FloB

Boy, seeing all those great freeware airports getting better and better every month I doubt that we will see a lot of commercial airport developers in XP. If Laminar adds some more HQ objects and facades and improves usability of WED we will have hundreds of quality default airports and hundrets of HQ freeware airports all over the world. I just compared the freeware LSZH to the aerosoft payware version - and honestly I prefer the freeware version. I've already more really nice airports on my HD than I can fly to... Flo

@ ryanbatc: Same here. If you move back and forth in time you see the color change. At sunset it's yellow and than comes blue. The reflection is probably intended and realistic but something's wrong with the mixing of colors. Will test with HDR off. Flo

Glad it helped. It seems that some library objects (esp. ruscenery) cause trouble on windows machines, whyever. I've seen some scenery packs "updated" (certain objects removed) because of that. Flo

Hi, I remember a scenery pack having (maybe) the similar problem. It was resolved by deleting a specific object. Have a look at the comments section and maybe contact the author: http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?app=downloads&showfile=20531&st=20#commentsStart Good luck

Is that a special effect or a bug? Where would the glowing blue light come from in the middle of the night and nowhere? No big deal, though. Thanks for answers Flo EDIT, it's not the fuselage but reflecting part of the props

What am I supposed to see in and above a thick overcast-stratus cloud layer? Actually I can see something from the ground, but as soon as I climb into it or above it this something disappears and I have clear skies all around...is that "normal"? Medium overcast-setting in Skymaxx. Flo

User Interface

Just a stupid idea: Could modified default clouds (+/- transparent, very low res and low number of puffs) be used to cast shadows and Skymaxx to represent the clouds visually at the same time? Since both rely on the XP-weather engine the shadows should match the clouds more or less... Wait - XPlane clouds don't move... Flo PS: I don't care much about cloud shadows.

Thanks for the explanation. Since I mainly fly at sunset/dawn I'm well familiar with the "small window of mismatched lighting" and I wondered why it's there. It's a pity because flying at dusk/dawn is fantastic in XP10. Now I know. Cheers Flo

What scenery is that? Looks like a nice place. Flo

What/how does it fix that? Could you please point us to that plugin? Flo

Currently there is no real fix for that. You can try to get the best out of it by checking draw highres textures from orbit (rendering settings), play with the maximum visibility distance in the weather settings screen and modding your art controls via "flywithlua" (see forum) thread. There are also some freeware and payware highres replacement textures out there but the result are not convincing IMHO. BTW: Using Skymaxx Pro seems to disable the x-plane weather-visibility setting. The limitation is XPlane loading just a certain number of highres tiles and fall back on low-res textures for everything that is behind them. Last word from Laminar was that they are looking into increasing the number of tiles now that they are running on 64-bit. Could be weeks, could be years... Flo

Saab A340, short trip from Spokane to Olympic (KOLM).

Saab 340A, departing from LFMN (Nice - Cote D'Azur) at sunset

No. I found that it's not very complicated to set the CL by mouse once you got used to it (I became too lazy to assign them again and again and open/close the TQ window). Once ready for taxi you hardly touch the CL until parking and esp. not during takeoff, approach or final when you're busy. I use my quadrant only for the power levers and autopilot operation. Just give it a shot Flo

I just wanted to make sure that the OP actually sets his CL within the min/max range and I for myself set them to max when taxiing for TO (since that is required for TO anyway). But you're absolutely right in pointing out the exact meaning of the throttle-lever and CL settings. Thanks. Flo

Yes, it is normal. Set condition lever to max and reduce throttle/use brakes during taxi if necessary. No problem here. Flo

The reason for the "gap" is mainly performance: The clouds are heavy on frames and to fill twice the distance with clouds you need much more than twice the number of clouds to draw... with the given tech this will kill FPS. You would need some fake cloud background or clouds forming a dome etc. to work around that. There might be other reasons why X-Plane can't do that (tile size/number). Flo

Saab340A - ready 2go @Wellington/NZ

Allright, thanks.

What is the meaning of the T/M setting (condition lever), I couldnt find anything in the manual. Thanks Flo

The OP doesn't say it is skymaxx - just referring to the draw distance. The impression of unlimited draw distance mainly results in setting cloud alt to near ground altitude. In the video the clouds nearly touch the mountains... Set clouds to 20.000 ft above ground and they will look like beeing drawn just for a couple of miles. Flo

I think this tool will only be of use if it works reliable (>99%), i.e. I don't have to check if it did right or wrong - and manually correct the ini. file. Otherwise I can do it myself right from the start without having a 25th plugin/work-around-tool installed. BTW: I guess Laminar will change the way scenery is handled rather soon. It should not be complicated to come up with something better, (=more user friendly) than what we have now - and I think Ben outlined ideas for th future when he first introduced the ini.file. You might want to check his blog. Cheers Flo

My understanding is that the tool is actually doing this fully automatically: "The script analyses the files inside a scenery and decides which layer should be used by default." Am I wrong?

Suggestion: Make the TQ 2D Panel also work as an pop-up just like for HDG and CRS via preferences. Every time the condtion lever is moved the 2D then should pop up and stay for 2 secs and then disappear again. I find myself constandly opening and closing the 2D window when setting the condition lever. Best regards Flo