Anyone not seen Helios in Action with DCS A10-C

[jeffyd123]

Tommy, Interesting point your'e making ... I do like looking at my beautifully rendered (and now with SHADOWS!) pit... Its very cool when I look at the CDU and the Sun is making it hard to see or the shadows are moving across the instruments when Im orbiting..

 

Loz, that Helios pit is friggin great! the textures on it have come a long way since I played with Helios (my PC is too lame for it) Your layout is really great.... welll done.

 

doooom.... gadroc made some well done tutorial vids on assigning keys. Hopefully they still apply to the newer versions.

Edited July 5, 2011 by jeffyd123

[Flim]

very simple to add keystrokes, you just have to to read a little!

[metalnwood]

That whole setup while impressive is really not to my liking.

 

Kills immersion not having the cockpit rendered and simulated with helios instead. Love to have infinity setup but i would never use a touch screen in that fashion.

 

For some it clearly adds immersion.. for me it has the complete apposite affect.

 

I agree that not having the cockpit rendered is not to my liking either. I use helios just like Loz but the cockpit is still rendered and I find it great.

 

I am surprised though that you think using the touch screen is less immersive as it seems like it has been forever that simmers have been wanting to get away from using the mouse to click buttons. Having to get the mouse and then try to hover over cockpit buttons has always killed the immersion for me but having it on helios has made it a simple job that is now a simple procedure rather than a departure from the actual flying.

 

Nothing killed it for me than flying around with TIR, full hotas but then having to take my eyes away find the mouse and click around.

[Loz]

I have tried, before using Helios, with a Portrait setup, just using my middle and bottom touch screen. If you run this as a main screen and the touch screen as an extended display in windows setup and then within the sim run in windows mode, you can use the touchscreen in game in the natural way.

That is very immersive as you can TrackIR look around and it's easy to see and touch to impliment anything in the cockpit. It's just such a shame that as soon as you inlcude the side monitors in any setup, you then cannot restrict the touchscreen calibration to just that monitor. Or at least I've not been able to.

[JaBoG32_Prinzartus]

Hi Loz,

Have you considered using those Ground Charts to be embedded in your profile? Just in case you have missed them.

 

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=73419&highlight=ground+charts

 

Our VAD-charts are going to be released as well, accordng to my current knowledge. New versions are currently in the works. :D

[Loz]

Thanks for the headsup. This looks like very high quality work which I will keep an eye on for the VAD charts as you suggest. Hopefully the overall file size will not be prohibitive for putting them in my profile.

[spike2450]

Hi

I've been looking at creating a pit with multiple monitors and this is the best setup i've seen, well done:thumbup: very realistic and immersive.

[hassata]

Be sure to check out Scsimulations.com. You can add side console touch screens to replicate more of the cockpit. There are also UFC kits and a new 'dash' unit. Keep in mind those guys are fans with RL jobs and not a business, which can affect availability etc.

 

http://www.scsimulations.com/showthread.php?532-FLIM-s-U.M.C-TOUCHSCREEN-COCKPIT

http://www.scsimulations.com/showthread.php?1374-UMC-A-10C-front-Console

http://www.scsimulations.com/showthread.php?1212-Flim-s-UMC-V2-Setup

[Succellus]

The seat and front panels are awesome. And the front panels can easely be programed to other sim as well.

As soon as i can i will acquire the panels.

[spike2450]

Hi Loz

 

Sorry if u r repeating yourself, with your spec / setup what sort of fps r u getting.

 

Any chance of a photo of your pit with the room lights on i.e. monitor mounting etc.

 

 

I've been searching, can i run 3 monitors and 4th touchscreen similar setup to Loz with 2 x GTX 260 in sli.

 

Regards:)

Edited July 7, 2011 by spike2450

[Loz]

Hi Spike.

I've set my max fps to 30 which seems to help prevent micro stutter that was sometimes evident. With full cockpit showing and near built up area it can drop down to 18 -19 in that config but if you go to HUD only view it's straight back up to 30.

 

Here is the view you were after I think. This one with a very early version of a profile.

 

 

 

The monitor stands I've made myself as the retail price for this sort of setup is ridiculous.

 

In the UK if you search some of the Disc Jockey / Electrical wholesalers you can find the Universal VESA Brackets (they use them to hold monitors for Karaoke) The poles are speaker poles and the base mount is a speaker mount used upside down onto a Ply base that I painted black.

 

 

Can't really comment on the SLI setup you propose but I am pretty sure that even with two cards in SLI with Nvidia you cannot run a fourth monitor. Someone else will correct me I'm sure if I'm wrong.

