Time to go to p3d - general views and experiences wanted

[BendyFlyer]

Ok - I am still firmly welded to FSX but because of hardware limitations (my current rig could not run P3D too slow worked but 2 FPS was hopeless for the original P3D) I am awaiting a new PC capable of running P3D V5 and or MSFS2020. The new MS sim is off the list for reasons many and various until they get it sorted out properly and I get sufficient bandwith to even download it so it is time to move to a sim recoded for 64 bit operation which of course is P3D.

I see that LM is still offerring three versions of P3D and it appears that the least trouble free route is P3DV4 which means I can port across most of my FSX addons - aircraft and scenery (with of course the inevitable tweaking and reworking of files systems etc for which there is no shortage of support and tips so that is ok). Most if not all I can reload via updated P3D versions from the addon developers, with a few exceptions, and it seems most of my less sophisticated FSX addons will work fine there as well.

I guess my main issue is what is the real difference between the two in terms of sim operability given my new machine will have an I9 chip 64GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD drive with the latest NVidia card (8GB).

So should I stick with V4 or go for V5? It seems V5 will use DX12 but V4 does not is that correct? and if so how do models created in the DX9, DX10 era go with these versions?

Most importantly - what should I not do? LOL I guess having like all of us installed and reinstalled FSX and everything over the years one is not looking forward to doing this all over again - so is it really worth it?

Advice and experiences appreciated while I await my new PC's arrival.

[Scorch00]

In terms of V5 and V4, there's not a whole lot of difference except in I think some more efficient tuning done to the sim itself as well as new ground, night, and sky textures. Along with some new aircraft not in V4. They also added PBR to some models like the C-130. I had heavily invested into V4.5 with environmental enhancements and things that I felt negated the need to bother moving everything over to V5. In terms of aircraft port overs from FSX to P3D V4 or V5, So long as the aircraft are FSX native and operate using 64-bit gauges P3D v4 will likely accept them. It's not a 100% chance though. At least in my experience. Easiest way I found to see if you'll have issues with port over or not is if the aircraft has both an interior and exterior model in the aircraft's model folder. P3D defaults to VC operation unlike how FSX was mostly 2D. So this is why it needs an interior model. If it only has an exterior, it needs to get run through MCX or a merge has to be done with an interior. You may still have to tweak things in the aircraft.cfg too. Most scenery can transfer over to P3D V4 as well from FSX. But sometimes elevations of objects are off. So there's that to look for. I've run into it a handful of times.

In terms of the latest performing spec computers, one with the hardware you mentioned wouldn't even break a sweat likely running either v4 or v5. V4.5 uses DX11, V5 uses DX12 I believe. But even with addon scenery, etc. You'd be surprised how much better P3D runs than FSX did. My PC is almost 2 years old and was a mid-line build back then. I have a Ryzen 7 2600X, Nvidia GTX 1080, 32GB of RAM, and I'm running it off a 1TB HDD even. I get some frame drops if I'm in a super congested area like Orbx San Diego with my AI traffic and everything turned all the way up. But across normal operation it's 40-60FPS normally in the areas I fly in.

[gastonj]

Hi,
The problem with P3DV5 is the management of the PBR. If the PBR industrial standards worked very well with the 4.5, this is no longer the case with the V5, whose decline is simply incomprehensible, darker. This is a major fault, a very serious bug!
JMC

[expat]

Moved from FSX to P3D v 4 two years ago and never looked back. It is superior in many ways.

[expat]

BTW - it is the 64 bit format that is the literal game changer.

[wombat666]

I started with P3D at the beginning, but the 64 bit P3D4+ and P3D5 were complete game changers.
Currently I'm running both, P3D4 seems to be more friendly to a lot of FSX based aircraft, P3D5 is rather fussy.
I have no intention of abandoning either for MSFS2020, as the P3D series have a decent commercial add on base and I doubt LM will sit on their hands when it comes to bug fixes and updates.
You might want to rethink your storage space: I'm a sucker for ORBX and I decided to load my (ORBX) scenery on a dedicated drive, much to my disgust 1TB wasn't enough.

My new (way over the top) system runs everything without breaking a sweat and is capable of storing anything I can think of, and I'm adding a 4TB SSD in light of new landclass and regional additions from ORBX. (Overkill but it's better to have the space and not need than to need it and not have it!)
Maybe MSFS2020 will find it's way onto an SSD, but not for quite some time.
I highly recommend P3Dv4+, simply because of it's flexibility, P3Dv5 has a few bugs and is not friendly with additions unless they are (mostly) v5 specific.

[BendyFlyer]

Thanks - Yep P3DV4 it will be. Advice and experiences appreciated and the SSD size issue and ORBX noted as well and appreciated as I have a lot of ORBX stuff to upgrade as well. It will be some time before I bother with MSFS2020 but will reinstall FSX just to run the Capt Sim 707 and 727 until they finally redo them for P3D then it is goodbye FSX.

