A few preliminary questions about FS2004.

[BTilson]

Well, I bought 2004 last night. Ran across a copy at walmart, I was rather surprised. I ran through the beginning flying lesson, then the first one out of the Flying Lessons section, Straight and Level Flight.

I've had a blast with it so far, flying a little Cessna. I've discovered that I definitely need to get a joystick though. Keyboard flying is a royal pain!

I do have one question though. Is there any sort of upgraded texture pack for ground textures? They dont look bad from the air, but when on a runway or flying rather low, the ground just looks terrible. I messed with the graphical settings some, and even turned the details up to "Ultra High." Much to my surprise, the game still runs perfectly fine, but even on ultra high, the ground textures look pretty yucky.

I played for maybe 2.5 hours last night, and it was thoroughly enjoyable the entire time. I am looking at it from more of a true simulator point of view than a game point of view, so I made sure to actually read all the lesson text and follow the flying lesson instructions and all that.

For my first "real" flight, I took off from a small airport, got up to about 5000 feet then slowly circled around to come in for a landing. All went well up until that point. I began my descent and apparently over judged somewhat, because I ended up crashing my Cessna into a tree probably a mile before the runway started.

Anyway, I look forward to participating in this forum and community for a long time to come. I think I may already be addicted!

[Sir_Crashalot]

Very good choice of you to start with a Cessna and not jump into a 747 right away. Crashing into trees before you reach the airport is perfectly fine, you'll learn eventually.

There are some freeware groundtextures available, one of them is Real Environment Pro (Google it). I myself use Ground Enviroment Pro, which is a payware package. Very good but rather expensive.


Crash

[ashaman]

Crashing into trees before you reach the airport is perfectly fine, you'll learn eventually.

To subvert the common cautionary suggestion: Do this only at home guys.

Doing this with the real deal HURTS and rarely you get a second chance to learn.

[Mictheslik]

Remember to check out some multiplayer flights....the perfect way to enjoy the hobby with other people.

On the ground textures you cant expect many of them to look good from the ground as they are designed to be looked at from the air.

.mic

[ashaman]

The BEST texture upgrade for FS9 is Ground Environment Pro (available even in a simpler non-Pro version) that defines darker ground textures to simulate the gloomy ground under cloudy weather (thing that not even "the cross" has).

Used together to Ultimate Terrain Europe, Ground Environment allows me to snub totally the half-assed "the cross" with no regrets.

NOTE: Ultimate Terrain and Grounbd Environment (pro and non-pro) are payware, but worth buy, worth to the last cent. If you plan buy some payware, buy at least GE. You'll not regret it.

[BTilson]

Well I downloaded Real Environment Pro last night.

[Sir_Crashalot]

Just keep practising in that Cessna. It'll work out fine. And don't hesitate to ask about instruments or how to do something. We are here to drive you crazy help.

Happy simming,

Crash

[BTilson]

I do have one question. Are there any programs that are basically an ongoing flight log? I would like the ability to go back through and look at all my old flights, see where I started, ended (crashed ), altitudes, airspeeds, etc etc... Do you know of any programs like that? I've looked through the downloads section of the site, but I couldn't find anything like that.

Thanks!

[ashaman]

Ah, old memories of FS4 and 5.1 coming up to haunt me, hearing the first steps of a beginner.

In FS there's in fact a flight log, though I never use it (never been interested) and can't really tell you about it. The only thing I know is that I've disabled mine (because if for some reason the flight log gets corrupted, FS goes insane (and M$, showing they can learn -- NOT -- in "the cross" have made this of course true as well. The matter is made worse by the fact that I have no idea on how to disable it and I'm counting with dread the days before my nephew runs to me bawling because his "toy" has broken [Yep, I've given my "cross" to my nephew to destroy. Let him use it as it deserves]).

[BTilson]

After I posted that, I actually found the built in flight log, but it seems to be very minimal. Logs time in the air for day and night, amount of time spent in VFR and IFR, the pilot and the plane, and not much else. I was hoping it would be a lot more in depth. The ideal thing would be a program with an interface similar to the "View Flight Analysis" screen showing your flight path, altitude chart, etc.

[FSFLYER2]

AirFX2006 will allow you to drop bombs, whole unlimited string, detonation. Fit cannon also.
Keep smiling

[Sir_Crashalot]

Logbook? There was a great one made by Rana Hossain but it's no longer available. You can still download it but it won't work anymore. Rana's site is also down so there is no new version. If you look at the several FS sites you will find some Excelsheets that can be used as a logbook but you have to fill everything yourself. Maybe there are some payware logbooks but not that I know of.

Crash

[garymbuska]

A good place to find all the freeware you want (other than here of course) is www.avsim.com you will have to register in order to download anything but it is free and they have a ton of freeware packages. Here you can find absolutely everything you can imagine for FS.Aircraft Scenery Textures and Mesh as well.
I use Megascernery northern california and Ultimate terrain (USA) I also own 727 Professional , A340 Professional and the pmdg 737 the next generation All are payware. I also have a huge fleet of non payware aircraft scerenry and Terain mesh.

[Transit]

Your rig is quite weak, but for FS9 is good enough, if you accept to hold back some with the detail cursors.

I just got FS9 and my gear is Pentium 3 /550 and a GF2 and 256 ram
frame rate is low but I am very happy with the detail of views
so i think your gear would be a lot better.
Get a joystick with twist rudder or even better peddals

have fun

Pete

[ashaman]

You can still download it but it won't work anymore.

Like the CIVA IRS. A shame. Why on earth limit the work of a freeware add-on, unless you plan to make it become payware (and it didn't happen). Really some people I will never be able to understand.