Which traffic program?

[arrowmaker]

Whilst browsing the excellent Jaggyroad site I came across this promo for Flight I's Ultimate Traffic II. It persuaded me that I finally must get a good traffic program. My query relates to which one? There seems to be three main contenders; the afore mentioned Ultimate Traffic II as well as My Traffic X and My Traffic 2010.

Any advice would be welcome. Are they all pretty much the same or does opinion favour one over the others? As a side note I mainly fly GA. Not sure if this will make a difference to which program I choose.

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[Brian_Gladden]

Well.... I have mixed feelings about both programs.

I initially bought My Traffic X and installed it on my system. The planes were not as detailed or textured as well as even FS 2002 era PAI aircraft but the did the job. However the rather random and fictitious flightplans were a turn off for me. Also no freighters at all. So I uninstalled.

On Christmas, I treated myself and bought Ultimate Traffic X. The planes look much better (Like the current WOAI aircraft) and it had more flexibility and of course, freighters.

I couldn't even install it. My system has three hard drives (one external) and FSX is on my secondary (F:\) drive. However to even install UT II you need to have over 2 gig free on C: drive even if FSX is somewhere else. I only had 1.9 so no install.

I just got my refund from Flight 1 this morning. Which isn't too bad considering the dual holiday weekends.

If I ever can afford a new system that can run FSX well (My current one can't) I'll re-purchase Ultimate Traffic II

[guzler]

I run UT2 as I prefer the detail in the AI aircraft. It doesn't contain charter or transport flights, so I also run some of the WOAI packs to compliment the gaps in local traffic. As it uses it's own traffic density settings, you can control it seperately than normal traffic giving another benefit.

It's got a whole load of other functions, but these days I don't meddel with them, but visit their website for more info on that...

http://ultimatetraffic.flight1.net/forums/default.asp

I've run pretty much all the traffic programmes and stuck with this one due to the quality of the models. Obviously my opinion only.

[stansdds]

I recently installed UT2 and I'm happy with it except that it does not generate cargo flights. I set the UT2 traffic sliders at something like 80% commercial traffic and 35% GA traffic. Higher GA settings seem to result in skies and parking areas packed with GA traffic and I can't get a radio call in edgewise or find a parking spot.

[IanP]

MyTrafficX has changed a little since it was released - apart from the fact that Burkhard has replaced a lot of the models (and the textures, which used to be my greatest complaint), it is no longer random flight plans.

The flight plans are now based on real world schedules and contrary to what Brian said, there are plenty of freighters in the pack, covering a large number of carriers. There isn't a full list of types and aircraft online at the moment - I was asked that the other day by someone and couldn't find one, Burkhard says he'll post one again, but the cut-down "MyTrafficX Lite" has a list of packages which it includes here: http://secure.simmarket.com/b.-renk-mytraffic-x-lite.phtml and you'll see that includes DHL and FEDEX in addition to CargoJet, Cargolux, World Cargo...

Personally, right now, I'm using an alpha version of MTX5.3a which I was sent to test something (being a mod on the forum and an experienced tester has its advantages) and I'm quite happy with it. I've also tried TrafficX from JustFlight, which I was highly unimpressed with (the routes and liveries were from the mid 1990s), and the demo of UT2. The latter certainly has very nice models, but nowhere near the depth of coverage that MyTrafficX has.

MyTraffic2010 is Aerosoft's version of MyTrafficX - I'd go for the direct download version from Burkhard rather than Aerosoft's, purely because it is better supported.

My opinion is that I'd go for MyTrafficX as it covers military, GA, cargo, charters... The models and textures still aren't the best available, but the routes in the latest versions are a colossal difference over what they were in terms of realism. It's also very well supported and gives a configurable array of traffic that will run on pretty much anything up to ridiculously insane levels where you'll never get to land or use the radio.

If model fidelity is your biggest preference, and you're not worried about anything other than airliners, I'd get Ultimate Traffic II.

Next step, if your system can run it without laughing and dropping your frame rate to single figures (my system loathes running FS9 models as AI...) is the various freeware FS9 systems with flight plans converted from TTools format (FS8) to FSX.

I wish I hadn't wasted my money on TrafficX. :(

Ian P.

[Brian_Gladden]

My apologies.... I have Traffic X.... I got the program titles messed up :isadizzy:

[arrowmaker]

Thanks for the info guys. Although it would be nice to have the higher fidelity ai offered by UT2, I think having a greater variety of traffic, eg cargo, military etc, is more important. Currently, therefore, I'm leaning towards My Traffic X.

[Oelwanne]

One thing i would like to add:
I own UT2 and i must say that it is great at all. But the geratest Thing for me is the Performance!

I have a Q6600 with 4 GB Ram and a HD4850 used on Vista 32bit.
I´m running UT2 with all sliders full and have only a very small impact on the Framerate.

So if Performance is important for you, UT2 should be your Choice.

[Francois]

My Traffic X anytime..... best models, best support. Period. (Ian mentioned the rest already).

[IanP]

A lot of performance is down to how many models there are, though.

