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Can’t wait to see how MSFS 2024 works with this:

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Quite speechless at how good this is on FS2020.

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I got a first flight done with the A380 and it's pretty awesome. It seems they have the general feel of it right, like a much bigger A320 (with more inertia).

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I'm very new to modern Airbus systems. I know the Boeing planes like 747-400, 777 and the 737-800 well enough but this is a huge difference.

I was surprised however that it flew so well in 2D mode using 5K screen resolution on my W6800X 32GB Mac Pro. Frame rates were smooth and no stuttering at all.

VR gives me crash-to-desktops which I suspect might be having two 5K screens and the VR headset all connected at once, it may simply be too much for the system to handle along with the heavy demands of Flight Simulator.
 
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^^
How buggy or stable is the plane?I am pondering whether I should install it now or wait a few weeks.

I use a TCA Captains Pack.
 
^^
How buggy or stable is the plane?I am pondering whether I should install it now or wait a few weeks.

I use a TCA Captains Pack.

The biggest glitch is that the engines are a bit too powerful - which is on the fix list I believe. I use the 4K version. The 8K is supposed to be very system intensive.

Also it’s fairly system intensive, but you can disable the passenger cabin view which improves it.

I’ve had a crash with the electronic flight bag as well, but it just resets itself which is no problem, doesn’t affect the plane.

You do need a SimBrief account for flight planning (zfw, CG and the takeoff V speeds).

I was able to enjoy it certainly. It’s far better than some payware addons.


I have the Thrustmaster Airbus throttles and side-stick controller. The throttles have the typical detents for the Airbus throttle presets.

I am still very new to the systems on this place so it will be a while before I’m very confident with it. I haven’t used the brake to vacate yet either, just manual braking.

Premium Economy:

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Business class with ICE:
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First:
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I am impressed by all comments in this thread. So much so, that I just purchased Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, premium deluxe edition. The DVD pack, as I prefer a physical copy of games.

Next step will be to find some controller setup that is good. And which I also might be able to use with Squadron 42 / Star Citizen, when those games are released. I was an early backer, but have no experience in flying simulators.

I love the trucking sims. And I believe I will love flight sims as well, if I learn how to fly.

👍
 
I am impressed by all comments in this thread. So much so, that I just purchased Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, premium deluxe edition. The DVD pack, as I prefer a physical copy of games.

Next step will be to find some controller setup that is good. And which I also might be able to use with Squadron 42 / Star Citizen, when those games are released. I was an early backer, but have no experience in flying simulators.

I love the trucking sims. And I believe I will love flight sims as well, if I learn how to fly.

👍
Welcome to the community!



This is a great time to buy FS2020. It will inevitably be discontinued because MS will want you to buy FS2024.



I started flying in 2020 using a controller and then only bought Thurstmaster TCA Captain X in late 2022.



My first tip is to wrap your head around the idea of flying which is different to driving. Planes don't like to be jostled with sudden changes in traffic or rapid acceleration or braking. Unlike with a car it can take a few seconds from when you use a control until the desired effect has been achieved.



Start by learning how to control:

-Altitude

-Speed



We all play FS different and this is reflected in how different aircrafts behave.



Small planes: More agile but feel less stable at low speeds.



Airliners: Stable but requires forward planning with regards to changes in direction or altitude.



Unfortunately FS2020 doesn't offer sufficient tutorials on flying planes. Therefore I recommend watching early FS2020 tutorials by:

Huddinson

Flightsimschool

FishStakes



In my opinion these channels offer the most educational and easy to watch tutorials without skipping what might be obvious to someone experience but not beginners.
The biggest glitch is that the engines are a bit too powerful - which is on the fix list I believe. I use the 4K version. The 8K is supposed to be very system intensive.

Also it’s fairly system intensive, but you can disable the passenger cabin view which improves it.

I’ve had a crash with the electronic flight bag as well, but it just resets itself which is no problem, doesn’t affect the plane.

