Microsoft Flight Sim 2020

[AndyJWest]

Yeah, I don't think 'some random guy with a YouTube channel' is exactly a reliable source.

[CanadaOne]

Well if a random guy on the Internet can't be trusted, what's this world coming to? 

 

If you go to content manager, you'll see a "core content" of about 80GB. I think he, and me by extension, thought that was a pending update and not simply the game as is installed. 

 

I smell a conspiracy!

[AndyJWest]

4 minutes ago, CanadaOne said:

Well if a random guy on the Internet can't be trusted, what's this world coming to? 

 

If you go to content manager, you'll see a "core content" of about 80GB. I think he, and me by extension, thought that was a pending update and not simply the game as is installed. 

 

I smell a conspiracy!

 

I smell someone trying to get people to watch their YouTube channel.

[Tycoon]

7 hours ago, tiger_0988 said:

If I’m not mistaken 2020 simulates real time weather?

 

There is going to be a massive tropical/storm hitting the southern portion of the country.

Yeah, lucky me, I'll be able to check out the live weather in real time while my roof gets blown off.?

[dbzero]

1 hour ago, CanadaOne said:

Apparently there's a 80GB update coming out, possibly tomorrow.

 

That's a mighty big update. 

 

Maybe we're getting the moon. 

Sweet...

I saw some interesting results when taking off from Louis Armstrong in New Orleans. In a Cesna 172 had clouds and then in the Lear Jet Clear skies. Both in Live time weather settings.

44 minutes ago, Tycoon said:

Yeah, lucky me, I'll be able to check out the live weather in real time while my roof gets blown off.?

I don't know whats worse-wild fires, smoke filled air and earthquakes here on the West Coast or Hurricanes in the Gulf Coast.

Stay safe. I've seen reports that tornadoes are also a threat along with the rain, wind and storm surge.

 

Edited August 27, 2020 by tiger_0988

[Hoots]

10 hours ago, AndyJWest said:

Well, I'm currently over the Gulf of Mexico, east south east of Houston. Not where I intended to be, because there is a monstrous storm in the way. Perhaps fortunately, MSFS doesn't seem to be modelling the wind (an intermittent bug with live weather apparently). No chance of climbing above it (I took the X Cub, because at least I know how to fly the thing), and for the moment I'm in accidental IMC haven't-a-clue mode, trusting the autopilot. I should probably head down, and find somewhere to land...

 

After-flight edit:

 

And so ends my trip from La Porte Municipal Airport, Texas to, um, er, La Porte Municipal Airport, Texas. Not New Orleans, which I'd intended to head for, but wisdom finally overcame foolishness when I realised that there was a possibility that the wind-bug might sort itself out, and blow me who knows where. On the plus side, I got some nice screenshots.

 

It was about here I began to have my doubts.

 

Trying to find a way around. I've not included screenshots of the inside of the clouds I failed to avoid flying into, since you'll already know what grey nothingness looks like.

 

Heading south, out of it. 

 

Got to see a rainbow on the way back. I'd seen another one earlier, but trying to get an external screenshot resulted in the autopilot doing strange things.

 

I'll need to learn to fly something with a bit more grunt before I look at another storm - hopefully next time the wind will be working.

 

 

 

  Nah, just get a sticker that says "Real men take on a hurricane with a Piper Cub". SW London is my old stomping ground. South London rules.

[SAS_Storebror]

11 hours ago, CanadaOne said:

I bought me one of those just for FS2020. Even if it only gives me 1% faster load times, I want that 1%!

I bought a different brand, but it was reviewed as being right next to the Samsung in performance for significantly less cash. 

 

Hi @CanadaOne, would you mind telling which one exactly you bought?

A colleague of mine is eagerly looking for the Samsung 970 price to drop for quite a while now.

Yesterday on Amazon he saw them for €119 and today even just €114, only to figure that delivery would be in 1-2 months, read: "I'm a Chinese guy collecting money and I will disappear without a trace in less than a week".

If you've got hints for affordable SSDs with specs reasonably close to the Samsung, he would greatly appreciate any hint.

 

Mike

[CanadaOne]

2 hours ago, SAS_Storebror said:

 

Hi @CanadaOne, would you mind telling which one exactly you bought?

