37% off of most Orbx/FTX scenery

[OldAirmail]

In my post - [url-http://forums.simviation.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=172331&p=1273615&hilit=+sale#p1273615]How to rip off the Aussies at the FlightSimStore[/url] I told you how to help the FlightSimStore get rid of unwanted DVD scenery stock.

Now it's even simpler - they have a sale on for the month of May.

Naturally is will not include the latest releases, but there's still plenty to choose from.

All of Australia - $23.96 USD



Beautiful Concrete, WA for $14.36 USD?



OpenLC for Europe - $19.16USD? This one makes a HUGE difference for ANYWHERE in Europe!



Take your time, you have the rest of May to get what you want.

[blackgranada77]

Bought Global Base. Was 72.90 AUD. FSS made me pay in Aussie Dollars after converting from US Dollar on my charge card. Scenery is great but my system took a big hit on FPS. Not sure why.

[OldAirmail]

Did you download & run FTX Central 2?

Don't worry, you'll get everything working correctly.



"Bought Global Base. Was 72.90 AUD. FSS made me pay in Aussie Dollars after converting from US Dollar on my charge card."

Check your email for an email titled "The FlightSim Store Order ######: Received".That'll show you your "US $" cost

There's a warning on their site about that.


If you can, Buy FTX: Global VECTOR - USD$34.31.

Orbx Global Base & Global VECTOR compliment each other VERY, VERY well.


It may seem like a lot of money, but remember: It's for the entire world.



I just bought the New Zealand north and south islands, and as you said - when getting to the actual purchase the price does show Australian $. The email shows the correct US price.

BTW - New Zealand North is only so-so, but then I haven't covered much of it. But DO get New Zealand South.


Leaving Queenstown (NZQN)








I don't normally have the FPS showing, so I just checked - PFS went down just a little - about 3 FPS. But there was no noticeable drag in appearance.

[blackgranada77]

No, haven't downloaded FTX Central 2. Worried that it might drop fps even more. FPS around LAX is terrible even though I set all my settings and sliders to what they recommend in the manual. Between 8-10 fps on ground depending on what you are looking at. On approach fps drops even more and becomes very choppy. Using I5-3570K OC to 4.0ghz have 16gb of Corsair XMS memory @1866mhz a 2TB HDD a Gigabyte GA-Z77-HD3 MOBO and a AMD Radeon 7870 graphics card. Dave..........

[OldAirmail]

One of the odd things about the Orbx/FTX system is that you should change your regions using either FTX Central, or FTX Central 2.

The reason for that is that everything, from houses & buildings, to vegetation, will be different. Just think of the difference between the Philippines and Alaska.

And that is one of the things that FTX Central will do: make sure that your scenery is correct for the area that you'll be flying in.

This is true even if all that you have is Orbx FTX Global Base, because you probably have other scenery add-ons.

And if the scenery order is out of sync then you'll have problems in FSX/P3d.



Speaking of other scenery add-ons

Another problem that can screw up your FSX experience is to have competing scenery systems/textures.

And that is true whether you have GEX (Ground Environment X), UTX (Ultimate Terrain X), FsScene 4X, or Orbx/FTX.

To some degree they MAY get along with each other. But you're probably going to have trouble.



FTX Central 2

This is the new version. And as I said - ignore the "beta" in the description, this is as solid as can be.

FTX Central 2 will not only switch out the needed scenery elements, but more importantly, it will check for any updates/corrections.

You may think that this is unimportant if all you have is the one scenery program. But you might be surprised: FTX Central 2 resolved a nasty scenery problem that I had.


On a last note - FTX Central 2 does not run continuously on your computer. So there's no need to worry about it using background resources.



There's not much else that I can say about FTX Central 2. It's free, and it does a really great job.

[OldAirmail]

"FPS around LAX is terrible even..."

That can happen with any high quality city scenery, although I haven't noticed any problem in the LA area myself.


For me, the problem was with New York City X.

If I set the detail VERY low, it won't crash my sim. But what good is that.



Anyway This is what I have for KLAX, and my system has lower specs than yours. Normally I'm getting around 28-29FPS.




There is one other thing. As I said I no longer have the FPS showing, and without the FPS showing I don't notice it if it drops 10FPS or so.

But I'm also using Prepar3d V2.5, and despite the lower FPS, my flights are smother than they were in FSX.

[blackgranada77]

No other scenery enhancements other than FTX-Global and KLAX_Photo_Real_ 3.0 all my other major airports are giving me high teens to mid twenties for fps. Will keep experimenting with settings and will try FTX Central 2. Do I need to uninstall FTX Central first?

[OldAirmail]

Don't bother uninstalling the old FTX Central.

Even some of the Orbx downloads will reinstall it, but when ever you use the newer FTX Central 2, the old versions icon will probably disappear from your desktop.

One thing that I find annoying about the new version, is that it will insist on being the "last"/bottom/end of list icon.

So where ever you put the icon, it'll rearrange its' self to where it thinks that you can't miss it.



I downloaded KLAX_Photo_Real_ 3.0 and checked the FPS in both FSX & P3d.

I tested it with the EXACT same plane, the Cessna 172, and with "Weather" set to cloudless, to eliminate any variables.

I checked it with & without the scenery - I checked and then un-checked the scenery box.

In FSX there was a 10 FPS drop using KLAX_Photo_Real_ 3.0.

In P3d there was a 4 FPS drop using KLAX_Photo_Real_ 3.0.


Strangely, neither program showed any problem with the drop in FPS. Everything was smooth.

If you have the same results as I did, I'd say just don't look at the FPS display.


Just to check my favorite Big City airport - KPHL (Philadelphia Int. Airport) from Sun:Sky:Jet with the same results - about a 4 or 5 FPS drop. Cities are just big resource sinkholes.