Flight Simulator Tips and Tricks

I found myself with a 60 Gig SSD drive unused so I searched for ' How to ' move FSX to different drive with many varied methods from: just copy FSX folder to new drive and change all registry keys to point to the new drive / folder .. to: FSX is like a virus when it installs... you are best to uninstall and reinstall to the new drive .... These are all in my humble opion nothing more than hogwash .... Here is how I did it with minimal effort... Firstly... you can muck up your FSX if you don't understand the basics of files and folders of your computer system... you have been warned.. I run my system with UAC turned off so if you have it turned on…

Here's How... Didn't know where to post this, but guessed here is a good a place as any. Only realised recently that the cooling fan on my PSU, which I'd mounted in the usual place at the top of the case, was actually pulling fresh air IN, and thus blowing WARM/HOT air INTO the top of the case, and directly DOWN towards the mobo and video card. When added to the fact that the two large case fans at bottom front, are also pulling in cool air for the hard drives, this was NOT a good combination. I couldn't believe I'd been running like this for so long. What a numpty! I realised my case (CMStacker) is designed for a second PSU at the bottom, so stripped down the …

Five hours of pain because I suffered a senior moment when I blew out all my USB port assignments using USBDeview.exe. First: Garmin Pilot (For Android or iPad) is a solid tool that will bring your immersion to even greater heights. It's free for 30 days, but if you want to try "SAFE TAXI" (Highly recommended) you will need to buy a year of that service even if you choose not to subscribe to the underlying Garmin Pilot. You can connect FSX to your tablet and use this app, but several little kinks: IN FSX: Start FSUIPC (paid version 4.5 or higher by Pete Dowson), and find the GPSOut settings. YOU MUST enable GPSOut to make the Garmin Pilot Work, and YOU MUST c…

Greetings, I thought about appending this post to the other SweetFX discussions, but most of them were reporting "problems" of some sort or another. I wanted to report that SweetFX is one of the sweetest (har-dee-har-har) addons that I have added in quite a while. While it is not perfect, it's pluses far outweigh the negatives. First things first: FSX Gold, DX-10, REX Essential +Overdrive textures with Opus Weather engine, Orbx PNW. Lots of stuff working well together. Installed SweetFX 1.4 with the default file settings. Dirt simple install - copy the file structure into the FSX.EXE directory. My first FSX program load crashed. Oops. B…

Hope this helps guys.

I have been having problems with FSX stuttering out of the blue, for the past 2-3 weeks.. Trying to get to the source of it, i: Cleaned my pc free from dust Reseated my ram and GPU Ran a AVG anti-virus scan Double checked with Malwarebyts Rebuilt FSX shaders Defragged my HDD Stilll the stutter remained (were as before with the same fsx slider settings i'd be all silky smooth) While testing today i decided to open the task manager to see what was running and found dtmng.exe..........: Secure search conduit (under description) (also checking to see that it was installed 8th may 2013 rang alarm bells - without my knowledge too) Ending this process, FSX would run smooth …

The left hand button. Sometimes if batteries or the mouse hardware itself is old , then tuning radios with a mouse can be difficult. Double clicks. This can be costly in some applications (buy it now on Ebay for example). I found a solution that works for me in Windows 8. The link is in this thread. http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/questions/101-331089/my-mouse-sporadically-double-clicks-when-i-press-it-only-once Utility is called : FixMouseLMB Fielder

How to make FSX smooth with any LCD, LCD Monitor or Plasma TV connected by DVI / HDMI No cfg file tweaks needed just widescreen true and vsync ForceFullScreenVsync=1 Go to your video control panel AMD Catalyst or Nvidia Control Panel. On Nvidia Control Panel go to Display Select Change Resolution Select your Refresh rate 60Hz, 50Hz, 30Hz, 24Hz (30Hz is best) If you have an AMD / ATI Card go to AMD ATI Catalyst Select Desktop Management Select Desktop Properties Select your Refresh rate 60Hz, 50Hz, 30Hz, 24Hz(30Hz is best) Load FSX go to settings Select Graphics Target Frame rate Adjust your frame rate to match your Hz …

