MinnSpin

My Feedback: (40)

The past few weeks, a club member hastreated us to RFG3.5 via a laptop projector onto 8' wall - COOL, Way cool! Kind of like flyingat IMAX - if you can imagine that - especially cockpit view.

Now, I'd like to upgrade from AeroFly (or Aero-Float as is more the case). As of this posting, Toweris offering G5 for $199plus Add-On's 1-5 at no charge (downloads). Plus $20 off your order.

So my question: - who's actually got some stick time on this G5 and what's your feedback? Is it worth pursuing or should I consider a G3.5 ebay purchase? I am concerned about system performance, although my computers (including laptop) are setup to run Pro-E, sporting 2+ gigs RAM.

I'd appreciate any / all weigh-ins.

hugho

At the AMA model show a couple of weeks ago, I talked to the real flight vender and came to the conclusion to stay with the 4.5 I have. The up grade to G5, cost a $100 and he said, "there really wasn't all that much difference." Take your choice.

I like the 4.5.

Good luck

HughO

da Rock

I've got some G5 stick time. Started with G3 and moved up with some of the in-betweens.

As you've had an exposure to G3.5 on a laptop, let's consider that.

There were some unrealistic things RF has done since inception. From what I've seen with my G5, I'm pretty sure they've got them fixed, at least the ones that bothered me. For example, landings can go wrong now. They didn't used to, and the plane used to stick on touchdown for all of them.

RF has always been software that pushed equipment, especially pc's that had motherboard graphics. So look at your specs versus the ones on the box carefully.

I gotta say that G5 has been very useful to me recently. I've just been restricted to the house for a few weeks and been on this pc with G5. The forced time has actually been somewhat enjoyable because of G5. I got bored once and switched over to FSOne. Nothing seemed much better or worse, but the model selection was greatly different. It's good that RF has continued to improve their product and expand it as well.

Truth is, there are also a few cheap sims available. RealFlight isn't the only one. Just happens to be the one you're most apt to see in LHSs and at friend's houses. No matter, it is certainly worth the cost if you've got the hardware to run it. Check the specs.

MinnSpin

My Feedback: (40)

Thank you for your feedback.
With Tower offer,G5 good investment. Much as the case with lower priced and free simulator, fall short do they when fine tuning flight characteristics and such. Much to learn have I.

Bonified Wingnut

Like da Rock said I didn't like the landings in the older version. In the G5 they are tougher- they bounce just about as bad as I do in real life.. Everytime I use it I learn sometning new. Finally figured out the brakes on the jets..by reading the plane description...go figure. It's nice to fly online with other people. Its about as close to being at the flying field I can get and still be indoors.-BW

Daddyo57

My Feedback: (15)

I have had my G-5 for a week and a half now and have flown many older versions along with other flight sims. I have to say G-5 is very realistic overall, I was very pleasantly surprised at how well the slope soaring simulates the real experience. It is a very usefull training tool for sure but I got it mainly to help me learn 3-D flying and keep up on my helecopter ability. I know it is fairly expensive but I fugure if it saves one crash it is a worthwhile investment,BTW I have saved 35,000 dollars so far! BTW just so someone doesnt take me litteraly... I did not really save 35,000 dollars, I DID however learn a bit more about flying in different situations and I DO really enjoy my new G-5 immensly. I had the FMS flight simulator and I find that I got what I paid for, meaning not much. Did i mention that I am really really having fun with it? yes 200 bucks worth of fun!

johndou

As has been mentioned G5 (and G4.X) are resource hogs. RealFlight lists their “Minimum requirements� and “Optimal requirements� on their box (or you can read it here - http://www.realflight.com/new/system-reqs.html ) Yet as most RealFlight users have discovered these system requirements, even the optimal requirements, aren’t capable of running the program optimally.

There’s a thread on the KnifeEdge site (the software developers of RealFlight) that discusses these issues and it would benefit you to read through it. http://www.knifeedge.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25224

A couple of examples: “...something better than the optimal specs, if you want to turn up the eye candy. I have a q6600 2.4 GHz quad core processor with 4 gig RAM and 2 Nvidia 8800GTS cards that does well.�
“I'm running a 3 Ghz quad core with 8 GB RAM and a Nvidia 9800GT graphics card. Runs fine on XP 64...�

As far as the Add-Ons - they were developed prior to 2006 and are considered “old technology�. But, RealFlight modified them to be compatible with G4.0 and then offered them as a free download (for G4.0 and above). I assume that was done to boost sales. The planes and helis do not exhibit the same physics as the newer technology aircraft, nor do the offer the same quality of graphics.

The argument for saving money from crashes is a bit misleading. If you fly you will crash. Any sim will help you to avoid crashes. So, why not get a free sim and save even more?!