You do need a SimBrief account for flight planning (zfw, CG and the takeoff V speeds).

I was able to enjoy it certainly. It’s far better than some payware addons.


I have the Thrustmaster Airbus throttles and side-stick controller. The throttles have the typical detents for the Airbus throttle presets.

I am still very new to the systems on this place so it will be a while before I’m very confident with it. I haven’t used the brake to vacate yet either, just manual braking.

Premium Economy:

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Business class with ICE:
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First:
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Thanks for the info. The power issue should be easily fixable. However I could temporarily remedy that by adjusting the sensitivity or curve of the throttle lever.
 
...
My first tip is to wrap your head around the idea of flying which is different to driving. Planes don't like to be jostled with sudden changes in traffic or rapid acceleration or braking. Unlike with a car it can take a few seconds from when you use a control until the desired effect has been achieved.



Start by learning how to control:

-Altitude

-Speed
I am not sure, but I might have a slight advantage compared to most people trying to learn this.

I am a tower-crane driver, and the tallest cranes I have been driving is 85m, with jibs up to 82m length.
So I am familiar with having a load hanging in 100m+ wires. Those cranes need planning, and soft movements.

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This was my last job, and my first experience with this type.

Normally I drive with fixed jib and trolley. All of them have two joysticks for control. Third joystick is for moving the crane if it is on rails.

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And thank you for the tip on tutorials, much appreciated 👍
 
I am not sure, but I might have a slight advantage compared to most people trying to learn this.

I am a tower-crane driver, and the tallest cranes I have been driving is 85m, with jibs up to 82m length.
So I am familiar with having a load hanging in 100m+ wires. Those cranes need planning, and soft movements.

View attachment 2445908 View attachment 2445909 View attachment 2445910

This was my last job, and my first experience with this type.

Normally I drive with fixed jib and trolley. All of them have two joysticks for control. Third joystick is for moving the crane if it is on rails.

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And thank you for the tip on tutorials, much appreciated 👍
That’s brilliant. You definitely have an advantage compared with me when I started. I had been driving Formula 1 racing games. The only planes that can remotely be piloted in a similar way are jet fighters.

You will have a blast learning about the game. It’s fun, relaxing and liberating. Unlike with a real plane, you can crash and learn without dying.

A few days ago I did a quick landing challenge on an unfamiliar runway. Got a B on my first attempt. I play whilst sitting on the floor in the lounge on my PC. I’ve enjoyed playing with the Thurstmaster TCA as much as I have with a controller.

Therefore don’t feel obliged to buy lots of peripherals. If anything, playing with a controller for the first 2 years was perfect as I could switch from watching YouTube using ATV4K to quick resuming into FS2020 in less than 1min on my Series X. Minimal friction and I have clocked 135 hours so far.

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Yes. Any keyboard/mouse works out of box.

For flight controls, Honeycomb Alpha XPC works (you then can hook a proprietary hub to make Bravo Throttle and Charlie rudders with it. I believe Logitech rudders will work as well).

Turtle beach has a yoke as well as a flightstick, and can hook their brand rudders up via one of those devices.

Thrustmaster makes a hotas one x, cheap and can hook their brand rudders up through it as well. (It’s much better designed as flight game stick than a flight sim stick, but it works well for the lower cost vs a more sim focused setup.)

Hori makes a flightstick as well, but haven't heard good things. No rudder support that I know of.

I also helped beta test firmware for a roll limitless converter, that will allow the pc only honeycomb alpha yoke, or a stand alone (normally needs the Xbox alpha xpc and Xbox hub) bravo throttle or Charlie rudders to unofficially work with the Xbox. I think other pc only flight controls could work as well via this method, but they have to be programmed to work by the developer, although he seamed very open to expanding the supported flight equipment.
Thank you for the info.

I tried to transfer over my PC platform: flight yoke (Logitech), rudder pedals, throttle and Thrustmaster TCA Sidestick for Airbus and no bueno.

