Colin S Posted December 4, 2013 Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 I want exams to be over so I can just buy this thing and stop having dreams of this stuff....... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomerik1972 Posted December 4, 2013 Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 Last week I was a a bit disappointed after Installing the first release of Skymaxx pro. I did not like the look of the skies and a huge drop in frame rate (from mid 30 to low 20) called for a deinstallation. Then a mail from x-Aviation arrived today with a link to the new release 1.1 of Skymaxx. Installation was done some hours ago, smooth as always from these guys, and it was a true joy to discover that the upgraded skies now looks absolutely fantastic! At the same time the frame rate was increased to good 40`s with the same settings giving me 20-23 last week.I have now increased the screen resolution to default iMac setting 2530x1440, still with great frame rate! Wow, developers,- the is great!!! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thywillbedone Posted December 4, 2013 Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 Is it my imagination or have the 1.1 version clouds become more transparent than before…seems like a disimprovement to me…just tested a few times so I may be wrong…is this how the FPS improvement has been achieved? If so, I prefer to go back to version 1 which looked better (again caveat that I have only tried on a few weather systems). Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flydav Posted December 4, 2013 Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 I noticed that too but for what we've lost we gained a huge boost in fps and after all I believe that v 1.0 clouds were overly solid and bulky compared to these new ones, also these clouds have much better shader, they are still dark at sunset but not as dark as before Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marcc Posted December 4, 2013 Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 Wow, wow and wow.....I'm blown away! Performance improvements: oh yes!After my first test flight, it seems I can leave the god rays ON now! Clouds, sky and lighting look nothing short of amazing.Looks so real to me. Took some screenshots, but they don't do justice, you just have to see this for yourself and in motion. Great job guys and big thank you! Cheers, Marcus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 4, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 Is it my imagination or have the 1.1 version clouds become more transparent than before…seems like a disimprovement to me…just tested a few times so I may be wrong…is this how the FPS improvement has been achieved? If so, I prefer to go back to version 1 which looked better (again caveat that I have only tried on a few weather systems). Thanks There was no transparency changed, and no texture files adjusted. Are you running in HDR mode? This is where you would noticed a change, because the tone mapping in HDR was WAY off in version 1.0, which caused the clouds to be much brighter than they should be. This update fixes the issue and where in the callback/buffer of X-Plane the clouds get rendered. Non-HDR and HDR should essentially be uniform now, where as in 1.0 the HDR clouds were vastly (and nastily) different to Non-HDR. Nothing was stripped in order to get our frame rate improvements. The code was only optimized in how it renders in X-Plane, thus we see huge gains as a reward for hard efforts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 4, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 Wow, wow and wow..... I'm blown away! Performance improvements: oh yes! After my first test flight, it seems I can leave the god rays ON now! Clouds, sky and lighting look nothing short of amazing. Looks so real to me. Took some screenshots, but they don't do justice, you just have to see this for yourself and in motion. Great job guys and big thank you! Cheers, Marcus So happy to hear, and thanks! Glad you're a happy camper! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 4, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 Last week I was a a bit disappointed after Installing the first release of Skymaxx pro. I did not like the look of the skies and a huge drop in frame rate (from mid 30 to low 20) called for a deinstallation. Then a mail from x-Aviation arrived today with a link to the new release 1.1 of Skymaxx. Installation was done some hours ago, smooth as always from these guys, and it was a true joy to discover that the upgraded skies now looks absolutely fantastic! At the same time the frame rate was increased to good 40`s with the same settings giving me 20-23 last week.I have now increased the screen resolution to default iMac setting 2530x1440, still with great frame rate! Wow, developers,- the is great!!! I somehow missed this one till now. Thanks for sharing your results...AWESOME! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