RealFlight has a history of introducing new versions just prior to the Christmas buying season - usually in Oct. RealFlight G3.5 has not seen any of the many bugs it has fixed and has not seen an upgraded since G4.0 came out in Oct. Of 2007. RealFlight G4.5 has not seen an upgrade (bug fix) since G5.0 came out. Just something to be aware of when it comes to RealFlight. Assume that in two years you’ll have to either buy a new upgrade (if RealFlight offers it) or buy the latest version (another $200.00)

dbcisco

I don't like that fact but I have to give RF/KE a break here.
RF/KE, like many software companies, stop fixing their programs as soon as the newest release is out.
I also have to give Microsoft credit for continuing to patch and develop XP long after its "retirement". Not many companies do that.

rmenke

My Feedback: (13)

I have been wanting something better than my very old AFPD and went with the Tower deal. Started at $199.99 less $25.00 discount and free shipping, worth around $10.00 I guess. Could not clean the AFPD off my computer, so further burdened the old computer by adding G5. From my view, the graffics are not as good as AFPD, as sharp or bright. Flight physics are a tad better than AFPD, but not much to brag about. In all fairness to the G5, I am a true computer dummy. Have been trying to find where the expo is for the G5, roll rates are way over reality. Makes hovering harder than the real birds, not what I wanted. Principal reason for the G5 was to get my rolling circles down and looking good. Have been working at that for 4-5 months with some success, 3D hoveing, elevators etc are not a problem. Our club with a few exceptions is a home for the aged over the hill gang that still is debating the virtues of electric while myself and a couple of buddies are having a ball. At 75 I don't want to waste a bunch of time on something inferior, or a big problem to get working correctly.

Don't think the combat feature is worth poop, gotta sign in to the net and work in to a existing group. Not very practical for this computer dummy. Thought there would be some typical fight the system graffics, sad, too bad, no. Don't think I would spend the bucks again here. Hope this helps.

da Rock

When you want to remove every bit and piece of an application from your computer there are a couple of steps to take. They're not really too difficult to do.

Click the lower left Windows button and from that menu work your way into the Control Panel. That'll be a bunch of folders. One of them will mention "programs" in it's title. You get into that to find the list of applications (programs) that you've installed. There will be a way to uninstall each. You might have to right click on the program name and then select uninstall for example.

Very often, the uninstall will leave that program's droppings. They'll usually be in a folder named after the Software company that developed the application or the folder might be named for the program itself. After you've uninstalled the thing is when you look for this folder to delete. Where do you find those program folders usually? Look in the menu that popped up when you clicked that button in the lower left. If that menu has a listing "Computer" click it and you'll see a window with your hard drive shown. Click the hard drive and you'll see a bunch of folders. One of them will be for Programs. Open it and look for a folder named after the Software company that developed the application or the folder might be named for the program itself. Right click it and choose "delete".

After you've got most of the sucker wiped out, you're almost good to go.

Have you done a defragmentation recently? or ever? If you want your pc to work decently, you really need to defrag the sucker every so often. If you're not real computer savvy as you say, you probably aren't defragging. It's pretty easy to do. Where to start? That button in the lower left. It's actually called the Start button, btw. Look in it's popup and you'll see "defragment". It takes awhile. Like overnight is good if you've not done it before. And if you've not done it before, trust me, you should and it will probably make your pc work faster or have less "freeze frames" when playing games etc.

Don't back down from this pc technology. It's actually easier than building model airplanes, otherwise the kids today wouldn't be doing pc stuff either.

Bonified Wingnut

I run Realflight G5 on my $199.00 Black friday special EMachines E627 1.6 ghz outdated laptop with motherboard graphics and 2 gig of ram.. Yes I have to disable some of the graphics to get it to run smooth, but it is far from a High end gaming computer. My desktop is a 2 year old 2.1 ghz AMD dual core with 2 Gb ram, a 256 meg dual core NVIDIA GeForce 8500 GT -Also not a high end gaming computer-and it does fine. The only time it stutters is in multiplayer when some fool has modded their plane to throw out thick black smoke. Like da Rock said knowing what is running on your computer is important. If you have a bunch of stuff running in the background it can eat up alot of your ram, cpu, and video card cpu especially if it is an onboard one sharing with motherboard ram.
I bought the laptop just so I could take it the the field and have a sim with me. I am glad that G5 DOES run on it.-BW

[email protected]

My Feedback: (444)

I just bought the upgrade from G3 to G5. I like it's defaults much better. They simulate flying at the field much better. I had to buy a $49 video card for my AMD 1.9mhz PC. You need to be Direct X 9 compatable. Here's the link

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...TSFY-_-Satisfy

I wish I had the digital trims, but I could just use my real transmitter. I think it was worth the $79 upgrade.

