CRJ_simpilot

Boat traffic doesn't exist in FS9 per say, but some add-ons do incorporate it. I had an add-on for Saint Martin that included sail boats and what not back in FS9.

Your first mistake may have been using DX10 Preview. Don't use that and see if that helps. Also, a laptop is not a good computer for simming. Why people chose to use a laptop for FS I'll never know. It can work, but nothing like a dedicated gaming desktop.

I'd say the main add-on would have to be a decent weather engine. You mention Rex so that'll cover that, but you also mention clouds. Well, I use Active Sky 2016 with the companion product Active Sky Cloud Art. What happens is that AS16 will work with AS16 Cloud Art to create some great cloud visuals as you fly. I never saw a thick overcast cloud layer before while I flew over it until I started using AS16 and Cloud Art. Plus it renders some nice fog and what have you. I've never tried Rex, so that too may be a great weather engine and perhaps between the two there are pros and cons. What I can tell you though is that if you plan on going full blown realism with a PMDG 737 or some other PMDG plane, the weather radar works with AS16 for accurate cloud/storm prediction in the Sim. I don't think it will work right with Rex. Something else you might want, though not everyone may not, is Helitraffic 2009. By default, FSX does not have AI flying helicopters around you. With this add-on you will have that providing the airport you're flying to or other airports near you have helipads. It's a really nice add-on and quite simple in how it works. Since you're new to FSX, I have to ask you. You didn't make the mistake of installing FSX to the programs folder, did you? If so, you really need to have the following path: C:\steam\FSX. Reason being is because in Vista and above to Win 10 the programs folder is emulated and protected so it will play hell with add-ons and everything else. Outside of that you may want to go to World of AI and MAIW to add AI planes to your Sim so that you're not alone up there. But a lot of the flight plans are only made for FS2004 so you have to convert them to FSX format using AIFP which can be downloaded here in the library. The FS2004 flight plans will work in FSX, but if you mix FSX and FS2004 flight plans, only FS2004 flight plans will work. If you start adding realistic airlines and what have you, I would rename the default AI flight plans file so you're not see fake made up airlines occupy the skies and airports. I have to look on my desktop at what that file name is now. If you start adding AI, you should get in the habit of updating the airports from here in the library you fly from and to so that you have adequate parking spaces for all of the AI. There are many, many other things you should know about, but I'll leave that to others. Check the sticky here in this subforum on improving your FSX.cfg file. And I really wouldn't mess with DX10 even though you can use that add-on to make things work. Through my reading it's been a source of issues and I just keep DX10 disabled and not mess with it at all. Speaking of books, check out this website full of free Sim books. https://www.flightsimbooks.com/ Good luck, have fun and learn away. You're about to embark on a hobby that may keep you wanting to fly for at least an hour everyday. Side affects may include a nagging wife/girl friend. LOL :pilot:

I'm wondering if it's a good idea having the sun beam in on the back of your monitor like that. Although, I do see a drape, but the heat might be a concern.

Outside of a decent payware add-on, try this. https://www.fsrealwx.net/index.php

I would try to run the installer as Admin. And once again, don't install to the programs folder.

Are you getting a specific error? And if so what does it say? I can't read what it says in that picture. Are you installing to the programs folder? If so, don't.

I'm trying to understand what you are saying. Are you saying that if you extract the second zip withen the WOAI zip, the World Of AI installer works? Did you set the installation path to a folder on the desktop like I pointed out and have you tried running the WOAI installer in Admin mode? I really don't know what is going on here. You said you cleaned your HDD? Describe that. In what way did you in fact clean your HDD. Was it a format and an OS reinstallation? Or did you just go in and clean out a bunch of files. If that's the case, perhaps there's some file or even, and I doubt this, some registry work at play here. I'd have to run my program that monitors the registry to see if WOAI does use the registry. I wouldn't think so. I know it looks at your registry to figure out where your Sim is though. Here's an experiment. Download Everything.exe and look for the file WOAI.cfg. Do you see multiple instances of that file anywhere on your Comp? https://www.voidtools.com/downloads/

I actually never had to extract the woa_airiceland_v1.zip at all. I left it in place and let the World Of AI installer extract it on its own.

Okay, I just tried this on my laptop without any Sim installed once so ever and it successfully extracted in a folder I specified on my desktop. I'll run this on my gaming computer next just to be proof positive, but I'm sure the files work as expected. Try this once. In the World Of AI installer select the path for extracting to the desktop. No where else. So your path might be something like C:\Users\[your_user_name]\Desktop\New folder In the New Folder, folder that was created on your desktop should be all of the files. From there just manually copy/paste them to their respective sections in your FSX directory. But! Be sure you convert the flight plan BGL file to FSX format first with AIFP. If you don't, only FS2004 formatted flight plans will show up in FSX. If you need help on knowing where to place the files just ask. BTW- I never even had to run the installer as Admin, but in your case you might have to.

