rec.autos.simulators

+Cinquo [swear to god I'm going to break 12 mins on the 'Ring tomorrow .)]

See Alison's site for an explaination of a detailed explaination of the
gauges:

http://www.racesimcentral.net/

See here for enhanced***pits and other graphics for GPL:

http://www.racesimcentral.net/

There are hundreds of GPL sites out there, but these will get you started.
--
don

New Programmes for Converted GPL Tracks
http://www.racesimcentral.net/

I think if you just avoided "shortcuts", you can break 10:00 easily.

Michael.

Good move, mate. *Goooooood* move! :-)

Ah, that'll be 1:30 for most of the lap, and 45 seconds for that ***y
hairpin...

Cooper. Say "Cooper". (It's a GPL thing.) In any case, though not
everyone agrees with me, I don't think the Cooper is a particularly
good car to learn on. It's underpowered, and doesn't slide around the
corners enough. I've driven the Lotus from the start at Rouen, and
though it's quite skittish, it's *very* fast when you get it pointing
in the right direction. The Eagle is almost as fast, and easier to keep
on the track, but it is big, so watch those tight corners.

Hang on here. Do you mean what I mean by "analogue" - ie not digital?
Your comment suggests to me that you're using a <gasp> keyboard! in
which case, change as soon as poss. to a good steering wheel or
analogue stick (you'll want force feedback, so you'll need the version
1.2 patch from www.papy.com).

If, on the other hand, what you mean is "without throttle help or brake
help, and with manual gears", then good on you! Don't touch these so-
called "driver aids" with a bargepole - they make it a hell of a lot
harder to get to grips with the real thing later on. Best to start as
you mean to go on.

<snipped bit about gauges as that's been answered elsewhere>

Shouldn't be too hard if you can keep it on the track. Try the Brabham,  
as the Ring is a lot twistier than you'd think.

So, welcome aboard! It probably won't be long before you add to the
ever-increasing ranks of people who can humiliate me by doing 3:15 at
Spa-Francorchamps... ;-)
--
David.
"After all, a mere thousand yards - such a harmless little knoll,
really."
(Raymond Mays on Shelsley Walsh)

There seems to be a lot of that about in the sceneries - places where you
can get terminally stuck in the 3d objects.

I disagree about C. So far I've only driven C and Eagle (does anybody else
find the Eagle engine sounds more like a Minimoog than a race car? .))  
extensively. I took up the Eagle to get some speedup to my Spa and Monza
times, but I just couldn't get it to run as fast as the C, because turning
it around corners felt like having to lift the car in the air with my hands
and turn it to point the right way! The C feels immensely tossable
and slidey and what's more, I can recover 96% of excess slides as opposed
to the <10% of the Eagle (it's rather intimidating really when its plumage
decides to slowly overtake its beak from the outside in the middle of
Burnenville at 285 kmh and you can do nothing to stop it). Sure, the C
isn't very fast, but then again neither am I, so for the nonce we make a
good pair.

Yes! Actually, I have an analogue stick (with a rudder wheel, even), but
I've found it impossible to map anything besides the steering into it.
If I put the brakes and/or throttle in the up-down axis, it makes
steering and gear changing nigh impossible, so I just map steering and
glancing functions in the 'stick and the rest to the keypad. I might
invest in a set of CH pedals at some point, but I'm not very convinced
that a wheel or FF is required to drive in a decent manner.

Nuh, never touched them with a bargepole or a ten-foot battle lance. I
reckon I should drive a few laps with auto gears at some point, though,
to find out where the cars' redlines are - ATM I don't have much of a clue.

If I pinch one second off my lap time every day starting now, that will
be taking place in just about a month. The countdown is on.

+Cinquo

Hi!

Be advised: If you have the accelerator and the brake mapped to a keyboard key, then automatically the driving aids for throttle and brake are activated! So you don't need to touch them with a bargepole ;)).
I second the tip that you should get a wheel-pedal-combo a.s.a.p., or at least add your mentioned CH-pedals to your joystick.

Regards
Crash

No, but then "everybody else" has downloaded alternative engine sounds. I'm
sure you'll find some nice sounding .wav's at the sites already mentioned in
this thread.

I'm all for driving what you're comfortable with. Go for it.

Yipe! You sir, are a brave man. Suggest you get yourself a wheel pronto
though.

clue.

The tach (the big dial in the middle of most dashes) was, in those days,
usually mounted such that the shift point was the 12 o'clock position of the
needle. Redline is usually around 12.30 - 1 o'clock.

Optimist. Welcome to the ranks of the eternally damned. ;-))

Jan.
=---

+Cinquo

It's at the GPLEA site, I think. ( http://www.gpl.netti.nu )

You driven Mexico yet? Believe me, Rouen is a picnic compared to that place.