Do I have to get a totally different set ?

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You will have a blast learning about the game. It’s fun, relaxing and liberating. Unlike with a real plane, you can crash and learn without dying.

A few days ago I did a quick landing challenge on an unfamiliar runway. Got a B on my first attempt. I play whilst sitting on the floor in the lounge on my PC. I’ve enjoyed playing with the Thurstmaster TCA as much as I have with a controller.

Therefore don’t feel obliged to buy lots of peripherals. If anything, playing with a controller for the first 2 years was perfect as I could switch from watching YouTube using ATV4K to quick resuming into FS2020 in less than 1min on my Series X. Minimal friction and I have clocked 135 hours so far.
I tried IL-2 Sturmovik many years ago, still have it. But I never managed to take off, crashed every time 😂

Well done on the landing.
I think your Thrustmaster TCA looks great. I am not very good with console controllers, although PS4 feels better in my hands than the PS3 did.
And I want it to feel somewhat close to a real plane. And a joystick might be better than a yoke, if I also will use it in Star Citizen.

I got the Tobii Eye tracker 5 just a few days ago. I used to have a three screen setup on a PC for truck sim. And that was great. But now I only use macs, so one display will have to do :)
 
What
Thanks for the info. The power issue should be easily fixable. However I could temporarily remedy that by adjusting the sensitivity or curve of the throttle lever.
For throttle sensitivity it was advised to leave everything at the default for the Airbus type throttles because of the particular detents they have for power settings. Then calibrate using the FlyByWire tools.

This so you have proper control when hand flying the plane (instead of too sensitive power).

think your Thrustmaster TCA looks great

It’s supposed to be a replica of the Airbus side stick controls so it makes sense using it with Airbus planes for instance pressing the red button cancels the autopilot.
 
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I tried IL-2 Sturmovik many years ago, still have it. But I never managed to take off, crashed every time 😂

Well done on the landing.
I think your Thrustmaster TCA looks great. I am not very good with console controllers, although PS4 feels better in my hands than the PS3 did.
And I want it to feel somewhat close to a real plane. And a joystick might be better than a yoke, if I also will use it in Star Citizen.

I got the Tobii Eye tracker 5 just a few days ago. I used to have a three screen setup on a PC for truck sim. And that was great. But now I only use macs, so one display will have to do :)
Whether to get a joystick or yoke entirely depends on the:
-Type of aircraft that you prefer
-Desk/living room space
-Budget

There’s truly not a one size fits all. This is why I played with a controller to begin to discover the types of airplanes that I like. I mainly fly airliners and never do bush trips, hence why I own the Thrustmaster TCA.
 
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Whether to get a joystick or yoke entirely depends on the:
...
-Budget

There’s truly not a one size fits all. This is why I played with a controller to begin to discover the types of airplanes that I like. I mainly fly airliners and never do bush trips, hence why I own the Thrustmaster TCA.
I thought about this. And I decided I will rather pay more for a set that feels as close to the real thing as possible.

In my job I use sticks all the time. And different manufacturers, and depending on generation, they can vary quite a lot.
I don't like t-shaped sticks, but not all straight sticks feel good either. Many has dead-man buttons, or you need to hold a cap up. Not something I prefer.

So I realise the design and material will influence how much I am going to enjoy the flight sim itself.
What has been your experience in your flight sims, guys? And do you have any recommendations?

I will start with a Cessna of course, but most likely I will want to move up to one of the large airliners. As I do not enjoy racing games, but very much prefer euro truck simulator 2. And I just upgraded to a truck wheel and a better wheel base, instead of the smaller all-in-one racing wheels.

I have 4 driving wheels now, with pedals and shifters. So buying a better one, will surely be cheaper in the long run ;)
My first was ACT Labs Force RS back in 2001
 
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I thought about this. And I decided I will rather pay more for a set that feels as close to the real thing as possible.

