JKirk, (not James T. is it?)

Sorry for the geek humor....

Anyway, I understand about the steep prices for a sim. I bought Real Flight G2 myself and it was close to $200. There are some free ones out there like FMS. I can't comment on those but the Real Flight is very good. I bought mine through Tower Hobbies (click here) and they have a program called Easy Pay. Basically they broke up my payments into 3 so the bite wasn't so bad and right now they'll throw in a $20 gift certificate as well. If you have a chance to try out a friend's I would recommend it. My local hobby shop had Real Flight G2 on display so I was able to 'test drive' it before I bought it. You can download FMS (click here) for free and test it out on your PC to see if it suits your needs. Which ever way you go good luck.