Fenix A320 EFB issues

User Support Hub Aircraft & Systems
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1

Does anyone experience this issue as shown in the video attached to this post?

I have contacted Fenixsim since the day I purchased the A320 in July but they haven’t been able to give me a solution. Ever since I have not been able to fly IFR - not even once but FlyByWire and default versions work.

The situation is that I usually get connection issues and when it does get connected, the menu in the EFB does not stay open so I cannot get past the passcode input. I was only able to get this working once or twice since July and on those two occasions, I did not have the chance to fly IFR.

I would appreciate any suggestions that do not include the following:

  • Firewall ports (done each time I install the A320)
  • Window 11 clean install (done that more than twice)
  • MSFS clean install (done that many times)
  • Remove all plugins from the community folder (done that)
  • Fenix support (no comment - just sent another email with this video)
1 Like
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It´s not a connection issue. When the EFB looses connection it gets a red triangle with a ! in the middle.
Hm this is a very strange bug…
I would uninstall everything, delete all Fenix folders, then deactivate the firewall and reinstall Fenix. Maybe this helps. But wow I have never seen such a bug. Sorry I don´t know what you could do.

But the good news is - you can fly IFR because the EFB is only needed for the V-speeds and nothing else.
You can input all data like Zero Fuel Weight, Center of gravity and more when reading the final loadsheet on the MCDU, and you can input the full MCDU METAR after checking the METAR mail from the departure and arrival airport.

The V-speeds wait let me think I have done this so often… the V-speeds are always the same when assumed you load the Fenix with maximum cargo, no passengers, and 4.5 or 5 tons of fuel.

It´s V1 135 knots, VR 141 knots, and V2 141 knots.

I have only flown a fully loaded Fenix once for flight dynamics and landing testing purposes (I don´t fly passenger planes but cargo or BBJ-bizjets only), I think with fully loaded tanks cargo section and passenger PAC count the V-speeds are V1 140 knots, VR 150 knots, and V2 155 knots (but I am not sure if I remember this correctly, I will have a look later what the V-speeds with a fully loaded Fenix are.)

I think you can even load the Fenix in the MCDU, PAC Cargo and Fuel can be loaded somewhere in the MCDU too (sorry for not knowing this exactly I have only tried this once manually loading several months ago in June after buying it, but I use the EFB to load it).

So you see you can use, program, load and fly the Fenix with almost zero issues without that EFB.
Only the V-speeds must be entered hmm let´s say with a little “creative freedom” :smiley: because I don´t know how to calculate the V-speeds manually.
But the V-speeds are not really important, because I fly the Fenix very smooth and with slow and smooth elevator and aileron movement and because the acceleration is so fast, most of the time the nose comes up at 150 knots. No problem at all (or let´s say almost impossible for my fly like the V-speeds tell me).

But of course it is annoying to be unable to use the EFB because it is a feature the Fenix offers and it uses beautyfully animated features to calculate various stuff + a moving map inflight. This problem should be solvable somehow… I personally would start with a complete fresh installation with no Firewall, and go to the Fenix discord forum instead of trying to contact support a second time.

3

@GamingCat2130 Thanks for your input. I’ll take your suggestion and try to fly it without the EFB.

4

Have you tried closing the Fenix app and running it as admin? I remember this happening when it was first released but haven’t seen this after they hotfixed it.

5

I have tried running it as follows:

  1. Fenix as admin, MSFS normal

  2. Fenix as admin, MSFS as admin

  3. Fenix normal, MSFS as admin

  4. Fenix normal, MSFS normal

  5. Ran the MSFS and Fenix with my local windows account

  6. Ran MSFS and Fenix with Microsoft account

  7. I tried starting Fenix on the runway, on the gate, on the ramp

  8. Tried to do without the EFB, but no way to attach power and MSFS does not have the means of doing this, perhaps it is just with this aircraft. I tried to attach power with a pushback tool but did not work. I spent another 5 hours on it yesterday, it is either no connection or the behavior on the video.

Here is one of the replies I got from the support team:

"- Ensure your Fenix A320 is installed into the default path of: C:\Program Files\FenixSim A320

- Check that the Fenix.exe application is running and not blocked by antivirus. Maybe try a restart of the app if it is.

- Try a restart of the Flight by closing the Fenix.exe, pressing ESC then Restart, and checking that the Fenix.exe application has started once loaded into the flight.

We have also noticed some liveries can break the connection. Please try using the default Fenix livery and report back." - very helpful indeed!

well, at least I know now that they can’t help resolve it, so I’ve decided to drop the aircraft and go back to FBW and A320 Ultimate.

6

That’s so frustrating. I hope you’ll resolve it. Sounds like you’ve tried a lot of variations. If I think of anything, I’ll let you know.

7

In my 30 year long career as gamer I had at least 2-3 occasions with NOTHING all over the internet solving my problem with a game program or sim… but a fresh windows install helped like a wonder (especially when having issues related to the firewall, a sandboxing software or an antivirus software, sometimes a firewall or an antivir marked some .exe already while downloading as “bad!” without even noticing me, and just did not let a game or program launch even when the antivir or firewall was being fully disabled and after a restart).

Maybe this has happened with your Fenix background app, an antivir or sandboxing software or firewall all in one protection software automatically “cleaning” a part of the Fenix background app .exe (and of course doing this again and again and again no matter how often you redownload and reinstall the Fenix) and because of that the EFB is refusing to start while the rest of the Fenix is running normal.

Or it could be some Windows framework error.

