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Emerging platforms pricing policy 2017


John Venema

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I really can't make my mind up. I was going to buy Global + Vector + Europe OpenLC today for my newly acquired P3D license but now I'm confused!

I'm an happy X-Plane 10/11 user just starting out with P3D (for specific planes)....but if a new version is coming(V4 of P3D) maybe it's better if I wait a little bit before investing in plugins....

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm....anyone can help?

 

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Eddie, the way I read John's remark the ORBX Prepar3d4 updates will be free or low-cost - which would be great news, notably for owners of a large number of ORBX addons.

 

However, if you are at the verge of buying Prepar3d my personal suggestion would be to wait a bit, despite. Even if some addons - no one knows about other maker's price policy - may be free or low-cost, the simulator itself will certainly not. Besides, while ORBX is usually vigilant with providing updates, some other makers are quite slow (up to a speed of zero...), and there will be certainly no addon planes available at startup. 

 

If I were you I would just wait for a couple of months and see how things will pan out.

 

Kind regards, Michael

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15 minutes ago, macca22au said:

To have P3Dv4 confirmed as definitely coming helps decisions enormously.  JV, Orbx seems to be ready to offer us good deals, so your piratical cover picture gives a false impression!

 

 

I know I'm excited!!!

 

And even more excited about JV's announcement that will make us happy.

 

I was excited about his last we won't charge you twice announcement too - and I bought like crazy during the last sale as a result.

 

Steve

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From a bit of Google type research it would appear that a 64bit programme is not really adversely affected by bgls and that they can be read OK. It is dll's that may need reworking to run in 64bit (Object & Peopleflow come to mind). I am no expert at all but just thought that maybe this could mean less "conversion" work would be required to make our current Orbx sceneries compatible. There could very well be other file types that need compatibility work, for example agn files, fx files etc. That would be for JV or other experts to comment on.

The interesting aspect about JV's comment was that it was "good news" so i am inclined to think that maybe the "conversion" process is less work than initially anticipated.

We shall see:)

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That's the formal stuff.

 

I would have hoped - and to an extent still hope - Lockeed Martin having taken the opportunity to tackle a number of longstanding issues on the way. Way off elevation data, the inflexible landclass/autogen system, and primeval hard-coded runway and navigation data come to my mind. Sorting these issues - beyond just switching to 64 Bit - would make (have made) a lot of more headache for ORBX, including structures hidden in the bgls.

 

Kind regards, Michael

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2 hours ago, jjaycee1 said:

From a bit of Google type research it would appear that a 64bit programme is not really adversely affected by bgls and that they can be read OK. It is dll's that may need reworking to run in 64bit (Object & Peopleflow come to mind). I am no expert at all but just thought that maybe this could mean less "conversion" work would be required to make our current Orbx sceneries compatible. There could very well be other file types that need compatibility work, for example agn files, fx files etc. That would be for JV or other experts to comment on.

The interesting aspect about JV's comment was that it was "good news" so i am inclined to think that maybe the "conversion" process is less work than initially anticipated.

We shall see:)

 

That would be great news for those like me who are addicted to AI traffic (.bgls).

 

Hopefully we will know sometime soon.

 

I love Orbx, and love P3D, but also own X-Plane 11.

 

I don't like it as well, but there is something strangely comforting about zooming around knowing that whatever happens, you probably won't get an OOM. 

 

Exciting times!

 

Steve

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Remember though guys, 64bit is not the answer to the maiden's prayer.  The Address Space is vital and OOMs should disappear.  But if you look at some of the available 64bit videos around, stutters and shimmering still exist.

Strangely enough 3.4.18 seems to have cured my OOMs, but d....d micro-stutters and shimmers still abound although fps are more than healthy.

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I believe that most of us understand that 64bit is not the Holy Grail, especially after JV's input on that aspect. However I think that the advantages of 64 bit's potential is also worth noting. Regarding stuttering and shimmering etc evident in some videos I agree, but would add that many people have differents experiences in that respect and many are a result of people's different spec rigs and settings rather that just either 32 bit or 64 bit.

 I currently have 2 64 bit "test" sims. The DGFlight School and AF2 and cannot begin to compare them in regard to performance. Flight School has autogen and basic Mesh and AF2 has no autogen to speak of but very impressive Mesh in the HiRes DLC content. DGFS perform just OK and AF2 is extremely fluid and 120 fps (which is what I set mine to) throughout, but both have different "stress" areas. DGFS in regard to displaying autogen and AF2 in regard to displaying very detailed mesh.  Neither have any real weather options to speak of. Only time will tell if 64 bit will allow us to max our settings with our current FTX and 3rd party addons in the form they are in at the moment. When developers start to offer "64 bit enhanced" sceneries, assumingly even more detailed than the current 32 bit offerings, then we will see the true results of 64 bit and whether it can cope with even more applied "stress" than currently experienced.