[wombat666]

Thanks - Yep P3DV4 it will be. Advice and experiences appreciated and the SSD size issue and ORBX noted as well and appreciated as I have a lot of ORBX stuff to upgrade as well. It will be some time before I bother with MSFS2020 but will reinstall FSX just to run the Capt Sim 707 and 727 until they finally redo them for P3D then it is goodbye FSX.

I must admit to keeping P3Dv3 for just that purpose, it became my alternative to FSX and the home of my CS Boeings.

[ColoKent]

I must admit to keeping P3Dv3 for just that purpose, it became my alternative to FSX and the home of my CS Boeings.

I'm going to reinstall V3 for precisely the same reason...CS 727s...I've got V5 installed, but I will likely uninstall that and reinstall V4.5 in parallel with V3.

Kent

[bazzar]

Hi,
The problem with P3DV5 is the management of the PBR. If the PBR industrial standards worked very well with the 4.5, this is no longer the case with the V5, whose decline is simply incomprehensible, darker. This is a major fault, a very serious bug!
JMC

Have to disagree there. The "darkness" is caused by a change in channel outputs for PBR. Yes it is a pain if you build/fly 4.5 and 5 but if the materials and textures are correctly output for V5, there is no issue. V4.5 ignores the extra channels and processes as normal.

[Thomas J Wood]

Actually the Pbr texturing never changed. But...there is a simple work around used in the industry to by pass PBR and get the same effect, I use it in my addons incase some of you run into problems with the PBR and shader collision that seems to be happening... P3d v5 is a good simulator, It has a few new features that will be translated properly in the coming -patches.
The PBR is not quite woking with some older cards, and some new features and enhancements that were adjusted, IE tweaked or introduced new features will need some refining.

P-v5 was a good step forward, it will need some refining but it is a better sim.

[BendyFlyer]

Thanks all, lot of research confirms it for P3D as it is now a proper 64bit architecture SIMULATOR and not a game. I did not get involved in simulation to play games but to revist aviation in all its glory and to actually fly the aeroplanes I missed out on for various reasons and some old friends that I spent real time in, that is use their systems, check lists and explore their handling. I will now begin preparation work for the big migration (where the heck is that license key sale voucher etc?). As I am all completely native FSX models anyway old FS9 with no interior models will not be a problem and the swag of addon scenery I have (including my own) will be able to go in as well (well mostly I am sure there will be some that do not do it). GAU v XML may be an issue but will deal with it as it goes.

Whole new life begins. Again thanks to all for your valuable insights.

[gastonj]

Have to disagree there. The "darkness" is caused by a change in channel outputs for PBR. Yes it is a pain if you build/fly 4.5 and 5 but if the materials and textures are correctly output for V5, there is no issue. V4.5 ignores the extra channels and processes as normal.

The extra channel is the Blue channel of the metallic texture. I know that, and I disagree a little with you! A texture exported by substance painter works well in 4.5 and bad in V5. Including the reflectance in the blue channel has no effect. So I am very curious, could you say more about your affirmation ? I think that substance painter is the de facto standard for producing PBR materials!
JMC

Edit : I qualify my remarks. I am perplexed because my comment was based on a conversion of a V4.5 model to 5 with MCX and the result was not satisfactory. The export with Blender 2.84 and SDK V5 gives a correct result it seems to me!





Laziness is a bad advisor, I will port the sources to Blender 2.84!

[blanston12]

I have always though of P3Dv3 as FSX where they have fixed most of the bugs. I keep it around to use with those FSX and FS9 aircraft that don't work in the 64 bit platform, but I can't tell you the last time I fired it up. To repeat what others have said, in comparing v4 and v5, v5 has some very good improvements in the base scenery, weather and GPU performance, but on the downside the PBR rendering has some issues (dark cockpits) and it is less stable that v4.5, I have had to reinstall it twice because it would get in a situation where I would get CTD as soon as I start the flight from the scenario editor. Based on LM's normal patterns, I would expect 5.1 to be released very soon, they tend to release updates every 6 months and 5.0 was released last April so hopefully the problems that everyone is rightly complaining about may be solved.

LM is playing a different game than M$ does, for LM P3D is a piece in a larger puzzle of providing services so the commercial pressures are different, while with M$ flight sim is an end it itself, its no longer Paul Allen's pet project, if it does not make enough money its done.

[BendyFlyer]

LM is playing a different game than M$ does, for LM P3D is a piece in a larger puzzle of providing services so the commercial pressures are different, while with M$ flight sim is an end it itself, its no longer Paul Allen's pet project, if it does not make enough money its done.

