Stephen Posted May 27, 2016 Report Share Posted May 27, 2016 Scenery Review - Updated : LSZH Airport Zurich v2.0 by Aerosoft Aerosoft have updated their X-Plane scenery of Zurich Airport to v2.0. This is a significant overhaul of this scenery and not just a nip and tuck job and I have a little bit of history with the scenery as well. The first Aerosoft release for X-Plane was the excellent BIRF - Keflavik which is still one of my all time time favorite sceneries that I used very regularly and even monthly. Second release was LSZA - Lugano Airport and this great little gem is buried in the shadow of the Alps on the Italian side. Both were excellent but still only small scale sceneries. The first "Mega" scenery release from Aerosoft was the third and that was LSZH - Zurich and the scenery was released in June 2012, and knowing Aerosoft's reputation in their "mega" series I was expecting something really amazing in scenery to come to X-Plane, but when it hit the desk, I was a bit and if not quite disappointed in the results. No doubt the buildings were used from the FSX (Flight Simulator) versions and they were excellent in design and textures, but overall the scenery left me cold. I rarely used the LSZH scenery either with only a few visits over the years, which is a waste of scenery in monetary terms. So Aerosoft and Pad-Labs have gone back to basics and given the scenery a total overhaul and re-released it as version 2.0, so no doubt I was very curious to see if the changes had been significant or just a quick brush over to make it more up to date... thankfully the former in a total makeover has been done, so let us see what the changes are. First Impressions The EADT Boeing 737-800 v5 was a nice choice for the route EGLL (Heathrow) to LSZH (Zurich) and on approach the scenery did look significantly better and different than I remembered from the arrivals in the past. No doubt the Windows machine makes a more comprehensive fill of the autogen, but LSZH looks far more intergrated into the X-Plane scenery, it now looks like a natural fit than the earlier v1.0 version. So immediately I am more comfortable with the the scenery than with my feelings of it in the past. On approach it feels great, though I notice the runway lighting is on in all hours. Where are the joins? Thankfully gone. Aerosoft notes all the orthophoto textures have been completely redone and the difference is excellent as it blends in perfectly now with the outer boundaries of the airport with the default textures... yes loving it. On the ground in the runways and taxiway textures look different and although the building structures are the same there is another change of look there also. It can actually be easily misleading as the main original terminal building texture is certainly the same, but the textures were excellent in the first version, so why change them, and thankfully they haven't. One of my first gripes on v1.0 was that Aerosoft didn't use any of the X-Plane features available to them, but those comments have been heard and on Gates A44, A47, A48, A49, A55 and you now have the animated Jetways feature (thank you), but it is a bit tricky as there is no auto guide or marshall to guide you in, so you have to guess your parking stopping point, go to the "Global Airport" menu of which the parking places are now noted and use it to verify the actual parking point and then note it for future reference. A small note is that you can tell the animated gates because glass is slightly different, not enough to look out of place, but enough to know which ones are active. So with this arrival I am already finding a lot of changes with v2.0 and all to the very good. Airport Overview The scenery does look very different, and if you go to my original images of v1.0 (below) you can see why and how much work has been done to the scenery to get it to match in correctly to the X-Plane landscape. The original v1.0 boundaries are very wide and it looks like the airport has just been dumped in the middle of the X-Plane scenery, areas are even cut off by a sharp line (roads) and then go back to the newer v2.0 and it is now all perfection in how the areas have been very well intergated into the surrounding areas. You can tell easily with the ground textures based on aerial images (0,5m/pixel) are so much more of a higher quality and the runways and taxiways are greatly improved and in the runways context and a few taxiways they are even a different colour. Terminals The main Piers of Concourse “A” and Concourse “D” which are directly connected to the main terminal. Concourse “A” is easily noted as it has the Control Tower on the top of the central part of the concourse. Concourse E is a remote terminal set to the north of the main terminal infrastructure and is connected to the Main Terminal zone by the automated underground “Skymetro” system. Concourse A: Gates A42-49, A51 - A56, A62 - A69, A70 - A79, A80 - A89 are on Concourse A, and are used exclusively by flights to and from destinations inside the Schengen Area, including domestic flights within Switzerland. It takes the form of a finger pier, directly connected at one end to the Airside Centre. If you think the A concourse looks different it is because it is different... all the textures have been completely redone from the dark flat greenish colouring in v1.0 (below) and the difference is now quite significantly better and the quality visually is overwhelmingly far better in transparency and better detailing, textures are now noted as 2k quality. Concourse 😧 Gates are prefixed B and D on Concourse D, Gates are D31 - D39 (minus D32/D37?), D41 - D42 and D51 - D58. Concourse D is designed to handle both Schengen and non-Schengen flights at the same gates. Each such gate has two numbers, one prefixed B and the other D, but with different passenger routes to and from the gates in order to keep the flows of Schengen and non-Schengen passengers separate. Again the concourse textures have been totally revamped