When I use their overzealous and stupid World Of Ai installer, I just install to a folder on my desktop and manually place the files where they should be. I never hardly EVER allow installers to put things in my FSX directory unless A) I Know what it is, and B) I know where it's going. That way I can build a better picture of the internals and if something breaks I can fix it. Plus I'm very familiar with installing add-ons, planes, and AI flight plans, etc. So with that try installing the package to a folder on your desktop and perhaps the problem won't be there. I can't see your FSX path, but if it's the programs folder there in lies your possible issue. Can you provide a link to this package so that I can check it out?

Well, I'm what you call a perfectionist. And that can and will be my own greatest enemy. When I took up welding I laid those beads down with a stick welder so great that you'd swear it was in fact a MIG weld. That's how precise I did things. And cutting metal? Forgetaboutit. My dexterity was absolute surgical with the metal cuts which was my favorite thing to do. After I cut other students' metal they didn't have to grind it that much at all. Not even the welding instructors were able to cut metal that damn good. The whole reason as to why your hands pivot left and right, etc is that your brain is constantly making corrections. Well with me I place myself in like a meditative state or something and there's very little corrections I need to make. I guess it's analogous to that of a sniper with his rifle. When I'm in the Sim I try to do things in a perfect fashion as well otherwise I consider the whole flight a failure. Unless of course I'm monkeying around. I don't even use a checklist like you really should. I commit my steps to memory, but there's been times I have forgotten certain things and when I do that I consider the whole damn flight a flop. Especially if I land off center line. I run LittleNavMap on the second screen and as your aircraft moves it creates a line behind your plane. Well, after my landing I look at that line on down the localizer and check to see If I made any deviations from center line. Doesn't matter if it's an IMC landing or if I crab the beast. Anyway, I've been flying the F-22 most of the time and back in FS2004 I had the great, great PMDG 737 which I absolutely loved. I took that plane all the way to Hawaii, Christmas Island, Samoa, Fiji and Auckland, New Zealand. I wanted to hit the land down under but I lost interest in completing my journey. Now I have taken the Lear 45 around the world once and the F-22 around the world four times, and to many, many other places. Including an Arctic island (who's name escapes me) that's above Norway that actually has a NSA listening post and a bunker that stores every plant seed on earth in case some crazy thing were to happen. I often read about the places I travel to in the Sim and sometimes I'll check those places out in Google Street View. I was amazed that Google actually had footage of remote areas of Mongolia. And looking at North Korea it's pretty nice there and to my amazement I saw a lot of Westerners in the imagery. Though in North Korea and some other places they don't have the Street View capability, but a bunch of blue dots all over you click that show panoramic pictures you can view of that area. To keep FSX interesting I plan on purchasing the PMDG 737NGX and try to abide by real life procedures. There's a real world 737 pilot on YouTube that goes over such procedures. I think the channel is called FlightDeck2Sim. I followed him on Facebook, but I have since gotten rid of that asinine platform. LOL Mostly use Twitter now a days. I also have a specifically made PMDG 737 check list App on my phone called PmdgSim. I installed the thing a long time ago and studied the checklists in preparation for buying the PMDG 737NGX, but I've always put it on the back burner, and I'm having too much fun flying around in the F-22 at an unrealistic cruise of mach 2.35 at FL500. Plane is nice to practically fly in and out of everywhere. Can't really do that in a 737. I've gotten all of my current rewards with my F-22. Highest elevation airport, top five highest elevation airports, lowest airport, most remote, etc, etc. Anyway... there really is a lot to do with a simulator. You can even practice failures. Or practice a failure in IMC conditions with the 737NGX. HAHAHA You'd really have to know what you are doing. I want to practice a complete FMC failure. I have yet to know how to time and Nav my way across an aeronautical chart using the plane's timer. Something I've been meaning to do. I have navigated a couple of times from Denver to Vegas with only VORs in the Lear 45 and the F-22. Looks like I wrote a column for the Sunday paper. I shall shut up now. BTW- Did you hear what I named tower at Area-51? If you listen carefully they say Kelly Johnson tower. I thought that was a nice touch. I wonder what it's called in real life? Probably something like tower 2 or some other mundane thing. I bet I could find the answer on the Internet since tower to plane coms are not encrypted or anything and there are active thrill seeks around there all the time listening on their scanner.

I loved Instant Scenery back when I ran FS2004. I used it to make Area-51. I made it so real I felt like I was really flying into there. Well, at least to me it did. Then I learned about bgls and effect files. So I added shooting stars over Area-51 and as you came in for a landing you saw several shooting stars and it was like you really were landing into Dreamland. I have sense removed them though since I thought it took away from the realism. I even experimented with auroras. I still have my FS2004 install backed up to a couple of HDDs. One day I may reinstall it. Here's a video of Area-51 in FS2004. I used FRAPS back then and the video quality is crappy. Plus, I made this video coming from a several month long hiatus of not flying. You'll see that my lack of skill was rusty on the turn off to the taxiway. You'll also notice I don't land on the end of that loooong runway. I have the ILS configured from the mid part of it.

