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AETI
The Jet Age
by Iair Arcavi (23 Feb 1998)
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According to what it says on the box, the requirements are as follows:
Microsoft Flight SImulator 98
Windows 95
8 MB RAM memory
VGA Monitor
Pointing device
CD-ROM drive
They also recommend having a 3D accelerator.
All the requirements are pretty minimal, and almost everyone who has FS98 should have all the rest.
Apart from the CD, there is also a manual in the box.
Unfortunately, it could have been made better. All it has are the installation instructions, a little
historical information on each of the planes and very little operation instructions.
Too bad they didn't include any V speed information on the planes or checklists.
Hope they do so next time.
Installation:
The installation of this addon is very simple. You put in the CD, wait for it to "autorun", select your FS98 directory and click "next" a few times. The installation program does all the rest. Very comfortable.
Specific Contents:What you actually get is this:
707-320B - Air Force One, Braniff, Northwest, Pan Am and Qantas.
727-200 - Air Canada, Braniff, Eastern, Flying Tigers and Northwest.
737-400 - America West, Continental, Delta, Jamaican and Varig.
747-200 - British Airways, Cathay Pacific, JAL, KLM and Qantas.
767-200 - Air Canada, British Airways, Delta, Hawaiian and TWA.
Each type of plane comes with its own panel and sound, which are all installed for you when you run the installation program.
The screen shots scattered around here show the different types of planes and their corresponding panels.
One can note the "evolution" of all of these planes just by looking at the different panels.
An interesting thing they added to these panels was a "check" switch (sorry, I don't know the technical term for it).
What it does is light up the warning lights on the panel when pressed. It doesn't really matter, since
the warning lights never turn on during flight, but it just adds 2 seconds of realism, I guess.
The visual model of the planes is also pretty nice. They look good, but nothing out of the ordinary - no breakthrough.
I did notice something I didn't see in other planes that was pretty nice. The "America West" 737 has different side views.
Instead of looking from the cockpit to the side, you get a passengers view of the wing when you look to one of the sides.
Pretty neat for replaying landings to see how the passengers would of have seen it.
The handling of the planes is also pretty good. They are easy to taxi and to land manually. Takeoffs go smoothly as well.
The sounds are good as well. Both from the inside and from the outside of the planes. This is a feature that FS98 has made pretty popular.
In general, this is a pretty good package. Planes, panels and sounds are all nice, but there isn't anything revolutionary in here.
Whether it is worth buying or not, depends on how big an FS freak you are
or how much you would like to have a very complete Boeing airline
collection all in one package. If you're not one of those who just have to have every single addon
that comes out, but prefer to save money for the really special addons, this wouldn't be worth buying.
For those of you who are lazy like I am, and don't like to look for good free planes and/or panels on the Net and then install them on your computer, this might be a good idea.
This way you get a few good planes and panels and don't have to work for them, just pay.
It still depends on how much you are willing to pay for laziness and/or need for more professional planes than freeware ones.
