A question for FSX users

[stansdds]

I gave up on FSX when 64 bit P3D v4+ arrived in 2017 and never looked back.
P3Dv4.5 runs much more smoothly - on the same PC - than FSX and with no more CTDs or OOM.
Plus all my favourite (native) FSX planes, Orbx Global and ADE work fine.
Really a no brainer.

Except for Ultimate Traffic 2, which is what I use for AI traffic. As I understand it, UT2 uses FS9 models which will not display in P3D. I might be able to change those models to FSX native, but that would be a lot of work and potentially not possible for all of the AI aircraft in UT2.

 

[expat]

Just to add, I don't have UT2 and make up traffic files manually/custom with good old Lee Swordy's TTools (also works in P3D). There are gazillions of freeware AI commercial (AI Aardvark; FAIB; TFS), GA (Alpha India) and military (MAIW) aircraft native FSX or P3D models out there that will display in P3D.

 

[Scianoir]

The fewer aircraft you have in the sim's '.../SimObjects/Airplanes' folder the faster FSX will start initially as it has fewer aircraft entries to scan. Wait times between clicking on the sim icon and the aircraft selection menu appearing can be reduced significantly by pulling out any aircraft you are not currently flying on a regular basis.

In my P3D install I only keep my favourite aircraft/helos installed and all the others are in a categorized 'back-up' hangar on a different drive. When I want to fly one of the backed-up aircraft I just 'copy and paste' or 'drag and drop' the aircraft folder into the active '.../SimObjects/Airplanes' folder and we are good to go. Likewise when I am done flying a type for a while I will 'copy and paste' or 'drag and drop' the aircraft folder back into the back-up hangar (just in case I had added new paints or changed .cfg files for some reason) and delete the aircraft from the active sim folder.

Here is a shot of my aircraft back-up hanger and the way I sort things (I do the same with my helos too).

View attachment 193230

Hi,

I'm just curious to know does the back-up hangar have to be outside the FSX folder or on a different drive to reduce FSX start up time?

I have a ridiculously large number of addon aircraft many of which I have moved to back-up hangars. However these back-up hangars are in my FSX folder although in separate folders outside the SimObjects\Airplanes folder. I assumed that because they were not in the SimObjects\Airplanes folder that they would not be scanned by FSX during start up but am I incorrect in that assumption?

Cheers,
Bill

 

[gbayo]

My back-up Hangar folder is outside the FSX folder, albeit on the same drive. You could try moving your back-up to a location outside the FSX folder and see if that improves your start-up times.
No doubt someone will be along soon with a definitive answer!

 

[Tako_Kichi]

My back-up hangars for both FSX:SE and P3D are on a different drive. If your back-up hangars are still inside the root FSX folder I believe they will still get scanned at start-up and therefore increase the initial load time. Your 'aircraft selection' list will be shorter though but that is the only advantage that I can see from leaving them inside the root FSX folder.

 

[Lord Hearteater]

Since I gutted a lot of extra bloat out of my FSX hangar, it does seem to load faster.