Laminar Research Updates X-Plane to V11.51b

after many iterations in Beta, in September of this year, Laminar Research – creators of X-Plane – released a crucial update, Version 11.50 which included support for Vulkan and Metal API engines. Since September, Laminar…

Posted: 13-Nov-2020 @ 21:13z
Laminar Research Updates X-Plane to V11.51b

after many iterations in Beta, in September of this year, Laminar Research – creators of X-Plane – released a crucial update, Version 11.50 which included support for Vulkan and Metal API engines.

Since September, Laminar Research has worked closely with the X-Plane community to identify some of the persistent issues that users may be experiencing since they updated to V11.50. In a blog post by one of  X-Plane’s lead developer, Ben Supnik describes the latest changes to version 11.51 which will initially be released in Beta form and will address a multitude of bugs that users have reported including crashes when changing between liveries, opening the map, generating aircraft icons as well as providing a much more stable platform for users in general. 

Although version 11.51 will have a primarily limited focus on bug fixes to 11.50, users will also see the addition of new joystick and input control configuration files which may elude to new hardware now available including the Honeycomb Bravo and TCA Throttle quadrants. There will be no gateway airport additions this time around but Ben expects this beta to be relatively short.

The post does describe where the team are taking X-Plane over the next few updates and their focus will be on what is drawn using the new API rather than how the simulator draws it. In simple terms, the team will focus on graphic enhancements and new features such as those requested by the community, here.

The team will also look at how the simulator accesses and utilises multicore functionality, meaning it will be able to render multiple views in parallel, making it faster at drawing shadows, water reflections and in-cockpit views resulting in an overall faster experience. This will only be limited to CPU usage, multi-GPU features may follow.

Finally, Ben commented that following on from the news from Apple and the announcement of Big Sur, the new operating system for Mac users, there will be a separate post after the team have a chance to test the platform.

To obtain Beta version 11.51, simply run the installation for X-Plane and ensure you have the Beta box ticked.

Changelog

  • Updated translations for most languages.
  • Updated & additional joystick config files.
  • Device loss crashes on Vulkan/Windows should be less frequent.
  • XPD-10617 CTD when using “regenerate icons for current aircraft (and livery).
  • XPD-10836 Device loss crashes on Metal/Mac should be less frequent.
  • XPD-11003 Metal has been disabled for Nvidia-based Macs on 10.15 because it hangs.
  • XPD-11025 Plane Maker 11.50 breaks the .acf file when periods are changed to commas.
  • XPD-11028 Crash in the map.
  • XPD-11030 Switching liveries a couple of times crashes X-Plane.
  • XPD-11036 Fixed broken mouse cursor in the 3D cockpit with LDR and OGL.
  • XPD-11038 Fixed washed out GL movie capture.
  • XPD-11044 Fixed missing runway outlines on the map.
  • XPD-11047 Fixed option for edge blending with no warping.
  • XPD-11069 Loading flight plans fails after loading a checklist.
  • XPD-10832 Added camera permission string for third party apps
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Jordan Williams
Jordan works in operations for a brewery, pub and hotel company in London. Discovering flight simulation when the 3x CD FS2002 was released, he then followed the natural progression up until P3D, where he switched platforms to X-Plane 11.
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