on concourse D, if you look (above right) you can see the awful v1.0 textures and the whole concourse look far better with the extra new changes. Note radar installations, tower radars with wind hoses are animated as well. The highlighted extra detailing is certainly very noticeable. very much like the Aerosoft EGLL in textures and detail, but overwhelmingly nice. Concourse E: Zurich Airport's international terminal is the remote island Concourse E known as "Dock E" is situated between runways 16/34 and 14/32. Gates E16 - E19, E22 - E27, E34 - E37, E42 - E47, E52 - E58 and Gates E62/64/67 are used at this concourse. First the v1.0 original concourse was... pretty crappy. This is the v2.0 updated concourse... Of all the terminals this "Dock E" has had the biggest transformation. Textures and glass has been totally overhauled and remodelled and is now simply excellent, and has see though with people inside. But the external detailing is really good and again very much like the Aerosoft EGLL facades. This is the sort of exceptional detailing that was missing from the original airport scenery and you really notice the differences. The western side of the terminal on gate 67 has been remodled to accommodated the A380 airbus. The parking position E67 at Dock E now includes a separate, elevated boarding bridge(s) and a Static Airbus A380 of Emirates Airlines. Which I am not sure about because if you take your A380 to Zurich then how can you park at gate E67?. also there is updated taxiways and parking positions, for creating parking positions for the Airbus A380 and changed lot of taxiway markings to accommodated the super-sized aircraft. Enhanced Apron P has now additional parking positions. Opposite "Dock E" the Swissaport GSE chalet style maintenance building has undergone a complete rework of the average original. And the building is now very authentic, with great placement of vehicles. Another new feature in v2.0 is the 3d ground changes that allows vehicles to go underground via tunnels. There is one at the eastern side of "Dock E" and another by the main terminal (below). Note the great detailing behind the tunnel entrance. Really well done the tunnels are complimented by another X-Plane feature missing from v1.0... moving airport vehicles. The airport has now a load of animated vehicles moving all around the airport doing various jobs, very animated and I really love (as I always do) these great X-Plane features when done really well, like here at LSZH. The animations scurry around across ramps, under terminals over airport roads with great purpose, love it. One of my really big gripes with version v1.0 was the landside area behind the four main prominent (P1, P2, P3 & P6) carparks with the main Terminal buildings with the Radisson Hotel connected to P1. This is what v1.0 looked like... I admit I could not run my render setting as high as I would have liked, but it was by Aerosoft's standards pretty dismal. This is (above) v2.0 version, and that is what you expected in detail in the first place. The area is now complete and those horrible low-res photo textures have been replaced by a far better hi-res set, the 3d ramps look slightly tagged on and don't blend into the ground textures as good as they should do, but overall the work done here is excellent. Lots of car animations also help with the area not being so empty and blank. The neoplan bus station is excellent with moving colourful neoplans going about their business. The northern maintenance area has the Gate Gourmet facility and the large and comprehensive SR Technics engineering building. These areas were quite barren in v1.0, but in v2.0 they have been filled out with more objects, and building textures are far better in detail. Most importantly this northern maintenance zone blends in now very well with the X-Plane boundary with a few extra buildings added to combine both areas into one complete scenery, visually it is now perfect. Cargo The cargo area has better textures but the zone is still quite empty, a few cargo objects the odd heavy static cargo plane would have lifted it a bit more... Western Boundary There is a lot of nice building detailing on the western boundary surrounding the approach to RWY 10, this includes the Fire Station and various airport and commercial buildings. Note the great approach lighting. There is a huge amount of field objects dotted all around the runways, including shacks and this good VOR station. The views across the runways to the terminal areas is excellent. v2.0 Lighting Airport Zurich's lighting (above) was totally horrible in v1.0, beyond awful. No doubt the lighting textures was crossed straight over from FS (Flight Simulator) and only a few areas like along the top of the concourses had any HDR X-Plane lighting effects. V2.0's lighting is far, far better... but not perfect. On the runways there is no center green guidance line and neither are there any on the taxiways, with just the blue edge lights. So you will need your aircraft lighting to help you find the centerline of the runway in the dark. Approach lighting is good though. Building and terminal textures are far better, but still a little dullish, I really wanted a lot more light in the areas and certainly in the glass windows, but the rear landside windows are certainly a major improvement over the v1.0 originals. Ramp areas has various lighting, but it pretty dull out there while working in your turnaround services. I had to use the JARDesign "Ground Handling Deluxe" to light the side doors so the passengers could find their way to the aircraft on the stand... should be brighter there alone. The landside by the carparks is also quite dark, no street lighting has been placed on the vehicle ramps and it is noticeable, as I said, far better but not perfect. Summary v2.0 Airport Zurich certainly resolves most if not all of the problems that I griped about in v1.0. It uses the great X-Plane features of animated jetways and vehicles, HDR night