Simulator better than RealFlight G3.5 ???

On Wed, 03 Dec 2008 01:24:46 GMT, "Chuck" wrote in :

I have RF G4.5.

I moved up from G2.

I enjoy it. My local hobby shop carries it and I was able to buy it with some gift cards.

I have seen other simulators--played with one once out in Toledo.

I'm running G4.5 on a Vista x64 system with 6 GB of RAM and ... hang on ... 256 MB video card. The system glitches routinely a moment after takeoff and at the point of crashing. My friend has a similar system with a little less RAM and a bigger, hotter video card. I've got the dual-core CPU set up to ramp up the clock on demand (I don't want it running hot when I'm doing stuff like this).

We speculate that it's my slow hard disks, maybe. I have a RAID array set up for mirroring.

After the obligatory glitches, all the rest of the flight is smooth until it's time to crash.

It's plenty good enough for my purposes for now. Someday I may give some other system a go ...

Marty

On Wed, 03 Dec 2008 01:24:46 +0000, Chuck shouted:

I have heard Aerofly Pro Deluxe is good.

I have Realflight G4.5 and like it. No reason to change. I am running an AMD 64 bit processor, 3 gb ram , a GeForce 7600 GS video card that has 256 mb of ram on it, Windows XP installed on one of the slowest SATA hard drives available. I have G4.5 set for full performance and have no problems with glitches. If Realflight would run under wine on Linux, I wouldn't even have Windows of any flavor installed on my system.

I have Aerofly Pro running on a 3Ghz HP Desktop with a 256MG 7600GT card, and it also runs on my Dell laptop that has a 2.4Ghz CPU but does have a "proper" graphics card in it ( 256mb but can't remember the make and model (Nvidia I think)) Desktop has 2GB RAM, Laptop has

1GB ram. Both are using the standard disks that came in them, nothing special, just what was maker supplied.

Runs perfectly fine (over 30FPS, usually around 60 to 100fps) on both. The key isn't the CPU it;s the graphics card.

bit processor, 3 gb ram , a

on one of the slowest SATA

problems with glitches. If Realflight would

on my system.

I have FS1 too (it was cheap). It's OK, but not the best sim ever, I prefer AFPD. I bought AFPD after Realflight G3 came out, as the G2 to G3 upgrade was a bit pricey for me and at the time the PC I had would have needed upgrades to cope with G3, so I sold it and bought AFPD that would work on my hardware.

I've also had Reflex XTR which was fine, but I changed to Aerofly as it had planes in I had (the Hype 3d) modeled by the company rather than a home programmer. I bought FS1 to get used to the Great Planes F22 raptor, but I'm not over impressed by the Sim and so it';s not been used much.

Ohave G2, If you turned off nost of the 3D and objects, and costruncted a simple field, it only needed an upgrade that cost as much as the sim to run it..mostly new video card ;-) It is one of the best frankly. Taught me not to crash.

Too much time spent on gadgets tho, not enough on core aerodynaimcs.

It proved to be not very good when i set up my own planes on it.

64 bit processor, 3 gb ram , a

on one of the slowest SATA

problems with glitches. If Realflight would

on my system.

Yeah. I second that. i have a PC and ALL it runs is model stuff.

Realflight, Motocalc and Corel Draw for plans.

| Chuck wrote: |> I have been park-flying RTF's for about a year now and still like to |> practice (and play) when it gets dark outside. A friend showed me his |> RealFlight G3.5 simulator and its OK but are there any better? ...

| Ohave G2, If you turned off nost of the 3D and objects, and costruncted | a simple field, it only needed an upgrade that cost as much as the sim | to run it..mostly new video card ;-) | It is one of the best frankly.

At the time, RFG2 *was* the very best available. For several years. And it was priced accordingly.

Then Reflex XTR (I think that's the one) came out and blew RFG2 out of the water -- KnifeEdge had been caught napping. So they got back to work and eventually put out RFG3, which was a big improvement. Renewed competition was a good thing.

Now, all the modern simulators are pretty good, and it's hard to pick one that's `the best'. Some are better at one thing, and others are better at this other thing, and so which simulator is `the best' will depend on what you're after.

And yes, having the appropriate hardware is important. It doesn't affect the flight model much, but if you want the graphics to look good you've got to have the hardware to support it -- otherwise you'll have to turn the graphics options way down just to be able to use it.

| It proved to be not very good when i set up my own planes on it.

RFG3 is much better. (RFG3 was a huge improvement over RFG2, but RFG4 is a small improvement over RFG3.)

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I liked the way that RF G2 handled helicopters about the best of all of the sims I've used to date. I have G2, but lost the product key (damned paper sticker), so I can't run it any longer. I'd love to resurrect it. It made heli flying lots of fun.

The later versions of Real Flight suck because of the non intuitive model set up terminology. WTF is children of this or that?

Ed Cregger

RF G4.5 definitely wants a high end video card or else. I'm running an athlon dual core 3.0ghz with 3 gigs of ram. I Ebay'd a Geforce 8500 GT Nvidia card but got less than great results. Upgraded a bit to an Nvidia Geforce 8600 GT card with worse results. Jerky background, some custom planes wouldn't "animate" even tho they did fly OK, went back to the

8500 card. Just picked up an EVGA E-GeForce 9800GTX card and WOW! I can turn on ALL options and set to highest and it works great. This card is HUGE. PCI Express but double slot and about a foot long. I actually had to modify the removable housing for the SATA drive with a hacksaw to get that sucker to fit in the case but fit it does. That being said, I absolutely love G4.5 and can say without any qualms that it is well worth the money if your puter can run it.