I have to agree with that view as well. The thing we forget is that the commercial training market is not doing it on the cheap so they will shell out thousands as required if it fits and helps and it certainly does, I have used all the sims in the past for real pilot training, mostly procedural aspects and when I retired they were fully integrated into airforce and civil pilot training syllabuses and courses. And of course thanks to microprocessors these training scenarios and missions are now plugged into the real world aircraft and they fly the real aeroplane doing a simulated mission they have practised on the ground in the sim now it is in the real thing. And of course training organisations and like folk do not buy one license but may buy hundreds along with regular updates and annual license fees. So they demand and get authentic simulated functional systems to get failures etc which is why P3D will always be ahead of MS and will be a stayer.

[blanston12]

On thing I should say in regards to stability vs v4 and v5. While I have had a lot of issues with v5 recently, issues that required re-installing, there are areas where v5 is much more stable that v4. In v4 flying into EGLL/Heathrow with Orbx England installed, you had around a 1/3 chance it was going to crash on you, with orbx TE-GBS there was a more than 50% chance it would crash on you while with v5 is it is much smother and very stable in this area. So when your deciding to invest remember v4.5 is now frozen and there will be no more updates, while v5 will keep getting better.

[BendyFlyer]

Not a final comment but simply a sober assessment of why I sought some opinions on P3D. I guess it was to gauge the impressions on its functionality, visuals and the usual simulation want to haves that have come with sims in the past - namely, variety and flexibility, variety of types and flexibilty that is good enough to cater for various simming needs.

I am thoroughly familiar with simulator training in the real world having had the experience of the original Link, various PC desktop varieties and up to including real full motion aircraft simulators. I have used and been involved in sims since they started like a lot of folk and like most people that has been dominated by MS just as the whole OS world has been dominated by MS (Unless of course you are going to do some serious computing, like science-engineering research and tools or run high volume transactional businesses ala your Bank or Big Store there different OS's rule). The other issue buried in all this hardware v software, namely hardware development particular processors chips has rocketed along with software struggling to keep up - damn my new phone has nearly a quarter of the RAM and processing power of this desktop I am using here and I can hold it in my hand. I guess having seen the capabilities in the real world which is all about integration and training you arrive at a different view to merely playing a game and it is here where P3D goes to top of the list and MSFS2020 no matter how pretty visually to the bottom (even compared with poor old FSX). You see already you are coming up against the market- product development boundary. MS are not in the business of simulation - LM is. The sober assessment of the new MS 'game'is just that that is who they are aimed at and that is the market not serious flight simulators or nerdy techies or even a bunch of old buggers smitten by the aviation bug and able to enjoy that world via imagination and the sim.

The other thing is that having access to the commercial or professional P3D has given me whole new insight into that product. The inbuilt functionality, networking and mutluser capacity is seriously good. This simulator program is finally doing what its long gone designers (SubLogic) imagined it would do be a professional level simulator for flight training etc etc. You see that is why the LM product stresses 'vehicle' sky, land, sea or space are all catered for. Weapon delivery and use is also very carefully catered for (no simple Tacpac system) - why because that is what the military do - they deliver ordinance via a vehicle. So you can design training from the simple do a circuit or instrument approach to an all weather flight in hostile operating environments with ordinance delivery etc etc. You can do that alone or grouped or overwatched by the instructor and or training system and keep records, evaluate performance and refine mission and training programs. Here is what I mean you can run a cadet/student through a basic exercise (nav or weather flight or weapons use and or targeting) in the sim. Then go out to the real aircraft and have them fly the same mission all artificially constructed and delivered on the glass cockpit via the onboard computer systems. Now here is the key thing to remember for all of us - when you fly for real and particularly in the military you are busy - checks are memorised, skills have to be very precise and performance has to be high now in the aeroplane you are not interested in the pretty outside world you are too damn busy flying the aircraft, going to the next task and executing that task and operating the onboard systems so full blown eye candy outside world visuals are nice but not critical gosh the older and even modern full scale motion simulators have visuals that are crap compared to good old FS9. Get the difference - they are there to fly the aircraft that means systems replication, operation and failures is critical to learning and being proficient - and that is what a simulator has to do, so you can do a hell of a lot of training on the ground, including systems instruction and do your whole initial type endorsement in the aircraft before you even get close to the real aeroplane.

So that is why LMs P3D and MSFS2020 are completely different products now that look the same. LM is just dealing with the new 64 bit, multi-thread multi-core, high speed processors and ram and DX12 environment - and as that is refined it will really be something. But the great thing is this because the original ESP coding was so good and because it is the foundation programming then all us sim nuts will get to keep on keeping on with our old favourites and clunkers from FSX into P3DV5 and on.

So thanks guys for the feedback and helping me sort out a problem to upgrade to P3D and say finally say good bye to my old clunker 32bit FSX.