Worth the upgrade?

C

cfossa

Member
Hi Guys,

For those who owned G3.5 and upgraded to G4 ... are the new features worth it?

I'm not concerned with rebates or advertising policies. I've had G3.5 for a long time and got my money's worth.

I'd really like to hear whether or not you think the new features are worth upgrading ($200). From the ads, all I can see new is a new controller, water landings, and enough planes/airports to make up an expansion pack.

Are there new features or improvements not discussed in the ads?

Also, how is performance on your G3.5 machine? I ended up upgrading my video card after buying G3.

Thanks!

Carl
 
cfossa said:
Hi Guys,

For those who owned G3.5 and upgraded to G4 ... are the new features worth it?

I'm not concerned with rebates or advertising policies. I've had G3.5 for a long time and got my money's worth.

I'd really like to hear whether or not you think the new features are worth upgrading ($200). From the ads, all I can see new is a new controller, water landings, and enough planes/airports to make up an expansion pack.

Are there new features or improvements not discussed in the ads?

Also, how is performance on your G3.5 machine? I ended up upgrading my video card after buying G3.

Thanks!

Carl
Click to expand...

To put it simply, no, it's not. All you get is some new eye candy that will slow down your computer and water, which will really slow down your PC. I am happy with G3.5 and will not be upgrading to G4 anytime soon. I think this was personally a horrible idea for them, but, that's just me.

So if you are a float pilot, then I'd say yes, it's worth the upgrade. But if you are not, then no, it's not.
 
Zelatio said:
To put it simply, no, it's not. All you get is some new eye candy that will slow down your computer and water, which will really slow down your PC. I am happy with G3.5 and will not be upgrading to G4 anytime soon. I think this was personally a horrible idea for them, but, that's just me.

So if you are a float pilot, then I'd say yes, it's worth the upgrade. But if you are not, then no, it's not.
Click to expand...

Not disputing you Zelatio, but how do you know it's not worth it? How do you know that it's "...some new eye candy that will slow down your computer and water, which will really slow down your PC. ..."?
You haven't upgraded. Have you used the new program? Just curious as to how you know?
 
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Johndou said:
Not disputing you Zelatio, but how do you know it's not worth it? How do you know that it's "...some new eye candy that will slow down your computer and water, which will really slow down your PC. ..."?
You haven't upgraded. Have you used the new program? Just curious as to how you know?
Click to expand...

Because I have used more than my share of computer programs in my lifetime, and I know that water is a very complex thing to simulate, and it WILL hurt framerates. Also, I know that Bloom also takes some processing and video power and it WILL hurt framerates. I don't have to own it to know that. Bloom is used to make things look pretty, even though in all the screenshots I've seen it's overdone and looks goofy. It make look good in a lot of games, I just don't think that it should have been done. KE has focused too much on eye candy and not enough on physics. Having all the same planes importable from G3 to G4 tells me that the physics changed so little that it's not worth it unless you are a float pilot.
 
Hi Guys,

Lots of threads that have degraded to questions about rebates and business policies.


Doesn't anyone out there have both G3.5 and G4 who can post a comparison?

Carl
 
cfossa said:
Doesn't anyone out there have both G3.5 and G4 who can post a comparison?
Click to expand...
I HAD both versions and ran the same models in both G3 & G4, right one after the other. I love G4's representation of water, but then I like to fly of water in real life. Flight dynamics seemed about the same, which is to say great. Ground handling is also about the same, which is to say could use a bit of improvement. However, regardless of all of the complaining I've hear from various people about this, the aspect is easy to mostly correct in the editor. Great Planes and Knife Edge deliberately sets the default values on ground friction low (just like on stalls). This is to keep the sim from discouraging novices from it's most important purpose, which is learning to fly. I too would like the ability to adjust the bumpiness of the fields, but this is pretty minor in the greater scheme of things.

In comparison of the two, I just sold my copy of G3. Enough said.

Yes, I lost access to a few models from the add-ons that I liked but I don't regret the decision. If KE can't develop a way to restore those to G4, I may model them myself. The ones I miss the most are the Corsair (add-on 1) and the SlowPoke (add-on 3) as I fly those in real life. These two would, therefore, be on the top of my modeling projects list.
 
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For me it's worth it. I just recently bought a SeaWind amphibian float plane, and have not yet finished building it. The plane has it's share of challenges, flying it off of water, and I wanted to see the realistic difficulties before crashing my real one. The one plane alone made it worth it for me to upgrade.

But... It doesn't work yet on my Matrox Parhelia (triple screen) yet as I am hopefully waiting for a patch that will fix my problem. G3 works fine on my machine. If not, then I will have to bite the bullet and upgrade. Big$$$. (I went through the same exercise with G3, and it finally came.

On another note... You know the hobby industry has to keep making money, perhaps the field of modelers is getting saturated with G3 and sales are starting to slow down. I mean C'mon.. We're modelers, and are all guilty of paying too much for a bunch of toys anyways, right? Knife edge is playing the same game. You cannot realistically expect to keep getting upgrades for free. The have overhead and programmers to pay.

