License

[WWA275]

Hi All, which license do most use in P3Dv4? I'm thinking about transitioning over from FSX.
Thanks Allen Daffern WWA275

[Mark Kusiak]

The "license" of P3D comes in three flavors...
Academic, Professional, and Professional Plus.

The "academic" package appears to be targeted towards students and has all the rights of the professional package at about half the price.

The standard, non-academic entry would be the professional license. I'm sure that you must be a student or teacher of some sort to qualify
for the academic license. For an entering pilot who is either buying for the first time or upgrading, it appears that the honest entry point
would be the "professional" license

What do you want to use the simulator for and do you want to be able to receive credit from the FAA for time flown on it?

Under certain circumstances, time flown on the simulator could be logged as flight time under specific conditions. Consult the FAA FAR's
concerning the logging of simulated flight. Licensing may be a part of the requirement to use a simulator in this manner.

For the WestWind pilot, what do you qualify for and what do you want to potentially use the simulator for.

[Rob Wilkinson]

Unless you're going to be charging for the use of your flight simulator in a business of some sort, you do not need the Professional license. Anyone can be a "student" of aviation and the only downside to the Academic license is the watermark.

[Mark Kusiak]

Thanks Rob...

[Sean McConnell WWA659]

I have found there are a few "combat" related features that do not work so well but that is a nonissue for Westwind.
I am a real-world pilot and use the Academic License. As Rob said the only downside of Academic license is the watermark.
Transferring from FSX and FSX Steam to P3Dv4 is a logical move and most of the FSX SP2 aircraft will transfer over to P3Dv4 without too much of a fuss, a few other required updates.
While I did use P3Dv4 for my main sim for a while, X-Plane 11 has become my goto sim. I still use P3Dv4.5 for aircraft I am missing in X-Plane.

[WWA275]

Thanks for getting back to me guys. I've been with Microsoft Flt Sim from the beginning and with WestWind for 20 years. I'm retired Mil and US Gov and love flying, although I can no longer fly do to medical reasons. So Flt Sim and WestWind are my past time.

I currently use FSX-SE but most of the major improvements to GSX, GSX PBR, etc, are going to P3D-V4 and FSDream Team are doing upgrades to 64 bit improvements on scenery as well. All of the addon scenery I have can also be used in the P3D platform. An upgrade seems inevitable but I don't know which one to use. How does the water mark affect the sim?

I don't know anything about X-Plane. I'll look into it.

Thanks for the time guys.
Allen Daffern WWA275

[Sean McConnell WWA659]

I would like to clarify a couple of points I made in my previous post here.

1. For FSX and FSX Steam aircraft to work in P3Dv4 they Must be FSX native models, they can not be FS2004 AKA FS9 conversions. Some of the payware aircraft will need a P3D update or need to rebuy the P3Dv4 version.

2. I have had X-Plane since version 9 and prefer the flight dynamics over FSX/P3D, but the lack of accurate scenery until version 11 limited my use of X-Plane. I live near Higginsville Municipal Industrial Aiport KHIG in Missouri, this airport sits right next to the city lake. Up until version 11 the city lake was missing from the scenery. At some point during XP10 development, KHIG was added to the scenery gateway and available for download. Prior to that, it was just a runway out in the middle of nowhere.

Graphics improvement and addition of basic ortho features such as lakes and rivers that were missing prior to version 11 was a game-changer for me. Also, there are a lot more people making decent airports for the scenery gateway so we are getting close to my Ideal sim which was a marriage of X-Plane's flight dynamics and FSX Scenery.

[WWA275]

Hi Sean, thanks for the info. Unfortunately after many years, my time with MFS is coming to an end. With any big change, you lose some good data like flight plans you have spent countless hours putting together. I will only lose a few addons but no big deal. I will go to P3Dv4 and for now play with XPlane 11 until I see what it's about. There are only a few aircraft from FSX I want. Is there a trick to moving them to P3Dv4? Can the WestWind livery's be used and can the WestWind AI aircraft be used? I know they aren't native but hope there might be a way.
Thanks Allen

[Sean McConnell WWA659]

Yes the FSX liveries will work in P3DV4. Use the same procedure to add to P3D as FSX.
I some cases you may need to make a dummy FSX.exe file and use a Migration tool to install an FSX aircraft into P3D.
After you get P3Dv4, make sure any new aircraft you get are for P3Dv4

[WWA275]

Thanks Sean, I'll be in touch.