WideView Weather - FSG real Weather

[XOrionFE]

Finally got this setup on my system this afternoon.  All i can say is that it is simple, does perfect weather modeling and is really easy to use.  It is syncing all my wideview clients weather absolutely perfectly.  I am one happy camper  . 

I am on the trial at the moment but buying my key tonight!

Scott

[XOrionFE]

Quick video

737 Cockpit Wideview and FS Global Weather

Scott

[sluyt050]

The synchronisation and overall impression is really overwhelming. Fantastic!

[Andrew 737]

Scott
Your Video - sensational

Mark
Your Settings - thanks for helping us all and sharing mate

Edward
FSGRW - thanks for confirming too; I've bought it in preparation for my WideView setup

Cheers everyone who has contributed here - keep it all coming

[Sam Llorca]

That is awesome Scott, glad you got it going, looks great.!!!

[markfire]

Scott


Nice videos mate. I really think you should upgrade those monitors to something bigger! I of course would be happy to take the old ones : )


Mark

[sagrada737]

Wonderful video Scott.  I admire your skill and persistence to continually "dial-in" your Sim.  It just keeps getting better!

Mike

[XOrionFE]

Thanks guys.   It is a highly collaborative effort learning from others experiences and sharing them here which makes these efforts bear fruit and come to life.   I appreciate all the help, viewpoints, and shared wisdom everyone brings to the table here.

One thing that would be nice to have in FSGRW which I think I will miss is the ability to tune Atis like we can with Active Sky.   In Active Sky you tune 122.00 to get Atis info whereever you are.   This is not an issue if using Realtime real world weather as you can use tons of products such as Foreflight and other EFBs in the cockpit or in Sim-Avionics you can call up a METAR right from the CDUs but if you are using historical weather (which is a great feature that seems to be available in all weather generation programs including FSGRW) then the EFBs and such will not be of help.   You can of course lookup station weather in FSGRW but who wants a big computer screen in the cockpit along with a keyboard to look it up.

Maybe the developer of FSGRW can chime in with some ideas or thoughts around this subject?

Other ideas?

Scott

[Sam Llorca]

Is a great feeling when you accomplish a task, specially if everyone pitch in and help, is good to see us moving forward as a group, this is what this forum is all about I'm happy for Scott and others that can use this as a vehicle to succeed, thank you members and companies associated here for your input, I said this because I know deep inside how Scott feels right now, keep up on helping each other out!!
Cheers,
Sam.

[Maurice]

Scott,

Nice to hear you finally got this monkey off your back. What wonders are you now going to come up with, with this newly liberated free time?

I just have one question re. FSGRW. If weather synchronization was not an issue with WideView, would you have stuck with Active Sky 2012 or would you still switch to FSGRW knowing what you know now.

I have read various comments on other sites related to the accuracy of the real weather depiction and several people claimed the weather with FSGRW was closer to the actual real weather than Active Sky. Can you comment about that or is it too soon to give your opinion?

Same question for Mark or anyone else by the way

Thanks,
Maurice

[XOrionFE]

If the wideview sync was working I would still switch to FSGRW over AS or Rex engines for the main reason I highlight in the video that it seems to spawn weather way off in the distance gradually and very realistically.  I dont see clouds just magically appearing out of nowhere like I did with Active Sky.   I also read that there is a new version of Active Sky in the works that is a total revamp so they can do silimilar things so maybe the next version will share this capability.  Right now it is FSGRW for me for that reason as well.   Worth the price I think.    Anyone can trial it free and get 12 weather downloads to see how it works.

[Maurice]

If the wideview sync was working I would still switch to FSGRW over AS or Rex engines for the main reason I highlight in the video that it seems to spawn weather way off in the distance gradually and very realistically.  I dont see clouds just magically appearing out of nowhere like I did with Active Sky. 

Very strange. I would think that this was an FSX function and not a weather engine function as you can specify the cloud draw distance in FSX. When set at 90 miles, I found it was much less disturbing than the default 60 miles.

Worth trying anyway, but I'm much more interested in how accurate the weather is compared to the actual real weather.

Thanks,
Maurice

[rhysb]

Scott,

Excellent video's and info. FSX looks great.

Rhys b

[markfire]

Maurice

FSGW is the only weather product i have used that;
1. creates real weather that reflects what you see out of your window.
2. gives you a feeling of depth due to the gradual build up of weather from far off.
3. can be used with wideview thus reducing it's workload = smoother graphics


I use REX textures installed on the server, then copied over to the four clients. At present i'm using 4096 textures but considering using the 2048 ones as not a lot of difference and agin will lowwerr the overhead on the pc's.

There are a few more tweaks to experiment with and i'll post the results first on here, of course : )

If there's any specific questions relating to wideview or FSGW drop me a PM

I must give a lot of the credit to Kosta regarding FSX PC performance, the guys a legend and really puts the time in.

