I'm a little surprised I haven't seen the release of the new Carenado B58 Baron for FS2004 mentioned at this forum. It's a beauty, well worth the price, IMHO, and so far free of all the typical Carenado bugs on my system. The textures are crisp, the model EXTREMELY highly detailed, and it flys right too, as far as I can tell. Further, it seems to be easy on the FPS (it runs considerably smoother on my system than, say, the C208 they released last year... better, even, than the F33, which was pretty smooth)...
The comparisons to the Dreamfleet bird are inveitable, I figure, so I guess I'll compare them myself. The Dreamfleet model is clearly aging and although for its time, it was darn near the best of the best, it clearly lags badly behind the Carenado model for visuals (much as the FSD lags behind the Carenado 337). Further, the Dreamfleet bird handles a little more crisply (that is to say, it seems slightly more responsive). While I am confident that the Dreamfleet Baron probably flies closer to the numbers, the Carenado Baron perorms similarly in all respects, and its more ponderous feel seems more appropriate to me (I am not a pilot, but I have been fortunate to have been allowed some stick time in some small planes, including a Beech C90. I was surprised by the relative stiffness of the stick in the C90. I imagine a Baron, another Beech twin of about the same size, would handle similarly.). The sounds are probably better on the Dreamfleet plane, and if you've got the RXP version, so will have to do without your nice Sandel HSI, but on the whole, the crisp smoothness of the 3D gauges in the Carenado rendition makes up for it (and you can integrate RXP avionics into the Carenado Baron... that option is specifically provided for in the model. I didn't, since my RXP gps doesn't work on a 64bit OS.)
I'd say, if you have RXP gauges independently of the Dreamfleet planes, get the Carenado Baron. If you don't, its your call. If you need procedural simulation, go Dreamfleet. For anything else, go Carenado.
The comparisons to the Dreamfleet bird are inveitable, I figure, so I guess I'll compare them myself. The Dreamfleet model is clearly aging and although for its time, it was darn near the best of the best, it clearly lags badly behind the Carenado model for visuals (much as the FSD lags behind the Carenado 337). Further, the Dreamfleet bird handles a little more crisply (that is to say, it seems slightly more responsive). While I am confident that the Dreamfleet Baron probably flies closer to the numbers, the Carenado Baron perorms similarly in all respects, and its more ponderous feel seems more appropriate to me (I am not a pilot, but I have been fortunate to have been allowed some stick time in some small planes, including a Beech C90. I was surprised by the relative stiffness of the stick in the C90. I imagine a Baron, another Beech twin of about the same size, would handle similarly.). The sounds are probably better on the Dreamfleet plane, and if you've got the RXP version, so will have to do without your nice Sandel HSI, but on the whole, the crisp smoothness of the 3D gauges in the Carenado rendition makes up for it (and you can integrate RXP avionics into the Carenado Baron... that option is specifically provided for in the model. I didn't, since my RXP gps doesn't work on a 64bit OS.)
I'd say, if you have RXP gauges independently of the Dreamfleet planes, get the Carenado Baron. If you don't, its your call. If you need procedural simulation, go Dreamfleet. For anything else, go Carenado.
