chaos

Congrats on your new build. Looks awesome even though I'm not a fan of RGB lighting (but it's almost impossible to get hardware without it these days... why?!). Have fun.. I'm going to upgrade soon as well :D

Just did a quick test and it works just fine. Very happy that this tool is now available for 3ds 2017. Thanks ED!

I own a TM T.16000 throttle and the biggest complaint I have is the ‘stiction’ as well as limited travel of the grip itself. Same applied to the CH Pro throttle which I used years before. IIRC the TECS grip travel is a mere 11cm which, IMO, is too short to make accurate thrust changes. What the Warthog throttle has going for it is the arcing movement which effectively increases the amount of travel for the same amount of desktop real-estate. Also, I’m hoping that they (VKB) are using bearings instead of rails but I’m not holding my breath. I am happy that other companies are getting into this corner of the market. The VKB stick will be ordered as soon as the European dealer allows it. Might take a wait and see attitude regarding the TECS even though it looks absolutely awesome.

Appreciate the update, DGambo. However, to be perfectly clear... we shouldn’t expect plugins for 3ds 2017 anytime soon? Is this correct?

Just wanted to weigh in on the debate regarding the new copy protection. I play DCS on a laptop that I take with me while I’m at work. I get to play on my time off (at work). As you can imagine, there is fairly limited play time available. Often times, I’m in places where internet is limited or even completely blocked (i.e. China). Unfortunately, I do not have the option of playing on a desktop. Many times I do not touch the laptop for weeks. I understand there is a need to have these protections in place in order to protect ED’s interest. I’ve been ‘happy’ with StarForce since it never bothered me or limited my access to the software. I feel that, with this new system, things are going to change and not for the better. I know my situation is a-typical. However, I’d be very annoyed if my, already limited, play-time is now effectively reduced to zero due to copy protection rules. Surely, there must be a better way. I know there is (and don’t call me Shirley )...

I hate to ask but... are 3DS 2017 -plugins in development?

Could you point me to a post by any of the ED officials that stated this? I believe they only wanted to increase the mesh density of the terrain to more or less match Nevada's. Nothing was said about other assets like buildings and such...

How did the May event go? I'm thinking of visiting the July show (if I can get the weekend off) and would like to go see the VEAO stand if at all possible.

Agree with the previous poster. YouTube is a great source on how to get things done. If you're using 3DS for modelling (which I'd suggest to use if you want to create content for DCS at some point) look up 'Arrimus3d' on YouTube and view his videos on the basics of 3D modelling. His collection of 3d modelling tips tricks and demos have been invaluable to me. Start with video #1 and work your way up from there. These days he produces mostly advanced techniques which may become relevant as you progress. The man is a natural at explaining stuff and makes it seem so easy. Highly recommended!

Those clouds have been in the sim (more or less hidden) since the release of 1.5 if I'm not mistaken. I remember them planning to have a bunch of different types as well as 'new' fog. However, this is information from years ago. To be fair, we've come a long way since Flanker 1.0 and the lack of new clouds certainly isn't a deal breaker but I did wonder about the status. I take it nothing has changed as far as we're aware of it.

Just wanted to know if there have been any status updates on the new 'cloud engine'. I keep very close tabs on the development of this sim but haven't heard anything new since... forever. I can only assume that it has been put on the back burner for now but maybe it is something that ED can touch upon in one of their news- updates. Unless I've missed something... has something been mentioned in the past year?

No issues encountered on my crappy 5 year old laptop. The install took a long time (an hour?) and my laptop tends to blue screen every once in a while due to hardware problems so I was a little nervous doing it. Oh well... I have an i7 6700, 32GB, GTX980 with 2 950 pro SSD's in a laptop waiting for me. Playing DCS is going to be sweeeet as of next week. :D. (excuse me for boasting... it's been like living in a dessert for the past 4 years). I have high hopes that Win10 will not let me down.

"Flipped UVW Faces" in XView. I have a whole bunch of them. In the Edit UV interface I should be able to mirror and/or flip them (polygons) so that they have the same 'orientation' like the rest of them (I'm not talking about normals... just UV's). I'm doing something wrong, obviously, but I can't seem to fix it no matter what I do. I have posted about this months ago and nobody knows what to do (like the rest of the Internet...).