A fresh OS helped me in many cases, I am not going to recommend you reinstalling a new OS because this is some annoying stuff, but I think this might be the only option left to try.
Getting some nice cheap SSD and a Windows bootstick ready, and trying to launch the Fenix from a fresh Windows install without Firewall, Antivir, and other stuff installed yet, but only Steam FS2020 and Fenix.
Of course this will take a full hour to get ready (with graphics card driver) and redownloading Flight Sim 2020 will take two days or so.
But this is what I would try when everything else fails and after trying everything else.

8

Thank you all for your suggestions. In my first post, I mentioned that I did a clean install of Windows 11 more than twice. In fact, I’ve tried almost everything I could possibly think of - one after the other. Fenix support even sent me some exe files to replace my old ones and that was over a month now.

In have also tried installing it to a different drive just to be sure the default path wasn’t the cause. I turned off windows security and there is no indication of it blocking the fenix.exe, all applications including fenix.exe, bootstrapper, CDU are all displayed in the task manager.

The interesting part of it is that PMDG 737-800 does something similar when I try to restart a flight - the first start always worked, but when I go back to the main menu and reload the flight or create a new flight, the 737 gets corrupted and does not react to any input (and the yoke is turned to 90 degrees to the left - see the screenshot attached) so only option to continue is restarting MSFS. But in the case of Fenix, nothing helps. Though the 737 has this issue but I can at least fly the aircraft - PMDG support couldn’t help as well.

I initially thought it was perhaps a windows store issue, and did plenty of resets. I still haven’t crossed that out though but not sure what to do about this besides getting the steam version which I certainly will not do.

Since I’m the only one with this issue, I rest my case and would gladly move on, hopefully, I will be satisfied with the default aircraft and make use of my resources elsewhere.

PMDG-737-800 - corrupted state
PMDG-737-800 - corrupted state1894×980 151 KB

9

Dude I’m right there with you. Only my sim worked just fine last week (before the .146 version release) and now, it’s unable to connect. The message they sent you is the stock message they sent me today 11/8/22. Of course, I got no further response either. I am ■■■■■■ at this company now. Why would they not have a solution for AFTER their new version was released? My initial engagement with them when I first bought the $50 version was great. I found out that 8k textures were my problem and after changing to 4k and uninstalling my liveries did that fix the problem. I reverted back to the Fenix livery this morning and still, unable to connect. This is very different to my first gripe over a week ago. Something is wrong with the new update but I hope the livery issue solves your problem.

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I think we’re not meaning the same, but I’m gonna write it anyway in the off change it might help you.

I had a ‘unable to connect’ earlier today and found that my simbrief account data was missing from the Fenix application. As I restored that, it connected again.

I think your problem sounds more serious, as I at least was able to enter the EFB, but here goes nothing. Good luck mate.

11

Thanks for your additions guys. In my last post, I said I was going to give up but I gave it another try, so uninstalled it one more time and reinstalled it and after the “no connection” problem which never goes away, I was successful in flying IFR.

The solution was not setting “cold and dark” as the default initial state so now I would have to load the aircraft with its engine running, and then activate cold and dark. One thing I noticed though, the engines were still running after activating it - I guess I just have to live with it for now.

12

Hello, AegHawk and others!

I just started getting this same EFB glitch when trying to start the EFB in Fenix A320. I haven’t flown my Fenix in awhile and not sure what really has caused this issue you are experiencing as well.

Not sure it’s the EasyJet livery i’m using (4K), because i flew with it once earlier and everything was ok’ish. Although my sim crashed mid-flight that time, but i was able to log in to the EFB that time just fine.

Today i installed the FSHud ATC addon i started getting sound problems with the Fenix. All the sounds went like sometimes quiet and then back to normal repeatedly. Not really staying at same level at all.

So, i did go to my Windows sound settings and i did some tweaking there and also in MSFS2020’s sound settings. I did then run MSFS2020 again to check, if the sounds are back to normal and i think they are now ok.

But next thing i know i started to get this very same EFB glitch problem you are having, and i just can’t seem to be able to log in it properly.

Haven’t tryed yet your ‘fix’, which is not setting the “cold and dark” as default state. Am gonna try it now next, but hhhmmm… since i can’t log in to EFB now i can’t change it, so i guess i could try reinstalling the whole thing. I hope that ‘fixes’ it.

If not, then it’s back to FBW Airbus then i suppose.

13

Well, that was pretty easy fix. Whew!

I just set the FlightSimulator.exe to run as admin rights. Now everything ran quite smoothly. No crashes and i was able to login and use the EFB just fine.

15

I’ve had some issues getting into the EFB. At the password prompt i’ll enter my “password”, usually just 1111, and sometimes I have to wait a while for the main menu to appear. Sometimes it doesn’t load at all.

It doesn’t work at all when I connect it to my iPhone. This is may be due to there not being any menu button that I can see.

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17

I’ve begun to have the same issue today. Yesterday I installed Kaspersky Security. Will uninstall it and report back.

18

Uninstalling Kaspersky did not solve the issue. Had to reinstall Fenix. It’s working but some EFB icons are missing.

19

I gather the liveryData.json file is not imperative to run with a Fenix livery? I’m new to Fenix liveries, but it doesn’t seem that the file is a requirement.

I’ve downloaded a few liveries, which I use as templates / guides. But with one of the liveries, the creator included the liveryData.json file however, all of the lines of code that start with RelativeFilePath clearly point to some other creator’s livery (LOL) yet the plane still looks and flies okay.

Just wondering as most all other liveries I’ve downloaded do not include the liveryData.json file.

20

i recognize the exact same issue. when the 737 doesnt initialize i have to kill the fenix_bootstraper.exe in taskmanager and all problems are gone. really strange…

21

If you’re using simbrief in cargo lbs, fuel in gal instead of KG. Make sure you change it in the settings. I had a similar issue like this today in the weight and balance where the load sheet would load, then go away until I fixed this.