Considering Retiring My HO Scale Layout and going all Trainz

1611mac said:
Hello,
The track icon next to your user name should have a version name. If you have not registered your copy of Trainz (you don't say which version you have) you need to do so. Without doing that you will get little response. If you have registered your copy of Trainz then you need to contact support and have them tie your registration to your forum userid. (Compare your userid track icon to others on the forum and you'll see what I refer to.)

Oh, and welcome. Don't want to appear unfriendly. This all has to do with forum users being legitimate Trainz users. The people here are nice, friendly, and helpful.
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I'm sorry for being dumb, but this is all very new to me. I purchased Trainz A New Era and the help file states the following.

Please note, purchases of Trainz: A New Era (digital download) or DLC packs for Trainz: A New Era from the Trainz Store will not require or include a serial number. Instead these will automatically be registered to the account they were purchased through.

I will be running through the tutorials, but it seems to me at a glance that you need to constantly spend money on Trainz to run and get what you want. With Flight Simulator, I would buy the base program along with a few aircraft add-ons and then fly till I was tired of what I had. I didn't need to purchase a route from Phila to LA or whatever.

I just want to run my trains and enjoy the fun. Am I reading this right, or am I all wet?

I bought A New Era. Did I buy the wrong thing? I just want the most powerful and flexible version of the software where I can play without subscription fees cramping my wallet?
 
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Did I buy the wrong version?

pequeajim said:
I bought "A New Era". Did I buy the wrong thing? I just want the most powerful and flexible version of the software where I can play without subscription fees cramping my wallet?
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I am willing to spend the money for Platinum, but will I get a credit for what I already purchased yesterday?

Seems like Platinum would be the ticket, but I want to hear from you folks before I rush in again and spend my money.

My requirements are...

A stand alone software package that allows me to run trains in different scenarios.
Build my own layouts.
Run my trains online with friends.

I'm sure as I get to understand the package more, those requirements will grow.
 
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pequeajim said:
I am willing to spend the money for Platinum, but will I get a credit for what I already purchased yesterday?

Seems like Platinum would be the ticket, but I want to hear from you folks before I rush in again and spend my money.

My requirements are...

A stand alone software package that allows me to run trains in different scenarios.
Build my own layouts.
Run my trains online with friends.

I'm sure as I get to understand the package more, those requirements will grow.
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T:ANE will allow you to do all this. TRS19 is a newer Trainz version. For all intent and purposes, you'll do fine with T:ANE. As you can see that we have multiple Trainz versions. Anything you've created in T:ANE can be moved on to TRS19 later. T:ANE is also a more mature product and still a very viable product.
 
I got TRS19 Platinum in Dec., and the got T:ANE a couple of weeks ago. There's still a beauty to the T:ANE version, and as John says, a more mature product. Many things on the DLS marked T:ANE and TS12 work fine in both T:ANE and TRS19. It helped to get me better acquainted with the workings of the programs. The best knowledge has come from reading these forums.
 
No, you did absolutely the right thing in going for TRS19. It is so much better than T:ANE, particularly once you learn how to use all the new features -- the PBR tracks, the 3D PBR textures, the TurfFX grasses, ... . It has taken a while for me to learn how to use them to best effect but I'm quite proud of my latest effort:

https://forums.auran.com/trainz/sho...w-TRS19-route-The-Rivercide-Electric-Railroad

There are a few more of my TRS19 efforts on the Download Station. Most of them are model railroads, which might give you some ideas when you begin your own layouts.

The only thing I'd quibble with is your choice of the Platinum edition. I went for just the basic version. A one off payment rather than a subscription.

Phil
 
Well I had loosely used MS but by sheer fluke came across TR2006 I think a year or so after it came out. What a most advantageous influence I found that to be and during occasional health issues was a great distraction. So widespread an definitely a lot more varies and easier to build. Had thought having not used model railways for a long time in life it was more bigger and brilliant as a takeover for me! In addition I did not have much experience in train sims at all and would not have got very far in my present project. It covers all of Northern Ireland Railways and extension over the Border all the way to Dublin so eventually the "Enterprise Express" between Belfast-Dublin will be available. It is the widest project for over the Irish Sea from the centre of civilisation (oops here in Glasgow!). So you can see what I have got back to trying to complete by visiting my project on the Net. Would not have got this done anywhere but on Trainz! ww.northernirelandrailwaysim.moonfruit.com








www.northernirelandrailwaysim.moonfruit.com







 
philskene said:
The only thing I'd quibble with is your choice of the Platinum edition. I went for just the basic version. A one off payment rather than a subscription.

Phil
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But the Platinum edition is also a one time payment :) ;)

---------------------------
Welcome Pequeajim to the world of Trainz and the forums and all of the other Trainz fun!
You are in for hours and hours of fun, so hopefully you have lots of time :D
When I started with Ultimate Trainz Collection back when I was a kid, I would play Trainz after school, and it'll already be 12am (and this was on a school day). The same happened with Trainz Railroad Sim 2006 :D
Don't let the number of DLC's make you look down the wrong direction (some new people complain about this), as they're optional add-ons (like a book store for example). Most of the freeware don't require any sort of DLC unless its specified in the description.
Like most said, we're pretty friendly, and helpful - can basically call it a huge Trainz family:)

Cheers
 
philskene said:
The only thing I'd quibble with is your choice of the Platinum edition. I went for just the basic version. A one off payment rather than a subscription.

Phil
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I didn't think the Platinum version I bought was subscription based? Are you saying it is. I thought it was stand alone?
 
If you did purchase a subscription, you can always change that to a non-subscription version if you wish.
 