lighting use is far better (but could be better still), the use of ground orthophoto textures are now very, very good and beautifully intergrated into the scenery. The complete redo of the buildings and terminals with hi-quality textures has lifted the scenery to a really high quality and visually brilliant viewing. This scenery is great X-Plane scenery, coming up from an average position to very high on the scale of desirable scenery for the simulator. Older purchasers of Airport Zurich can get a 50% discount on the new version and although there maybe a grumbles about paying more for a scenery they have already bought, then my opinion is that this is certainly a vastly upgraded, expanded version and worth the extra payment to have a really good LSZH - Zurich as part of your X-Plane scenery collection. So yes I am delighted to see great work done well, Airport Zurich v2 certainly now lives up to the Aerosoft quality and reputation that was missing in the first release version... ____________________________________________________________________________________ Yes! the Updated : LSZH Airport Zurich v2.0 by Aerosoft is NOW available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : Airport Zurich v2 Price is US$27.99 Note: Owners of the former Airport Zurich v1 are entitled to get a 50% discount: please send an email to [email protected] to get your discount code. Updated Features: Newly created buildings and objects with lots of 3D details, partly high resolution 2K textures New transparent boarding bridges with glass sides at every gate Updated taxiways and parking positions, as creating parking positions for the Airbus A380 changed other positions and moved lots of taxiway markings Parking position E67 at Dock E now includes a separate, elevated boarding bridge Static Airbus A380 of Emirates Airline, parking at Gate E67 Terminal 2 was recently rebuilt and was finished by the end of 2015 – we already completely finished the terminal for this scenery Enhanced Apron P with additional parking positions Jet engine test site with new, large noise absorption hall The entrances to terminals 1 and 2 were recently rebuilt – we already completely finished the reconstruction for this scenery, including a new roofing Additional features: Completely created scenery of Airport Zurich for X-Plane 10, state of late 2015 Detailed representation of the airport Photo realistic ground textures based on aerial images (0,5m/pixel) All buildings and airport facilities Photo real textures for buildings, vehicles etc. Complete taxiway and runway signage “High speed taxiways”, allowing for exiting the runway at high speeds Great night effects (baked textures X-Plane 10 HDR) Animated radar systems and wind hoses Animated vehicle traffic at and around the airport True to original runway and taxiway lighting Traffic routes with ground traffic signage Optimized for good performance (frame rate) Custom Mesh for the Airport Area Animated De-icing Trucks east of Terminal E VFR Helper Gates A44, A47, A48, A49, A55 with animated Jetways (installed AutoGate Version is needed) Manual in English/German and up to date charts Requirements: Windows 7 / 8 / 10 +, Mac, Linux X-Plane 10.40 + (Any edition) MultiCore Processor with 3 GHz or faster - 8 GB RAM 2Gb VRAM Minimum - 4GB or higher is recommended) Download size: 400 MB. Install: 1 GB Installation and documents: Download is 446.60meg and the scenery is deposited in the "Custom Scenery" There are three folders to install: Aerosoft LSZH Airport Zurich V2.0 a (958mb) Aerosoft LSZH Airport Zurich V2.0 b (136kb) Aerosoft LSZH Airport Zurich V2.0 c (57.80mb) Marginal's jetway and docking guidance system plugin is required for the animated jetways. Documents: Include a manual (German & English) and a comprehensive set of LSZH charts ____________________________________________________________________________________ Update Review by Stephen Dutton 27th May 2016 Copyright©2016: X-PlaneReviews Review System Specifications: Computer System: Windows - Intel Core i7 6700K CPU 4.00GHz / 64bit - 8 Gb single 1067 Mhz DDR4 2133 - GeForce GTX 980/SSE2 - Samsung Evo 512gb SSD Software: - Windows 10 - X-Plane 10 Global ver 10.45 Addons: Saitek x52 Pro system Joystick and Throttle : Sound - Bose Soundlink Mini Plugins: JARDesign Ground Handling Deluxe plugin - US$14.95 Scenery or Aircraft - Boeing x737 by EADT x737 Project (X737 Project) - Free! - Avro RJ100 by The Avro Project (X-Plane.orgStore) - US$22.95 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leporello Posted May 28, 2016 Report Share Posted May 28, 2016 I'm quite interested in this scenery, but I haven't read any impressions about frame rate which is one of the most important variable to make a scenery not just a pleasure to look at but also to fly into. I'd appreciate some lines about performance. Apart from that great review as always. Leporello Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stephen Posted May 28, 2016 Author Report Share Posted May 28, 2016 2 hours ago, Leporello said: I'm quite interested in this scenery, but I haven't read any impressions about frame rate which is one of the most important variable to make a scenery not just a pleasure to look at but also to fly into. I'd appreciate some lines about performance. Apart from that great review as always. Leporello It is rule that if I don't note the performance then it is within the normal boundaries of which most computers can safely handle it with a 10-15 frame headroom, it it is heavy or close to the minimum requirements then I will usually note that. The Zurich v2.0 falls about midway, better than v1.0 but this is a big scenery and will take a certain amount of performance. I admit I am running a powerful machine on this review but the framerate was also running in the mid-30's with all my render settings set to very high, so that is good performance to me. SD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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