Recently solved a really annoying problem I had after going through all the normal routes, flushing shader cache, etc. After deciding to try out Kostas tweaks to FSX including CFG changes, I had the attached screen showing on the free flight screen for all aircraft, this was replicated in game. Long story short and after following several dead ends, I discovered the problem was caused by having shader 3.0 mod installed and having reset the fsx.cfg file which removed a required line from the config file that shader 3.0 requires. Simply uninstalling the shader 3 mod and flushing the shader cache resolved it. As the problem was caused by a missing line from t…

Well, this is nothing new, but figured I'd share my ENB series settings. It took me hours to get it to this point; so maybe for someone out there it will be a freebie. I spent a few nights experimenting with and researching all the ENB series file settings and have got it to a point where it seems, at least to my eyes, to be very real, with a touch of atmospheric bloom, and working in all conditions (desert, night, day etc.). I found this handy download that installs ENB into your fsx directly. It's been tweaked by the maker, but I find it to be quite conservative and not using the enb potential to the fullest Imho. Thanks for making the installer though! : h…

This all started with me wanting to buy TrackIR 5. But because 1)I'm poor and 2) I play fsx sitting far back on a couch with a big screen, I couldn't because track IR5 has a maximum distance of 4 feet. Also it's bloody expensive. I love the idea, look, and functionality of the system, but it can't work with my physical set up and bank account. At first glance, this might seem silly, but holy crap does it work nearly as well as track IR...especially for just casual flying looking left and right, up and down. If you've ever tried Mouse-look ( shift+ O) , you'll notice that it has the lovely, smooth, 'real' head motions of track IR...only you're using the mouse,…

For all people out there how have a jailbroken iDevice, I found a new app on Cydia called FMC Planner. This app lets you plan a flight according to the different sections of a FMC. The app also has Dropbox support. The app works on all devices running iOS 5.0 or higher. A valid copy of PMDG's 737 NGX for FSX is needed, cause the apps data is based on the -600,-700,-800 and -900 model of PMDG.

Hello all, today I decided to take my new batch of Saitek Pro flight TQ apart to improve the weak lever detent. Hope this will improve your Saitek TQ and better flight sim experience. Regards, AJ

To all simmers: I hope we all take a moment to reflect on the contributions of this prolific flight simming contributor and wonderful man, on this one year anniversary of his passing. RIP Opa.

This is a trick to look at the old MS flight sites in case if you write a history report or look for old info.FS 2004 links:FS 2004 site during the time when Boeing made the 777-200LR:http://web.archive.o....fsinsider.com/FS 2004 site when FSX was announced:http://web.archive.o.../fsinsider.com/FSX sites:FSX site when it was first released:http://web.archive.o....fsinsider.com/When Microsoft planned to release the expansion pack for FSX:http://web.archive.o....fsinsider.com/When the expansion pack was released:http://web.archive.o...ames/fsinsider/Before ACES closed:http://web.archive.o...es/default.aspxWhen FSX had a shortage:http://web.archive.o...ames/fsinsider/The sit…

For a continuous update of "Who's online?" - here's a small "convenience" tip: my normal browser is Firefox, and there's around nine or so, tabs along the top, giving me quick browsing to those regular sites. What I also do, is to launch IE as well, connect to the "http://forum.avsim.net/pages/teamspeak" site, and then squidge it down into a small window at the side of my main browser. Many of us have more than one monitor, so it becomes an un-obtrusive no-brainer. It refreshes itself every five seconds or so, and you can always see who's online out of the corner of your eye.