Here's his site for those that want to get the most out of their rig.


http://kostasfsworld.wordpress.com/fsx-software-and-hardware-guide/


Credit to my buddy Andrew737 who always bugs me regarding performance and perfection : )


Happy times


Mark

[FredK]

I finally got around to trying FSGRW.  I concur with all the positive comments above, and it truly is a must for WideView users!

Previously on my WideView setup I had WideTraffic running on a totally separate network to squeak out some extra performance.  With the FSGRW network bridge setup I have reverted to a single network for combined WideView/WideTraffic.  The net result is even smoother preformance for WideView including AI traffic and absolute 100% synchronization for weather.  And the weather effects as mentioned are terrific.  I find that the "white flashing" is much reduced even when using moving clouds. 

Fred K

[rprather]

If the wideview sync was working I would still switch to FSGRW over AS or Rex engines for the main reason I highlight in the video that it seems to spawn weather way off in the distance gradually and very realistically.  I dont see clouds just magically appearing out of nowhere like I did with Active Sky. 

Very strange. I would think that this was an FSX function and not a weather engine function as you can specify the cloud draw distance in FSX. When set at 90 miles, I found it was much less disturbing than the default 60 miles.

The problem (at least from my experience) is that the SimConnect API allows you set the weather either globally or at specific METAR stations. SimConnect has a function that returns the nearest METAR stations, but the results are inaccurate. If the returned data was accurate, it would be extremely easy to query the nearest stations then set the weather data, creating weather in the distance. But since the data is inaccurate, most people set the weather globally on each update (hence the instant change). A few developers have tried things such as setting the weather once within XX miles of the destination airport, then leaving it static. But if the real weather changes before you arrive, then the weather you see in the sim will not match the real world ATIS. I'm pretty sure this could be remedied with a good back-end database and a few great circle calculations to determine the nearest METAR stations, but I never got that far.

[fatcharlie]

wow guys, good to find a topic about this.

I've got the evaluation version of FSGRW and I think it's great.

However, I'm using FS2004 - does any of you know how to synchronise weather in FS9 as opposed to FSX?

I aspire to XOrionFE's lovely clouds which pass smoothly from one screen to the next...

[ckovoor]

However, I'm using FS2004 - does any of you know how to synchronise weather in FS9 as opposed to FSX?

Hi,
To the best of my knowledge, cloud synchronization across independent monitors (i.e. on different pc's, not multiple pc's on the same card like with TH2go), and also traffic synchronization (which WideTraffic X does), is not possible in FS9. Luciano has made this clear in the WidevieW manual. It (cloud sync) happens in FSX SP2 and beyond, but that is through something internal to FSX, as Luciano himself said.
Regards,
Chakko.

from WidevieW 2004 manual, p.35:
"IMPORTANT! all the synchronization methods, with or without WidevieW, synchronize the weather "data" only, and there is no guarantee that every PC of the network will behave exactly as expected. For example, if a 3/8 sky coverage has been selected, the same coverage will be passed to the clients, but the actual position of every single cloud in the sky, may be largely different from one PC to another, causing some unpleasant effect while flying in the clouds (you will not see the clouds passing exactly from one monitor to another). Also, since FS2004, the weather can be modified by some unexpected situation or FS' interpolation & complex morphing, preventing a safe and reliable synchronization throughout the network. Unfortunately these situations are totally outside of my control, and I cannot do anything at the moment, in order to improve it."

From WidevieW X manual, p.26:
IMPORTANT (APPLIES TO FSX BEFORE FSX SP2) WidevieW synchronizes the weather "data" only (raw METAR information), and there is no guarantee that every PC of the network will behave exactly as expected. For example, if a 3/8 sky coverage has been selected, the same coverage will be passed to the clients, but the actual position of every single cloud in the sky, may be different from one PC to another, causing some unpleasant effect while flying through the clouds (you will not see the clouds passing exactly from one monitor to another) This happens because the clouds are randomly scattered in the sky and each PC generates different random positions, impossible to take control over them.
IMPORTANT (APPLIES TO FSX SP2 / ESP / P3D)
With FSX SP2 and later simulator software, the clouds seems to be actually capable to synchronize through the monitors, so you can see the same cloud, with its specific shape and texture, passing from one monitor to another. Anyway, this feature still require that the clients are powered up all together (with a maximum tolerance of a few minutes between them) and also the simulator software launched at the same time (again, a few minute of difference can be tolerated). Moreover, the computers should have the most similar software and hardware configuration and NO dynamic weather active. Setting the weather via add-on weather programs may also disrupt precise cloud shape synchronization (you can of course still use add-on weather programs, but you may lose this particular function)

[fatcharlie]

Hi Chakko,

Yep I'd seen that in the manuals, but made the assumption it might be something to do with FSGRW that makes the synchronisation. In other words, although WV is not capable of synchronising across networks, perhaps FSGRW was.

Turns out, it's something in FSX. So i guess I'll either have to buy FSX or just put up with funny looking clouds.

Thanks for the clarification.