(This topic should be a pin/sticky or an essential part of the initial setup.)
It should be explained in full before using the program. At this time it is not.
Sorry about the rant, it just seems wasteful.
The setup menu does not cover what the options are and what they entail. For instance creating a manual cache space involves over-writing the hard drive and might take hours. I didn’t expect that. Nor do I still know if any new scenery data will be stored to my HD or just temporary Rolling cache.
My mistake as a newby:
1). As a new MSFS2020 pilot my basic understanding was that "As you fly, the scenery gets downloaded and saved". Ok great. That is fantastic. I flew dozens of major cities across the world to re-fly later on. I spent countless hours circling back and forth trying to get every detail of every place of interest. All those lumps of rock finally turned into little ticky-tacs with a few dozen passes and I thought it was all permanent.
I downloaded huge amounts of free beautiful data at Asobo/Microsoft’s expense…
But now I need to do it again…what a waste.
2). My internet connection speed is very slow but the program is installed on a big D: HDD (8TB)
(My C: drive is an SSD)
3). Photogrammetry then did not work for a distant city and I didn’t understand it simply was not available. So I thought “Oh clearing that cache might solve the problem. FSX used to crash on approach.” Everything saved was now gone.
4). Then I went into the forums and learned there was a major difference between Manual and Rolling cache. This function was not explained from the beginning. And it should be.
It is frustrating to fly the same area and have to start over from scratch. Some people have faster connections. Some people have more storage capacity. Many will not understand why this is happening and why their graphics are now worse than before
How about making it the very first step during set-up?
How about asking the user how much total disk space they want to use for storage and explain why?
How about starting every flight with low scenery then permanently collect higher levels depending on time spent?
How about estimated download time when selecting manual map grids to download?
How about the option of downloading to a fast SSD drive and transfer to another HDD with a pause recommendation?
A little information goes a long way. Other users might experience the same situation.