A colleague of mine is eagerly looking for the Samsung 970 price to drop for quite a while now.

Yesterday on Amazon he saw them for €119 and today even just €114, only to figure that delivery would be in 1-2 months, read: "I'm a Chinese guy collecting money and I will disappear without a trace in less than a week".

If you've got hints for affordable SSDs with specs reasonably close to the Samsung, he would greatly appreciate any hint.

 

Mike

 

Morning,

 

I bought this one: https://www.amazon.com/XPG-SX8200-Gen3x4-3000MB-ASX8200PNP-1TT-C/dp/B07K1J3C23/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=nvme+xpg&qid=1598522667&sr=8-1

 

Watched a bunch of reviews and this one was said to be almost as good as the Samsung, but is available (1TB) for $170 instead of $250 for the 1TB Samsung 970 Evo. I had no problem saving $80.

 

Installed and works perfectly.

[SAS_Storebror]

Thanks a bomb @CanadaOne!
That one indeed looks very interesting.

I start biting my a$$ for having purchased the Kingston...

 

Mike

[Lusekofte]

I took a 152 From Svolvaer to Tromsoe. A trip I have flown several times in different types, mostly different Cessnas. 
I chose Cessna because average hour price flying it is about 28$ hour in Norway 

an actually reasonable price. 
It was clouds at 900 feet, 2000 feet and 4000 feets some heavy rain. So I decided to climb over the clouds to 6000 feet, now in order to see if I could do instrument flying made me do something we never did in our rl flights I climbed through the thickest densest cloud. Coming up to 6k I iced down and descended below cloud level just under 2000 feet. 
ice slowly went away and I got instrument flying longer than I planned. 
At this altitude I had to avoid some mountains where sun broke I got hot air flows making me climb. Other places I got fall wind. All if this following my flight path by landmarks I was familiar with and compass. 
All though I find this avionics complexity a bit eaayer to use and maybe less complex atm compared to x plane. I never in any 

flight sim felt such a accomplishment and really feeling of flight. 
I flew alone in a Cessna, as I done so many times, but not alone. And did not mess up , except from the icing part that was very supricing to me

[Uufflakke]

17 minutes ago, 216th_LuseKofte said:

except from the icing part that was very supricing to me

 

There is a word artist among us.

[Lusekofte]

Just now, Uufflakke said:

 

There is a word artist among us.

Damn I did that without thinking. I must be a talent

[ZachariasX]

1 hour ago, SAS_Storebror said:

I start biting my a$$ for having purchased the Kingston...

You will not feel a difference. Btw, as soon as you exceed your write cache, these things will all write at ~100 MB/s, like a spinning disk. You should keep that in mind when setting your rolling cache. As soon as you set that size and you are generaus, exceeding the fast cache, the whole file not fitting in that cache will be written at 100 MB/s, and suddenly it's gonna take a while. That's the nice thing about large size SSD, double the capacity usually doubles your write buffer. Striping them multiplys it further.

[DD_Arthur]

Grotty weather here this morning so I went for a brief spin around Dunkeswell, our local GA field.  Did it in real time and weather and it's just astonishing.

Dunkeswell was opened in 1943 and USN B24's operated out of here on anti-submarine patrols.  Note the proximity of two other abandoned airfields nearby and apologies for the sound - something buggy going on here.

 

 

 

[scram77]

If you check the content manager there is a 79gb update there waiting to be downloaded - saying that if will download next time the game is launched.  I saw it last night but have since turned on the game and it's still not begun installation yet.

[DD_Arthur]

1 hour ago, 216th_LuseKofte said:

I chose Cessna because average hour price flying it is about 28$ hour in Norway 

an actually reasonable price. 
 

28$ per hour? In Norway? That must make it one of the most inexpensive leisure activities in the whole of Scandanavia!  ‘Fancy a beer?’  ‘No, I can’t afford it today, I’m going to rent a Cessna instead’?

[RedKestrel]

4 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

28$ per hour? In Norway? That must make it one of the most inexpensive leisure activities in the whole of Scandanavia!  ‘Fancy a beer?’  ‘No, I can’t afford it today, I’m going to rent a Cessna instead’?