Looking for a better way to keep charts handier than printing them out, I have tried installing approach/departure charts/airport diagrams on my Kindle 3 (I can't afford an IPad2 right now). I had installed individual charts in the Kindle as a PDF, then transferred them to a collection named AIRNAV CHARTS. This was too cumbersome as each chart is listed individually.I then found a website called On-final.com. At this website, you can download all the charts for an airport as one larger PDF file. Then I named each file by it's code (e.g KDEN Bundle for Denver International) and installed the bundle to the AIRNAV CHARTS collection.This makes finding all relevant charts for …

Hello After searching and researching I finally came up with a workable and flexible alternative to purchasing a dedicated CDU panel to work with FSX and my PMDG and other Aircraft. My system Configuration ASUS Deluxe PS5 MbDual Pentium 3.33 ghz CPU4 gb memoryRadeon 6770 Graphics CardCreative Lab soundcard3 1tb hdsSaitek RuddersSaitek Radio PanelsSaitel YokeLilliput 669Gl touchscreen46 Inch Olevia Monitor (HDMI)Windows 7 32 bit (too late to upgrade to 64 bit) What I wanted was a Flexible CDU Panel versus a dedicated CDU Panel. After reading several reviews of the available CDU panels I was discouraged by both the quality and the price. I finally decided on the Lilliput to…

Two of the best sites I've come across when looking to bump up the muscle:-920 series procs:-http://forums.pureoverclock.com/showthread.php?threadid=5736Sandy Bridge:-http://www.clunk.org.uk/forums/overclocking/39184-p67-sandy-bridge-overclocking-guide-beginners.htmlHave fun!

If you are not getting the "Tune ATIS" option at airports which are not in the default FS2004 database - such as Kai Tak (9Dragons version) or a ficticious airport you have created yourself, the following should correct the problem:a. Open the airport in Afcad or similar utility.b. Under Lists, locate the Com frequencies and then highlight the ATIS entry and select Properties.c. The "Name" data must be the airport's ICAO code. See screenshot.In the case of Kai Tak, the afcads which come with the enhancement all read Hong Kong instead of VHHX.Just changing the Name data allowed the ATIS to now be an option on my ATC menu. If you are adding the ATIS, just be sure the ICAO …

If you are suddenly experiencing Keyboard issues in FSX or FS2004, this may be a solution:Are you on Comcast? (the Internet provider)If you are ...The problem is with "Comcast's" new "Constant Guard". It scrambles all of your keyboard commands while online and in FSX or FS9. All you need to do is remove that program from your computer and restart and you will be a happy camper again. You can thank a fellow by the name of "34Kansas" who posted this fix on another site.

I just ran across this "tip" in another forum and thought it should be posted here as well.Normally if you have a PopUP window (the compass as an example) invoked, it will not continue to display when you change views - when going to Spot View for instance.You can keep any PopUp window visible when you change views by just adding the following line to the window in question in your panel.cfg file:type=specialThis works in both FS2004 and FSX.If you wish to close the PopUp when in another view, just Right click the PopUp window and select the close option.This "trick" works very well for me as I often like to have the compass always available.Hope you find it useful.

Problem: You have downloaded and installed a new livery (repaint) for your favorite aircraft - but it does not show up in your aircraft selection screen.Solution: Using the following "checklist" should help you find the problem.Assuming you Copied the new texture folder and Pasted it in the proper airplane folder, and assuming you Copied (using Notepad) the [fltsim.n] data which was provided and Pasted it correctly into the aircraft.cfg file:a. The title= line must be unique (if it duplicates another title= line, the new texture will not display)b. The sim= line must refer to an .air file which you have (without the .air extension) in that aircraft folder. If it calls for…

A friend of mine just sent me this cool "trick" for FSX so thought I would pass it along.Normally you cannot pan when in Tower View in FSX.Using this procedure, you can.On your Assignments page, set up a key combo for the "View track/pan Toggle" entry. I used CTRL I as it was available. (this could be done with the registered version of FSUIPC also) Go to Fly now and then get into Tower View - then invoke the key combo you set. You should now be able to pan 360 degrees while in Tower View using your hat switch. Hitting the key combo again will return you to the normal Tower View.Hope it works as well for you as it does for me.