[stevelup]

Definitely something amiss there...

Mine starts in about 20 seconds. In terms of setup, everything 'just works' out of the box except for setting up your joystick axes and buttons (which takes about one minute).

[Keef]

I just checked mine. It took 35 seconds to load the first time (joystick not plugged in) and 20 seconds the next time (with joystick). The C172 then flew from Elmsett to Crowfield with no problems apart from the landing not being one of my best.

[matthew_w100]

See? I knew I was too thick to have a licence. I've tried several versions, up to v9 and never had any luck with it. I've always reverted back to FSX. It looks great on paper but... ISTR the issue last time was making it properly understand and calibrate joystick and throttle. Nor could I work out which file to click on to change plane. And various other issues which made me chuck it back in the box after a weekend of trying.

But I have a clearish fortnight now - maybe I'll have another go if y'all think it's worth it.

[stevelup]

If you need any assistance, give me a shout!

[matthew_w100]

Why thank you sir, I may just do that.

Q1 - is it possible to run it without having a CD in the slot for licencing? SO antediluvian!

[stevelup]

Yes, but it involves very mild naughtiness... pm me...

[joe-fbs]

IIRC there are several threads abut this in Student.

[matspart3]

Ian, I think the North Cotswoldians have hacked the forum. They've typed a load of stuff that no-one understands that doesn't have anything to do with flying

[russgreen]

XPlane with TrackIR and VFR Photo Scenery is a pretty immersive combination.

RC simulations have a page on how to configure Xplane for a very realistic UK environment. http://rcsimulations.co.uk/shop/page/36

To avoid the need to put a CD in the drive....Use something like Magic Disk to RIP your disk 1 to an ISO file then load the ISO as a virtual CD drive. http://www.magiciso.com/index.htm

[matthew_w100]

So onto the PC went X-Plane - and then off again three hours later. I refuse to run something which requires a cd in the drive (nor am I going to muck around with one of those virtual cd things). And I appear to only have one usable GA aeroplane, a rather dull C172. Loads of martian nutter nonsense but no single tourer. Nor aerobat.

I just don't see the appeal!

[stevelup]

Not sure why you even wasted your time installing it in that case - you knew full well that it needed the CD in the drive or a workaround!

There are - quite literally - thousands of aircraft available for X-plane covering every possible type but you have to put about 30 seconds of effort into finding the one you want, and dropping the files into the aircraft folder.

[matthew_w100]

All right - I'm being petulant! And a bit silly. I'm having another go. You had said there was a work-around for the cd thing - is there anything other than the virtual cd trick (which is more trouble than just putting the cd in)?

It doesn't seem to like my throttle quadrant now - i have to reverse the direction for the throttle axis (but not the mixture) and it won't let the rpm drop much below 1000 on the ground or 1700 in the air. Which made landing "different".

Where do aeroplanes come from?

Thank you for your forbearance

[TLRippon]

This is what I've just built for the Air Cadets in Kettering:





The thoughts are:

FSX is very graphic intensive. We use a piece of hardware to stretch over 2 screens and two other outputs to drive the projector and Operator station as a result we have a Xeon processor with 12 cores and bucket loads of RAM, Stacks of memory on the graphics cards too. We use the Saitek radio, switch and autopilot panel, which are surprisingly inexpensive when you are used to buying actual aircraft parts and with the instruments on the panel monitor, there is no need to use the mouse or keyboard to fly the aircraft. I'm not happy with the projection so we are moving to 3x50" LCD TV's placed closer to the windows to give an immersive experience and a 45 degree view.

I'm considering the move to X-Plane but I read lots of flack about it on the enthusiast forums.

Fancy a project Steve?

[stevelup]

All right - I'm being petulant! And a bit silly. I'm having another go. You had said there was a work-around for the cd thing - is there anything other than the virtual cd trick (which is more trouble than just putting the cd in)?

The legit way is to order a USB license key. You then leave that stuck in the back of your machine. The dodgy way is the virtual CD trick.

You only have to do it once though, so it's a brief bit of pain for subsequent peace and quiet.

It doesn't seem to like my throttle quadrant now - i have to reverse the direction for the throttle axis (but not the mixture) and it won't let the rpm drop much below 1000 on the ground or 1700 in the air. Which made landing "different".

When in the 'calibration' screen where you can see the little graphs for each input, cycle all the controls through their minimum and maximum values. X-plane now knows the correct min-max values. Again, you only need to do this once.

Where do aeroplanes come from?

Your best bet is to join the X-Plane forums here:- http://forums.x-plane.org

Just had a quick look - there are 2918 aircraft available for download. There are loads of really good free ones, and also some stunning pay ones. Best strategy is to look at ones that have had more than a 1000 downloads and five star on the reviews, but you can always read the comments as well.

Thank you for your forbearance

Last chance on the grumpiness

[matthew_w100]

One more! Just tried to download a Warrior, from that site. The acf file is, I am told, corrupt...