New Condor Tips Document

Hi,

I have created a Condor Tips document for new Condor Competition Soaring
Flight Simulator users. It is available he
http://www.cumulus-soaring.com/condor.htm

Let me know if you experienced Condor users have any corrections or
additions for the document. I'm relatively new to the software.

Good Soaring,

Paul Remde
Cumulus Soaring, Inc.
http://www.cumulus-soaring.com

On May 5, 10:12 pm, "Paul Remde" wrote:
Hi,

I have created a Condor Tips document for new Condor Competition Soaring
Flight Simulator users. It is available hehttp://www.cumulus-soaring.com/condor.htm

Let me know if you experienced Condor users have any corrections or
additions for the document. I'm relatively new to the software.

Good Soaring,

Paul Remde
Cumulus Soaring, Inc.http://www.cumulus-soaring.com

Not bad for a first shot at making tips, Paul! Good stuff - Condor
has taken awhile to get popular here in the USA but the Europeans have
embraced it and I'm excited about more of us in America taking
advantage of all it has to offer!

One suggestion: In your tips document, mention to people that Condor
shouldn't be too tough to fly. If the controls seem too sensitive or
are "off", they should check the "Input" configuration tab and adjust
the sensitivity of the joystick axes.

Take care,

--Noel

Hi Noel,

Good point. I've been playing with the sensitivity a bit myself. I'm
curious how you have yours set.

Paul Remde

"noel.wade" wrote in message
...
On May 5, 10:12 pm, "Paul Remde" wrote:
Hi,

I have created a Condor Tips document for new Condor Competition Soaring
Flight Simulator users. It is available
hehttp://www.cumulus-soaring.com/condor.htm

Let me know if you experienced Condor users have any corrections or
additions for the document. I'm relatively new to the software.

Good Soaring,

Paul Remde
Cumulus Soaring, Inc.http://www.cumulus-soaring.com

Not bad for a first shot at making tips, Paul! Good stuff - Condor
has taken awhile to get popular here in the USA but the Europeans have
embraced it and I'm excited about more of us in America taking
advantage of all it has to offer!

One suggestion: In your tips document, mention to people that Condor
shouldn't be too tough to fly. If the controls seem too sensitive or
are "off", they should check the "Input" configuration tab and adjust
the sensitivity of the joystick axes.

Take care,

--Noel

On May 6, 5:06 am, "Paul Remde" wrote:
Hi Noel,

Good point. I've been playing with the sensitivity a bit myself. I'm
curious how you have yours set.

Paul Remde

I wish there was some magical setting; but every joystick is a little
different. :-/

The biggest "universal" thing I've found is that the CH Pro Pedals
tend to be very sensitive, so with them I tend to lower the
sensitivity slider down to only a couple of notches above the minimum
to prevent yawing the nose way too much.

Oh, one other thing to mention in the Tips document: If the screen
seems jittery or the glider seems to respond in a stuttering or jerky
manner, you need to lower the graphics settings to get better
performance.

Enjoy!

--Noel

Hi Noel,

Thanks for the tips!

Can you clarify the comment below. What do you mean by "lower the graphics
settings"?

Paul Remde

"noel.wade" wrote in message
...
On May 6, 5:06 am, "Paul Remde" wrote:
Hi Noel,

Good point. I've been playing with the sensitivity a bit myself. I'm
curious how you have yours set.

Paul Remde

I wish there was some magical setting; but every joystick is a little
different. :-/

The biggest "universal" thing I've found is that the CH Pro Pedals
tend to be very sensitive, so with them I tend to lower the
sensitivity slider down to only a couple of notches above the minimum
to prevent yawing the nose way too much.

Oh, one other thing to mention in the Tips document: If the screen
seems jittery or the glider seems to respond in a stuttering or jerky
manner, you need to lower the graphics settings to get better
performance.

Enjoy!

--Noel

Condor soaring is GREAT. If you can't really get up in the air, then
CONDOR is the next best thing. I tried unsuccessfully to get condor
to participate at the Memphis convention, and to get a on-line
competition going at the contest...but most people had no idea what I
was talking about. At this years convention in New Mexico, I talked a
little bit to Noel, about trying to set up an American on-line soaring
simulator contest again....especially now that CONDOR is making more
headway here in America. I contacted the creators of Condor in
Slovenia, and they were VERY receptive about helping those of us
interested in America. So, everyone get their winter soaring
simulator software and joysticks in place....it's a great way to fly
when earth-bound!
Micki Minner

OK---I'll ask---
What joystick is recommended for Condor.
My Gravis Eliminator was not very good with a large dead spot in the middle.
I took it apart to see if I could improve it---made it worse.

Saitek, Logitech, and Microsoft all seem to have good ones on paper at
least.

Favorites?