On Thu, 4 Dec 2008 17:14:46 -0800, "fubar1" wrote in :

You have probably put your finger on the weakest link in my system.

I've got a ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT with 256 MB of RAM.

I'll definitely be on the lookout for an upgrade in a year or two. Not now. I'm trying to be happy with what I've got. It's way good enough for work, and that's what I'm supposed to be using it for.

Marty

On 2008-12-05, Martin X. Moleski, SJ wrote: | On Thu, 4 Dec 2008 17:14:46 -0800, "fubar1" wrote in :

|> ... Just picked up an EVGA E-GeForce 9800GTX card and WOW! I can |> turn on ALL options and set to highest and it works great. ...

Not surprising. It's very high end.

| You have probably put your finger on the weakest link | in my system. | | I've got a ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT with 256 MB of RAM.

Actually, that's a pretty decent card. It ought to run RFG4 just fine, with most options turned on.

If you want to rank your cards, check here --

| I'll definitely be on the lookout for an upgrade in | a year or two. Not now. I'm trying to be happy | with what I've got. It's way good enough for work,

Really, if your work doesn't need 3D graphics, pretty much any video card will work.

Thanks for mentioning Tom's hardware site, Doug. I had forgotten about this once revered resource. Much appreciated.

Ed Cregger

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Hi Chuck, I have three sims. Real Flight G2, Reflex XTR, and Aerofly Pro Deluxe. I

*never* use RFG2. IMHO, it's the most unrealistic and bug laden. Reflex is my favorite for all out training because you may set the start position of the aircraft. Great for shooting landings without having to fly the pattern each time. It's the absolute best for chopper and torque roll training because you can set the controls you want to use and let the sim do the rest. I spend most of my sim time on AFPD only because I can use my RFG2 controller. When I want to use Reflex I must hook up my JR XF631 xmtr and the battery is usually dead :-(. If I had a separate controller for the Reflex XTR I would undoubtedly spend 98% + of my sim time on it. In a nutshell Reflex XTR = #1, Aeroflly Pro Deluxe = a close #2, and Real Flight G2 completely out of the running.

I would happily sell my RFG2 + 6 Add-ons if I could keep the controller. I'd even throw in my old RealFlight controller. (Pre G2). Ed F.

| In a nutshell Reflex XTR = #1, Aeroflly Pro Deluxe = a close #2, and | Real Flight G2 completely out of the running.

To be fair, RFG2 came out in 2000. It's not really fair to compare it to much more modern simulators, especially now that it's two revisions out of date ...

But if you want to be complete, let's also compare to the Ripmax simulator, as well as Dave Brown's RCFS.

RFG3 is a huge improvement over RFG2. RFG4 is a minor improvement over RFG3. Is RFG4 better than the others? I don't know. It's certainly more `slick' than anything else I've seen ...

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I haven't seen a computer sim that is actually accurate in its physics. Fortunately, it isn't necessary that they be accurate in order to have fun or to even learn the basics of flying.

The RFG2 sim made flying helis easy. No, not because of the poor physics. It was easy to customize the heli parameters without dealing with the later revision's "mother of children" and crap like that. Why would the Tower conglomerate let something like that be approved for sale?

The older versions of Real Flight Gx were far easier to toy with and have fun. I'd like to see G5 go back to permitting us to moving the balance point without referring to the manual to find the proper nomenclature.

I've flown the earlier Dave Brown and the FMS sims. They were okay. Far better than nothing, that's for sure. Haven't flown the AeroFly sim yet. Tried to order it two or three times and then gave up. Their website was messed up and wouldn't let me complete the order.

Ed Cregger

You guys are awesome. What a great breakdown on the pros and cons. I wasn't even familiar with some of the simulator programs mentioned. Thanks again. I am re-reading and digesting it all.

Chuck

How can you tell that it is not acurate in itss physics? I fly the BLT plane of RF4 in the store and was impressed that it flew almost exactly the same as my GWS Slow Stick, Since then I downloaded an actual GWS Slow Stick from knifeedge, and this was even closer.

Free sim models for RealFlight.

"Peter Olcott" wrote

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I'm talking about the overall impression that is left upon the participant in terms of input lag, amplitude/duration of inertia related effects, etc. This may be more due to latency of the computer system than a gross error in the software.

Ed Cregger

I tried downloading from this site

-- I am using G3.5) and got a file directed to RealflightG3/Planes/Custom. This sounds right, however the file type was .g3x. This also sounds right EXCEPT the program did not recognize it! Looking in the RealflightG3 directory suggests two files are used (with file types of .fastkex and .collision) which are stored in the directory Collision/Planes/3dmodels. I also notice that the program stores my model mods in directory ReafflightG3/Planes/Custom (with file type .plng3).

Now I am really confused! Anyone know what is going on?

Still confused -- but! I managed to download and fly the Swordfish -- but! Underpowered in a big way and can't modify either engine power OR weight. The result is I can ONLY takeoff on a hard surface!! What the heck is this?