loki

Network issues can be hard to diagnose as there are a number of possible issues. What anti-virus and/firewall are you running? Some of these can interfere with internet traffic. What router are you using? Have you had trouble streaming from other services, such as Netflix? Are there other devices on the network pulling significant amounts of data at the same time? Some routers, especially the ones ISPs often provide, can't handle much of a load. They may be fine running an internet speed test, but not a continuous load from a streaming service, for example. Does it happen any time of the day, or only certain times, such as the evening? Cable internet networks are usually shared amongst all subscribers in the area, and if everyone is online at once (before and after work), speeds for everyone can suffer if the ISP hasn't properly provisioned the network. There could also be issues along the line between your house and the ISP. For example, my parents had intermittent connection problems that took a few months to sort out a few years ago. Turned out to be a loose connection in the phone line between their place the telephone exchange that was occasionally being knocked out by the wind.

Yep, pretty much. Updates cascade through the DNS servers, and some can take a while to get them.

Like he said, it was a DNS issue. The DNS server he using, probably from his ISP, likely didn't have the proper addresses for the MSFS servers, and thus couldn't direct the requests properly.

As of 2018 the store is very much under direct control of Flightsim.com. https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/content.php?18770-Announcing-Store-FlightSim-Com Still don't see why some people are so worked up about this price. Nothing was being hidden.

After the game is installed, Steam is only used to verify your licence to run the sim, so I don't think it has anything to do with your problems.

Glad to hear it's working, and thanks for sharing the fix.

Cloudflare has a free alternative DNS service to using your ISP, with a good description about what it does. https://1.1.1.1/dns/ They also have instructions on how to use it, linked below. You can change the settings for one specific computer, or change it on your router so all computers, smartphones and other devices on your network can use it. https://developers.cloudflare.com/1.1.1.1/setup-1.1.1.1

Do you have a family member or friend nearby that uses a different ISP than you? I've run into issues over the years where something between the ISP and a company's servers (Apple's App Store in one case) broke. Until the ISP and company sorted it out a VPN sometimes helped. If there is someone using a different ISP nearby, it might be worth dragging your computer over to try a quick flight to see if that fixes it. Otherwise, if a VPN is your only way, look for one with a deal on as you shouldn't need to pay full price. Most of the bigger names have specials going on pretty constantly. I've been using Surfshark lately, which works well for my use. Pay attention to what's included in the service, though, as some have bandwidth limits which would be and issue with photogrammetry. Here's one list of VPN deals. https://www.tomsguide.com/news/best-vpn-deals

There are certainly issues with scenery in different parts of the world that Asobo and Microsoft are slowly fixing, including the issue with bridges. In the mean time you can keep an eye on the file library here and over at Flightsim.to as there are many, many add-ons already available, with more being created all the time. Here's a couple for Hobart, for example. https://flightsim.to/discover/hobart

It will depend on what matters most, and possibly your budget. An Xbox is cheaper than a mid to high end PC and would be less of a hassle to get up and running. There are also joysticks, throttles and other peripherals available for them, with more coming out in the future. On the other hand, they are still more limited when it comes to peripherals in general, so you won't be building a full blown home cockpit as is possible with a PC, for example. Add-ons in the sim on the console are limited to what's available through the built-in Marketplace, so you can't download them from places like here or other add-on websites. A PC is more flexible when it comes to hardware, peripherals and add-ons, but can take more time configuring, updating and maintaining it all in general. There are some features coming to the sim, such as proper multi-monitor support, that the Xbox won't be getting. PCs will also continue to evolve and increase in processing power beyond what the Xbox is capable of, though it remains to be seen how the sim makes use of this. And of course, right now there are the ongoing supply issues if you want to build your own PC.

Have you tried going to the Toshiba and Samsung sites to see if they have the wifi drivers available for those specific netbooks? Will need to download on another machine and copy over.