Yeah that is a really good deal! Maybe you have to bribe the rental place with good beer too?
I have heard that beer in Norway is excellent but expensive, even compared to Canada...

[AndyJWest]

1 hour ago, DD_Arthur said:

Grotty weather here this morning so I went for a brief spin around Dunkeswell, our local GA field...

 

Please stop posting videos like that, Arthur. ? I'm trying to persuade myself that I should be learning to fly a turboprop, so I can actually go somewhere in a reasonable timeframe, and then you go and remind me that there's yet another fun-kite I've not tried yet. Now I'm going to have to try it out in real-time weather too. Doesn't look as bad here as Devon, though it's getting distinctly gloomy. If you hear reports of a Robin colliding with the Shard, that'll be me...

[SAS_Storebror]

2 hours ago, ZachariasX said:

You will not feel a difference. Btw, as soon as you exceed your write cache, these things will all write at ~100 MB/s, like a spinning disk

I'd say it depends.

In "normal" real life usage I agree that the speed difference probably isn't noticeable, however especially when transferring big chunks of data, like in your example, they are quite different.

See e.g. https://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/9203/kingston-a2000-1tb-nvme-pcie-gen3-2-ssd-review/index.html

By the by, in that 100GB transfer shown there (which definitely exceeds the DRAM cache), the transfer rates are 478MB/s for the Kingston and 859MB/s for the ADATA SSD.

 

Mike

[Lusekofte]

1 hour ago, DD_Arthur said:

28$ per hour? In Norway? That must make it one of the most inexpensive leisure activities in the whole of Scandanavia!  ‘Fancy a beer?’  ‘No, I can’t afford it today, I’m going to rent a Cessna instead’?

Not rental. Cost is measured purely from fuel , hangar rent , airport fees and service economy. And is a estimate made from a average planes hours a year. Fly less cost more. On top of that a normal person would have to count financing and equipent and time spent. 
Come to think of it, renting a plane is cheaper, if you only fly your required hours a year. You have to really fly a lot in order to “save” money by owning. 
BUT compared to more fancy or vintage aircraft, choppers asuch it is still cheap

1 hour ago, AndyJWest said:

 

Please stop posting videos like that, Arthur. ? I'm trying to persuade myself that I should be learning to fly a turboprop, so I can actually go somewhere in a reasonable timeframe, and then you go and remind me that there's yet another fun-kite I've not tried yet. Now I'm going to have to try it out in real-time weather too. Doesn't look as bad here as Devon, though it's getting distinctly gloomy. If you hear reports of a Robin colliding with the Shard, that'll be me...

Yeah I tested the two engined diamond. Quite easy to fly and faster. Not too complex besides the G1000 system. 
I fly up to an hour with planes without AP 

Over that I at least take the 172 so I can let go of the controls for a while

[DBFlyguy]

Anyone know if there is an actual patch today or was that youtube video just pure speculation?

Edited August 27, 2020 by DBFlyguy

[SAS_Storebror]

The dev blog entry mentioned "Expect a release date for the patch in our August 27th update."

There's a subtle difference between "expect a release date for the patch" and "expect the patch".

 

Mike

[DBFlyguy]

2 minutes ago, SAS_Storebror said:

The dev blog entry mentioned "Expect a release date for the patch in our August 27th update."

There's a subtle difference between "expect a release date for the patch" and "expect the patch".

 

Mike

 Got it

[AndyJWest]

Tried the Robin Cap 10 out. Very nice. 

 

A bit of a WTF moment in the cockpit though. What the heck is this for?

 

Figured it out. ?

 

I think I'll have to transplant myself to the other side of the Atlantic though, if I'm going to put this thing properly through its aerobatic paces in real-time weather. London is solid overcast, down to about 3000 ft, and chasing what looked like clear skies to the north east resulted in me landing in Norwich. I was getting low on essance, Which even my schoolboy French told me probably wasn't a good thing.

 

 

[ZachariasX]

1 hour ago, SAS_Storebror said:

In "normal" real life usage I agree that the speed difference probably isn't noticeable, however especially when transferring big chunks of data, like in your example, they are quite different.

