Ok. So I'm horribly late to the show, but what a show it is. I've flown a good deal of helo sims back in the day, but it's been a while since I've fired one up. This, hands down, is miles above them all. Bravo to Eagle Dynamics on this one. If this is any indication how this series treats it's 'study' sims, I will be buying A-10 hopefully by Christmas then. I only hold off in that I know I'll be spending the next few months getting used to starting this bad boy up from a cold start. Hell, I love just flying the damn thing, let alone opening up with it. Anyhow, preaching to the pulpit here, but this kicks mighty arse.
-Murdock

Welcome aboard, Murdock!

Yes, its a blast!

And a definite challenge at times.

And let me follow my post up with GOD BLESS - "Left Windows Button + HOME" LOL. Owners will know what I'm referring to. Anyhow, the only thing I'm finding difficult is "finding" the panels referred to. Yes, I need to re-watch the tutorial vids a few 10 times over to get it to sink in. Oddly, I find it actually interesting to play this sim in windowed mode. At least during this learning process. I'm able to keep the pilots manual and key reference pdf open and easy to get to, whilst in the middle 3/4 of screen I'm training on the helo.

Loving it thus far. My first landing attempt, not going home from that one. A letter will be sent to my babushka. -

And now I've subsequently setup a laptop next to my desktop's monitor. I transfered the pilot manual and key guide pdfs to the laptop, so I can keep them up whilst learning. Now I'll switch to full screen mode in the sim, as otherwise, I was having some difficulty reading the panel writing in the cockpit to ATTEMPT (key word!) the cold start. I got pretty far in it even in that windowed mode, but there was a point where I just could not find one of the switches they mentioned in the pilots manual section 5-7. Anyhow... I'm sure I may have a particular question or two down the road. I'll try to keep them as specific as possible. - Murdock

For the cold start, there are several printable checklists on the eagle forums that you might find easier to follow. Sometimes you're better off with the keystrokes.

Cold starts, just like a number of "maneuvers", take some prep and practice. You'll get the hang of it, I'm sure!

Welcome to Black Shark. Of all the things to call it, I want to add "blessing." Even though the patches fixed some things, the sim when first released was so stable as to defy simming reality.

But unfortuntely the last patch broke DCS:BS for many still on 32-bit OS and ED seems to bet everything on 64-bit and have not fixed it so far (applies to DCS:FC as well).

/KC

... what? The last patch had DCS:BS running just fine on XP32. You're probably talking about A-10C.

There's really no way to stay with 32-bit. If you don't want to upgrade to a 64-bit OS, you quite simply have to suffer the consequences of this: Reduced details and other things.

Using a 32-bit OS these days is living in the past. Yes, it'll do fine for your browsing, your email, a bunch of games still, but for things which require a large memory space - like DCS - it's time to leave 32-bit in the past. You're not running some netbook with 1-2GB of RAM to play the game any more.

And what's DCS:FC?

No I'm talking about DCS:BS and no it's not running fine on XP32! Since it does not seem to have any garbage collection routines the RAM fills up and a CTD is inevitable when RAM usage of simulator.exe reaches ~1.34 GB on my PC. This equals to about ~30-40 minutes flight on a MP server with 15+ players then I'm greeted with the CTD, not fun when you spent that 30 minutes to sneak into a good position with the Shark.

It can be reproduced 100% of the times and information on how have been sent to ED back in summer 2010 and they confirmed that there is an issue. You can read all about my (and others) CTD problem here:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=54162

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=53874



I agree that 64-bit is the future but for me (and I'm sure I'm not all alone) thats not an option for my gaming rig since I would loose my HOTAS by installing Win 7 64-bit. As you probably understand, flying without HOTAS is a no go!

If ED sells me a sim as 32-bit and it works on my PC before a patch but breaks after installing the new patch they sure gonna hear about it and IMO provide a fix. Do you think I'm unreasonable by requesting that?



How come I could fly for hours on end without a single CTD on crowded server (talking 50+ ppl on 104th) before the patches?