I've always used Kiwi for the shoes and Brasso for the metal. :D No, never served, but was in JROTC and a firefighter explorer.

Some awesome sauce to add to your wonderful Windows 10 experience that may be relevant. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/10/microsoft-suspends-distribution-of-latest-windows-10-update-over-data-loss-bug/ Got to love that wonderful QC. At the top of the website it says: "Upside: more free disk space — ." But in reality, and since 98% of all updates are NOT needed, your HDD is filling up with useless junk. I read on one computer forum that someone stated there was somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 GB of update crap on their machine!

If you allow asinine Windows to update your drivers, DON'T! I can't stress that enough. Read this: https://www.laptopmag.com/articles/disable-automatic-driver-downloads-on-windows-10 I would only download your drivers from the manufacture's website. The only thing I can tell you now is try a system restore, or uninstall your GPU driver with Revouninstaller in Safe Mode and install the driver that worked or the latest driver from Nvidia's website. Or you could wait, and wait and wait some more which is BS!.

LOL Go ahead and look at the SIm videos subforum where I posted a video flying into Myrtle Beach during hurricane Florence. I done gone skipped off the Atlantic with that one.

I used to use 2D all the time, but I couldn't pan left and right to see out the windows right away for traffic while taxing or flying. And it reduced realism. So now I fly VC all the time. If you have blurry textures, then that's a resolution issue or some other setting in your Sim. The comments before this one should help you out. I should add though that I have used aircraft that by default had poor resolution gauges in the VC. About the Lear 45. Check out the following files. You might be pleasantly surprised with the upgrade. I use it myself. fsx_lear45_upgraded.zip forgotten_gauges.zip

And I just read in the FS Commander PDF that you should install the Sim for all users. I don't remember if I did that for FSX or not. I sure hope I did. I usually do when I install things though.

And don't install the Sim into the programs folder. Only in the root of C drive or another attached drive.. well, preferably attached to the SATA port, not USB. The reason why you want the SIm in the root of C drive is that the programs folder is write protected and all this rot and as such it may be a bugger for add-ons to work correctly. With XP you don't have to worry about that. With Vista on up you do. Just direct the FS2004 or FSX installer to C:\\FSX. That's it.

Do you need a parts list for a new computer build? Can you build it? If not, a PC store can. What's your budget? FS2004 is more than capable. But you might want to jump on ahead to FSX. There's also Prepar3d, but it's in large part only for educational use according to their EULA. But many don't care and buy (or steal) it anyway. Also note, a lot of add-on creators are moving to Prepar3d for asinine reasons if you ask me. The Sim is largely CPU orientated. To make matters worse it's only single thread capable as well. It won't take advantage of multiple cores, so buying some unreal 16 core or what ever CPU isn't going to help you. If you Google "Passmark single core" You'll get a list of CPUs with the highest to lowest single thread capable performing CPUs according to their benchmarks. Not sure how accurate it is, but I'm pretty sure it's in the ball park. I'd stay away from Steam. But that's just my opinion. You can buy FSX on eBay. That's where I got mine. Just make sure the product key is valid. You may want to ask the seller. But if you chose to stick with FS2004, obsessively you don't need steam. I'd also get windows 7. Windows 10 IMO is crap with the forced updates and it can and WILL give you headaches. I'm a member of several computer forums and have my own, am subscribed to several Facebook pages on PCs and can't tell you how many times I've read that updates have hosed over one's machine in one facet or another. I'm not saying don't use 10, but if you want stability I wouldn't use it and risk the potential frustration. That's all on you. Win 7 can be bought on eBay but you have to be absolute certain you get a valid key. Look at the seller's feedback score. And eBay always has you covered. In fact, they protect the buyer more than the seller. And PayPal also has you covered. As to XP. It's still fine to use despite the asinine crap of no updates and it's "hacker" prone and will somehow get "malware." I think that's just something tossed out there to the masses to get you to use M$'s latest and in their eyes, greatest OS. I currently run XP in a netbook that runs 24/7 in the kitchen that's connected to the Internet. Its use is for PhoneTray, a TeamSpeak server and a FTP server who's storage is on a SD card. I've upgraded it to 2GB of RAM and disabled the page file to save on wear and tear of the fragile flash hard drive that can only take so may writes before failure. I call it the Kitchen Kiosk, and it's also used for quick Internet searching and recipe look ups. So in a nutshell, while XP is severally outdated, it's not an incapable OS to use for FS2004, and FS2004 would probably run better in XP anyway. But! With new computer hardware means you more than likely won't be able to use XP since the motherboard drivers are not coded for XP. With XP you can always use a Deep Freeze program to isolate the entire OS so that absolutely NOTHING gets placed on the computer. I use Fortres Security Clean Slate myself. Not even polymorphic malware can take me down. A quick reboot and all is back to normal. Waaay better then any signature-based anti-virus, that I can tell you. I have over 500 MB of malware that I use for testing and nothing got passed the reboot. Anyway... Answer the first three questions if you could. Wiin 10 fan boys commence the flaming. HAHAHA!