SUGGESTED INSTALLATION TIPS FS98

Most of my scenery will install pretty much as is the standard practice for add-ons within the Microsoft Flight Simulator 98 program. They can reside anywhere on the hard drive or on another hard drive for that matter and they are linked through the scenery libary option. As a rule I try to keep the one I use most on the highest layer level and its good to separate the layers by non-adjoining layers.

To run my scenery you need to disable the default world scenery libraries for the area you wish to navigate. This means if you want to fly in Vermont then you need to disable the Northeast Scenery files in the world library. For Detroit you would have to disable the Great Lakes Scenery.

This will ensure that there are no tiling conflicts, but sometimes its hit and miss and if two airports are tiled nearby they will cause one of the airports to seem to float. I've actually seen this phenomena on the ground also. Although they appear ok when you start your take-off roll you fall through the sky and crash halfway down the runway even on the ground.

In my constant battle things well managed on my system I keep them in their own folder. This allows me to interchange scenery bgl files without having to go through the rigamorale within the flight simulator program. It just works best for me.

I created a folder titled "FS98Scenery". Within this folder I divided in a similar fashion to the NOAA Terminal Coverage and then created a folder within each for disctinctive states or provinces. Each of these folders has two folders. One for Scenery and Texture respectfully.

Note the wildcard indicating all of the bgl type files or all of the r8, pat, or oav files are to be considered inclusive. If you are missing a texture the program will still run but buidings and polygons will appear greyed out.

Keeping the files orgarnized is important and is the key to giving you flexibility with your installation. If you choose to place the files within the FS directory they may load a little faster depending on your CPU speed and RAM. Like everything else with Flight Simulator its a trade off though and faster CPU speeds should not have much problem with them external to the program.

One other option is to place the texture files in your main texture folder which takes up less room. For design purposes this isn't too convenient so I prefer to keep them externally. Placing them internally allows different scenery files to share the textures and thus creates faster loading of the textures.

  SUGGESTED INSTALLATION TIPS FS2000

Things go a little different with this version of the program since with FS2000 I use the default scenery in the background. This means you will not have to disable anything in the world library.

Those of you who have used my FS98 scenery understand my thinking here. I keep the scenery out of the main FS program so that it doesn't get jumbled up with all the texture and bgl swapping that goes on. For most of you the directories probably will work best within the Main FS2000 scenery directory. Textures are handled the same way as described above.

I created a folder titled "FS98Scenery". Within this folder I divided in a similar fashion to the NOAA Terminal Coverage and then created a folder within each for disctinctive states or provinces. Each of these folders has two folders. One for Scenery and Texture respectfully.

One other option is to place the texture files in your main texture folder which takes up less room. It allows multiple scenery areas to share texture files and you might find that way more convenient.

One big difference with FS2K is that information is kept in your scenery.cfg file in the main folder. This includes information concerning the layers, flatten areas and exclude areas. Specific information on this can be found at the respective scenery download pages.

  SUGGESTED INSTALLATION TIPS FS2002

Things go a little different with this version of the program since with FS2002. Excludes are pretty much the same and should be in the same directory as the BGL's.

Flightsim doesn't really care where you install the files as long as you point the program exactly where it belongs. For instance my FS2002 bgl files reside in their own respective folder;

c:\Flightsim\FS2002\SceneDB\Airport\CYOW\Scenery

I had to create a few folders but that can be done in the extraction process if your using winzip. Although the safe method is to unzip everything into a temp folder. Basically any file ending in a BGL belongs here.

Textures as normal all go into the MAIN Texture folder inside flightsim. So any R8, OAV, BMP files should be extracted there.

The last step then is to open the flightsim program and go to your World Library Menu and add the scenery as instructed by Microsoft. This is how you point the program to the scenery and it will add the lines to your scenery config file. Make sure when you select the folder that you type in *.bgl into the selection box so it includes them into the folder.

There is the possibility you may see two airports in your Airport directory afterwards but its not really a problem as the default airport is excluded.

  SUGGESTED INSTALLATION TIPS FS2002

Things are pretty much the same in FS9 or FS2004 as they were in FS2002. Positioning the Exclude in the Scenery folder so that it keeps the same hierarchy is importants. FS2002 versions of my scenery do work in FS9.

Unzip all *.BGL files into a folder you have created for it. (I don't recommend using the AddOn folder as it opens the door for problems later on with overlapping layers.) Basically I just created a folder called SceneDB and then two others within it so that I can keep some distinction between them. Here is an example of how mine looks;

c:\Flightsim\FS9\SceneDB\CYOW\Scenery

This folder contains all the bgl files.

No changes on the Textures as normal all go into the MAIN Texture folder inside flightsim. So any R8, OAV, BMP files should be extracted there. Many of the textures I use share compatibility so they work best from here. You can experiment with a texture folder if you want, but you might run into seasonal problems if you do. Basically your on your own in that case.

There is no AFD file for 2004. Instead I am in the process of modifying AFCAD211 files for that purpose. Special instructions are required for this and will be found on the on the specific Projects page.

The program should pick up on the changes but you will still need to point to the scenery in the World Library Menu. This you will find under Settings, from the main page as you enter the program. Remember that you must restart the program for the changes to occur.