In my job I use sticks all the time. And different manufacturers, and depending on generation, they can vary quite a lot.
I don't like t-shaped sticks, but not all straight sticks feel good either. Many has dead-man buttons, or you need to hold a cap up. Not something I prefer.

So I realise the design and material will influence how much I am going to enjoy the flight sim itself.
What has been your experience in your flight sims, guys? And do you have any recommendations?

I will start with a Cessna of course, but most likely I will want to move up to one of the large airliners. As I do not enjoy racing games, but very much prefer euro truck simulator 2. And I just upgraded to a truck wheel and a better wheel base, instead of the smaller all-in-one racing wheels.

I have 4 driving wheels now, with pedals and shifters. So buying a better one, will surely be cheaper in the long run ;)
My first was ACT Labs Force RS back in 2001
Wow. 4 racing wheels. You must have a lot of space. My suggestion is to apart off by buying Thrustmaster TCA stick. Use it to learn the game and get a feel for sticks and the extent to which you would like to do things manually in a plane.

Thereafter start building your setup. The yoke or stick is just one part. I use a wireless mouse to pan around the cockpit, others use Quest 2 VR. There are also third party aircraft replica panels of buttons.

I had as much fun playing with a controller as I am having with a stick. Therefore having the best of most number of accessories isn’t important and the setups can greatly vary. Just playing, watch and read reviews of pheriperals. Each one has pros and cons regardless of price.
 
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What can also be done with that A380 if it climbs too fast is use a flex rating.

That makes it more normal. Rather than climbing 5000ft/min I’m doing 2900 with a light fuel load.

You should also create a Navigraph Simbrief account and link it with the plane so you can quickly import your flight planning and company route.

It also lets you do your V speeds.

MSFS 2020 is still pretty stunning with the right addons, I put FSLTL traffic injector on mine and it's now given me real world traffic:

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Qantas A380 x2, Thai A350-900, Emirates SkyCargo B777, UPS 747-8F and others, Qantas 737-800 behind.

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I've done another flight with that A380 and there was a new version made available today. It's pretty stable to fly for me without any crashes.

I also tried a TCAS situation with another nearby plane, the A380 automatically took action and initiated a climb, then leveled out when the conflict was avoided. The autoland works as well.

It's amazing this is free, given some addon companies charge a large fee for their addons.
 
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Can we expect non-alpha press reviews. I am curious as to whether the game will have new handcrafted buildings that won't be pushed to 2020.
I've done another flight with that A380 and there was a new version made available today. It's pretty stable to fly for me without any crashes.
It crashed for me on the runway. But that was with settings at ultra. Dialed it down to medium settings and no crashes. There was lots of screen tearing/stutter but I signifigantly reduced it by changing from dlss quality to balanced. I play in 4k with 16GB vram by only 16gb system ram.
 

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16gb RAM is likely the issue. I’ve got 96GB here (6x16GB) and 32GB VRAM so I probably skip a lot of the crashes just through that. I did about 1.5 hours of an OMDB YSSY flight yesterday with only a momentary sound drop out. I couldn’t continue the flight longer because it was too late in the evening. I stopped somewhere past the east coast of Oman.

I think nobody has a non Alpha version of 2024 MSFS yet.
 
16gb RAM is likely the issue. I’ve got 96GB here (6x16GB) and 32GB VRAM so I probably skip a lot of the crashes just through that. I did about 1.5 hours of an OMDB YSSY flight yesterday with only a momentary sound drop out. I couldn’t continue the flight longer because it was too late in the evening. I stopped somewhere past the east coast of Oman.

I think nobody has a non Alpha version of 2024 MSFS yet.
System RAM utilisation is 8GB when I fly the stock neo a320. Switching to it from the A380 made me realise that most stock textures are not 4k.

Only the lettering and screens appear to be. Not a bad thing as the planes also need to load on the series x and a + run on lower spec computers.