Yes. The scenery objects are not, it has to be said, the world's greatest. But
who cares? just stay on the track :-)

Get some new sounds, then. Everyone else does. I've got a great Eagle sound
(can't remember where it's from, but it's gorgeous).

That's interesting, as I have exactly the opposite experience. I can hurl the
Eagle into corners at ridiculous angles, and still come out more or less in one
piece; but in the Cooper I have to concentrate ferociously to keep it on line
at all. Of course, I'm probably using different setups to you, and my driving
style may well be different. But to be blunt, if you want to do really fast
times, you'll need the Eagle for Spa and the Lotus for Monza. With the right
setup and absurd amounts of practice there's nothing to touch them.

Horses for courses, then, as with so many things in GPL. If you can go well in
the Cooper, good luck to you. Wish I could...

Not in a "decent" manner, no. But if you want to drive *fast*, then a FF wheel
(or at least a FF stick) is vital. Put it this way: my PB at Spa improved by
four seconds when I first got a FF wheel (though I've improved with the old
non-FF stick since, so the gap isn't as great now). Go the wheel route - you
won't regret it. (The Logitech Wingman FF wheel is the most popular, but some
people - me included - prefer the Microsoft Sidewinder FF wheel.)

No, no, no! Do. Not. EVER. Use. Automatic. Gears. Got that? you probably won't
learn anything new, and you'll lose the feel for gearchanging, which is
important. In any case, finding the redline is easy: if the engine blows up,
you've gone too far...

So you're doing 3:45 in a Cooper? That's not at all bad, actually. My Cooper PB
there is 3:32, after a lot of effort. And to illustrates why you might want to
persevere with the Eagle at Spa: my *Eagle* PB is 3:19!

--
David.
"After all, a mere thousand yards - such a harmless little knoll, really."
(Raymond Mays on Shelsley Walsh)

The red needle pointing skywards sounds to me like you are either
speedshifting or changing down too early when braking.  Either way, when
you set the game to a higher damage level this is going to start doing
*** things to your engine.

Speedshifting is changing up a gear without easing off the accelerator
before hand and causes the revs to jump whilst the car is momentarily in
neutral.  Like I say, at higher levels the game is less forgiving with
this kind of thing and you may start to wonder why you keep getting
blown engines.

HTH
--
Peter Ives - (AKA Ivington)

No person's opinions can be said to be
more correct than another's, because each is
the sole judge of his or her own experience.

On the sound front, I no first hand experience of hearing any of
the GPL cars.  I use all the sounds from the GPLEA site because
I have no reason to doubt their accuracy based upon their
excellent car and track work.

Cheers

Phil

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I wish they would bundle their stuff, like the USPits bundle.

And provide a better readme with their Seasons and Sounds patches.

Dolle Dolf

Sounds are tough to deal with. There are as many soundcard and speaker
configurations as there are computers. I say find some sounds you like and
turn them up LOUD! Alison has a very good set on her site.

As far as the***pits and cars, there are enough photographs available in
books and on the net to tell you how accurate the graphics in GPL are. From
my research I'd have to say the GPLEA is doing a brilliant job with the
tools they have to work with.

There are other graphic "enhancements" for GPL available as well, improved
dashes with red-line indicators, improved gearbox graphics, one-off cars and
the like, that may not be totally accurate, but I see nothing wrong with
using them if they enhance the experience of the game for the user.
Personally, I find too much eye-candy a bit distracting and cut back on the
trackside details at most tracks, but I do like to turn it all on when
friends come over and want to check it out<g>. I just don't want to see any
Marlboro signs in my 1967 F1 sim!

The most important thing for me is that the***pit look good, as I spend
most of my time there, and that the gauges are sharp and crisp looking. I
have to laugh when I see the original gauges in GPL, they look as if I
forgot to put on my glasses<g>. That new GPLEA Lotus looks so nice, I just
may have to start driving the car, I've purposely avoided the Lotus, just
because I drove it for 6 months in the demo and everybody else seemed to be
using it...always gotta' be the rebel<g>. I have not noticed any fps loss
with the new***pits, but I wouldn't be surprised if it happened with a
lesser cpu.

Now, if we could just do something with the helmet graphics...
--
don

New GPL Programs for the Converted Tracks:
http://www.racesimcentral.net/

Roger Waters hates racing.  He blasted them on the album "Amused to Death".
It's Nick Mason, Pink Floyd's drummer who has one of the most impressive
collection of vintage racing cars in the world. Just being nitpicky, but PF
is religious to me ;)

--
-- Fran?ois Mnard <ymenard>
-- May the Downforce be with you...
-- http://www.racesimcentral.net/
-- People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realise
how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world.