MatthewS

Sure, but this joint venture has not even been announced. How many times do business ventures 'fail to launch', very often. But yes it will be very interesting to hear more details of this project.

Regarding Android market you can look at downloads for 'paid only' apps or even unlock keys. For example, https://market.android.com/details?id=mobi.beyondpod.unlockkey&feature=search_result As the Google refund policy is refund only within 15 mins of purchase the download numbers are representative of actual purchases. PMDG's sale figures are not going to convince FSX devs to target XP. The CRJ-200 figures might.

Wow. Now that's overstepping the line. I will say, in the nicest and sincerest way possible, none of your business. It's not my product, but it's a very bad question to ask. Why? Would'nt release of this information be a good thing for XP? I'm sure many FSX devs would be very interested to know the size of the XP market. This might encourage more FSX devs to take XP more seriously. Magazines/newspapers publish circulation figures, other markets (eg Android/iPhone) publish sales figures. Whats the big secret? I suspect the number of sales is less than 1,000.

It's a question of how much investment we are talking about... I think X-Plane devs grossly underestimate the amount of investment required by PMDG to produce the NGX. Would such investment be recouped in the X-Plane market? How many CRJ-200 units have been sold? 1,000? 10,000? more?

I have no doubt that X-Plane devs have the talent to build the equivalent of PMDG products. I just question whether the amount of "investment" required in developing equivalent products will be undertaken by X-Plane devs given the rather small returns of the X-plane market (compared to FSX). That's I suspect why PMDG seems not interested in X-Plane, the market is not large enough to justify the investment required to produce products of the depth we are used to with PMDG.

Excellent! Any clues as to what these are?

The fact remains there is nothing in XP that can compete with the detailed systems modelling of the PMDG NGX (nor for that matter the PMDG 747-400/800, MD11, LDS-767 or FSL ConcordeX). Seems like the only thing that comes remotely close is the CRJ-200 and potentially the IXEG 737 when released (I sure hope so). IMHO XP10 has lost its golden opportunity to capture market share from FSX. If only it had been released in December last year as was expected then we might actually have seen more FSX developers releasing XP products by now. Apart from a few aircraft by Carenado and the REX texture pack has anyone else of note from the FSX sphere bothered with XP?

This has been discussed much on the various Flight forums. The common view I believe is that:- 1) Flight is a enhanced version of FSX (thus not 'arcade'). The 'not arcade' aspect has also been confirmed by the official Flight website. 2) The Flight 'store' means exposure to a vast market for Flight developers, with vendors paying Microsoft a commission on each store sale (similar to how Steam works). 3) Vendors do not need to go through the store. And thus the freeware 'market' and 3rd party stores will continue to operate. Additionally from what I've read PMDG and vendors such as ORBX are already under NDA with regard to Flight, so presumably they are already developing (or considering) products for Flight. Since Flight is closely related to FSX it should be relatively easy for vendors to 'port' products to Flight. I think you'll see Flight released with the Flight marketplace already populated with some big name FSX vendors.

You should read what I say more carefully.

You should go read the Flight site and/or the Flight forums over at AVSIM. Flight is for PC and not X-Box. I wouldn't worry about PMDG, they will continue to make some of the best simulation products available. IMHO I very much doubt any XP developer will have the same level of success as PMDG.

To be fair, I don't think that's the issue here. The argument presented was PMDG is a priori superior to X-Plane, and always will be. Clearly that is, prima facie, ridiculous. Personally I have no opinions about MSFS aside from financial/strategic ones; namely that MS killed FS to increase their monetization, and this bodes very ill for PMDG and the FS add on community. But that's another thread. Yes IMHO PMDG products are superior (in systems simulation) to currently available XP products. Will that change, well lets hope so, because it means better products for XP. The real shame for XP is that XP10 is delayed probably till the end of the year. Flight maybe available by then, so I think the likelihood of PMDG or many other FSX developers jumping ship to support XPlane is now quite slim. In anycase Flight seems to be based upon FSX so it should be far easier for developers such as PMDG to make products for Flight than for XPlane. The best thing for XP was the canning of ACES. The worst thing was the announcement of Flight. I think XP10 is destined now to remain a relatively small player (compared to FSX/Flight) in the Flight sim market.