Yes. That is why I prefer to get large ones and stripe them. You can get incredible transfer rates like that, but ONLY if the NVMe are hooked up directly to the CPU. Else, it will limited to what corresponds to 4 lanes PCIe 3.0, namely ~3.5 GB/s. This means one really fast SSD can choke your entire System bus. I'd never stripe a system SSD, as there is null real world performance benefit, but it matters getting a fast one. From what I see, not in games. Both IL2 and DCS have about identical loading times on my rig, regardless whether I start them form SATA SSD or VROC SSD. That is still feels fast is due to the fact that eve a slow SSD feels fast, as long as you don't fill her >70% or so. Doesn't matter whether one array has 5x the transfer rates.

 

Most NVMe, especially on Intel 1151/1200 boards are hooked up to the chipset, there each SSD competes with the other and your synthetic benchmarks are just that, synthetic. Having a game like FS2020 distributed over different SSD will not make double performance, the SSD will compete for data. But for games, it is enough. But it is a serious limitation on the amount of storage you can place. On Socket 2066, you can put in 8 or more SSD and hook them to the CPU (if it is the right one), you can even make a single bucket of data out of them. recent AMD boards do that even much better, as you can use more RAID modi and chose SSD other than Intel for it. As for productivity, AMD is far, far above anything Intel offers currently.

 

Also, it apears to me that Intel VROC is also not as fast as dedicated controllers...

[DD_Arthur]

After a morning and afternoon of thunder and lightning weather is now fine in south west england?. I note the Cat. 4 storm now lashing the eastern US will mean next weekend will be raining cats and dogs in the Uk! On the other hand, perhaps I’ll try some aerobatics over Davis-Monthan.... it’s now only a couple of mouse clicks away?

 

‘

[Lusekofte]

I have a question of peoples opinion. 
I am a guy liking to fly PO 2 , A 20, IL 2 JU 52 , just fly around , all these and some more give in their own way a great feeling of flight in GB. 
It is still early, and it still pretty overwhelming. But I sure like to fly around in this sim. More than in DCS, X plane, GB and Cod. 
are the dynamics better or is it just the famous “feeling”

 

[AndyJWest]

1 hour ago, DD_Arthur said:

After a morning and afternoon of thunder and lightning weather is now fine in south west england?. I note the Cat. 4 storm now lashing the eastern US will mean next weekend will be raining cats and dogs in the Uk! On the other hand, perhaps I’ll try some aerobatics over Davis-Monthan.... it’s now only a couple of mouse clicks away?

 

‘

 

Yeah, the rain and thunder is here now. Chucking it down. ☔

 

I tried the CAP 10 out again from Cascade, Idaho (U70). A nice spot, but a bit high, at 4,700 ft, to get the best out of it aerobatics-wise, so after a few manoeuvres (including spins, which it seems to do at least plausibly) I decided to head off cross-country instead. I selected  Halley (KSUN) about 90 miles to the southeast as my destination, and almost came a cropper. The ATC told me to do a left-hand circuit, then land on 31. Which would have been sensible enough, if the (a) the airport hadn't been in a narrow valley, (b) I hadn't got rather low, and put full flaps in too early, and (c) either low power at altitude (Halley is at 5,300ft), or possibly a downdraft from the hills on the western side of the valley hadn't left me descending too steep, even at full throttle. I somehow made it onto the runway, but it wasn't elegant. A straight-in approach from the southeast would have been much more sensible, and I doubt people actually fly a normal circuit. MSFS ATC clearly can't be trusted.

[Lusekofte]

1 hour ago, AndyJWest said:

MSFS ATC clearly can't be trusted.

I do not think Their system is complete. It is in many ways simplified in some areas

[Yardstick]

Has anyone got freeware add-ons working? 

 

I bought through Steam and installed it on a dedicated 250gb SSD I had spare.  I have placed the add-ons (a couple of small GA airfields) in the 'communities' folder on this drive but can't get them to show up in game.  I'm not sure whether the add-ons should appear listed in the 'content manager' or whether the 'communities' folder having been created in a non-standard location is causing problems.  From what I have read this folder seems to get installed in all sorts of locations with different pathway / file hierarchies depending on whether you bought direct from MS, through Steam and / or chose a custom location - makes trying to trouble shoot it very difficult. 

