My Win 7/Max 9/SDK problem solved

[Paul Domingue]

I just upgraded to Windows 7 64-bit and ran into all the problems I've been reading about on the forum, but after a week of digging I finnaly solved it, so I'm passing it on.

At first I couldn't install FSX let alone the SDK in any folder other then the Program Files (x86) without installation errors. Come to find out (Program files) is for 64-bit software and (Program Files (x86)) is for 32-bit software. I had a new drive that I wanted all my FS stuff on and made a folder called Program Files (x86) on my new E: drive and everything installed properly to the E: drive after making sure I had all the proper prerequisit software installed.

My next problem was linking the SDK plugins to Max 9, How Ha, what a fiasco! Max kept telling me if I wanted to use the Aces Tools I had to add the path in the Configure Systems Paths of Max (which I did) and I know it was correct because I have been using the same thing in XP for quite sometime. I just couldn't figure it out.

BTW, I used the Secret Super Admin back door as well to no avail for installations.

I found the answer to the problem in the ESP SDK. When I pointed to the plugins folder in the SDK from Max 9 it writes it into the plugins.ini file for Max. It can be found in the (C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Local\Autodesk\3dsmax\9 32bit\enu) folder. For some reason both Vista and Windows 7 have a problem writing the correct data to the file.

It should be as follows:

[Directories]
Additional Max plug-ins=E:\Program Files (x86)\Autodesk\3ds Max 9\Plugins\
AcesTools=E:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Games\Microsoft Flight Simulator X SDK\SDK\Environment Kit\Modeling SDK\3DSM9\Plugins

The text in RED was missing in the ini file and once I edited it all was well.

Note: change the pathes to suit your system install.

I hope this helps anyone who may have run acrros the same problems.

Paul