I will upgrade to 64GB if I buy FS2024.
 
Thank you for the info.

I tried to transfer over my PC platform: flight yoke (Logitech), rudder pedals, throttle and Thrustmaster TCA Sidestick for Airbus and no bueno.

Do I have to get a totally different set ?

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Xbox controllers need a security chip, except for keyboard/mouse. For official supported controllers, you need to have one that specifically work with Xbox.

Off the top of my head, Thrustmaster has a cheap joystick hotas, turtle beach has both a yoke and a stick, Hori has a hotas (no rudder pedal support) and the honeycomb has the alpha xpc yoke (the original alpha Is not Xbox compatible.)

Typically, the yoke/joystick will have the authentication chip, and there are built in plugs on the yoke (or a hub that connects to the yoke) to support their brand of rudders/throttle for the full setup.

(Honeycomb actually lets you use Logitech pedals, as they didn't have their own “Charlie” rudder pedals released until a couple of months ago, normally you need rudders from the same company as the main device).

There is an unofficial work around by using a roll limitless adapter, but so far it only works for the honeycomb system (original alpha (NOT XPC) or stand alone bravo/charlie). He was interested in expanding the supported flight controls, but you will need to confirm with the roll limitless creator if he is willing to create the custom firmware needed for your setup.
 
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MSFS 2024 is released - did anyone try it yet and what machine do you have?

I’m waiting until my preferred plane is made available for it. Currently I don’t fly anything else other than the A380.

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MSFS 2024 is released - did anyone try it yet and what machine do you have?

I’m waiting until my preferred plane is made available for it. Currently I don’t fly anything else other than the A380.

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I will download it tomorrow when I am at home. Any idea when the a380 might be available. Are we talking weeks or months?

The performance penalty is nuts. I wonder whether it will be worth it.
 
MSFS 2024 is released - did anyone try it yet and what machine do you have?
I tried it both on my Series X and HP Omen i9-10850K, 32GB of RAM, 1TB SSD (installation drive), RTX 3080. My initial impressions are, don't uninstall MSFS 2020 just yet. The trade off between MSFS 2020 and 2024 is striking as the design approach to both have changed dramatically. Instead of assets and cache residing on you HD, most of it is downloaded now.

Installation was horrific and I wasn't alone as it took about an hour from the time I launched the game to the main screen and reports on Avsim.com had users saying the same. Why? Because lots of the assets are downloaded on the fly. It becomes problematic when millions of players are trying to do the same. When I finally got to the runway in my Cessna Skyhawk, the instrument panel was mostly blurry as well as the airport scenery (early 2000 3D grass scenery with little textures). The cockpit looked like someone sprayed brown dirt inside the plane.

However given time things cleared up. From what I could tell, the graphics look pretty much the same as MSFS 2020, maybe slightly better but i'm busy concentrating on flying. MSFS 2020 looked great but the way things are streamed into 2024 is a little concerning. What is a bit concerning is the data that's used. If you have a data cap, pay attention to that. I flew a Cessna from Gary Int'l in Chicago to the MSFS iconic Meigs airport. A 13 min flight sucked 9.5GB of data.

I did have a chuckle flying into Runway 36 in Meigs as the approach had pockets of water on the tarmac. The airport no longer exist and is quite literally a marina but was inserted back into the game.

Performance wise it was about the same, in some places better, and other places a little worse. I need to give that some time after Microsoft optimizes their servers for the game.

The performance on the Series X in 4K was also about the same as MSFS 2020.
 
It's a good thing I got the game free on Game Pass. I just tried playing the game US EST and was booted off because the 'service had too many players'. Microsoft needs to fix this ASAP or they will get some serious heat especially from those that actually paid money. If they are going to do a live service game, then have the available capacity to support the tens millions of people who are wanting to play. I expect the Gaming Press to cover this soon. Not a good look for such a high profile game.
 
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