 

Update:

Well, that was odd.  I haven't changed anything but when I checked this evening the add-on airfields were now showing up.  However, the liveries I've installed (same location) are not showing.  Go figure!

Edited August 27, 2020 by Yardstick
Update

[Charlo-VRde]

Have I missed anyone posting videos of their flying over any of the Great Battles area maps? It would be neat to see the rivers and lakes we might recognize, though of course the roads, buildings, etc. would be completely different

[Lusekofte]

[AndyJWest]

1 hour ago, Charlo-VR said:

Have I missed anyone posting videos of their flying over any of the Great Battles area maps? It would be neat to see the rivers and lakes we might recognize, though of course the roads, buildings, etc. would be completely different

 

I don't think you'll see anything much you wouldn't from Google/Bing maps, unless you are interested in the shape of the terrain, and want to get close in.

 

Flying over East Anglia earlier, it was easy enough to pick out former airfields. Being East Anglia though, 'terrain' there is essentially two-dimensional anyway.  Must have been easy to get lost and land on the wrong airfield.

[Yardstick]

2 hours ago, Charlo-VR said:

Have I missed anyone posting videos of their flying over any of the Great Battles area maps? It would be neat to see the rivers and lakes we might recognize, though of course the roads, buildings, etc. would be completely different

 

I checked out the Kuban peninsular around Anapa.  Unfortunately it's just as ugly in FS2020 as it is in DSC - brutalist Soviet era concrete everywhere.  GB certainly chose the best period to model it. 

 

I also flew SW down the Meuse valley starting in Liege (one of the more interesting areas on the otherwise bland Rhineland map).  But it is an area that the auto-gen terrain seems to struggle with.  The forests are just flat textures, the GPS height map produces a lot of glitches and the river undulates like a roller coaster.  All issues I hope with time Asobo can improve.  

 

I also visited Portsmouth one of the 2 cities in the UK that have been re-created using photogrammetry data and it looks fantastic with an amazing level of detail.  Flying over terraced house you can even see all the crap people have in their gardens (bikes, kids swings, barbeques etc).  However, where it falls over spectacularly is recreating ships.  HMS Queen Elizabeth looks like a 5 year old has hand drawn it and HMS Victory is almost unrecognisable with trees where its masts should be, same goes for HMS Warrior.

Edited August 28, 2020 by Yardstick

[Feathered_IV]

Curious to see what some of the Pacific atolls and volcanic areas look like.  

[DD_Arthur]

2 hours ago, Yardstick said:

I checked out the Kuban peninsular around Anapa.  Unfortunately it's just as ugly in FS2020 as it is in DSC - brutalist Soviet era concrete everywhere.  GB certainly chose the best period to model it. 

I seem to recall reading somewhere that nearly half the buildings in the United States have been erected since 1980.      I suppose that must give some  indication of how the built environment has grown in the years after WW2.  This is FS2020’s Kuban?

 

Edited August 28, 2020 by DD_Arthur

[DBFlyguy]

Have any of you taken Micrsoft's advice and visited Kitty Hawk yet?  If so, was the actual monument (3d model) there for you? All I've got is a crappy texture drawing which seems really odd since the game recommends it as a spot to visit....

 

 

[Blooddawn1942]

I was looking for the Nazcar lines. I was at the right location but they weren't there. 

[Ribbon]

Croatian coastline (Dugi otok and Kornati archipelago) and Swiss Alps (from Geneva lake going east) so far nicest experience for me!

 

Started around the world trip in Cessna 172, started from Zadar/Croatia>Rome>Milano>Courchevele>Geneve....

Edited August 28, 2020 by =VARP=Ribbon

[FlyingNutcase]

On 8/27/2020 at 1:16 PM, CanadaOne said:

 

A couple of youtube videos. I mean, it was on the Internet so it MUST be true.

 

Or maybe I'm just a bear of very little brain and I'm misreading this.

 

 

 That was more or less proven to be false in one of the comments to that vid. A misunderstanding by the guy that posted the vid.