Captains!
During the past year, we have provided uncharacteristically little information about the projects underway at PMDG. With this announcement, I am going to shed some light with a few status updates and some new information that will, no doubt, excite a good many of you!
First- lets address the transition between FS9 and FSX. Historically speaking, the transition to new version of Microsoft Flight Simulator has been a relatively seamless endeavor. A few updates might have been required to some of our favorite legacy products, but for the most part, forward compatibility wasn't difficult to accomplish. In recent years as our flight simming hardware has become more complex, our community as a whole has hoped to see revolutionary changes in the FS platform, but instead been satisfied with evolutionary changes.
The old addage: "be careful what you wish for" comes to mind with the arrival of FSX.
With the arrival of FSX, the “norms” of development transitions were dramatically shaken up. You have no doubt noticed that PMDG and many other developers have been slow to produce high fidelity scenery and aircraft addons for FSX. This slowness has its roots in a couple of areas. I am probably not surprising anyone when I say that FSX performance on the average simmer’s system was spotty, at best in the initial release. This, combined with the need to wait for delivery of development tools for FSX, and the need to adapt development practices to a vastly changed Flight Simulator platform has caused a significant gap in product release schedules for many FSX projects.
At PMDG, we have likely dug deeper into FSX than any other developer to date. During this process we were able to identify and help resolve a wide array of problems that impacted not just PMDG- but all aircraft developers for FSX. This process has been detailed, difficult and protected by NDA- hence we were not in the practice of sharing our efforts with you. But digging into the capabilities of the FSX platform and pushing them to their limits (and in some cases, beyond…) has allowed us to explore the benefits of adapting our development process in order to take full advantage of many of the powerful new features contained within FSX.
This process of exploring, adapting and learning has, obviously, slowed us down… Dramatically- in some cases. By our own internal measurement, we are well nigh two years behind schedule. (And to think it frustrates you.... imagine how we feel! )
At the end of the day, all of us on the PMDG team are excited about the future prospects for FSX and the capabilities it provides to add-on developers. But we are not immune to the fact that many of our long time customers are not yet finding success running this capable new platform at a speed which allows for the level of enjoyment they currently experience with FS9.
For this reason, we have invested a considerable amount of time and energy this summer into evaluating what is best for you, our customers, our product development schedule, and the future of the Flight Simulator platform as a whole. In a perfect world, the FS9/FSX transition would have been a smooth one and all of us would be enjoying the new platform fluidly. Our experience has shown that while some users have tremendous performance with FSX, others simply cannot get the kind of performance out of FSX that allows them to enjoy the platform. This is of concern to us, as it means that our customer base is unable to move onto the new platform as confidently as we have experienced in the past.
With this in mind, we are going to change course on a previously firm commitment that we had made to produce the PMDG MD-11 as an FSX only product. After evaluating the market once again, we have concluded that we can do a better job of serving your needs by appreciating your desire to upgrade to FSX when your hardware capabilities warrant such a move, rather than forcing you to move in line with our development cycle. Earlier in August, we began the process of converting the PMDG MD-11 to dual platform compatibility.
As is traditional with PMDG, I am not going to provide any release date expectation other than to say that we are still a few months away. The transition to dual platform capability presents its own unique set of challenges, and some that we may not yet have discovered. The process of developing a second, entirely independent MD-11 visual model for FS9 is not one that we undertake lightly, and I cannot underestimate how much work will be involved in that piece of this project alone.
In the end, I think that this decision should bring some happiness to a number of customers who do not feel that they will run FSX efficiently in the near future. While it does kick the release schedule for the MD-11 back along the calendar pages- we think that most of you will agree that the additional time will be worth the end result.
Now, looking forward, here is what you can expect:
The PMDG 747-400/400F for FSX is being merged into a single product that is being tied up for release “soon.” (I know you hate that word…) We are combining the 400/400F into a single package under FSX in order to provide you with a better value for those who elect to transition to FSX with this venerable product. In producing this product for FSX, we have, quite literally, ripped the guts out of the simulation and replaced it with an FSX enabled core that eliminates some of the bottlnecks we experienced in FS9. This is an unusual product release in that "it's still a 747-400" but we have your loyalty and product value in mind with our expected pricing process. (More on that later...) I would expect the 400/400F for FSX to arrive within the month. (standard disclaimer applies: if we find something wrong- we’ll take longer, etc etc etc…)
The PMDG MD-11 will be released in FS9 and FSX compatible versions simultaneously. We are still a few months away from a general release here. We are very close to merging the VC and 2D cockpits into the simulation and this will mean you should begin seeing some very detailed screen shots in the near future. This product is probably one of the more exciting developments I've seen in some time- the MD-11 is so different than the Airbus and Boeing cockpits you've all become used to that it really will be enjoyable to learn and fly something entirely new!
The PMDG 737 NG2.0 is now currently expected to be released as an FS9 and FSX compatible product, including many of the technologies that we have developed for the 747 and MD-11 product lines. This product will not arrive in 2007… I'm going to put some caution into this announcement to say that if the general trend for simmers is into FSX and away from FS9- we may choose to move this product forward also. It is FAR easier for us to develop on a single platform than it is for both- but given what we know of the release timeline- I am very comfortable saying that this will be a dual platform product. (We can't wait to get you all flying short-haul once again! The long-haul jetlag is starting to show up as bags under your eyes!!!)
We have a few other aces up our sleeve that I’m not able to discuss with you at this time- but I will provide more information as it becomes available.
I hope this makes up for the long absence of information- we hope you will see the speed of things picking up rapidly, beginning in just a few short weeks!
Robert S. Randazzo
Precision Manuals Development Group
www.precisionmanuals.com
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ik heb weer lekker XP erop gezet en Vista eraf. Daarna FSX geinstalleerd + SP1 + FS global 2008 (SRTM Mesh voor de hele wereld) en een of andere FPS update van avsim en het draait allemaal als een trein!! Ik heb maar een 3GHz CPU met een Ati radeon 9800 maar ik was echt verbaast hoe goed alles liep. Mijn terrain sliders heb ik allemaal op het hoogst en het water ook en nog haal ik 24 FPS!!! heerlijk. Gisteren even boven de rocky mountains gevlogen, maar wat ziet dit er schitterend uit zeg met die mist in de bergen enzo i.c.m. met active Sky X !!! 
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met dank aan fibonacci
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maar met PMDG vliegen is nog zoveel mooier
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(serieus 
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