XP11.21 - Woah!
Results 1 to 15 of 15

Thread: XP11.21 - Woah!

  1. #1

    XP11.21 - Woah!

    I was curious about the current state of X-Plane and noticed that it gathered quite a bit of interest over at CBFSim. So I installed the demo and experimented a bit. Did some research and experimented a bit more. More experimenting, more research...and finally a monetary addition to Laminar's development (or party) fund.

    Everything just works out of the box. Download, install and off you go. No registry entries, no folder path restrictions, nothing.
    Installing add ons is so much easier than in FSX. No gauge, effect, sound or similar folders that get cluttered over time. Sceneries don't even require database manipulation, just name the folder appropriately, delete the database file and presto, it's activated without much further ado!

    That user interface had me at the first clicks. It's nothing short of a benchmark in efficiency!

    In the simulator itself, the visual presentation and performance was much better than I expected, even on my laptop. Not for the rain drops on the wind screen while flying though clouds or the sense of motion or the sloped runways or tons of autogen and (freeware third party) AI or the night lighting or the 25-30 FPS that can be attained with all that enabled, no...it's the animated autogen trains. Those tightly packed roads, but totally empty rail lines in FSX were a bit of an insult to an average European who has logged much, MUCH more rail than air or road miles.

    As for AI and ATC and the interaction between them...well, there's got to be a bit of an aftertaste, BUT: Laminar still wants to improve this. So there's another aspect that's fascinating me. You get all this out of the box and there's still more to come.

    Honorable mention: The tight integration of the development tools (PlaneMaker, AirfoilMaker, WorldEditor). Centrally managed, continuously updated and (so far) well documented.

    The quality of the developent tools is noticable with all the freeware add-ons. Admittedly, there are way, WAY fewer airplanes than for MSFS, but what's available would most certainly come with a price tag in FSX. Zibo's B738, that Lancair Legacy FG, the modded default MD-80, a Let 410, an An-2 and heck, they even have a working Do-328...all free and complete!
    Not to mention the terrain add-ons. Basically infinite photoscenery (Ortho2XP) with matching autogen (Europe-2), landmarks galore (various packages) and updated vector and mesh data (HD Mesh). Again, if this was MSFS, you would (most likely) have to pay.


    I'm really, REALLY impressed by all that. And I figure it's not the end of the line yet.


    That said, if Laminar does indeed improve the ATC or the community comes up with further improvements to their equivalent AI/ATC solutions, I might just get a divorce from FSX.




    P.S:
    Laminar Research accepts PayPal as a payment method, all the relevant plugins are already 64 bit, there's no grief over old baggage, you can bomb things out of the box and you won't have to go back to school to buy it.

  2. #2
    I flew a cessna 172 into the wake turbulence of a 747, just for fun. You should do that in the demo and find out something else it does better than FSX...

  3. #3
    Welcome to the party!

    i9-10900K, 64 Gb RAM, RTX 3090 FE, Win10 Pro 64-bit, Reverb G2

  4. #4
    SOH Staff txnetcop's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2005
    Location
    Wentzville, MO
    Age
    73
    Posts
    5,242
    Blog Entries
    1
    It isn't as good as P3dv4 but it is ATC

    https://www.x-plane.com/kb/using-x-p...affic-control/
    Ted
    Vivat Christus Rex! Ad maiorem Dei gloriam

  5. #5
    SOH-CM-2019
    Join Date
    May 2007
    Location
    Nevada
    Age
    80
    Posts
    1,363
    Blog Entries
    1
    The only annoying part with freeware is the amount of library’s that have to be installed. Otherwise you are correct about xp.

    flying aircraft in xp I find much more difficult because of the way flight dynamics can be programmed much more realistically. Where fsx aircraft mostly fly like they are on rails, you have to pay attention in xp.

    it took me a while to get back in to xplane as I absolutely hated version 9. Version 11 is almost completely revised. Right now although I use p3d, xp-11 is my main sim.

  6. #6
    SOH Staff txnetcop's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2005
    Location
    Wentzville, MO
    Age
    73
    Posts
    5,242
    Blog Entries
    1
    Because of the age of my unit, Socket 775, QX9770, GTX 285, and 8GB 1200 Ram I can only fly XP10 but I have it looking so much like XP11 I'm pretty content. I have found that most XP11 aircraft fly in XP10. It took me a while to come around to using XP but there really is a difference in how the planes fly. It is more realistic. I owned a Cessna 140 and 152 and both of these in XP10 fly so much like the real thing in XP that I can't argue my way out of it anymore. I am still impressed with A2A aircraft, Orbx and many of the freeware aircraft in FSX so I still use it. FSX has come so far thanks to developers so I will never give it up but XP10 is my main sim now. I have used XP 11 in the new units I build for Young Eagles and others who commission me to build units but I can be patient, I have other priorities right now. Bjoern welcome to the real darkside...Roger just joined recently.
    Ted
    Vivat Christus Rex! Ad maiorem Dei gloriam

  7. #7
    A day later, version 11's horrendous memory consumption is dampening my enthusiasm a bit. Those 8 GB RAM in my computers might have worked really well for FSX, but in X-Plane, it barely covers the sim out of the box! I figure this wasn't an issue in the demo since the provided area is five tiles at best and XP11 loads like 12 out of the box. Same issue (LOD radius), different sim. *Grr*

    For both devices, a 16 GB kit costs about 150€ each. An 8 GB kit alone for the desktop retails for 83€.


