TILEPROXY for FS9 or FSX - have you ever tried this?

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 08 Mar 2008, 13:16

I've found this in the end: http://edtruthan.com/tileproxy/tutorial/

"WHAT IS TILEPROXY?

Created as FREEWARE by Christian Buchner, it's a real-time interface between Microsoft's Flight Simulator X and the Internet. It will download photo-terrain textures from online map services by acting as a proxy server and file format converter. This tool turns your Flight Simulator into an interactive 3D map browser unlike anything you have experienced before. In FSX resolution levels of up to 30cm per pixel can now be achieved. It may also be used with Flight Simulator 2004 (FS9) though texture resolution is limited to 4.75 meters per pixel, (as pictured above...still very nice!). With the latest version (Beta 7) Dual Core (and above) PC's now experience very fast load times in FSX. For older machines, FS9 will enjoy faster load times than FSX however. Recent versions of TileProxy now also include global water masks so FS water bodies and shorelines, with the usual reflections and FS water effects, are present!"

Have you tried this? How good (fast, fine) does it work?

djnocturnal · Post by **djnocturnal** » 09 Mar 2008, 01:56

intersesting, i might give this is a try!

any one else ever try this?

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 09 Mar 2008, 10:55

I'll try that stuff this evening, I'm going through all the documentation reading right now, nothing (too) complicated so far ...
what is it worth? -> just check this (plus some videos on YouTube, search for "tileproxy"):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cbuchner1/ ... 1164/show/

If this is for true

then we can forget having lost many gigs of HDD memory for all those (costly) photoreal sceneries, just for a few gigs of cache, just for those areas where YOU fly indeed, with the freedom to go everywhere (practically) where YOU like ...

Some more pics of what you can get right now, just for free!!!:
http://www.libertysim.net/forum/viewtop ... =6&t=16779

GrahamS · Post by **GrahamS** » 09 Mar 2008, 11:38

It would appear that the user aircraft has a maximum speed of around 200 kts with a top of the range PC and a very fast internet connection, or the ground textures become blurred as they cannot load fast enough.

KevinJarvis · Post by **KevinJarvis** » 09 Mar 2008, 17:03

Those shots are indeed incredible.

That would work very nicely for my weekly bush flights.

I guess I'd better get it before some payware company buys it up and starts charging us for it.....

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 10 Mar 2008, 09:16

So I tried this.

It looks promising, in overall.
I tried Beta 7 on my config: Vista 64, FS9 and 4 Mbit internet line.
Loading times are much shorter than I expected.
I managed to set up all that stuff, despite to have load Vista64 with F8 pressed (to disable digital driver signature checking) all the time as well as having to disable UAC permanently.

I did fought with the black tiles issues though.
Avsim forum tricks appear not to work on my setup:
"Beta7 / FS9 - Black Tiles Work Around Tip..."
http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az= ... 2981&page=

That's why I do not post pics yet (do not want to disappoint with black holes

).
The cure should be to use just "stable" Beta 6, what I plan tonight.
Oh, what's important - I started to fly with Yahoo Maps but switched to Google Maps - it depends much on coverage quality they offer.
Oh - and Google thought that I'm a robot maybe, so wanted me to input another stupid letter code intto the pop-up window (gosh....). Anyway - after this incident everything run smoothly (except black tiles but this I'll try to overcome, as I said).

It all looks like a new era technology is being born ...

KevinJarvis · Post by **KevinJarvis** » 10 Mar 2008, 16:14

I've got version 6 ready to load on FS9. But the instructions are a bit confusing to me.
The read-me I have states to configure, I must see the chapter on configuration. But I cannot seem to find that chapter....

I'll keep trying though and post some screenies if I get things worked out.

Psuls · Post by **Psuls** » 10 Mar 2008, 18:14

I tried to install it yesterday but got a dll error

maybe because i don't use XP sp2?

Javier Tapia · Post by **Javier Tapia** » 10 Mar 2008, 20:20

Hi,
what about airports and AFDs? Microsoft default airports not always are exactly where they should be.
Also... does the effects distinguish between water and hard surfaces?

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 10 Mar 2008, 22:12

I'm not a supporter at all but will try to answer

:

@Kevin: you may find it confusing at a first sight but all install goes as described in tutorial (there are links to other tutorial pages as well)

@Pascal: I think XP SP2 is required ('cos .NET 2 is ...) ...

@Javier: The Tileproxy world sceneries work exactly same as any other (photo-) scenery. What is "higher" in a rank that is more "important". Also- if airports (ie AFCADs as well) are misplaced than they are in a real world then you'll get same misplacement when using both Tileproxy and those airports. But ... nothing dramatic there as Tileproxy sceneries work best at higher flight altitudes and on the ground level everything is blurred.

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 10 Mar 2008, 23:28

Got the stuff to work!

Some heights of Israel:

Towards the sea:

@Javier: here's my Dimona AFCAD, that I prepared using Google Earth - looks like I scored direct hit

Over the never-existed-Dimona-Research-Center, I don't think I would be allowed to fly there in a real world:

Approaching Aquaba gulf:

Coverage is multicolored (as Google Maps are at different LODs) but ...:

Such a photoscenery for free, well

Today same incident as yesterday: the Google security guys asked me again, if I'm human ... I'm not sure anymore ...
had to key in some stupid code and got a new, fresh, detailed tiles loaded into my FS

djnocturnal · Post by **djnocturnal** » 10 Mar 2008, 23:46

looks great! is it true about being restricted to to under 200?

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 11 Mar 2008, 00:18

I don't know, my Socata runs at 190Mph max

but from what I see you can fly 330 as well.
Be aware though - all this stuff is much better when you fly slow, on a mid flight levels. It's more for admiring our World, all in all.

BTW - here's en example of misplaced AFCAD (Taba HETB):

Looks like our scenery designers should be precise down to meters (feets?) when preparing AFCADs, referring to Google Maps, or something similar ...

CrazyDunc · Post by **CrazyDunc** » 11 Mar 2008, 07:16

Does it work with FS9?

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 11 Mar 2008, 08:15

I am using FS9, I don't feel that the World is ready for FSX, CD!

sprocky · Post by **sprocky** » 11 Mar 2008, 20:00

It really looks great. That is something I was waiting for since the early FS days. Unfortunatly I am very limited in bandwidth (384kbps)

djnocturnal · Post by **djnocturnal** » 11 Mar 2008, 20:40

i thought i heard somewhere that megascenery is working on something similar, the only down side apears to be the mis placed afcads.

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 11 Mar 2008, 21:38

Megasceneries are not fo free ... this one is:

Here's a secret Tibet mission ...

djnocturnal · Post by **djnocturnal** » 11 Mar 2008, 22:40

wow, that looks really nice!! gonna have to give this a try tonight!
so is it safe to say that if google earth loads slow on my connection is this still worth trying? i have dsl 7mb but i get nothing close, more like 4, i'm just worried because google earth loads crazy sloooow

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 12 Mar 2008, 06:31

DJ, I use 4mb connection myself.
Problems are not with last-mile connection, more with overall Internet speed and Google Maps servers speed.

Tileproxy works like this - it caches surrounding area at first, so when you get into flight in the end, everything to your proximity is covered.
And this means A LOT of miles.
Should be no problems with cover, especially when you try Cessna (even Beech 350) and fly around.
If you use SR-71 you just have no time to look out of the window