323: Don’t be Fooled

| Tom Tsui

Received quite a lot of spam mails regarding a self-claimed award winning and most realistic flight simulation on the market recently.   Did a search and found that this ProFlightSimulator is actually a rebrand of an open-source flight simulator developed by FlightGear.    The guys just copied and markets the free product for $197 (discounted to $97).   Unbelievable!

Here’s the statement regarding the scam by FlightGear.   Most sadly, there’s nothing the developer can do about it under the Open Source GNU GPL v2 protocol.   So be careful and don’t be Santa in this way.

 

322: Wind Indicator on C172 Heading Gyro

| Tom Tsui

Different to the Integrated version, the design of my Standalone C172 Heading Gyro doesn’t come with anyC172_HDG_Wind_Taxi indication of wind direction so as to render a more realistic appearance.

Many users, however, have been requesting to include such a feature because it is a useful reference while taxiing on the ground so that proper aileron and elevator actions could be conducted against strong headwinds, crosswinds or tailwinds as in the real life situation. Continue reading →

C172 Gauges Updates Delivered

| Tom Tsui

Download links for my C172 gauges updates have all been sent by emails.   Any users who don’t receive my mails should contact me directly or notify me via the Comment Section below.

321: C172 Gauges Price Reduced

| Tom Tsui

Due to the coming of Christmas and the new A36 and B58 gauges, plus the C172 gauges have been released for nearly a year, prices of both the Integrated and Standalone C172 gauges have been reduced up to 25% off.

In addition, the latest versions of both series, now equipped with the newly written installer, are fully compatible with both the file structures from the old and the new Saitek drivers as well as the SPAD.neXt driver as mentioned in the previous post.

Installation is even simpler.   Continue reading →

320: SPAD.neXt with FIP Support Released

| Tom Tsui

SPAD.neXt (Saitek Panel Advanced Drivers neXt Generation) by Ulrich Strauss is a replacement driver for Saitek’s Flight Simulation Panels.   The just released version 0.8 now provides full support to Saitek’s Flight Instrument Panels as well.

HDCMPIndeed, the recent drivers from Saitek have brought improvements over older versions.  That’s no doubt about it.  But they are still lack of flexibility and configurability.   Especially, the company’s FIP driver still only support a subset of the simulation variables.  This has caused incompatibility issue among those 3rd-party aircrafts which use the simulation variables extensively in their designs. Continue reading →

319: B58 and A36 FIP Gauges Preview

| Tom Tsui

B58 ENGLately, half of my minimal flightsim time were spent on creating new FIP gauges for Baron B58 (both default & Carenado versions) and Bonanza A36 simultaneously as they share many similarities.

Different from the last C172 gauges which categorizes into Standalone and Integrated versions, and charges separately, the new B58 and A36 gauges to come will include both Standalone and Integrated or Extended gauge face-plates altogether in a single package, when applicable.

This includes customization for both default and Carenado aircrafts, making some of the gauges consisting of up to four different versions.

In addition, the installer for the new gauges will be compatible to Windows 10 and the new Saitek drivers file structure as well.

Followings are a few more preview screenshots of the gauges already completed or about to complete.   Continue reading →

318: Another Network FIPs Start Up Approach

| Tom Tsui

In response to the last article regarding Starting up Networked FIPs Locally, Michael Basler recommends another simpler and even more versatile approach.   Here’s the note from Michael:

==========

I start the simulator Continue reading →

317: Starting Up Networked FIPs Locally

| Tom Tsui

TechLevel02W
Putting FIPs on a networked PC could reserve system resources for the simulator but the FIPs on the remote computer have to be started manually.

Stefano Cancelli in the Comment section of the story provides a solution by using a Microsoft utility called PSExec.    Via PSExec, the FIPs on the networked PC can now start up automatically when FSX on the local computer launches, and quits when FSX exits.

Very useful tips and followings are the instruction from Stef: Continue reading →