The A2A Simulations Community

Lockheed Martin has launched a new licensing scheme for their P3D with new 1.3 version release. You can now purchase P3D for just $49.95. So, monthly fee for developers and expensive professional purchase is no longer required.

Here is the news announcement:
http://www.prepar3d.com/news/lockheed-m ... -students/

Here is the info for new 50 buck licence. Home use is now official!:
http://www.prepar3d.com/prepar3d-academic/

Version 1.3 release notes:
http://www.prepar3d.com/prepar3d-versio ... hange-log/

This is getting really interesting. LM is actively developing the sim by listening community wishes (what I've read) and now it seems to be more easily in the reach for us home users. There are of course still many things to be done to make P3D fully a complete alternative for FSX (such as wide 3rd party dev support, TrackIR is now working only through EZDOK, and there are difficulties in installing some FSX addons to P3D, some not working at all or have EULA restrictions). But, things are starting to look really good IMO.

Price is really not that bad anymore and I think I'm going to try out P3D at last. After all, you don't lose your FSX install after installing P3D, so what the heck Anyways, somehow XPX just doesn't seem to be my product (and no A2A for XPX!) not to mention gameish Flight, so why not to try this one now. To me, P3D is starting to look the best future successor to FSX. Of course, it will be a whole new ballgame when the P3D 2.0 comes out in the future as it may lose its backwards compatibility to FSX/ESP. Ultimately, I think 3rd party support will be the ultimate make or break for P3D in home simmers computers.

Edit: downloading now with blazing fast speed.

This is awesome news grunt! Good catch.

P3d is the most logical next step for fsx simmers IMHO...

Cheers!

Bud

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Buddy Morgan



i5 2500k - Asus P8P67 Pro - G.Skill Ripjaw 8GB - EVGA GTX 570 Fermi

Only if you walk sideways.
Developers are only modifying their installers to install FSX sceneries into Prepar3d, and one of them even charges additional $$ for a side by side license. Prepar3d makes sense as an upgrade from FS9, but for those of us using FSX, just a lateral move.

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I see things bit differently. FSX is legacy software now and no one is going to fix its inherent problems, ever. Yes, right now P3D is pretty much FSX, but LM has already fixed issues and is constantly developing it, which takes FSX as a platform forward. It is very unlikely that P3D is going to fully replace my FSX in immediate future, but tomorrow I'm going to start dropping addons in the sim, test it a bit and after that see where things are going. Nowadays, FSX is a good platform with all its flaws and who knows what P3D is going to be in the future when former ACES guys in LM are continuing the work they made for MS until ACES was shut down. To me at least, P3D seems to be the best option for successor. When and if this happens, I don't know. I support the effort of the team by purchasing the product and I hope P3D goes forward from the home simmer perspective. Future P3D 2.0 with redone graphics engine will most likely be the big jump and if we have good support from 3rd party devs at that time, we may have a winner in our hands.

I tend to agree at present. It would be a lateral move today, but I've heard that they are looking towards making P3d DX11 compatible. I think that has potential to be a game changer from what we know of FSX today.

Bear in mind, I have absolutely ZERO knowledge of software development, but from a consumer standpoint... I think the best thing to happen to our hobby would be for the developers to have a good solid relationship with the platform company... Unlike what we are seeing with Flight!. As the platform evolves, the developers will be able to move in conjunction with the platform upgrades.

I'm happy with FSX as it stands, but much like my iPhone... Until the next model comes out, I don't really know what I'm missing. I think P3d has the same potential to roll out new and improved platforms periodically and then the developers will do the same. Time will tell!

Cheers!

Bud

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Buddy Morgan



i5 2500k - Asus P8P67 Pro - G.Skill Ripjaw 8GB - EVGA GTX 570 Fermi

This post is about other publisher, but I don't consider A2A and ORBX as competitors, so here it goes. I also believe that many of us here are using ORBX sceneries with their A2A aircraft, so this is is IMO relevant post here. Moderators, feel free to remove this if this is against the policy:

For all ORBX scenery owners and those who are considering the P3D or already own it: ORBX has released all their former side-by-side-licenses (SBSLs) in FlightsimStore for free, so there is no extra cost in running ORBX scenery in FSX and P3D anymore! Not all areas are yet covered with SBSLs, but ORBX has also announced new merger tool coming in near future.

Here is the announcement:
http://www.orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/ ... ator-tool/

Things are really starting to kick in with new 50 buck licence. I hope other important publishers (*cough* A2A *cough* ) are following the example. Porting over is mostly just modifying the installer, of course some addons may require bit additional work. Shouldn't be that much, because P3D is basically patched up ESP.

There's apparently - according to a few developers I have spoken to and posts at FSDeveloper - a significant number of changes between FSX and P3D versions of Simconnect.

This means that any software that uses external modules (such as, for example, Accu-Sim) may well need some considerable work to be made fully functional in P3D, if they use the bits that L-M have changed. I don't know the answer to that, but I do know that I found bugs trying to get the Accu-Sim Spitfire and B-17 into P3D. What I don't know is whether those bugs were specific to the Accu-Sim aircraft, or general P3D bugs. One, at least, was definitely a known P3D bug.

Ian P.