If in doubt go visit the PMDG forums on AVSIM. You will be pleased to know that PMDG does have vast experience in developing airliner simulations in addition to numerous NGX pilots on the beta team (with tens of thousands of NGX hours in total). The PMDG NGX is licensed by Boeing and in addition PMDG have access to Boeing NGX engineers.

See previous reply re vertical profile logic. And yes I don't think anyone other than PMDG will do a more accurate airliner simulation (NGX or otherwise). It's just unreasonable to suggest that the UFMC/vasFMC generic fmc implementation could be more accurate for a specific airliner than the accuracy of PMDGs custom written NGX specific fmc is for the NGX.

Yep, but PMDG implements the NGX FMC ver 10.8A, does UFMC/vasFMC? So it's highly unlikely the generic VNAV implementation in UFMC/vasFMC is going to come up with the same vertical profile during all phases of the flight as the PMDG NGX. Sure the climb rates might match reality if you config UFMC/vasFMC correctly but the vertical profile flown wont match the NGXs vertical profile logic.

So you're trying to tell me that UFMC/vasFMC's "generic" VNAV implementation will use the same predictions logic as the Boeings NGX VNAV implementation (which PMDG has simulated precisely). I very much doubt it.

I bet though the generic VNAV modelling in UFMC/vasFMC doesn't match the intended aircraft's vertical profile very closely. Here's a quote from Robert Randazzo over at the PMDG forums (http://forum.avsim.net/topic/337111-some-days-progress-just-doesnt-come-easily)

My 'aging' Q6600 (2.6gz quad-core), 4GB RAM, GTX460 1GB VRAM, FSX on SSD - PMDG 747-800i 30fps in the VC, and 50 to 100fps in external view (depending on altitude). Yes exactly, do any XP aircraft model VNAV? When one does then we can at least compare "apples with apples".

Yes for sure! But how many "X-Planers" commenting here even use FSX and have purchased the PMDG 747-400/800, MD11 or say the LDS 767? If they compare the current XP offerings to the PMDG/LDS offerings it would be obvious that XP is behind regarding systems modelling. The CRJ-200 seems the only one that comes close (though it doesn't have VNAV for starters). And the PMDG NGX raises the bar (for systems modelling) yet again in relation to the current offerings. I do agree that the VC/external visuals in XPlane (eg CRJ-200 and IXEG 737) are better than what FSX is capable of in terms of clarity and lighting abilities.

Re depth of systems modelling on the NGX just visit the PMDG forums on AVSIM. I have a hard time believing that any XP product will be able to compete with the depth of systems modelling offered by the PMDG NGX (at least for the next 12 months, if ever). Yes I agree the graphics quality of the IXEG 737 VC in XP seems to be slightly better than the PMDG NGX VC.

Sure the graphics look slightly better.... but somehow I think the systems will pale in comparison to the PMDG NGX.

That's a pretty lame statement....using the word "ever". There was nothing in that video that can't be done in x-plane technically, or even right now. I assure you XP will have comparable products in time, I've seen them. We've heard this many times. But as far as systems go don't think there's anything (existing or in the pipeline) for XP to compare with the PMDG NGX (or for that matter the PMDG 747-400/800 or MD11). Also... Flight is on the horizon now. This is another competitor for XP10, and I think PMDG (et al) are more likely to move to Flight rather than XP10.

Yes it will. I'm talking about the systems modelling not the graphics (The PMDG graphics are still excellent, check out the 1080p video). If PMDG decides to port to XP maybe, but they don't seem to be interested. Yes XP has a lot of great 3D modellers/programmers but PMDG have spent about 4 man years on the systems development, its meant to match the NGX systems precisely.

That 2nd officer in the 747-800i is an addon. The PMDG 737NGX will raise the bar yet again... don't think XP will ever have anything to compare to it! http://forum.avsim.net/topic/337162-customize-your-pmdg-737ngx/ I very much doubt AFS2012 will be ever be released, they have not even started development. Flight supposedly is being rewritten with performance and multi core support in mind. Looking forward to XP10 too.

3d cockpit excellent... even if it's just generic XP gauges. Please fix the hump if you have some spare time! The default 747 will be the screenshot 'poster child' for XP10, so that hump problem is going to be real obvious.

+1 I'd be interested to see if the 'hump' has been fixed too. Hope so!!!