Flight simulator software

[Haole Boy]

Aloha everyone,

Hoping someone can help me with this. Customer's machine died, he's in his late 70's and just uses it for email, playing movies and running a flight simulator program. Got him set up with a new machine that will get his email and play his movies. But... now he wants me to recommend a flight simulator program. I know nothing about this at all. He's got the "yoke" and foot pedals (no idea what brand or model they are).

Any recommendations? He's not looking for air combat type of stuff, just general aviation simulation. The machine is running Windows 7.

Mahalo,

Harry Z

 

[Porthos]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/314160/Microsoft_Flight_Simulator_X_Steam_Edition/

System Requirements

• 
  Minimum:
  • OS: Windows® XP Service Pack 2 or later
    
  • Processor: 2.0 Ghz or higher (single core)
    
  • Memory: 2 GB RAM
    
  • Graphics: DirectX®9 compliant video card or greater, 256 MB video RAM or higher, Shader Model 1.1 or higher (Laptop versions of these chipsets may work but are not supported. Updates to your video and sound card drivers may be required)
    
  • DirectX: Version 9.0c
    
  • Network: Broadband Internet connection
    
  • Storage: 30 GB available space
    
  • Additional Notes: Broadband internet connection required for multiplayer features

 

[Mainstay]

I have a customer that just loves https://store.steampowered.com/app/269950/XPlane_11/

 

[Alexey]

You should probably ask what he had originally. As far as peaceful simulators go, both MS Flight Simulator X and X-Plane (whatever latest version there is), are good.

 

[timeshifter]

Reminds me of something my dad told me. He was into flight simulator software when we got them a computer years ago. After getting a little familiar with it he ran into a friend of a friend who was a commercial airline pilot. Dad mention the flight simulator and how he was progressing with it and told the guy that take-offs were good but was still having trouble with landings. To which the pilot replied:

"Take-offs are optional, landings are mandatory"

 

[nerd2u]

Install a combat flight sim for him he may enjoy the change or pace lol

Sent from my SM-G870W using Tapatalk

 

[Alexey]

"Take-offs are optional, landings are mandatory"

This only true in spacecraft. Aircraft eventually land one way or other. Nobody ever stuck up there yet.

 

[Sky-Knight]

I found this one recently trolling a Steam discussion thread. https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/products/world/

 

[Alexey]

If you want peace, X-Plane is more realistic, MS Flight Simulator X (steam edition) is less realistic but still good.
If you want war, DCS World is realistic to the extreme, and then you have IL-2 variations, and Rise of Flight.

If you need multiplayer, MSFS X and Il-2 certainly support multiplayer and there is War Thunder but the latter is more of an arcade with pretty limited flight modeling. Others likely support multiplayer as well but I'm not quite sure.

 

[Salteque]

You should probably ask what he had originally. (whatever latest version there is), are good.

This would be very important, mostly to determine if his add-ons would be compatible with a newer version. Also what particular aircraft does he like to fly? How deep should the simulation of those aircraft be?
In the flight sim community most folks are on Xplane 11 or Lockheed Martins Prepar3d V4. Prepar3d is developed from the ESP platform ( professional version of FSX) that Lockheed bought from Microsoft way back. It has the advantage of being compatible with many older fsx add-ons.
You'd get alot of info searching the flightsim subreddit and the forums at avsim.com. There are also alot of flight simmers on twitch and YouTube as well.

But first find what he uses and then you can go from there.

 

[Haole Boy]

Mahalo for all the replies! Much appreciated!

Customer had an older version of Microsoft Flight Simulator, so I'm going to go with the new(er) version of Microsoft Flight Simulator that is steam powered. I know nothing about this, so it will be a learning experience for me.

(kind of ironic working on this one... my formal education is as an aircraft mechanic, but never actually worked as one...).

Harry Z

 

[Steve202]

Back in the day I was big into MS Flight Sim. Microsoft Flight Simulator X Steam Edition is probably the easiest to use

 

[Salteque]

Back in the day I was big into MS Flight Sim. Microsoft Flight Simulator X Steam Edition is probably the easiest to use

You'd be amazed at the immersion and depth of systems simulation available on the latest platforms. It's really come a long way.

 

[Haole Boy]

Again, thanks for all the feedback. Unfortunately, I hit a roadblock using the Microsoft "Steam" flight sim. It REQUIRES admin authority, and there's no way I'm giving this customer admin access. He regularly gets call from "Microsoft Support" and gives them free access to the machine. So, I've locked down the machine as much as possible.

Ended up wasting about 1.5 hours downloading / installing all the Steam stuff plus the actual Flight Sim stuff before realizing there is no way this will work for this customer. Uninstalled all the Steam & MS Flight Sim stuff, and ordered the DVD (non-Steam) version from Amazon.

Again, all the feedback was greatly appreciated, just wanted to update the situation in case anyone else has this same issue.

Harry Z

 

[Porthos]

and ordered the DVD (non-Steam) version from Amazon.

It may too require Admin access as well.

 

[Haole Boy]

It may too require Admin access as well.

Well, on the Steam community pages there were several people ****** off that their DVD version did not require Admin authority but the Steam version did. Hopefully I will find the same thing. If not, I'll be back asking for other recommendations.

Mahalo for taking the time to reply.

Harry Z

 

[Altster]

I see no one mentioned Flight Gear - and the best part of it is - it's Open Source Software. From what I understand it sounds like he may have what is required to use this simulator. I might be a bit late in responding, but you might wish to check it out anyway.

 

[Haole Boy]

I see no one mentioned Flight Gear - and the best part of it is - it's Open Source Software. From what I understand it sounds like he may have what is required to use this simulator. I might be a bit late in responding, but you might wish to check it out anyway.

Mahalo for the info. If the DVD version of Microsoft Flight Simulator X does not work, I'll give this a try.

Harry Z

 

[jzukerman]

Again, thanks for all the feedback. Unfortunately, I hit a roadblock using the Microsoft "Steam" flight sim. It REQUIRES admin authority, and there's no way I'm giving this customer admin access. He regularly gets call from "Microsoft Support" and gives them free access to the machine. So, I've locked down the machine as much as possible.

Ended up wasting about 1.5 hours downloading / installing all the Steam stuff plus the actual Flight Sim stuff before realizing there is no way this will work for this customer. Uninstalled all the Steam & MS Flight Sim stuff, and ordered the DVD (non-Steam) version from Amazon.

Again, all the feedback was greatly appreciated, just wanted to update the situation in case anyone else has this same issue.

Harry Z

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=7352
Although not supported anymore, it does work just fine on Windows 7. Takes a little bit of detective work to figure out if one or more executables need elevated permissions, but once setup, it's good. I use it with a couple of business clients and their Line-of-Business apps.

 

[Haole Boy]

I installed Flight Simulator X from DVD onto the customer's computer today. Works fine. Recognized his yoke and rudder pedals with no input from me. Success!

A couple of warnings:
- The install took more than 1 hour. After about 20 minutes it was only 30% done, so I left the customer and told him to call me when it was done. (He is only a 5 minute drive from my place so it was easy to leave and come back again.). (I charge by the hour, so it was a waste of my time and my customer's money to just sit there...)

- Activation was a PITA. The online server apparently wasn't working (if it even still exists after all these years). So went the phone call route which pushes you to use a smartphone. They send you a link which connects you to an app where you type in the registration key in the app. But there was no 0 (zero) on the numeric keypad so I could not use this. Called back and refused to use the smartphone and you end up typing in your 48 character numeric key, then they give you another 48 character key you have to type in. But, it got done and he's happy.

Again, thanks for all the suggestions and help.

Harry Z