[PMDG's new B747-400 and FSUIPC5]

15 hours ago, Pete Dowson said:

I'll put an option in to try to fend off any such calls, though that might not help if my theory is correct. Meanwhile, PMDG did say they'd release a fix.

This fix has now been released (via the updater in the PMDG Operations Centre software), and announced by forum post. I'll quote from the announcement below:

8 hours ago, rsrandazzo said:

PMDG 747-400 Queen of the Skies II for Prepar3D v4:  Along with a few minor tweaks, this product was updated to temporarily disable a process that allowed users to connect the 747 to Squawkbox/IVAP using FSUIPC.  This connection process was causing the 747 to fail and will be reintroduced once a solution is found.  This disablement only affects Prepar3D v4.

I've also tried out the fix with 5.101k (which previously rendered the 747 unable to initialise regardless of load order), and it is now working properly even when loaded directly from the startup interface.

 

8 hours ago, rsrandazzo said:

It is important also to point out that we have disabled the ability to use FSUIPC to connect the 777 to Squawkbox/IVAP while we work through some compatibility issues that create problems for the operation of the airplane for some users.  This disablement is expected to be temporary.

It's interesting to note that even the PMDG 777 (which has been released for P3D v4 today - albeit only the -200LR and 777F) announcement came with a similar note.

 

Seems to be all going for me now - many thanks for your efforts on this matter Pete!!

I know I said earlier that I only really use FSUIPC to run FTG ACARS (which remains the case), but as a small token of appreciation I've purchased a license key for FSUIPC5 anyway. Who knows, it might just open the door to features I'll come to swear by!

 

EDIT: Also just tested with 5.101m and (as expected) works fine.

[PMDG's new B747-400 and FSUIPC5]

8 hours ago, Pete Dowson said:

I'll put an option in to try to fend off any such calls, though that might not help if my theory is correct. Meanwhile, PMDG did say they'd release a fix. Have you looked?  It may have only gone out to those who;ve reported the problem to them so far, so they can prove it

 

With the latest 747-400 released this year, PMDG now pushes "real time" updates to us via their Operations Centre software. I've just checked there and no update yet, but being that this has all happened in the last 12 hours or so, I'll stand by and see if an update comes out over the weekend.

[PMDG's new B747-400 and FSUIPC5]

Good morning,

This is another 5.101k test report - after installing 5.101k, starting a scenario directly on the PMDG 747 still led to the initialisation failure (blank screens etc), but more interestingly the workaround of loading default aircraft first also stopped working. I've only done a brief few tests but haven't been able to get the PMDG 747 to load properly at all on 5.101k.

I then reverted to 5.101j and loaded using the workaround successfully.

Quite fascinating - I think this shows an interaction between PMDG 747 and FSUIPC5? Whereas previously we haven't been able to show that altering FSUIPC5 (whether through the ini parameters or otherwise) could predictably affect whether the 747 would load.

Regards,

David

[PMDG's new B747-400 and FSUIPC5]

Just now, Pete Dowson said:

First please see my last post in this thread, just before yours.

Pete

 

Just saw it after I posted. Thank you very much for the update, and I look forward to testing with 5.101k.

[PMDG's new B747-400 and FSUIPC5]

12 hours ago, Pete Dowson said:

Does it? Where do you see that? It isn't according to what PMDG are telling me.

Pete

 

Between the thread here and the thread at the PMDG forum, I did a quick count showing 10 people reporting this problem specifying that they are running win7, 1 person on win10, 4 did not specify OS; in addition, 4 reports of all OK on win10, and in one case someone experiencing this problem on win7 installed win10 and stopped having the issue.

I don't know much about programming (and don't claim to), and I can only try to understand the problem based on what I can see in the forums (all that I have access to). But the above stats, plus your statement that you've compiled with target set to win10, it gave me the impression (perhaps an "intuitive hunch") that it might be OS related.

4 hours ago, Pete Dowson said:

Here I can make the PMDG 747 work flawlessly on my Win7 system -- provided I load itt as the first aircraft at the Scenario menu. And thereafter I can swap aircraft back and forth at will.

If I load a different aircraft as the first aircraft and THEN load the PMDG 747, it gives me a black screen only and P3D4 hangs, needing a Task Manager "terminate process" to get rid of it.

And this is exactly the same whether FSUIPC5 is being loaded or not!

This does suggest a loading or initialisation problem in the 747 code.

Incidentally, have you asked PMDG to create a Win7-targetted build to test with? If not, why not? Why only ask me?

Pete

 

Thank you for your explanation, now I understand how you've arrived at the conclusion that it's a PMDG initialisation problem (which I previously struggled to understand).

To answer your question at the end, I don't actually know what PMDG's compile target was (I guess there's a high chance it would be win10), and this forum here is where I got the hunch and my post this morning was the first time I put it into a sentence. That is a very good idea sir, and I shall go and contact PMDG.

[PMDG's new B747-400 and FSUIPC5]

On 7/06/2017 at 2:40 AM, Pete Dowson said:

Not that it's relevant, but my development system is Win7 Pro 64. I used the current VS15 compiler system with the libraries set the same as P3D4 and the target set to Win10.

Pete

 

Hi Pete,

By any chance, would it be possible for you to compile one with a target of Win7 please, just as a test to see if that fixes the problem for those of us suffering on windows 7? It does seem peculiar that this problem seems to be mainly affecting windows 7 users.

Kind Regards

David

[PMDG's new B747-400 and FSUIPC5]

I've also experienced this issue, and I'm also running on Windows 7 (and I've also noticed the trend that there's more tales of trouble on win7)

When I removed FSUIPC entirely, PMDG 747 loaded up perfectly every time. This was a bit frustrating as I fly with FTG which has an ACARS requiring FSUIPC.

After hours of trial and error I've found that I can fairly predictably load up the PMDG 747 if I loaded the default F-22 first at the gate (for some reason loading the F-22 at the default scenario KVPS rwy 19 doesn't make the 747 load correctly). I first discovered this while playing with the three extra lines in FSUIPC.ini Pete mentioned, but I've since removed all three and can still predictably load up the 747 at the gate on top of the F-22.

 

I remember searching the PMDG Knowledge Base at first, and their known cause for this (blank cockpit displays, unresponsive, no landing gear in external view) is not having SimConnect installed. Since the 747 works perfectly with FSUIPC removed, I do wonder if it might be the interaction between FSUIPC and SimConnect that's causing a conflict with PMDG?