Just my .02 :cool:

-Patrick
 
Zelatio said:
To put it simply, no, it's not. All you get is some new eye candy that will slow down your computer and water, which will really slow down your PC. I am happy with G3.5 and will not be upgrading to G4 anytime soon. I think this was personally a horrible idea for them, but, that's just me.

So if you are a float pilot, then I'd say yes, it's worth the upgrade. But if you are not, then no, it's not.
Click to expand...
The water doesn't slow my computer down at all, what are you talking about? :confused:
in fact, G4 uses less resources, on my computer that is. Getting 200 FPS with all standard graphic settings.
 
The water doesn't slow my computer down at all, what are you talking about?
in fact, G4 uses less resources, on my computer that is. Getting 200 FPS with all standard graphic settings.
Click to expand...
Thanks for clearing that up, Josh. I'm sure many will be happy to hear the truth!

Charles
 
josh0987 said:
The water doesn't slow my computer down at all, what are you talking about? :confused:
in fact, G4 uses less resources, on my computer that is. Getting 200 FPS with all standard graphic settings.
Click to expand...

I find that extremely hard to believe. Water is complex, and I find it unbelievable that that is the case.
 
Thanks for the replies.

If I understand correctly:

Water take-offs and landings are a great improvement
New controller is an improvement
Flight physics and ground handling about the same
Several new models and several new flying fields
Loss of all models from Add-on1 to Add-on5 (That's 74 models since I have all 5)

I've got a couple of questions:

How do downloaded models made for 3.5 fly on 4? Assume they will be OK since flight physics are about the same.

Can the 3.5 controller be used with the 4 controller to fly split screen?

The upgrade from G2 to G3 was an easy decision for me because of the better 3D flying. The night flying in 3.5 was cool, but I rarely used it after the first month or two. This upgrade is a tougher decision ... the water landings sound cool but I'm not sure it's worth losing the add-ons and/or keeping two sims running and updated. If there was a "killer" new feature in G4 I'd be on the upgrade already. It's just not there for me like it was with 3D flying in G3.

Maybe I'll hold off and see if they solve the add-on compatability. :rolleyes:

Carl
 
josh0987 said:
The water doesn't slow my computer down at all, what are you talking about? :confused:
in fact, G4 uses less resources, on my computer that is. Getting 200 FPS with all standard graphic settings.
Click to expand...

I'll have to call B.S. on that one also. I have G4 and G3.5 and there is even a dramatic difference between a G4 "3D water field" and a "3D land field" water takes a hit on the fps.....there is also a drop from "photo water fields" to "photo land fields"

As far as "less resources then G3.5? I can't comment as I upgraded my graphics card during the switch. But in my opinion I'd say G4 (especially water fields) take a much bigger hit on fps.
 
cfossa said:
Thanks for the replies.

If I understand correctly:

Water take-offs and landings are a great improvement
New controller is an improvement
Flight physics and ground handling about the same
Several new models and several new flying fields
Loss of all models from Add-on1 to Add-on5 (That's 74 models since I have all 5)
Click to expand...
Correct...
cfossa said:
I've got a couple of questions:

How do downloaded models made for 3.5 fly on 4? Assume they will be OK since flight physics are about the same.
Click to expand...

They Fly the same but switch settings are reversed.

cfossa said:
Can the 3.5 controller be used with the 4 controller to fly split screen?
Click to expand...
Yes...

cfossa said:
The upgrade from G2 to G3 was an easy decision for me because of the better 3D flying. The night flying in 3.5 was cool, but I rarely used it after the first month or two. This upgrade is a tougher decision ... the water landings sound cool but I'm not sure it's worth losing the add-ons and/or keeping two sims running and updated. If there was a "killer" new feature in G4 I'd be on the upgrade already. It's just not there for me like it was with 3D flying in G3.

Maybe I'll hold off and see if they solve the add-on compatability. :rolleyes:

Carl
Click to expand...
 
Since there are doubts about the water 3D fields, could someone please clear this up, for everyone?

Would someone be so kind as to compare a standard 3D field, with comparable objects, with a water 3D field, so that we may get a handle on fps differences?

Thanks!

Charles
 
Water consumes a lot of graphics processing power when it is turned up to HIGHEST quality. At LOW quality it consumes very little.

Everything that is rendered by the sim takes some time. If you run the sim at high resolution, full AA, with quality levels HIGHEST, only a very high end machine will net you 30 fps. This isn't a bug. It's something we do on purpose so that people with really high end machines have something prettier to look at.

Since the physics run at a high rate all the time you should be tailoring your graphical quality to something in the 45 fps range or so. You can go down to 30 or even 25 fps if you like, but I personally prefer a little bit of headroom and I don't personally need all the eye candy.

Jim
 
Thanks, Jim! That's EXACTLY what I was looking for.

My G4 shipped today, I can't wait!

Charles
 
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jbourke said:
Everything that is rendered by the sim takes some time. If you run the sim at high resolution, full AA, with quality levels HIGHEST, only a very high end machine will net you 30 fps. This isn't a bug. It's something we do on purpose so that people with really high end machines have something prettier to look at.

Jim
Click to expand...

Which is exactly what I hope for.

Today's computers will be slow-pokes next year... and when I upgrade my current Quad Core "monster" I like to see the software scale up as well.
 
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