--
Hartley Falbaum


"MickiMinner" wrote in message
...
Condor soaring is GREAT. If you can't really get up in the air, then
CONDOR is the next best thing. I tried unsuccessfully to get condor
to participate at the Memphis convention, and to get a on-line
competition going at the contest...but most people had no idea what I
was talking about. At this years convention in New Mexico, I talked a
little bit to Noel, about trying to set up an American on-line soaring
simulator contest again....especially now that CONDOR is making more
headway here in America. I contacted the creators of Condor in
Slovenia, and they were VERY receptive about helping those of us
interested in America. So, everyone get their winter soaring
simulator software and joysticks in place....it's a great way to fly
when earth-bound!
Micki Minner

Video cards are generally limited by computational power and data transfer
bandwidth. (bus speed)

Hi Paul

You can generally improve the smoothness of display by increasing the frame rate
- and hence perceived quality.

Way to do this is to reduce the computational task by lowering the display
resolution (of what condor renders, not the screen) The task of rendering a
screen is a geometric function of three resolution parameters. Since the number
of pixels to calculate is a function of horisontal resolution X vertical
resolution a modest drop in resolution dramatically reduces the number of
calculations required per frame.

Often better is to lower the colour depth. Many LCD screens have limited colour
gamut anyway - so the default 32bit per pixel colour depth is largely wasted.
Dropping to 24 or 16 bits per pixel does not particularly reduce colour
perception, but it can substantially reduce the data transfer requirement. (and
the calculation complexity) Go back to the higher setting for your photos...

So setting 1024x768x24 is faster than 1024x768x32 is faster than 1280x1024x32 etc.

In general a video card with dedicated video RAM and decent OpenX support is all
that is required for Condor. If you have shared RAM - try to limit the data
throughput to increase frame rate till it is smooth.


Cheers
Bruce


Paul Remde wrote:
Hi Noel,

Thanks for the tips!

Can you clarify the comment below. What do you mean by "lower the graphics
settings"?

Paul Remde

"noel.wade" wrote in message
...
On May 6, 5:06 am, "Paul Remde" wrote:
Hi Noel,

Good point. I've been playing with the sensitivity a bit myself. I'm
curious how you have yours set.

Paul Remde
I wish there was some magical setting; but every joystick is a little
different. :-/

The biggest "universal" thing I've found is that the CH Pro Pedals
tend to be very sensitive, so with them I tend to lower the
sensitivity slider down to only a couple of notches above the minimum
to prevent yawing the nose way too much.

Oh, one other thing to mention in the Tips document: If the screen
seems jittery or the glider seems to respond in a stuttering or jerky
manner, you need to lower the graphics settings to get better
performance.

Enjoy!

--Noel

Hi Hartley,

I currently use a 10 year old Microsoft Sidewinder II joystick. It is OK but
I don't think they are available as new any more.

I was curious to see how a force feedback joystick would work so I just
ordered the one found he
http://www.amazon.com/Saitek-Cyborg-...624 89&sr=8-1

I look forward to having increased pressure at high speed. I don't know if
it will be worth the money but I just had to find out. It should arrive in
a day or 2. I'll let you know what I think of it.

Paul Remde
Cumulus Soaring, Inc.
http://www.cumulus-soaring.com

"HL Falbaum" wrote in message
. ..
OK---I'll ask---
What joystick is recommended for Condor.
My Gravis Eliminator was not very good with a large dead spot in the
middle.
I took it apart to see if I could improve it---made it worse.

Saitek, Logitech, and Microsoft all seem to have good ones on paper at
least.

Favorites?

--
Hartley Falbaum


"MickiMinner" wrote in message
...
Condor soaring is GREAT. If you can't really get up in the air, then
CONDOR is the next best thing. I tried unsuccessfully to get condor
to participate at the Memphis convention, and to get a on-line
competition going at the contest...but most people had no idea what I
was talking about. At this years convention in New Mexico, I talked a
little bit to Noel, about trying to set up an American on-line soaring
simulator contest again....especially now that CONDOR is making more
headway here in America. I contacted the creators of Condor in
Slovenia, and they were VERY receptive about helping those of us
interested in America. So, everyone get their winter soaring
simulator software and joysticks in place....it's a great way to fly
when earth-bound!
Micki Minner

Bruce -

Your advice is generally good; but those rules of thumb are changing
as graphics cards have evolved over the last few years.

Screen Resolution and Color Depth affect graphics performance mostly
when the graphics card doesn't have much memory (such as with cheaper
PCs that have "Integrated" graphics chips or "Shared memory").

Furthermore, most of today's LCD screens are actually designed to work
at 1 optimum resolution. Using lower resolutions will cause the
screen to look blurry or blocky (in Windows and other 2d applications,
not just during 3d rendering).

The geometric complexity of a scene (i.e. the number of three
dimensional shapes in view) is more critical to performance with
today's modern 3d graphics cards.

So the first thing to do is to try to lower the amount of trees and
objects being rendered. Also lowering the visibility (drawing
distance) or lowering the terrain or texture detail can help. "High
End" smoothing (such as anti-aliasing or anisotropic filtering) can
also add a big slow-down and should be disabled if the computer isn't
performing well.

Most of these display/graphics options are visible from within the
Condor settings / configuration screens.

Take care,

--Noel
(Former computer-game developer) :-)