Just an other remark: Sometime I don't understand answers from Virtualy like: FSDT sceneries are made for FSX, which is much better than FS9 and you have to accept some issue.
With regard to the mesh problem, FSX allows a developer to create a very small local mesh than can be used to fix such problem. On FS9, it was much more complex, because one had to create a whole LOD quadrant, and start "resolution war" with any other meshes around.
I agree that FSX is probably a better platform for quality sceneries but I am asking myself why it is sold for FS9?
Because we found a method to convert the FSX scenery into FS9 so quickly, that it doens't make sense not to do it, as long there are people buying it. But we were always been open telling that the FSX version is the best one.
A lot of sceneries works pretty well in FS9 and actually there are more people complaining about FSX than FS9.
No, you shouldn't make the usualy mistake of assuming that that people that posts on forum statistically represent the reality. People that post on forum for complaint are ONLY users that have problems, and it's easier to have problems in FSX, not because FSX is worse than FS9, but because it's crippled by addon products that weren't specifically designed for it, and were instead ported from FS9, and this is a big no-no.
I've seen countless how "tutorials" aimed at developers, written by "respected" people that many developers usually trust for guidance, that suggest techniques, especially for gauges, which don't make ANY SENSE. They didn't make much sense in FS9 already, and are entirely wrong and possibly dangerous in FSX.
Whenever I get a look at ANY source code sample for gauges, the code is written so bad, that it's a miracle it would even *works*, let alone works fast. 95% of the developers in the flight sim industry are amateurs who learned C/C++ *because* they were forced to use it to develop gauges, and they are now happily downgrading to the XML "language", because C/C++ was just too much for them.
They don't have any idea of how to optimize for real-time simulation, they never run their stuff through a profiler and, even if they did, they wouldn't had any clue how to fix the problems in any case, so they just put the blame on FSX, because they aren't able to program an airplane that doesn't suck half of the fps all alone, so they force users to run it on a sim designed for 6-years old hardware, so it doesn't entirely get crippled on today's fast machines, and those poor users think the airplane has the right to be slow, because it has a complex simulation...
Here's a performance charts that shows exactly what I'm talking about:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3395/3251820427_5e46b7e173_o.jpgHigher bars means better fps. I assume everybody here knows who programmed the Microsoft F/A-18...
There are commercial AI packages that still includes
models from FS2002!! Because the publishers don't want to invest in rebuilding the whole AI set with FSX standards and proper LOD, which is too time consuming, hoping users would not mind, because it's easy to put (again) the blame on FSX begin "slow", and "everybody" knows it...
End of rantSorry guys, but it was too much time I had to vent this...I promise this is the last time.