Bonified Wingnut

Thanks for the website, I usually go through Newegg,but if you have good luck I might try them out someday.-BW

spitflier

My Feedback: (2)

I just loaded the upgrade from G3.5 to G5 I feel like I just wasted $79 I find little difference in the graphics and i don't see myself on line flying with others But most disapointing was I lost all my Add-ons that I had purchased just for specific planes. The float addition was OK but not worth $79 I should have gotten the Phenoix I played with that at the WRAM show and think that would have been a better spend

mmn

My Feedback: (4)

You didn't lose all your Add-Ons. They are still there in G3.5. The Add-ons were redone and made free for G4 and later versions. You can download those from:

http://www.realflight.com/free-g4-add-ons.html

spitflier

My Feedback: (2)

I saved the add-ons to my desktop but can't figure out what to do next I tried dragging them into the real flight data ile but that didn't work I got a product error code when i tried to open it directly any help
Thanks

da Rock

The addons are available as a download and they install perfectly that way. And of course the downloads are FREE so no reason to avoid that way.

They seem to require that additional planes and flying sites be installed into the application. That is a common occurrence with applications. (Plus it saves you from all the work required figuring out what the add-on data is and where and all that's required to save it etc etc etc.)

Bonified Wingnut

1. Locate the file on your disk.
2. Unzip the file. If you have Windows XP or Vista, you can just double-click it.
3. Extract the .zip file's contents to "C:\Program Files\RealFlightG4\Data" or "C:\Program Files\RealFlightG5\Data" (assuming you installed in the default location).

Now run RealFlight G4, G4.5 or G5 and the Add-Ons content will be available in the aircraft and airport selection dialogs.

That is copied from the site.
You can extract the file RFAOV*_G4 anywhere but you have to place it in the Data folder of G5' program files.
If this is not working what OS do you have?

apereira

I currently have Aerofly pro Deluxe, G5 (upgraded 4 to 4.5(free) then the $80 upgrade), and also the Phoenix, and the physics engine in my opinion has the same as I list order, I still think the AFPD flies more real than the others, but the G5 has better graphics for sure, I don't understand how is it that people say it looks the same, for example, you can see all the edge breaks but more important "also does the airplane", so far the G4 and up are the only simulators to have the model reacting depending on the terrain.

I use the simulators for pattern practice, and I have been able to fly a pattern aircraft that actually flies like my real ones on G4 and up, on AFPD had to fly big Extras that behaved like a pattern ship as the downloadable patter ships for AFPD look like my Osmose but I don't have a clue what airplane physics is made from as it's not even close to the worst pattern aircraft I've flown.

The Phoenix has great graphics but really don't like the physics so far, the airplane (Integral) does not fly like the real ting at all, and is very difficult to set up so it does not many unreal movements, I'm still working on the software setup.

I have to say that the G5 in my opinion is the best of the three if you take in count all the details of graphics/physics, I just hate the fact that KE software treat you like a Microsoft customer where you need to keep upgrading your software like Office and pay for the new software instead of making it a part of the free upgrades, I know that R&D cost money but I have gave KE $680 through out my G sim use so far, and G4 to G5 they all came in a one year period. So in 5 months we will be upgrading to G5.5 or something like that.

So back to your question, if you plan to use a Video Bin on a wall, I will recommend you the G5, the software really demands a lot from your computer when on the ground, as many more physics variables are calculated because of the ground mapping for the model to interact with it, my Laptop core duo handled the 4.5 with no problems, and my desktop (2 years old) only showed signs of slowing down on the ground, as soon as the model clears the ground it works perfect. But, if you have not purchased G5 yet and can wait, then take a look at the Aero Fly 5.

Hope all this helps.

dbcisco

My bolding:dbcisco

The graphics is dependant on the capabilities of the graphics card so even though software many have the capability of producing better graphics it can't output anything better than the video card can display. For example, a video card that can run G3.5 at max. detail may run G5 at reduced detail with the result that the graphics look almost identical.
I also felt that AFPD looked better when planes were at a distance than in G4. I can't compare G4.5 because it had "problems" and when I finally got it running I felt it was not much of a difference from G4. I don't have (and am not likely to get) G5.
Expect RF to release G5.5 or G6 in Oct. or Nov. they have been releasing a new version just in time for Xmas for the last couple years.[sm=confused.gif]

apereira

In my case,I compared the three simulators running on the same computer, and my graphics card is pretty powerful, so the comparisons I made is based on the same system standard. One thing is I never had any problems at all with any of them.