Hello everyone.

As the title says I'm trying to improve my FSX experience.

Mesh: I've been reading good things about FSGlobal, but I think that if I download free mesh addons I would have the same result (time lost but money in the pocket :P). What do you think?

Terrain: I've only seen free addons (didn't like the ones I've seen) and FS Scene, are there any other solutions? Is FS Scene a good addon?

Environment: This one is hard, Flight Environment X, X Graphics, or Real environment X? (Can you give me the pros and cons, please)

Best regards, Jorge.

Environment: I have Flight Environment X with X Graphics, but only because I felt FE was such a huge improvement to FS2004. Real Environment is the more recent release, and was in development for several years. If I had to do it all over again, I'd give REX very serious consideration because I've read that it has an improved engine as well as photorealistic cloud textures.

The default real-time weather engine isn't too bad though, and I usually just use it instead because I'm lazy. If you choose to stay with stock weather engine, XGraphics may be worthwhile.


Terrain: Are you asking about photo terrains specifically, or texture upgrade packs and landclass products? Photo terrains will be the most visually accurate but they are usually expensive, take up a lot of harddrive space and are limited in coverage. Landclass products simply change how the ddefault (or upgraded) textures are distributed across your mesh; sometimes they give more authentic results and sometimes they do not. I don't think any landclass product is 100% perfect.

I personally think the Ultimate Terrain products deliver a lot of bang for the buck. They provide some landclas changess but mostly focus on changing coastlines, water bodies, roads and highways, parks, golf courses, railways, etc. If you are trying to navigate by landmarks, these improvements are invaluable. UTX is a fair competitor to photo scenery, and covers entire continents instead of just one major urban area.

Thanks for the quick reply Skycat.

I've been reading some good things about REX and I think I'll give it a shot.

Regarding the terrain options, can you explain me the difference between, photo terrains, texture upgrade packs and landclass products? (Does landclass means the same that terrain mesh?)

What I'm looking is to get a real feeling of terrain for VFR flights, being that roads, rails, cities, mountains, etc, and especially terrain, since most of Europe looks like a big desert (almost no vegetation) in FSX

Sorry for the quantity of questions...

Best regards, Jorge.

Basically, the mesh is responsible for the 3D shape of the terrain. Think of it as the wireframe model of the earth. You can buy or download meshes that attempt to render portions of the earth with increased accuracy based on different source data or at a higher resolution than default. Resolution is based on how many known elevation points are used within a given area; a higher resolution might make for a smoother transitions between peaks and valleys on rugged terrain.

Some default regions of FSX are already very well represented while others can obviously be improved. In previous versions of FS the mountains of the U.S. were rendered in high resolution but other mountainous regions of the world (for example, the Swiss Alps in FS2004) were underwhelming. I believe the mesh quality of FSX is superior to previous versions but it still generalizes large portions of the total world's coverage. I think that in the end you have to decide if the areas where you do most of your flying are adequately rendered; if you don't plan to heavily explore Africa or Alaska, for example, you probably don't need to have every hill and valley of the planet presented in high detail.

This review of a mesh product will help explain what I mean.

Replacement textures are customized variations on the default samples that FSX uses to decorate the mesh. Replacement sets like Ground Environment X simply try to increase the resolution of ground textures, or make forests look more realistic, change river colors, make farm fields look more appropriate for a particular region, etc. What is important to note is that you are simply making an area that FSX has already designated as an urban area or a crop field or an arid desert look different; it does not make new towns or move rivers or change coastlines.

Landclass is the data that tells FSX how to distribute the textures on the mesh. It also can control distribution of autogen buildings and trees; where the roads and railroads are placed; and the shape of rivers, lakes and coastlines. Landclass design is part art and part science; it is usually created by interpreting satellite imagery into data that FSX can use to assign its library of ground textures to the mesh. FSGenesis National Landclass Project is an example of a landclass that has been in development for years; I like the changes it makes for the U.S. urban areas but I believe it chooses the wrong textures for where I live. SceneryTech's rendition of the U.S. is more accurate for where I live but it makes some urban areas too small and sparse looking.

As I said before, the Ultimate Terrain X series provides a lot of enhancement for what it costs. It is mostly a landclass product but it does add a few new textures plus night lighting effects. Unfortunately the series only covers USA, Canada and Europe right now. You can use UTX with a mesh product, replacement textures and usually with another landclass product.

Photorealistic textures are a different approach to 'painting' the mesh. These are basically overlays of actual aerial or satellite imagery instead of generic textures. MegaScenery is an example of addon products for U.S. locations. VFR Real Scenery is a similar product line that covers all of England.

Earlier I said I have Flight Environment w/ X Graphics. I meant Active Sky X with X Graphics. I have used Flight Environment in FS2004 but never in FSX.

Thank you very much for your explanation. I'll now look for the best solution for my taste and for a good FPS vs Looks point of view, it seems that there are more options then what I was expecting...

Thanks again Sycat, you are the best.

Best regards,

Jorge.

Orbx FTX is all you need. No need to worry about landclass, textures and mesh. Its all there. IT only covers Australia though, but USA is soon to be released.

I have both Flight Environment X and Real Environment Xtreme. They're both good products and noticably improve the look of the sim but I prefer the clouds, skies and water in FEX to REX.

I've been reading in the REX forums and it seems it isn't working at 100%, there are some problems with the weather engine.

@Zorg12: That package really looks great, but I was looking to improve Europe first...

I have had the FSgenesis bundle for a year and had it installed on my older XP computer. Today I installed FSX on my new Vista computer and also the Genesis bundle of East, plains, rockies, west, Alaska/Hawaii, and World. My local airport seems to be on a huge plateau and the area does not look as good as I remember it looking on the older set up. Does the Genesis install put the scenery in the right place, or do I need to find it and move it manually. When I opened the addon scenery in the sim there was nothing there. I am also trying to get the Active Sky bundle to download again from HiFi Software, but they no longer recognized my log on info, so I set up another account. I sent them an email with all the product license info, and am waiting on their reply. I hope I don't have to spend another $69.99.