"...And NP is a small company with a great group of guys from my experience, who are always willing to personally go out of their way to help, not some cliched "corporate bigwig" stereotype. They put a great deal of effort into getting games to open up to head-tracking for a flight/racing sim market that is infinitesimal...."
Spot on. I first contacted NaturalPoint after I lost my arm, what, fifteen years ago? The support from NP was great as I struggled to learn how to use SmartNav and cope with my disability. If I wrote to them they always replied immediately and positively, and, although it might sound trite, I felt they were really 'there for me'.
Later, when I got into flight games to pass the time, I wrote and asked how to use my SmartNav with Warbirds and Dawn of Aces. I guess I wasn't the first to ask, because TrackIR came out about a month later. I bought it and off we went. I bought the 3Pro when it hit the shelves - Forgotten Battles was around by then and I really enjoyed the extra sensitivity and the Vector Clip. About a year ago I bought TrackIR 5 and gave my 6-year-old 3Pro to a new-to-FB pilot. He's loving it. I'm loving the 5 too, and the Track-clip's accuracy & convenience...
Watching this thread I've been surprised at the animus that seems to lurk in the argument of the anti-NP crowd. I don't give a flying f*** if someone wants to use a freetrack solution to achieve head-tracking, and I hope they will be able to in CloD. But why on earth do some people want NP to "go bankrupt"? NP exists by creating a kit that works 'straight out of the box' - useful to disabled people like me (and many others) and the sort of people who haven't the time or the aptitude to either assemble the equipment or write code.
Along with the NP hardware and software comes that same level of support that was there 'for me' fifteen years ago. When I had a problem I wrote an e-mail; and when America had woken up, I received a reply that put me straight. Somehow I don't think I could expect the same level of dedication from the freetrack crowd.
brando
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Another home-built rig:
AMD FX 8350, liquid-cooled. Asus Sabretooth 990FX Rev 2.0 , 16 GB Mushkin Redline (DDR3-PC12800), Enermax 1000W PSU, MSI R9-280X 3GB GDDR5
2 X 128GB OCZ Vertex SSD, 1 x64GB Corsair SSD, 1x 500GB WD HDD.
CH Franken-Tripehound stick and throttle merged, CH Pro pedals. TrackIR 5 and Pro-clip. Windows 7 64bit Home Premium.
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