announcement OrbxDirect - business as usual - daily restriction (5x) on manual downloads only, FSS wrappers now validate

[John Venema]

Good morning.

 

I think following my email blast and announcement topic that there's still some confusion over what has actually been restricted, and this is causing some angst when in fact it's mainly business as usual.

 

So let me clarify things as best I can. Please read carefully.

 

1. The only thing that has been limited to one (1) download per day  EDIT: We've increased this to five (5) per day is the manual download function:

 

That's all. Everything else works normally, like it has since launch day on November 1st. I apologise if this was not made clear in my announcement yesterday.

 

 

2. You can still install as much products as you like through FTX Central 3 - no limits, no caps - that has not changed

 

 

3. Adrian has now re-enabled validation on all your old FSS Wrapper Installers, so you can use those again now.

 

 

4. You can backup / restore  /move your entire Orbx products in one swift action by copying just two folders from your sim. Nick Cooper explains this in his pinned topic here:

FTX Central 3 has "smarts" built into it - when you move the ORBX folder back into a new sim installation and run FTXCv3, it automatically scans your Orbx addons, adds them to the user interface and sets up the scenery library and copies all custom files for you. Automatically.

 

 

5. If you have not re-installed Windows or moved to a new PC, you can still use all your backed FSS unwrapper installers again if you used them once before. All the registration information is stored in your Windows registry so you won't be prompted for them a second time.

 

 

6. If you are rebuilding a PC, doing a new install, or moving to P3D - anything that requires the installation of ALL your purchased Orbx products - please just go ahead and do it. It has been working as normal this entire time, if you used FTX Central V3 to do the installations.

 

 

7. If you are experiencing slow downloads via FTX Central 3 please bear with us. This is something we are continually trying to solve, made more difficult because it only affects a certain percentage of customers. Most people get near their ISP's maximum speed when downloading (I do, most of the Orbx team does, most of the customer beta testers did), but clearly there are a group of customers who are getting poor download speeds. For this we apologise and I can promise you we are still working with our hosting provider to find solutions.

 

 

Apology

 

Following 230 replies to yesterday's announcement I now realise that I should have handled it better, used less condescending language, and made the nature of the restriction clearer. I apologise if I offended anyone or my actions have caused a loss of trust. As a team we are very proud of what we've built with OrbxDirect and we want everyone to be able to enjoy the best purchasing and add-on management experience possible.

 

As far as the bandwidth costs to the business is concerned, we'll just have to suck it up and move on. We decided to make our own store and now we have to play with the big boys and understand the costs of doing so. People keep thinking we're this big multi-national company when in fact we're still a relatively small business, and still learning each day - and learning from our mistakes too.

 

We do appreciate your custom, your loyalty, your enthusiasm, and we 100% know it is your purchase of our products that puts bread on our tables, so thank you for the support and continued growth - without you we wouldn't have come this far. We never forget that. 

 

So, to recap:

 

1. The only thing being restricted are the manual downloads - now increased to five (5) per day

2. Everything else works through FTX Central as it always did, nothing has changed - try it now if you like

3. Adrian has now re-enabled validation on all your old FSS Wrapper Installers, so you can use those again now.

4. You can quickly and easily backup your entire Orbx collection with a simple folder copy

5. FSS wrappers will still work if you've used them already without re-installing Windows.

6. FTX Central download speeds are great for most people, bad for some - we're working on it

 

[John Venema]

Bump: Following internal team discussions we have increased the daily limit for the manual downloads from one to five (5) per day.