    Apparently, you can cut down the amount of loaded tiles* at the cost of more frequent terrain load cycles and an ungainly green ring around your aircraft at airliner altitude.




    * https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php...d-dsf-enabled/

  8. #8
    Yielding page file management to Windows at least won't crash X-plane anymore when using anything beyond default scenery.

    Looking at the figures in Windows' performance options, it's no wonder why X-Plane crashed during or shortly after loading. Manually setting the page file to 6 GB wasn't enough; automatically managed, it blows up to 10 GB with HD Mesh v4 and X-Life traffic!
    X-Plane's process has almost 10 GB virtual memory assigned, but physical use curiously enough is just one third of that.

  9. #9
    Coastie Dolphins/Spartans CG_1976's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2007
    Location
    JBSA/Corpus TX
    Age
    47
    Posts
    3,510
    I need to really get XP11 back since the USCG is keeping me in TX out of JBSA and Corpus. Just gotta find time to buy anther HD and download install it. Miss the Twin Otter from RW. Makes for a great TX Coastal Patrol AC since there is no MH65C or C27J. I'll use the Canadian Solution.

    AMD FX 8-Core Black 4.2Ghz, 8G Ram 2TB HD, W8.1 pending W10, ATI R5 2G X2 Crossfire
    http://www.canadianarcticfse.com/

  10. #10
    Can't spend much money at the moment, but I've been eyeing an external USB3 SSD for X-Plane for an upgrade. These retail for around $150 with 512 GB of storage space and would offer a completely portable X-Plane experience across devices (if you stay away from OrthoXP).

  11. #11
    SOH Staff txnetcop's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2005
    Location
    Wentzville, MO
    Age
    73
    Posts
    5,242
    Blog Entries
    1
    Quote Originally Posted by Bjoern View Post
    Can't spend much money at the moment, but I've been eyeing an external USB3 SSD for X-Plane for an upgrade. These retail for around $150 with 512 GB of storage space and would offer a completely portable X-Plane experience across devices (if you stay away from OrthoXP).

    Yessirreee at least 512GB...$150 is a great price!
    Vivat Christus Rex! Ad maiorem Dei gloriam

  12. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by Stefano Zibell View Post
    I flew a cessna 172 into the wake turbulence of a 747, just for fun. You should do that in the demo and find out something else it does better than FSX...
    12 years on one would hope so.
    Intel i5-10600K 4.10 GHz 12 Core CPU
    Asus ROG Strix Z590-E Gaming LGA1200 Z590-E Motherboard
    Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4-3200 Memory
    Water Cooler - CORSAIR iCUE H100i RGB PRO XT
    Corsair 850W PSU
    MSI RX580 Radeon Armor 8Gb
    Windows 10 Home Premium 64
    3 x 21" Acer LED screens

  13. #13
    Coastie Dolphins/Spartans CG_1976's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2007
    Location
    JBSA/Corpus TX
    Age
    47
    Posts
    3,510
    Quote Originally Posted by txnetcop View Post
    Yessirreee at least 512GB...$150 is a great price!
    Got any suggestions where I can find at that price and availability down here locally in San Antonio?? Keep it around the 410 please, not the nut job 1604 lol, not in the mood for the TX German Autobahn demolition. lol.
    Last edited by txnetcop; June 16th, 2018 at 16:53.

    AMD FX 8-Core Black 4.2Ghz, 8G Ram 2TB HD, W8.1 pending W10, ATI R5 2G X2 Crossfire
    http://www.canadianarcticfse.com/

  14. #14
    SOH Staff txnetcop's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2005
    Location
    Wentzville, MO
    Age
    73
    Posts
    5,242
    Blog Entries
    1
    Quote Originally Posted by CG_1976 View Post
    Got any suggestions where I can find at that price and availability down here locally in San Antonio?? Keep it around the 410 please, not the nut job 1604 lol, not in the mood for the TX German Autobahn demolition. lol.
    Hey, that's my hometown you're talking about LOL! Actually in San Antonio I would drive to Dallas to Fry's Electronics because nothing in San Antonio came close to the prices or the amount of parts I could find in Dallas but you're in luck. Drive to Austin instead to Fry's Electronics...less than an hour away. Plan on spending the day it's like a Computer Disneyland!


    https://www.frys.com/ac/storeinfo/au...aps-directions
    Vivat Christus Rex! Ad maiorem Dei gloriam

  15. #15
    Installed World Traffic and X-ATC-Chatter. Still not as good as MSFS/P3D, but better than being all alone.



    Quote Originally Posted by txnetcop View Post
    Yessirreee at least 512GB...$150 is a great price!
    Thought so, too. But the bookeeping part of my brain nonetheless clings to my cash tighter than a newbie pilot to the stick.

Members who have read this thread: 0

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •