Redglyph

Haha, I tried to report that in another thread (among other disk space-related issues) but only got irrelevant remarks saying basically that it was fine like it was. So good luck with that.

The problem here is coming from most people not reading correctly a post. I won't even try to answer this further, it was not meant as a debate anyway. It will come naturally later from someone else anyway.

DCS 2.5.4.28461 Shore-Based Landing mission 1) The diagram on the briefing page is unreadable 2) Like some other training missions, the audio text at the beginning is cut. It is displayed once the mission starts, but since the user must get busy to adjust the throttle and other parameters to the starting conditions, there is no time to read it. After 10 seconds or so, it begins being narrated but then it is cut almost immediately with the next instructions ("set hook bypass to Field..."). This behaviour is not always consistent, restarting the mission makes the audio earlier. Other missions For example, the "gun gun gun" tutorial has a similar problem. There isn't even audio until "If you want to use the radar to track and compute a firing solution", and the text displayed earlier just before that is sometimes so brief it's impossible even to type PAUSE. At some point I saw the Gun Rate and the Master Arm switch highlighted and no text for a while, then a short text flashing mentioning to open the Master Arm cover and set to ON. Etc. In conculsion the whole beginning of the mission is very confusing again. I think it could start smoothlier with a trigger on time or position, there are probably transients at the beginning of each mission due to fact this aircraft is more demanding. This makes the mission start very dependant on the system it is running on, and the performance-related options.

There's a long thread about it (outside of the bug/problem section): https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=234927

Even if you target the switch and the mouse cursor transforms to the clickable shape, most positions do not react to the click. The user has to aim to the right of the switch to be able to click it from SHUTOFF to NORMAL. I tried to take a screenshot but the cursor is not shown (it was on the tip of the switch but it wouldn't click).

Thanks Baltic! So that answer the question on those two pairs of switches I guess (afterburner cut and oil cutoff), they are only used as emergency and should remain OFF. Not easy to find an English translation of those manuals :/

DCS 2.5.4.28461 I noticed a little glitch in that mission, there is a text saying to move to a specific catapult, but there is no audio and the text is only briefly displayed. I actually missed it the first time because I was looking inside the cockpit, then at some point I was instructed to sweep the wings forward and to put military power, which seemed very strange from the starting position ;) The Tomcat is also dancing furiously on the deck, it seems that the aircraft in DCS are not yet statically linked to the ground they are on, they're slipping back and forth (and up/down) all the time. It didn't seem that obvious in the cold start mission.

Found out it happened because of the Afterburner Cut switches, I've finally reported that here.

As has been answered, cheap SSDs are not always the best, and comparing a simulation that requires a fast SSD with a game which doesn't isn't a good argument. I repeat, the problem is not only SSD but very long downloading times, and most probably disk loading to the memory, memory occupancy, and so on (no wonder one gets regular freezes). Just disregarding a problem saying "I don't have this problem so you should not have this problem either" is also very selfish IMHO, but it seems the norm here. So have it your way, let's encourage 3rd parties to include unrelated files in DCS, and sorry to point out a problem that was already pointed out and fixed in another module :p Jeez, some people.

Fine, let's encourage them to waste precious disk space because another completely unrelated game is taking more. That's a very good argument. And yet not long ago, similar reports were made for the Fishbed which was taking less than this (and for relevant files).

Sorry differ but in my opinion they need to optimize a little bit instead of asking everyone to buy a larger disk, 8.5 GB is completely off the mark. Recently, M3 said they'd make an effort for the MiG-21bis, which was also taking a ridiculous amount of disk. Unnecessary stuff like those WAV files have nothing to do in there. Yes, some SSD are cheaper... and probably also less reliable or less performant. In any case, I'm not eager to reinstall everything for that kind of reason.

I'm using an SSD. You are correct, before that I was getting a lot of those when starting even the Nevada map in 1.5. Since then it's smooth (except Normandy) :) It happens also in very local flights, for example the shore take-off or the landing missions. So it's likely the F-14 either computing or initializing something, or loading data. I suppose a good test would be (i) very low world radius, (ii) low-quality textures, in order to see where this is coming from.

I have 16 GB of RAM for the CPU and 6 GB for the GPU. In general the performances are OK when using the simple training missions. Some of them have static F-14s so it probably doesn't represent a typical busy mission. I get regular freezes of 1-2 seconds in flight or taxiing, that I never get with other modules (in Caucasus, that is, I didn't even try in Normandy). Seeing the huge amount of space it takes on the disk, it could be due to the little space remaining in memory for the DCS world after the F-14's textures are loaded (overall it doesn't look as if optimizations were the primary concern). Or it could be the module initializing something, I don't know, it's just breaking the immersion quite effectively. It's otherwise a great module, I hope those performance issues can be tackled soon.

DCS 2.5.4.28461 The F14 is currently by far the largest module, it takes more than 3 GB of disk space, and another 5.4 GB in the CoreMods folder. So about 8.5 GB only for one module! SSD space is precious, and download times are getting long, would it be possible to reduce that somewhat? Some of that seems to come from uncompressed files. For example, - "Soundtrack" takes 540 MB, those are *.WAV files that could be compressed. Actually they're present twice: their *.ogg counterparts already eat up 100 MB in Sounds/Walkman. Are those .WAV files related to DCS? And are they necessary? Perhaps they could be optionally downloaded on another site for who wants them? - the manual is 252 MB! That's more than a scanned book of the same size, and it makes the reader struggling when going through. There is an option to compress the images when building a PDF document, it should be used. I'm pretty sure the textures can be compressed too. The problem is, if we remove those files ourselves, they are downloaded again on each update.

To add some information on this issue: I observed the same problem with the kneeboard controls on the MiG-19P but it disappeared on its own after starting a mission with the module and restarting DCS a few times (for other reasons). I changed other bindings so it may be due to that. When I'm looking now at Config/Input/MiG-19P/keyboard/keyboard.diff.lua, DCS added one (?) of them as "removed" without my intervention. This command is in the common files, Config\Input\Aircrafts\common_keyboard_binding.lua (while yours is in the module's defaults): local diff = { ["keyDiffs"] = { ["d3003pnilunilcd100vd1vpnilvunil"] = { ["name"] = "Kneeboard current position mark point", ["removed"] = { [1] = { ["key"] = "K", ["reformers"] = { [1] = "RCtrl", }, }, }, }, I confirm the same duplicated orange lines as you for the Viggen, but I haven't flown it so I can't say about the "auto-repair" which happened on the Farmer.

Significantly longer loading time in SP, didn't try MP. DCS is on an SSD.

I think you're right. I'll try again with a checklist to make sure I don't forget anything. It's usually understood we should know that before doing the startup - on a real aircraft, but here those are obviously meant to teach that, that's why I prefer to report what issues a pilot with no experience in the Tomcat may encounter. It's always a difficult balance I suppose. Sometimes I find other missions like for ex. the MiG-19's or the Harrier's by Baltic Dragon have sometimes too much 'SPACE' pauses for my personal taste. But the opposite is quickly overwhelming the first time, which means it fails its purpose. My preferred way is the mission that detects we have accomplished the step and goes on, but it takes more time to make (when the control numbers in the ME are even known to the mission maker). The assisted startup is great, except the text log disappearing instantly :/

Yes, that's absolutely fantastic :) And in the air too, that's really making a difference in the otherwise very sterile DCS environment. Actually, everything about Heatblur's F-14B is more lively than the barren experience we usually get, it's obvious they spent a lot of time taking care of all they could think of.

I think so, that's what I already reported above. I don't get this with other missions, for example when starting in the air (same with the afterburner switch), so either the procedure followed in this mission does something to this subsystem logic, or it only works when the mission begins with the aircraft already started. But that should be reported in the MiG-19 section and not the training mission part, really. Since they seem to have a lot of things to fix already, and that even in calm times I get very little response from Razbam, I didn't report it. Maybe you'll have more luck than me, feel free to try.

Agreed, I have tens of unread bug reports, and quite a few patches that were never taken (actually none of them, even by PM to ED or 3rd parties like Razbam and Heatblur).

DCS 2.5.4.28461 Awesome setup for this training mission! I saw a few quirks that I'm listing below. 1) The audio for the first text isn't read completely, it's cut after the 3rd phrase by the audio of the 2nd text ("As you might know the F-14..."). => synchronize the audio correctly, don't use system-dependant timing or actions that could cut the text (this happens often in training missions, the Yak-52 is a very illustrative example) 2) The log disappears too soon. If someone has to look for a button, or just wants to take the time to enjoy the cockpit and the surroundings, it could be a problem. By the way, I also saw later that Jester's "subtitles" were disappearing at once, this is even more annoying if one tries the assisted start-up procedure. => increase the text log duration, especially with Jester's. In general for those trainings, there's no use to clear the text at all, it will be replaced by the next one (there is an option in the ME for that) 3) "Coordinate with RIO" to check lights. How? I didn't see any option in Jester's menu. Is that only for MP? 4) Master Test switch to EMERG GEN, - lights NO GO, then GO: I could not see that, not implemented yet? 5) The whole test with checking the voltage, having some lights illuminate for 2 seconds, the SAS changing after a MASTER RESET, were not observed at all. I suppose it's not implemented yet?

I would rather have them release a 2nd option with less destroyed cockpit that we can read (and I confirm again, it's not only a problem for VR users), than designing several coloured and shaped seats that we won't see much. Those are great little touches of reality and I much appreciate them, but the primary concern should be the ability to use the module. I suppose that the approach to weathering is to start from a fresh cockpit and to proceed iteratively by damaging and tainting the textures, so this newer or "less older" cockpit must most probably exist already. Let's hope they hear us.

I confirm the problem, experienced in DCS versions 2.5.4.28090 and 2.5.4.28461, with both the MiG-19P and the F14B. There is another closely related issue: when DCS is restarted it is possible to assign axes again, but after a short time the visual displacement bar stops working (sometimes it doesn't work from the beginning).

It's not only VR, I'm only using TrackIR and it's a real pain to read the panels. Maybe it doesn't matter to a pilot with a good sight and a real Tomcat, who has flown the jet for years. But it does for someone who has a classic monitor and doesn't know all the knobs and buttons by heart. This and inconsistent cockpit click buttons logic are apparently little things, but they completely break the immersion. PS. I'd hate to only point out one little downside. The overall atmosphere in the cockpit, all the little details inside and outside the aircraft, are fabulous! :)

+1