) I upgraded P3D peacemeal from V3.2 to V3.4 (i.e. uninstall client, reinstall new client, uninstall scenery, reinstall new scenery...... which in turn would force a reinstall of Global and HD Trees)  This did not appear to go as well as in previous upgrades.  This got me really thinking about doing a clean new install.

 

3) I did upgrade to FTX Central 3 prior to bonking my OS over the head with a baseball bat. I have been away from simming for a few months due to work, and when presented with an opportunity from FTX central V2 to upgrade to FTX Central 3 with license transfer, I did so only because I try to make sure that all my product is up to date. What I did not understand is that my old FSS wrappers would become useless.   There may have been a lot of discussion on this in the forums prior to, but that is not going to be a catch all to warn every one of the new process.

 

4) After upgrading to FTX Central 3, many of the products that I had previously installed in FTX central 2 indicated they had an update available. When I attempted to install those updates I would get an error message along the lines of Product not included in group, cannot update. This was final item that said "Time for a complete overhaul". I backed up all my items to my fileserver drive and completely wiped the OS hard disk and the Flight sim hard disk which are always separate on this machine. 

 

Not realizing exactly what I was getting into with the license transfer, I assumed it would still be able to use my FSS purchased downloads to reinstall products after I got the base OS back in place.  For all the communications that may have been done, again, it didn't reach everybody. This of course forced me to download all products fresh again via FTX Central 3.

[Andreas R. Schmidt]

I have 36 products from ORBX at the moment and reinstall Prepar3d and FSX because of problems with Windows 10 it was nessesary to make this step.  I have transferred my licenses. If that comes to effect,it seems that i can´t fly for the next 30 days.I have stopped flying this week and work hard to reinstall. Today I have only Wales new installed. It was a horrible slow process with the new version of FTX Central 3.

After this new problem with ORBX I think, sometimes it might be that my next step for the future  is X-Plane 11 and stop all activities in FSX, P3D and ORBX. 

Because sometimes I want to "fly" and not to "rebulid" and "reconfigure" and wait for this nasty slow downloads via the FTX Central. At the moment i feel not good.  P3D and FSX are both 

construction sites. In the meantime I use P3D for VFR and rebuild it slowly, and FSX for IFR using only FTX Global and Global Vector. and the rest is no longer in use in FSX.

[OLDflyboy]

You have my support John.

This situation reminds me of the "great gasoline shortage" in the USA circa 1970 or thereabouts:

Drivers who had rarely kept more than 1/2 a tank would line up at 5AM to "top up" and then drive home and park the car.

[awf]

3 hours ago, John Venema said:

 

Yes it's a valid question and we'll have to sort it out with Adrian tomorrow (they are asleep in Australia right now)

 

 

Indeed, that is how I migrate sims myself. I had to move my P3D installation from C: to D: drive last week so I just coped my entire ORBX folder and re-ran FTX Central, then re-install FTX Global. Job done. Took me a few minutes.  The same applies rebuilding a PC. Why people don't backup their whole ORBX folder on an external HD I'll never know <shrug>

 

Well why not make life simple and make a backup solution in FTX Central V3 and copy the whole directory structure plus files to a backup medium.

With a simple option to (re)install via one button click ;-)

We can then skip all the drama and make the most of us happy since we are already making backups of our installer files.

In that case you would avoid the need to download everything again and we both have our simple but effective solution.

 

Cheers,