If you have been wondering whether Flight1's "Ultimate Traffic Live" is worth purchasing, let me assure you that it is. Other than Orbx, I can't think of another product that has done so much to enhance my pleasure and immersion in FSX-SE. There are plenty of positive things to say but I'll keep it to a few:

1. Because all the models used are FSX native, the FPS is amazing. One of the things I missed from the FS9 days was airports with LOTS of AI. Now you can have this with very acceptable performance. For many areas I've tried it in so far, I've had the sliders at 100% AI (GA and Airliners) and NO stutters or problems of any kind. Also, because the models are all FSX native, you can turn the aircraft shadows on the ground without risking the AI suddenly vanishing or even having the slightest effect on FPS. The visual quality of the aircraft models is very high - I've been very impressed with some details I have seen when getting up close.

2. I don't think I realized how much time I wasted constantly tweaking AI and trying to convert various packages so they would work in FSX. Those days are over! I can actually (gasp) use my sim time for flying!!!

The only thing I miss is military traffic but I have enough FSX packages to keep me happy and the good folks at MAIW are coming out with some major FSX upgrades - all of their F16 and P3 packages are now available in FSX native models, with more on the way. (C130 is my guess)... I'm hoping the developer may add some military options. I think this is an aspect of the hobby that has grown considerably, if the increasing number of outstanding payware military planes is any guide. Personally, I would even be willing to pay for a separate product that achieved this on the same level as UT Live.

I'm sure there are going to be some posts from people who have had problems with UT Live - as we all know, systems are different and there are sometimes problems that happen for one person that don't for others. All I can tell  you is that so far it has been virtually flawless. In three days of using it, I have discovered ONE wrong texture and it took me 30 seconds after I found it to replace it with the right one. (If you're interested, it was the Dash 8 400. I was seeing shadows on the ground but no airplane. Luckily, the  shadow easily identified the culprit and it was a single .bmp file which I replaced with .dds from another source.)

I don't think I've ever posted what some might see as a "product endorsement" - that is not my intention. Just sharing with my fellow sim addicts that this particular product has been a really great experience for me

Cheers

Ian

I completely agree, best AI package bar none.

Completely agree.  I've also gone to sites like FAIB and FSPX AI to get more current models, and there are plenty of repaints out there since UTL still has some of the older ones.  The developer will also put out a Power Pack with newer liveries and enhanced options.

It's good, but my only gripe is the dated liveries/schedules. I get that development was focused on changing the way AI is injected, and they did a great job with that, but sometimes I'll be sitting at a busy airport and feel like I'm back in 2008.

Also, I wish there was more cargo options out of the box.

Glad you all like it, but this is one bandwagon that I'm not jumping on.  I'm just not interested in another incomplete product.

Ernie

Thanks for the mini-review Iain. Good to hear that you are seeing great FPS levels but I wondered what sort of VAS impact this has, particularly at 100%, as I understand that AI generally contributes a lot to VAS usage?

Bill

10 hours ago, scianoir said:

Thanks for the mini-review Iain. Good to hear that you are seeing great FPS levels but I wondered what sort of VAS impact this has, particularly at 100%, as I understand that AI generally contributes a lot to VAS usage?

Bill

Hi Bill. As an old codger, I'm a bit confused by some of the newer aspects of performance criteria like VAS. I have tried to read up on it, but my poor old brain has trouble with some of the terminology, so I'm pretty much stuck in the "if it isn't stuttering it's working fine" mode.

 All I can say is that so far I've had zero OOM crashes and fast texture loading times even after flying for some time. Currently  I don't do any point to point flying, as I have so many airports and addon planes from the Christmas sales (don't tell my wife!) that mostly I'm doing local flights. As I understand it, VAS is an issue for those who do a lot of long distance heavy metal flying and so I can't comment on that. But prior to getting rid of my old AI, I was having frequent OOM issues and sometimes loading textures from external to VC views took ridiculous amounts of time. I also haven't tried it in any congested areas yet, as my current obsessions are flying within certain Orbx regions, particularly Norway, Papua New Guinea, Alaska and New Zealand. I'm sure 100% traffic going into EGLL or JFK would be pushing my luck.

12 hours ago, adf said:

It's good, but my only gripe is the dated liveries/schedules. I get that development was focused on changing the way AI is injected, and they did a great job with that, but sometimes I'll be sitting at a busy airport and feel like I'm back in 2008.

Also, I wish there was more cargo options out of the box.

