"Ice" puts forth some valid concerns. I installed FSX (not Steam) and compared to DCS World, the "out of the box" DCS has FSX beat hands down IMHO. Especially for the price. Even after installing ORBX Global (not cheap) the graphics, both scenery and aircraft, in DCS are far better.
I wanted to compare A2A's P-51 to the DCS P-51 but how frustrating and expensive is this going to get to have an experience within FSX to look as good as DCS?
Very frustrated with all of the hassle and expense of downloading ORBX products.
After all, this is only a part-time hobby.
Maybe P3D would be a better way to go?
Any thought would be appreciated.
Thanks!

Not really fair comparing FSX to DCS. After all, DCS only renders the Georgia area and I'm not even sure the towns are accurate (never checked). In FSX, you can go anywhere in the world. DCS has been working on Nevada for.... about 5 years now.

Thanks Ice. I am meerly speaking of the graphic quality for the cost of DCS v FSX.

Again, not fair to compare. DCS is quite new whereas obviously FSX is old... very old. To get DCS-level of detail, you need a lot of mods for FSX. From what I learned, P3D is slightly better but I'm leaning more towards XP10.... but again, both sims would need a lot of mods before they can even hope to be compared to DCS.

I know most SimHQ'ers have already made up their minds. But for those who find themselves here through search, "there is another". X-Plane is beautiful to look at and is still enthusiastically supported both by the developer and a very active community.

Thanks Ice. No since beating a dead Horse any longer. I was only trying to add some support for your questions.

I think what it was is that you were trying to compare a flight sim that tries to render the whole world vs. a combat sim that only really renders one area. They had a lot of time to work on that map (DCS) whereas FSX/P3D/XP10 have to derive their data from other sources or auto-gen the location.

If you were to compare FSX vs. P3D vs. XP10, then it would be a better starting point to compare.

Let's just say that we've been waiting almost 5 years for Nevada for DCS. If they had to do the entire world, they'd never release a product at all!

Most flight sims that are "global" are not really round... more like a squashed cylinder. As I understand it, FSX renders the entire world as a round ball. I believe FS2004 actually sort of "fakes" the north and south poles.

By contrast, combat sims usually render an area so tiny as to be a postage stamp by comparison, mainly because operational distances are way way shorter for sorties (usually), and terrain takes computing power to handle.

FS2004 and FSX render the stars in the sky as they really behave in real life, so that navigation by sextant is possible. Even today the USAF uses sextants as backup navigation for their LC-130 Ski Birds, the C-130's used to send scientists to Antarctica and the Arctic circle. Seems they use it as backup to GPS, as VOR's are not in those regions, and they are a long way from home.

Creating an area 1000x1000 miles is dead easy compared to rendering the surface area of Earth. Kudos to any team attempting that.

Don't agree. I use P3D, but even compared to FSX I don't think DCS is a really good looking sim when it comes to the world around you. The cockpits and planes are great but FSX/P3D with Orbx stuff is much better then the ground textures and scenery in DCS.

Of course, that'll change with EDGE's release.

There's no doubt, DCS wipes the floor with the civilian sims...

...as long as you stay in the black sea region

Yes, building out FSX, P3D, or XPX to as close to DCS spec as possible is going to be very expensive, but you're arguably getting more out of it (the combat portion of DCS not-withstanding)

-Each add-on (plane, scenery, utility) you buy compounds the others. For example, if I buy a new aircraft, I can use that to go explore my existing scenery library. I can fly any plane in my catalog to a new airport. A new weather app can be used anywhere in the world to produce a unique challenge.

-You have a much, much larger catalog of aircraft to fly in any of the major global civilian sims, something to suite any unique taste. Maybe you prefer low level VFR flying in GA prop planes, maybe you want to tackle the challenge of trans-continental airline travel, or maybe you want to know what it's like to manage and maintain a vintage WWII warbird.

-There is a deep bench of FREE content for all the aforementioned platforms, so you don't need to dump a ton of cash to have an enjoyable, but wide reaching experience.

Only DCS has a valid combat option.

I've been a long time happy FSX user, thanks to DX10 tweak and lots of quality payware (ORBX, REX, ASX, A2A, RealAir) it's been my sim of choice.

I also own X-Plane which is good, but just requires too much manual work to get quality freeware scenery installed which I don't have time for.

I also own DCS but I don't really consider it in the same category due to the lack of quality scenery options for it...

Finally tried Prepar3D this week (v3.1), and I'm really impressed with it, much better smooth framerates and easy handling of windowed and multiple monitors, it's been really great to use. The only downside is that some of my FSX payware for it requires separate purchase for P3D.

P3D will be my sim of choice at this point, with FSX Steam Edition as a backup for certain payware, and DCS for milsim combat flying.

Depends on your definition of "valid combat". With the release of VRS Tac Pack and FSX@War that gives FSX user's a more worldly option of waging conflicts, whereas dedicated combat sims only provide a smaller space to fight in. Not to mention the overwhelming amount of developers that are now designing or adding Tac Pack comparability to their new and former FSX combat aircraft releases.

With regards to overall immersion, detail and quality of FSX, straight out of the box, very generic in nature but as someone that's invested over the last 7-8 years in add-ons such as REX, Orbx and other scenery's, I think it looks fantastically realistic...but at a far greater price of the add-ons. I agree that it's very unfair to compare FSX to DCS, though I also own DCS and it is indeed grand, but small in scale. What I like about the Tac Pack concept and it's evolving combat regime, is I can now simulate longer, realistic flights from staging bases not inside the theater of operations, with re-fueling and such. Granted, FSX@War is very much in it's infancy, but I see it maturing much faster than DCS is releasing their updated terrains and such. Hopefully, with the release of DCS 2.0 and additional campaign/maps such as Hormuz, Caucus and Normandy (WWII), that terrain palette will expand dramatically but still not on a global scale such as the potential that FSX has. I also look forward to what may come forth with Prepar3d v3 and beyond. Lockheed Martin seems to be investing much in this and developers seem keen to continue adapting their releases for not only FSX, but Prepar3d v1,2 and 3, as well as Tac Pack.

What about the Strike Fighter series from Third Wire? You can't ask for more combat. I have both DCS and the Strike Fighter series. When I'm itching for combat, I play the Strike Fighter series much more often than DCS. For non-combat, it's now P3D v2 all the way. I've basically quit FSX. P3D is FSX enhanced. There is no point to having both.