Thanks Fracture, I've seen those videos before (check out arrimus 3D as well) and they are excellent. I'm looking for help on fixing errors in the UV mapping but there doesn't seem to be anything available (either on video or in forums)...

Deal! It may take a while because this has taken far longer than I anticipated. PM inbound shortly. Thx.

It's starting to look an airplane anyway. There's a 'few' more things that need fixing/touching up. At least I got it to work in the ED ModelViewer tool. Apprehensive on the texturing bit. No idea where to start and this unwrap UV thingy is abracadabra to me. Does anybody work with Quixel and does that ease the pain of texturing compared to i.e. 3DS stock UVW tools?

For some reason I can't view the wireframe that makes up the model. Is this a known issue?

Also, make sure the keyboard has a proper num-pad on it.

I did notice a frame drops at one point during the blue whale demo but I wasn't moving my head at the time so it didn't bother me. The Vive experience was otherwise a smooth one during the 10 minutes I spent with it and at no point did I experience judder. Also, the tracking is really good. The sales person handed me the controllers while I was wearing the headset and, without seeing my own hands, I knew *exactly* where they were. I was quite impressed with that. BTW, I see little to no use for the controllers in DCS.

Not sure my 'review' is adding anything useful to the discussion but here goes... I've visited the Microsoft Store in NY today where they have an HTC Vive available for demo. I've never experienced VR before (except for the 2 minutes in a 'Gear VR' by Samsung which doesn't really qualify). The Vive demo consisted of 3 'scenes'... The blue whale (whale swimming past while you're standing on the deck of a sunken boat), Tilt Paint (cool 3D painting program) and a First Person shooter game (bots flying and shooting at you). The Ski Goggle is very comfortable. Granted, I've only worn it for 10 minutes but I can see myself gaming with this thing strapped to my head for hours. There was no outside light entering the headset. FOV was far better than I expected and at no point did I notice the edges. What I did notice right off the bat was the screendoor effect and it was a lot worse than I anticipated. Again, I didn't spend any time adjusting IPD and whatnot. The demos were comfortable to look at and I didn't experience any nausea. Resolution was quite limited and I have a hard time believing that it is enough to do a serious combat mission in DCS. Flying around, admiring the Nevada scenery, would be fantastic though. There was a brief moment when I was slightly disoriented while I was moving my head. The headset seemed to have lost tracking for a second although I can't be sure. What was my overall impression? "Woohooo... this is going to RoCk!" The screendoor effect did bother me a little (although I didn't really notice it after a few minutes of 'gaming' and I would like the resolution to be upped as much as possible... crappy PC be damned. 1st iteration of a technology that can change the way we learn, play and interact. It'll only get better from hereon out. It's a shame Intel is all but stopping development of faster desktop processors or so it seems. I don't need no stinkin' low TDP. Give me 'balls to the wall' performance. The new graphics processors of nVidia and AMD are a welcome addition and their release seems to have been well timed with the release of the Vive and Rift.

Apparently it is not HTC's fault. Most of the orders are cancelled by the bank for security/fraud reasons...

Based on what I've read online, the Vive and Rift are comparable as far as visuals go. Supposedly, positional tracking is slightly better with the Vive. Yes, Vive is more expensive but comes complete with 2 controllers (which I don't see the use for in flight-sims). Once Oculus gets around to getting their controllers ready, both systems are going to be very similar in price and performance. Thats not surprising as both companies have worked together extensively in the development of VR systems. The real question is... which allows for a more 'open' standard'? I'm worried that Vive will be (or become) a Steam exclusive... and I can't stand 'Steam'. It's like the iTunes for Windows :-(

Seriously... The idea that a mac is better at graphics/design is so early 90's. Besides, mac users are a tiny percentage of the global market. It doesn't allow the use of an up to date discrete graphics card and you're paying through the nose for that fruity logo on the back. No thanks, I'd like them to keep their focus on the PC. Options galore and an affordable system for all my needs. That includes games, 3DS, visual studio and Adobe CS.

by going really fast down the runway :D (sorry, couldn't resist...)

No worries. I appreciate you're trying to help. The difficulties of communicating with snippets of text and all that. No harm done.