Sorry, I mean FC2 and it's exactly the same problem there.

This is the reason why I haven't bought DCS:A-10C.

/KC

Yikes, KeyCat! I know it doesn't help you, but I'm sure glad I went to 64-bit!

I know the ED devs and testers are very concerned about cross-platform capability, and I see you've been posting in their forums. Have they not been responsive?

If I was in your shoes, I would certainly be cautious and check with other 32-bit users on the ED forums before plunking down cash for A-10C.

KeyCat, have you tried the 3GB fix?

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1092529&postcount=38

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1084420&postcount=8

The nice suprise for you is that DCS: A-10 has now dropped in price to $40 on Steam.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/61010/?snr=1_4_4__13

Glad to see that you're enjoying this incredible sim.

Hey Keycat, why switching to 64bit OS would make you loose your HOTAS?

When having the ticket open they where. I can not remember exactly their words but after patiently waiting for ~10 months I asked again and the reply was something like "we are aware about the issue but unlikely going to be fixed". Thats why I say ED betting everything on 64-bit but I hope they change their minds, I mean no program should CTD... could even live with a screen poping up X seconds flushing the RAM or whatever but not CTD.

Yes, I tried the /3G switch along with various values for /USERVA= but problem persist, IIRC only change with /3GB was that I did not get any error message at all, just strait to the desktop. I've spent countless of hours trying to find a workaround and collecting crashdumps etc, only ED can fix this one it seems.

Sure, I can go back to pre-patch and get rid of the CTD's but there is not many people flying that version on-line and co-op's is my main reason for flying.

@Jacobs: I'm still using my old but thrusty FLCS+TQS (SWF22 modded) and MS have dropped gameport support since Vista so I'm stuck with XP 32-bit on my gaming rig until I can afford to buy new HOTAS.

/KC

KeyCat,

I assume the post below was made by you?

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?...7&postcount=22

If so, the crash is occurring in the kernel32 itself which indicates an issue with the OS. Sure, Black Shark is helping trip it, but Microsoft kernel32 crashes aren't something that ED can fix. It also looks like when you first reported the issue you were driving Windows XP SP2. Did the problem persist once you installed SP3? There are apparently lots of folks with 32-bit Windows XP SP3 that aren't having the same problem.

Unfortunately yes.

I can add that I�m not alone getting these. IIRC 4 out of 6 in our (loose) group running both XP and Vista 32-bit had them after the latest patches for DCS:BS and FC2 was applied. Most of them just got annoyed and quit flying, one have just recently upgraded to Win 7 64-bit.

It was a while ago but if you look in the thread for FC2 you can find crash reports I collected from two of the Vista 32-bit machines (RedOne's and Salsam's), they did not bother to report it to ED themself.

I love flying the Shark but since the patch/es last spring I have not flown at all, except for the testing done.

Anyway, it was not my intention to hijack this thread, I just wanted to put forward that this problem exist and people still running 32-bit OS should beware of it before buying.

/KC

I went through your history on the ED board, and I note that this is actually not true. You had the relevant ED staff respond to you extensively, and you actually failed to respond to several questions posed by staff members. You did however post replies to them, meaning that you were aware of their precense.

If you intend to attack someone's reputation, please try to at least get your facts straight. The matter WAS reported, you had actual conversation with ED about it, and you dropped it before supplying the requested information.
Thanks.

Before you attack someone, please try to at least to read and understand the post.

I was saying that two guys I was flying with also experienced CTD's (but on Vista 32-bit and not so frequent) but did not bother to report it to ED themself so I told them where to find the crash reports and e-mail them to me so I could post them on the forum.



I was in contact with Alex numerous times while the ticket was open and I'm pretty sure I answered every question he asked and provided as much tech info as possible so what you are saying is not true! No offence, but I wonder who should get the facts strait?

I'm not here to tarnish ED I'm just sharing my experince with others and still hope for a solution so I can fly MP again.

Thanks.

/KC