Personally I would love the FTX addons to remain in their current detail offering rather than being enhanced even more so that I could fly with autogen, road traffic, pylons etc but at the fluidity of AF2. I only have 2 areas in all my FTX addons that cause any stress and that is London and KLAX and both those areas are a result of me not turning down my settings to suit. My fault, not FTX's or P3D's nor 32 bit, but hopefully/potentially resolved with 64 bit !

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I'll be a little bit of a contrarian here ;). On one hand, anybody can, of course, be happy if that means not spending money again on the same addons. On the other hand, I hope that it doesn't mean that 64bits will be the alpha & omega of version 4. Speaking as a customer, compatibility should not be an end in itself. The old ESP is tired, we reached the limits that astute and innovative developpers can do, we need refined terrain, air dynamics, weather and light rendering engines AND true multiprocessor computing.   I'd rather have that (a clean break). If we can have both even better. But as we say in French, one cannot have butter and the money for the butter. 

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Well said, Dominique!

There will certainly be some roughness to the conversion to 64-bit but I am sure that P3Dv4 will contain many, many improvements, most of which we have not yet imagined. After all, LM have been working on the new version for a long time, and converting to 64-bit will have been only one of many challenges with the new facilities available.

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10 hours ago, Richard McDonald Woods said:

Well said, Dominique!

There will certainly be some roughness to the conversion to 64-bit but I am sure that P3Dv4 will contain many, many improvements, most of which we have not yet imagined. After all, LM have been working on the new version for a long time, and converting to 64-bit will have been only one of many challenges with the new facilities available.

 

I agree with you, Richard - I think we will see improvements while things remain somewhat familliar.

 

17 hours ago, jjaycee1 said:

I believe that most of us understand that 64bit is not the Holy Grail, especially after JV's input on that aspect. However I think that the advantages of 64 bit's potential is also worth noting. Regarding stuttering and shimmering etc evident in some videos I agree, but would add that many people have differents experiences in that respect and many are a result of people's different spec rigs and settings rather that just either 32 bit or 64 bit.

 I currently have 2 64 bit "test" sims. The DGFlight School and AF2 and cannot begin to compare them in regard to performance. Flight School has autogen and basic Mesh and AF2 has no autogen to speak of but very impressive Mesh in the HiRes DLC content. DGFS perform just OK and AF2 is extremely fluid and 120 fps (which is what I set mine to) throughout, but both have different "stress" areas. DGFS in regard to displaying autogen and AF2 in regard to displaying very detailed mesh.  Neither have any real weather options to speak of. Only time will tell if 64 bit will allow us to max our settings with our current FTX and 3rd party addons in the form they are in at the moment. When developers start to offer "64 bit enhanced" sceneries, assumingly even more detailed than the current 32 bit offerings, then we will see the true results of 64 bit and whether it can cope with even more applied "stress" than currently experienced.

Personally I would love the FTX addons to remain in their current detail offering rather than being enhanced even more so that I could fly with autogen, road traffic, pylons etc but at the fluidity of AF2. I only have 2 areas in all my FTX addons that cause any stress and that is London and KLAX and both those areas are a result of me not turning down my settings to suit. My fault, not FTX's or P3D's nor 32 bit, but hopefully/potentially resolved with 64 bit !

 

My experience with 64 bit consists of X-plane 11 - I'm a huge Orbx fan (and P3D), but XP11 is quite fun too.   I flew a silky smooth flight around some gorgeous Orbx-like Jefferson County scenery today at a silky 10 FPS more than P3D - that is what I'm hoping Orbx and P3D v.4 bring to the table - I think they will.

 

Steve

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16 hours ago, Richard McDonald Woods said:

Well said, Dominique!

There will certainly be some roughness to the conversion to 64-bit but I am sure that P3Dv4 will contain many, many improvements, most of which we have not yet imagined. After all, LM have been working on the new version for a long time, and converting to 64-bit will have been only one of many challenges with the new facilities available.

 

Hi Richard,

 

Let's hope so but I am intrigued by JV implying that the OrbX products won't need much work or not at all to transfer into v4. In a first approach, that would mean that the terrain (including 3d objects) engine hasn't changed much if at all. That or that I overread his post ;).

 

At another level (and to stay in today's mood) the idea of 64bits would be a remedy for enhanced smoothness in P3D is typical #FakeNews  :lol: !

 

 

 

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Hi Dominique,

 

I believe that programmatic files require at least recompilation to be able to co-exist with a 64-bit P3D. Data files probably will not. So scenery files can probably remain unchanged. Even if they cannot, a recompilation with a 64-bit version of the ADE may be sufficient in many cases.

 

A 64-bit P3D will presumably be stored in a Program Files directory rather than the existing Program Files (x86) directory. So the minimum required would be for programs in the Program Files directory to concatenate these two file types in order to access the existing data files.

 

I agree that 'smoothness' will always remain a challenge for the simulator developers because all try 'to push the envelope' of capabilities.

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