geofa Posted December 4, 2013 Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 Something unbelievable made even more unbelievable. I've got skymaxx on fairly maxed out settings and on my 4 year old machine getting in the high 30's fps. Hdr still takes me in the single digits but I can do without. This product has just sent xplane simply to the top of flight simulating experience in a second. Thanks so much for the quick update-even more blown away now. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 4, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 Something unbelievable made even more unbelievable. I've got skymaxx on fairly maxed out settings and on my 4 year old machine getting in the high 30's fps. Hdr still takes me in the single digits but I can do without. This product has just sent xplane simply to the top of flight simulating experience in a second. Thanks so much for the quick update-even more blown away now. Thanks, Geof! We're really happy to hear you enjoy it so much! Your compliments are well received and appreciated, so thank you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zzap_v Posted December 4, 2013 Report Share Posted December 4, 2013 (edited) Cloud Shadows would be nice, if possible Edited December 4, 2013 by vag66 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pryoski Posted December 5, 2013 Report Share Posted December 5, 2013 (edited) I was already in that happy 40+ fps state with beautiful skies using SkyMaxx version 1 on my old i5 clunker of a PC. Now ... I'm still in that happy state with 1.1 and everything pushed a notch higher! Thanks John and Cameron ... love your work! Kris P. Edited December 5, 2013 by Kris Pryo 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 5, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 5, 2013 Now ... I'm still in that happy state with 1.1 and everything pushed a notch higher! Thanks John and Cameron ... love your work! Thanks for the compliments, Kris! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dpny Posted December 5, 2013 Report Share Posted December 5, 2013 Wow. You weren't kidding about fps improvements. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 5, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 5, 2013 Wow. You weren't kidding about fps improvements. Sounds like you're happy now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dpny Posted December 5, 2013 Report Share Posted December 5, 2013 Sounds like you're happy now. Very much so. I've gone back to OS X. Figure if I'm gonna get low fps, might as well do it in an OS I like. Now, if nVidia's OS X drivers could just do hardware instancing. . . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 5, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 5, 2013 ery much so. I've gone back to OS X. Figure if I'm gonna get low fps, might as well do it in an OS I like. Now, if nVidia's OS X drivers could just do hardware instancing. . . Glad to hear we could make it better for you! Enjoy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nazze Posted December 5, 2013 Report Share Posted December 5, 2013 (edited) This update was such a great perfomance boost. Now it is really flyable in HDR. This add-on is just so cool!! Great work!PS: Nazze is back again! Edited December 5, 2013 by Nazze 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arb65912 Posted December 6, 2013 Report Share Posted December 6, 2013 I saw the first release announcement, I have read bunch of threads and decided to wait. I did not have to wait long and I saw the new release and even more replies with very happy customers. Well, Cameron Team, you convinced me. I am buying Maxx Pro this weekend and I already know I will love it. Great job with the update, Gentlemen, I did not have the product but I can see that it is working great now. Can not wait to start using it, I mean it. Cheers, AJ 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 6, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 6, 2013 Great! Let us know how you like it, AJ. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly Posted December 7, 2013 Report Share Posted December 7, 2013 Hy,the problem with Orbit textures persist.It is possible resolve this bug.Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LeeDCO Posted December 9, 2013 Report Share Posted December 9, 2013 Have installed 1.1 twice on my iMac. There is no SkyMaxx Pro plugin listed, just the Gizmodo 64. Thus there is no SkyMaxx Pro. Any Suggestions? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 9, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 9, 2013 Have installed 1.1 twice on my iMac. There is no SkyMaxx Pro plugin listed, just the Gizmodo 64. Thus there is no SkyMaxx Pro. Any Suggestions? Can you please post your log.txt file in your X-Plane folder? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cameron Posted December 9, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 9, 2013 Hy,the problem with Orbit textures persist.It is possible resolve this bug.Thanks Just tested again. Works fine. If you're just trying to go to exterior view and zoom out as far as you can, it won't always work. It's based on relative location of the aircraft, which is really all that matters here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jsmirand Posted December 9, 2013 Report Share Posted December 9, 2013 Really happy with the results, Sky Maxx 1.1 rocks! I noticed also that with many clouds, God Rays, etc, my system constraint generally moved from my CPU to my NVidia 780 card. Running on 3 x 27" monitors I am getting about 30 FPS flying around Hawaii, and the clouds remind me of my actual trips to the islands. Thank you!Johnhttp://www.johnmiranda.com/flightsimulator.htm 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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