The older USB 2 ports were a bottleneck when trying to run games or applications off the drives. USB 3 isn't nearly as much of a bottleneck, though still slower than an internal NVMe drive. Using expansions works just fine and is fully supported on Xbox consoles, and has been for many years. With the new Xbox Series X/S consoles, there is a custom port specifically for SSD expansion that gives the same performance as the internal storage. Once the expansion drive is installed, games can be moved between the internal and expansion drives. https://support.xbox.com/en-CA/help/hardware-network/storage/manage-storage

Photoreal scenery and other add-ons can significantly increase the risk of OOMs. PMDG has a good guide to follow. https://support.precisionmanuals.com/kb/a108/vas-management-stopping-out-of-memory-oom-errors.aspx

I think you missed my point. I was responding to your claim that upgrading from multiple versions would cause chaos, which is demonstrably false. Being under continuous development doesn't require mandatory updates either. The main reason for required updates has far more to do with keeping client applications in sync with their servers for pulling down streamed data, connecting with other clients for multiplayer networking, as well as anti-cheat/hacking updates. While it is new to the flight sim community, anyone who has been playing other games for the past decade or two is likely very familiar with the need for forced updates, especially when playing on consoles. It can be frustrating and is a big drawback of the modern gaming world. There are memes going back years about people wanting to get a quick round in of their favourite game, only to be sidetracked by a required update.

That's not a very convincing reason as there have been many applications and operating systems that support updating from multiple prior versions without any sort of chaos. It is a very well understood process in the developer world at this point. A far more likely reason would have to do with keeping the networking code in sync between each user and the servers as differences in this area would get far more complex with multiple versions. There could also be changes to the photogrammetry data on the server side that require an update to the client that would break previous versions.

Those with AMD Ryzen CPUs should get the latest updates from both AMD and Microsoft to fix performance issues with those CPUs. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/10/amd-and-microsoft-release-fixes-for-ryzen-slowdowns-in-windows-11/

Microsoft did restrict it to the last couple generations of CPUs, but people have got it installed on older, unsupported, models. However, Microsoft has said they could restrict future security and systems updates to systems with the officially supported CPUs.

Both Cloning and Imaging can help protect against disk failure. Cloning is also useful when changing a drive, say from a smaller to larger model (I did this recently with an NVMe SSD), by copying the old directly to the new. Imaging can do the same thing, but you would have to create the image file first on a third drive, then restore the image file to the new drive. For just backing up, imaging is probably the better option. Most imaging programs also allow you to create versions or snapshots that can also let you restore to a point in time as well, depending on how much space there is on the backup drive. They also often allow you to compress the image files to save space. With cloning, you can't use the backup drive for anything else, otherwise it is no longer a clone of the source drive. Imaging creates image files that you can store on a separate drive alongside other files and data. The main limitation with imaging is space on the backup drive. There are plenty of options out there for cloning and imaging (many support both options). Macrium Reflect is a popular one due to the free option. Acronis TrueImage is another common one (Seagate and Western Digital sometimes bundle it, or offer a free download, with their drives). I've been using O&O Software DiskImage lately. Windows actually includes a tool to create images as well, though it is buried and doesn't offer as many options. https://www.windowscentral.com/how-make-full-backup-windows-10

There's always an exception. :pilot: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/41823/watch-this-c-17-engage-its-thrust-reverses-in-mid-air-to-make-an-extremely-rapid-descent

Yep, there are options that use standard parts unlike the big names such as Dell, and right now are often cheaper than going your own way. Some also have experience working with flight sims as well.

That is an option, but the worldwide supply issues right now mean it isn't cheap, if you can even get the parts you want.

Make sure whatever PSU you use is a good model. There have been issues with Gigabyte PSUs catching fire that were essentially being dumped in hardware bundles, for example. And regarding Alienware, make sure to do some research on reliable PCs too. There are better options out there, including local shops or companies like Jetline Systems that specialize in flight sim PCs.

While one of the main differences between PCIe generations is about how much bandwidth each one has, it doesn't necessarily mean performance is going to take a big hit, if it takes a hit at all. Games often don't push GPU bandwidth as much as one might think. On the other hand, a PCIe gen 4 SSD would probably benefit more. Edited to add one example of the performance differences between PCIe generations. https://www.digitalcitizen.life/pcie-4-vs-pcie-3/

Good to hear it's worked out.

Which sim are you using and where did you buy the planes from?