Don't feel bad. I purchased TRS19 Early Edition stand alone. That was an "outright purchase." After a few months I went with the Gold subscription for access to the everything Trainz had to offer. There is some comfort in knowing that I can cancel my Gold subscription any time and still have a purchased copy of TRS19.

My tip for a new user? Most Tane routes (and a some TRS19 routes) will be much too dark in TRS19. Learn the "reset color" and "environment tools" right away as some routes will benefit a LOT from your setting these properly.

From the Wiki: http://online.ts2009.com/mediaWiki/index.php/Help:Edit_Environment

General TRS19 help: http://online.ts2009.com/mediaWiki/index.php/Help:TRS19

--

TIP: Best way to find things in Wiki is to do a google search using the "site search" advanced search option. Use this for the site:

http://online.ts2009.com/mediaWiki/
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A google site search would look like this (this is a search for "tools"):
Code: 
tools site:http://online.ts2009.com/mediaWiki/

I mention all this because for me, it is by far the best way to find things in the Wiki. A plain Wiki search from the Wiki page doesn't seem to work well for me.
 
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philskene said:
No, you did absolutely the right thing in going for TRS19. It is so much better than T:ANE, particularly once you learn how to use all the new features -- the PBR tracks, the 3D PBR textures, the TurfFX grasses, ...
Click to expand...

Absolutely correct. Even if you never do your own layouts, there are incredible ones in TRS19 on the DLS. Philskenes are particularly good if you like mining and timbering, although he has industrial ones as well. Along with sessions for you to run.
 
If dictatorship countries kill electricity and the internet with a nuke then every young person in the US will freak out as their iPhones will be useless bricks. They can’t live without their phones. I have model trains of different sizes packed away. O, HO, N, G and my late grandfather’s 1 gauge Lionel train with double ended electric locomotive and combine, coach, and observation. I used to have a train table but got rid of it in 2015. I once had an HO layout, then an HO amusement park with a railroad around it, then switched to O gauge with Lemax amusement rides and haunted houses. I still have all the stuff packed away. I stated with MSTS around 2001, then switched to Trainz by 2003 or so. MSTS has a lot of content, and long routes, but you are tied to your train when in a route and no operating turntables and electric catenary routes have catenary on all tracks. In Trainz you can switch between trains, and it is easier to build in. And content and quality has been improving. Dovetail has nice sims and routes but it’s all payware and not builder friendly like Trainz. The only problem with Trainz is that third party sites sometimes go belly up and that results in missing content when downloading a route that has content from now defunct sites. And having to hunt down like 50 unknown dependencies. I like simulating tourist railroads especially steam ones the best. I also like amusement park sims like RollerCoaster Tycoon 1-3 and Planet Coaster, and there’s another one called Parkitect which is newer like Planet Coaster. Is TS2019 worth it to buy? Is it that much better than TANE? But, weren’t there bugs in it or were those fixed by now? What’s the difference between the more expensive and the cheaper version? Will most content that works in TANE work in 19? And you can edit the built in routes that were locked in TANE. I want to extend the C&O route and simulate steam excursions on it with 765, 261, etc. from Huntington to Hinton.
 
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Well I'm finally getting things going. I sold several of my engines which raised enough money to buy the hardware for my gaming PC that's going to run this mess. Here is what I ordered tonight,

Thermaltake V200 Tempered Glass RGB Edition 12V MB Sync Capable ATX Mid-Tower Chassis

Samsung 970 EVO Plus SSD 1TB - M.2 NVMe Interface Internal Solid State Drive

EVGA GeForce RTX 2080 Super Black Gaming, 08G-P4-3081-KR, 8GB GDDR6

Patriot Viper Steel Series DDR4 32GB (2 x 16GB)

AMD Ryzen 9 3900X 12-core, 24-Thread Unlocked Desktop Processor with Wraith Prism LED Cooler

Corsair CX Series 750 Watt 80 Plus Bronze Certified Modular Power Supply

And the motherboard is...

MSI MPG X570 Gaming PRO Carbon WiFi Motherboard (AMD AM4, DDR4, PCIe 4.0, SATA 6Gb/s, M.2, USB 3.2 Gen 2, AX Wi-Fi 6, HDMI, ATX)
 
You should have no problem running this program or any other for quite sometime. I have the older MSI Carbon motherboard except mine is for the the Intel i7 CPU and I put in an Intel 5930 Extreme CPU and this handles this quite well even at nearly 5 years old. A couple of years ago I replaced my EVGA GTX780 TI with the then new GTX1080TI. I also loaded up my system with a few large hard drives, in addition to the the SSD for booting, and also installed 64 GB of RAM. I did this because I also edit music and that requires as much RAM and disk space for processing.

Both MSI and EVGA make greate products, and I've used both for years always with great success, but I won't be upgrading anytime soon. Being on a retirement budget, I'll milk what I can out of this hardware before I move on to something else. By then who knows what kind of hardware we'll have.
 
Yes I did, but?

MP242 said:
I would suggest that you store all the HO model railroad equipment away in box's, not in a hot attic where they will melt, or not in a cold damp garage where they will freeze and become brittle, and do not store them in foam, as the foam will turn back degrading back into oil, and adhere to the plastic models.

Save your model railroad equipment away, for sale in another decade, when the economy repairs, as in todays market you will lose thousands of dollars as nobody wants it, or has the temperament to meticulously to clean track, and run mechanical model railroad trains.

<--
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Ironically, I see a charge on my bank statement, "[FONT=source_sans_proregular]PAYPAL *TRAINZPORT 02-26 4029357733 8313 INT'L SERVICE ASSESSMENT FEE". What the heck is this?

[/FONT]
 
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