Incidentally my setup runs off one of my cards as you can't do Crossfire in windows mode which is essential to enable the export of the MFCDs etc. But you can run 4 monitors off one card with AMD 6000 series.

Good luck.

:)

[metalnwood]

Loz and I have basically the same setup, I am running 2x 6970's with crossfire turned off - so essentially only one.

 

I don't run with the cockpit off and get ~ 50fps in windowed mode with my main view at ~6000x1080 and the touchscreen running off the same card at 1920x1080.

 

Of course it drops depending what you are doing but it is always playable, I havent seen it drop below 30 except sometimes on the ground.

[metalnwood]

I guess we were typing at the same time :)

[Loz]

I don't run with the cockpit off and get ~ 50fps in windowed mode with my main view at ~6000x1080 and the touchscreen running off the same card at 1920x1080.

Yes and I used to get very similar but I was always getting a little micro stutter to the external graphic (ie view outside cockpit) so on advise here, I set a max fps 30 and it certainly has solved the micro stutter. It's smooth now.

Any difference in our scores would probably be because I run mine at a slightly higher overall res 7968x1200. :)

[metalnwood]

You are unlucky, I managed to get away from micro stutters but cant remember exactly why.

 

Yes, when I was running 16:10 monitors I was running another megapixel more pixels and saw slightly lower FPS.

 

I didnt want 16:9 monitors because of the smaller vertical monitor size. Now with the 3x42" monitors I guess I have the best of both worlds :)

[98abaile]

How did you get the touch screen to work Loz? I can't seem to get mine to work on the correct screen unless the touch screen is set as my primary monitor.

[hassata]

was always getting a little micro stutter

 

Did you disable Catalyst AI as per WTF's instructions?

 

• Disable CATALYST A.I - You must follow instructions below to disable Cat A.I. The slider settings are for enabled only, they've made it harder to disable it but here is how with latest drivers:

 

* Close down CCC.exe and MOM.exe via Taskmanager

* Navigate to <username> \AppData\Local\ATI\ACE\Profiles

* Open Profiles.xml with Notepad

* Alt + F and search for "Catalyst"

* Change Value Enable to Disable for Catalyst A.I

* Save

* Restart

[spike2450]

Still looking for that perfect pit before I splash the cash and now Loz has thrown a spanner in the works with his great work, lol :joystick:

 

Thanks loz 4 the photos, very helpful

 

Perhaps in the short term a large LCD monitor with the smaller touchscreen positioned below, I could probably run that on a single gtx260.

 

I've seen lots of forum users using twin iPads and separate small USB screens to display the MFDs / cockpit. The Loz setup with the price of a single touchscreen is perfect and, less complicated and seems the way to go when creating a pit, does anyone disagree?

 

All opinions appreciated :)

[metalnwood]

I don't disagree, I think the ipads are nice but only if you have them. I wouldn't go buy two of them for a sim when a better investment was with the touchscreen.

 

I was the first to bring a cdu to the ipad, I did it for myself but helios made me think a touchscreen was the better solution. In the end it is much better but the ipad is also a good solution if you already have one lying about. Not as good but cost effective if you own one.

[Loz]

How did you get the touch screen to work Loz? I can't seem to get mine to work on the correct screen unless the touch screen is set as my primary monitor.

Thats about the most "iffy" part of the setup. Calibration in windows is rubbish. But that's what I you have to perservere with. Type in the windows search/run Calibrate the window for pen or touch.

You should get the option when you calibrate to skip to the next monitor by pressing "Enter" but then very often when you do touch the correct screen it doesn't register it.

Sorry not much help I know.

[98abaile]

Sorry Loz, I don't quite understand. What exactly do I type into the run window? Windows doesn't recognise the command "Calibrate".

[Loz]

Ok Sorry I'm using Win7.

If you open the Start Menu and type at the bottom in the search, either Touch or Calibrate you should come up with, as an option, "Calibrate the screen for Pen or Touch input"

It is also available in "Control Panel/Hardware and Sound/Tablet PC Settings/Calibrate the screen for pen or touch input"

 

If you are not using Win7, I've no idea. Not even sure that touch screens are supported below Win7.

[Gadroc]

How did you get the touch screen to work Loz? I can't seem to get mine to work on the correct screen unless the touch screen is set as my primary monitor.

 

What OS and touch screen are you using?

[Heli Shed]

Well done loz!

[Loz]

Loz, great video. Would it be possible (unless you have already) to post a video with you using the trackir and cockpit view to give a better idea on how you use it on a daily (or hourly ;) ) basis?

 

Here you are as requested.