Microsoft Flight Simulator
This page is designed to help you get started in your collection of Microsoft Flight Simulator files and information.
I assembled these links back when I was into Flight Simulator 98 and 2000.
Most of it should still be applicable to later versions (FS2002, FS2004, FSX).
The links were last checked on 2008-03-26.
1. General Sites
- AVSim
- The emphasis seems to be on news. I usually jump straight to the download library.
- FlightSim.com
- You have to login to download files, but it's worth it! There's a huge library of files on this site, and plenty of info as well, including reviews. I love the search engine. There's also a forum. I use the main menu as my starting point.
- FSInsider
- This is Microsoft's "blog site" about FS. It's pretty easy to navigate and has lots of introductory info and news.
- Microsoft FSX home page
- The FSX home page is simple, attractive, and focused on marketing.
- simFlight.com
- Search and you will find lots of tips, reviews, etc.
- SimTakeoff (was Cranenburgh)
- The design is a little chaotic and the content is mostly out of date, but the writing is friendly and enthusiastic. There are usually descriptions of each category at the top of each page.
4. Aircraft
- AVSim - FSX Aircraft
| FS2004
| FS2002
| FS2000
| FS98
- Login Required. Thousands of aircraft, most with at least one picture.
- FlightSim - Aircraft
| Airlines
| Reviews
- Login required. Use search. Tons of aircraft, nice pictures.
- Fly Away - FSX Aircraft
| FS2004
- The links are for prop planes. You can use the drop-down to find commercial jets, military aircraft, helicopters, vintage, etc.
- Simviation - Downloads
- Organized by FS version and aircraft type: Civilian Jets, Props, Military, Helicopters, Vintage.
- SimTakeoff - FS2000 Aircraft
| FS98
| FS95
- Some pictures.
8. Weather
These were useful for FS98, but not needed for FS2000 or later, which has built-in weather generation and downloading.
- Real Weather for FS Pilots
- By Curt Olson. Contains METAR and SAO data. I used to download my METAR data from here (saving it as metar.txt). This site also contains links to the RealWeather software.
- NOAA Metar FTP Site (times out as of 2008-03-26)
- METAR data for the previous day. There are 24 files here. I think 21Z.TXT = 9PM-10PM. I haven't tried any of these yet.
11. Search
As a test, I searched the following sites for "Bellingham" (WA) and "Charlottesville" (VA), two cities where I've lived. Here I report the number of hits, some of which aren't actually scenery.
- AVSim - Search
- Test results: Bellingham 5, Charlottesville 4. Select "Microsoft Flight Simulator" category to eliminate non-FS results.
- FlightSim - Search
- Test results: Bellingham 4, Charlottesville 8. Login required. Nice search engine.
- simFlight - Search
- Test results: Bellingham 1, Charlottesville 0.
- Fly Away
- Test results: Bellingham 0, Charlottesville 0.
- Simviation - Search
- Test results: Bellingham 1, Charlottesville 2.
- SimTakeoff - FS2004 Files
- Test results: Bellingham 0, Charlottesville 0. Search is at bottom of page.
14. Other Stuff
- Trav's FS98 Screen Grabs
- Comparison of hardware versus software rendering of the same view, as seen on the ATI Xpert98 graphics card.