Dash 8 q400 pilot edition!

Years ago, many years ago when I was a kid I had the opportunity to go aboard a Dash 8 with my Brother who worked for a company that used Dash 8's and got to watch them start the engines and do a short taxi to test the engines.. I surprised myself, jumped into the Majestic Dash 8 and was able to do most by memory.
 
Lately the aircraft I purchase are not compatible with my hardware. It is very frustrating. Does anyone else have this problem? I'm holding off on the Dash-8 because I don't know if it will be compatible.

David
 
Hi David,

Add your hardware to your signature and we can look at the system you are running. There are a lot of factors that go into performance when working with high end aircraft. It would be a shame for you to miss out on the great aircraft that are available now.
 
Some of the equipment I have:

Saitek Flight instrument panels (using the heading bug will not work on some aircraft) Saitek Auto Pilot and PRO Flight Radio Panel (Autopilot heading bug and buttons "HDG" "NAV" "IAS" "ALT" "VS" "APR" don't always work. I also have Goflight button panels, knobs and the Goflight TQ6 Throttle Quadrant. Now they work good 99% of the time. I did use the goflight autopilot for some but the lighting got dim and their autopilot didn't fair any better than Saitek's. I also use Simplugins FSX panel builder for some instruments and they work well or should say respond well but I cannot click on them in full screen mode without knocking FSX off and down to the taskbar. These instruments work on a USB third monitor, very little if any FPS hit..... I was surprised about that.

My computer is a AMD Phenom(tm) II six core 2.7Hz 16gb, windows 7 64-bit, and a NIVIDIA Gforce GTX660 2GB graphics card. I will be update the processor to 8 core and 3.4Hz in a couple of months, I hope.

David

OOps forgot the VRinsight panel used for an overhead panel.
 
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Some of the aircraft that give me problems are CS's 707, 727, 737(my favorite) The CS C130 works fine? CLS VAe 146, FeelThere ERJ135LR v2 (Beautiful aircraft but a nightmare to fly. JF_Douglas_DC8-10, another beautiful aircraft but hard to fly with my setup. and also the jf_Tristar. Most if not all GA aircraft I have work good with my setup and JF_Douglas_DC6B works very well and their Comet also.

If only their Autopilots were stock FSX setup!

David
 
You obviously are devoting a lot of time to your sim judging by the pictures. Nice setup.

My old system was about one notch below what you are running now. I ran all of the CS stuff with no problems and also the previous Majestic Dash 8. I've got the new Dash 8 Q400, but haven't tried it in the old box. It's an absolute gem in my current rig. Majestic coded their new Q400 to run some of the tasks outside of FSX. It seems to work really well, I've had no glitches and make good FPS with no crashes, OOMs or other nasty bits.

If your CS tubes are a problem, I'd look for a conflict somewhere in your peripherals. Your basic system should handle those planes with no issues, even if you are running REX weather and other eye candy.

If you're not running FSX Booster or something like it you may want to look in that direction. The tweaks make a huge difference and you can split the load across your processor cores. When you get around to stepping up your system I'd get away from AMD and go to Intel.

IMHO, I'd buy the new Dash while it's on sale. You can always pump up your system to accommodate. I had the CS and PMDG 777 for quite a while but couldn't fly them until I built the new rig.

FYI, I'm not hyping the Dash 8 for Majestic, I'm actually pretty miffed at them. I bought the first plane at premium retail and was very disappointed. I waited to see if they would offer previous owners an upgrade for reduced price....no joy.
I bought the rev 2 for full pop again. Didn't make me very pleased, but I have to admit that the plane is quite a package.

Hope my info helps.
 
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The only problem with my system is it's incompatible with todays autopilot systems of some aircraft, otherwise I have little problems as far as FPS go. In the past I use to replace the AP with a default 737 AP. Not so easy today.

The Dash-8 sale runs til monday. I'm sure I will give it a shot.


David
 
Pepere said:
The only problem with my system is it's incompatible with todays autopilot systems of some aircraft, otherwise I have little problems as far as FPS go. In the past I use to replace the AP with a default 737 AP. Not so easy today.

The Dash-8 sale runs til monday. I'm sure I will give it a shot.


David
Click to expand...

I've run into some AP issues in the past. Those can be modified/fixed in the aircraft and panel .cfg files. I have a standard HU display and Autopilot that I burn into most of my aircraft. They function through pop up displays and about 98% of the time they are compatible with what is in the aircraft.

The Dash 8 Q400 is different. You have to fly this one by the book, so setting up the autopilot is more demanding, but completely real world.

G
 
I tried the majestic Dash 8 with my new saitek multi panel and radio panel and I've found very little functionality with them which is very disappointing, I'm hoping someone out there knows how to get them working.
 
sleightflight said:
I tried the majestic Dash 8 with my new saitek multi panel and radio panel and I've found very little functionality with them which is very disappointing, I'm hoping someone out there knows how to get them working.
Click to expand...


There is a program called SPAD (Saitek Panels Advanced Driver) which may help. I have the program but have not used it much at all. I've probably had it for a year of so. It is free ware http://fstools.weebly.com/


David
 
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