I agree about the cargo options. I'm sure there were copyright issues or something but it's pretty weird not having UPS or FedEx etc. But it is possible to get some FAIB and FSPX models with cargo repaints and I'm sure there will be more as people see the need to fill that particular gap. As for the older liveries, when you get to my  age mate, going back to 2008 is actually a good thing. It adds to the pleasure to leave reality behind for a while and go back to the "good old days," which for  me is any time at all that isn't now! LOL I'm not  quite sure what Ernie means by an "incomplete" product as they have already issued an upgrade and I'm sure they will continue to develop the product, but frankly, I can't see any developer having the resources to give us a "complete" product if that means every type of airplane flying in the world in every real-world livery that's completely up to date. To me it's all about "immersion" into a fantasy but "real-seeming" world, so if I land at an airport and see good looking AI that belongs at that particular location, I'm happy. That's what it's been so far - I haven't seen anything that shouldn't be there and haven't noticed any glaring omissions other than some of the major cargo companies and military traffic. Those I can take care of myself... All I can say is to repeat what I've already said - FS9 levels of AI density with smooth operation, great looking  models and realistic looking airports with FPS never below 25 and often far higher. I'm loving it...............

Hi Iain. From one old codger to another, I had no option but to force my poor old brain to learn about VAS usage a few years ago because of frequent OOMs and to be honest I'm still not quite sure where VAS 'lives' but FSUIPC allows me to keep an eye on it and avoid most OOMs! I do however have a number of FSX configurations which I can select depending on anticipated aircraft or scenery resource demands.

Its good to hear that you've had zero OOMs and improved texture loading times after getting rid of your old AI and installing UT Live particularly with your AI sliders so high. I run my AI (using Ultimate Traffic 2) at about 10-15% (and sometimes lower) and at that level airports can be pretty bare but it certainly helps with avoiding  OOMs when using resource intense aircraft into and out of resource intense airports. It would however be nice to be able to run AI traffic at higher levels so I am tempted to try UT Live.

By the way it's good to hear that someone else has ridiculously large numbers of addon aircraft and airports - I really need to stop but just keep adding more!

Bill

14 hours ago, adf said:

It's good, but my only gripe is the dated liveries/schedules. I get that development was focused on changing the way AI is injected, and they did a great job with that, but sometimes I'll be sitting at a busy airport and feel like I'm back in 2008.

The schedules are from mid 2017, hard to call that dated when even the most up to date custom setups are mostly from the same time period.

Liveries are definitely outdated, correct? 

42 minutes ago, okupton said:

Liveries are definitely outdated, correct? 

Are they? I haven't noticed that... 

But then again, it's not something I have looks truly hard at. The airports I visit (mainly major airports in europe and US) seems correct... 

Also, I agree with the OP! Amazing FPS and easy setup. No fiddling around and very nice models.

Edited May 16, 20188 yr by Anders Bermann

Some of the liveries are outdated. For example I still see some of the old American Airlines paints from time to time. You can change/add liveries but it wasn't the best experience for me. Hoping to see an update soon, but there is no ETA. On the plus side, it does perform very well in P3D v4.2.

12 hours ago, SKEWR said:

Some of the liveries are outdated. For example I still see some of the old American Airlines paints from time to time. You can change/add liveries but it wasn't the best experience for me. Hoping to see an update soon, but there is no ETA. On the plus side, it does perform very well in P3D v4.2.

It took me a little while to figure out how to add liveries but I can say that I have now added about 100 to passenger airlines, all native FSX models and no performance hit, and there are now addon packages for UTL for FedEx and UPS so at least some of the cargo deficit has been filled. Another thing that is nice is simply by using the F1 or F2 key, you can scale the traffic density up or down depending on your need while continuing to fly - there's no pause whatsoever as it simply adjusts the amount of traffic it is injecting into the sim. You can see the results instantly. I am impressed with some of the features of the new Just Flight traffic program and maybe wish I had waited, as I find dealing with Flight1 on any topic a real pain, while Just Flight have wonderful product support people and a much easier way of working with them... So for those who are still "on the fence," you might want to check out Just Flight. It's in the pre-release stage so I'm sure it's still a bit buggy, but Just Flight have a good track record of releasing timely fixes for problems

I just reinstalled FSX:SE after about 6 months without it, and I had purchased UTL for P3Dv4 a few days ago.  I am certainly very pleased with UTL in FSX:SE.  It's funny, UTL knew that I installed FSX:SE and I loaded it up the first time I ran FSX:SE, even from a different drive.  I can say that it seems to work better for me in FSX:SE and appears very little if any frame rate impact.  I haven't noticed anything with VAS yet, but I'm still installing add-ons.