If you run an equal number of models, you will see different performance levels - the freeware offerings will have the biggest hit on performance as they are FS9 models, MyTrafficX will probably have the lowest hit as the models and textures aren't as detailed - there are fewer draw calls on MTX models than there are on UT2, I believe (UT2 is mainly Fruit Stand and other models converted to FSX as I understand it). However MTX will then take away its own advantage by filling every gate at every airport within a 20 mile radius and having so many aircraft on approach that most of them will never be able to land if you set the sliders too high. All of the major packages - TrafficX, UT2 and MyTrafficX - will show far more models than FS can handle successfully if you run both GA and Airliner traffic at 100%. You'll really want AISmooth if you want to start trying that.

UT2, TrafficX and MyTrafficX all use native FSX models (with some exceptions, I believe, in MTX still, but they can be disabled).

"Sliders fully right" on all the options will mean considerably different things, so it is a bit of an imprecise measurement to record performance against. Comparing the three I have direct experience of - TrafficX, MyTrafficX and huge amounts of FS9 freeware with converted flight plans - MTX displays a lot more traffic for the same loss in performance compared to the other two. I've not seen enough of UT2 to be able to comment, as the demo only covers two airports.

Has anyone created a widget that simply counts the number of AI aircraft being drawn at any one time, so you could make a direct comparison? That would actually be quite useful as a comparison tool for the different AI packages if anyone has one or could quickly produce one.

Another option, which anyone with AI Flight Planner could do, would be to disable all other aviation AI, place an equal number of the same model types from each pack using exactly the same flight plans (thus eliminating the other variables as much as possible) and compare the frame rate hit then.

I'd be really interested in trying that, but don't have the time or money to obtain all the options and test them right now.

Edited to add: Oi. Francois. You're biased! :d - however something else of interest is that MTX and UT2 apparently work very well together, with an option to use UT2 for what it covers, disabling the clashes in MyTrafficX, then fill the rest of your skies with the bits of MTX that aren't in UTX. The downside of that, of course, is that you have to have both, but the combination gives the best of both worlds. I've not tried it to say how well it works.

http://forum.simflight.com/topic/61456-welcome-to-ultimate-traffic-2/

Ian P.

[Francois]

Yes, and I never said I wasn't....... but aren't we all one way or other ? ;-0

[jetstreamsky]

I don't know if anything has changed since I last looked, but due to the way UT2 works, if you refer to the Map it causes UT2 to reload the traffic from scratch and not from where you left off, on the other hand UT2 follows routes more realistically.

[kilo delta]

I don't use any payware traffic program...prefer to stick with WOAI for airline traffic,FSX GA Traffic...for ehhh...GA traffic and MAIW for military traffic. Both WOAI and MAIW traffic files are converted to fsx format in order to prevent messing up my other traffic files.

[IanP]

The only problem with that, KD, as someone else came to me with the same problem a couple of nights ago, is that many peoples' systems balk at displaying lots of FS9 AI models - inlcuding mine.

When Andy (the guy I was talking to the other night) disabled his MAIW and WOAI files and re-enabled the default AI, he went from 12-15fps to 50-60fps and no, I'm not joking. He was running unlimited and was reporting >90fps at one point. Re-enabling the FS9 AI (with converted flight plans) killed his frame rate back down to barely above single digits, in spite of the fact that he was changing the AI sliders to display a similar amount of traffic between the two.

He is now investigating FSX native AI packages but, as he is primarily an FS9 user still, is holding off for a while.

Anyway. My main reason for revisiting this thread is because I mentioned the other day that Burkhard Renk said he would post a list of all the aircraft in the latest version of MyTrafficX. He uploaded a pdf earlier today at this URL: http://www.fsrail.com/MyTypes.pdf

Hope that is of use!

All the best,

Ian P.

[Bjoern]

WOAI.

Advantage: Costs nothing, covers nearly everything.
Disadvantage: Frame rate hit.
Workaround: Set your FSX settings with AI traffic in mind.

[IanP]

My big question is why NONE of the freeware teams are interested in creating FSX native models?

I know that the flight dynamics are different, so that may explain a lot, but most of the FS9 AI flight dynamics handle well enough in FSX that they're usable, if not perfect. Certainly most people wouldn't complain about them if they were free. So why is no-one doing it?

I'd do it myself, but I'm long since past being told how much my modelling and texturing sucks so fine, I just don't bother trying any more. ;)

Ian P.

[Bjoern]

My big question is why NONE of the freeware teams are interested in creating FSX native models?

...

So why is no-one doing it?

My take:

Serving two combined platforms is more efficient than serving two separate platforms.

Also: Spare time hobby.

And: No FSX user, no FSX models.


I'd do it myself, but I'm long since past being told how much my modelling and texturing sucks so fine, I just don't bother trying any more. ;)
A FSX conversion would just involve XML editing, setting up materials, keyframing and tagging a few animations and attachpoints.

Seriously, there is not the slightest bit of modeling or texture unwrapping involved if you can get your hands on the source files.

One won't have to convert every single AI model out there, all the B7x7s and A3xxs out there would totally do the trick.