Precision Manuals Development Group (often abbreviated as PMDG) is a commercial add-on aircraft developer for the Microsoft Flight Simulator,[1] Lockheed Martin Prepar3D,[2] and X-Plane[3] series. The company was founded by airline pilot Robert S Randazzo, who stated that his ultimate goal was to bring greater realism to simulation.[4] The company is based out of Virginia but has several employees in countries such as Belgium, South Africa, and Canada.[4] It has eight employees as of 2018, with a collection of beta testers which include multiple aviation professionals.
| Company type | Software Developer |
|---|---|
| Industry | Flight Simulator Software |
| Founded | 1997 |
| Headquarters | Alexandria, VA |
Key people | Robert S. Randazzo |
Number of employees | 13 |
| Website | https://pmdg.com/ |
Company background
The company began by producing detailed flight manuals, hence its name. However, the company soon moved on to developing add-on aircraft after creating only two manuals for the Microsoft Flight Simulator, 747 and 757. The first aircraft development was a package of the Boeing 757 and Boeing 767 for the Fly! simulator, which could be played on Macintosh or PC. On 25 October 2014, it was announced on PMDG's AVSIM forum, that the Boeing 777-200LR base package will be available on the Prepar3D platform.[6]
With employees and contractors working around the world, PMDG is headquartered in Northern Nevada, approximately 15 nm north of Reno-Tahoe International Airport. On June 4, 2012, PMDG announced that they would move back to Virginia, where the company was founded.
Aircraft
PMDG has created nine aircraft for Flight Simulator 2004 and ten aircraft for Flight Simulator X, two of which are extensions of the 747-400X. The PMDG Boeing 737 NGX is for Flight Simulator X and Prepar3D only and is currently available in 737-800/900 winglet/non-winglet models. The 737-600/700 winglet/non-winglet models are a continuation of the base package and are available as an expansion. The 777-200LR and accompanying 777-300ER expansion were the first PMDG products for Lockheed Martin's Prepar3D V2 which was released on February 7, 2015, as well as Flight Simulator X (the NGX was patched to P3D V2 compatibility after the 777). These two products are widely regarded as some of the best offerings for flight simulation in terms of system depth, fidelity, and function, as well as faithful exterior modelling, sound, and flight dynamics.[citation needed]
On June 1, 2016, PMDG released the Douglas DC-6 simulation, marking the first aircraft by the company for the X-Plane series of flight simulators.[7]
With the arrival of P3D v4, the 747, 777 and 737 aircraft are being freely upgraded from P3D v3 (32 bit) to P3D v4 (64 bit). On February 24, 2019, it was announced that no new products would be developed for 32-bit platforms (not precluding updates to existing products).[8] Thus, the B747-8 was the last release for 32-bit platforms, notably marking the end of 13 years of FSX support.[citation needed] On November 8, 2019, the PMDG NGXu was released. It is a version of the later NG3 product for the Prepar3D platform, and offers the BCF, BDSF, BBJ1 and BBJ2 variants as expansions to the base product. The NG3 itself , released in May 2022, is only available on the new Microsoft Flight Simulator that became available in 2020, released in smaller packages per body type, and covering the entire NG, BBJ, and MAX product lines. Each package contains all variations derived from that body type insofar as they exist (passenger, cargo, BBJ)[9] PMDG announced the previous day that all development for the X-Plane platform as well as all 32-bit platforms would be canceled.[10] On October 20, 2020, PMDG announced the development of the 777X family of airliners was in an early stage.[11] In mid June 2021, all products for X-Plane and FSX were retired ahead of the release of their first product for the new Microsoft Flight Simulator.
Microsoft Flight Simulator, First Releases 2021, 2022
On the 18th June 2021, PMDG released their first Aircraft for Microsoft Flight Simulator with the Douglas DC-6. Then during February/March 2022 the group announced that the first of their upcoming Boeing 737 Next-Gen Aircraft (Boeing 737-700) had reached BETA Testing and a Streaming/Broadcasting embargo was lifted in April 2022. Among the chosen 'Streamers' were Chewwy94 & The Flying Fabio, who demonstrated a pre-release version. The New Aircraft was released around 21:05utc on 9 May 2022, on the PMDG Website, which went offline around 2 hours after release, whilst IT teams scrambled to put in place additional server resources to cope with the inefficiency of a server side rendered webpage written in PHP due to higher demand. During early hours UTC of Thursday 10 May 2022 access to the PMDG website was restored and a short time after the Aircraft was once again being offered for Purchase.[12] The twitch streamers who were able to download the aircraft upon release heaped massive praise upon the product, with one saying they felt it was a "Game Changer for Microsoft Flight Simulator, the PMDG 737 now takes the sim to the Next-Level" [citation needed]
| Aircraft | Flight Simulator 2004 | Flight Simulator X | Prepar3D v2/v3 | Prepar3D v3/v4 | Prepar3D v4/v5 | X-Plane 10 | Microsoft Flight Simulator | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boeing 737-600/700 NG | 2003 | Retired | ||||||
| Boeing 737-800/900 NG Expansion | 2003 | Retired | ||||||
| Beechcraft 1900D | 2004 | Retired | ||||||
| Beechcraft 1900C | 2004 | Retired | ||||||
| Boeing 747-400 Queen of the Skies (QOTS) | 2005 | Retired | ||||||
| Boeing 747-400F QOTS Expansion | 2006 | Retired | ||||||
| Boeing 747-400v2 Queen of the Skies (QOTS) | October 30, 2007 | Retired | ||||||
| Boeing 747-8i/F QOTS Expansion | July 29, 2010 | Retired, Visual model only | ||||||
| Boeing 747LCF QOTS Expansion | September 26, 2010 | Retired, Visual model only | ||||||
| McDonnell Douglas MD-11 | October 14, 2008 | October 14, 2008 | Retired | |||||
| Jetstream 4100 | September 9, 2009 | In Development | Retired | |||||
| Boeing 737-800/900 NGX | August 4, 2011 | March 6, 2015 | ||||||
| Boeing 737-600/700 NGX Expansion | October 29, 2011 | March 6, 2015 | ||||||
| Boeing 777-200LR/F | September 5, 2013 | February 7, 2015 | February 26, 2021 | In Development | ||||
| Boeing 777-300ER Expansion | July 18, 2014 | February 7, 2015 | February 26, 2021 | |||||
| Boeing 777-200ER Expansion | February 26, 2021 | |||||||
| Boeing 777X | Early development stage, no platforms announced | |||||||
| Douglas DC-6 | July 20, 2017 | July 20, 2017 | June 1, 2016 | June 18, 2021[13] | X-Plane, FSX retired | |||
| Boeing 747-400V3 QoTS II | January 31, 2017 | January 31, 2017 | May 8, 2020 | In Development | Includes 400, 400D, 400M, 400ER, 400F, 400ERF | |||
| Boeing 747-8i/F Expansion | September 22, 2018 | September 22, 2018 | May 8, 2020 | |||||
| Boeing 737-800/900 NGXu | November 8, 2019 | |||||||
| Boeing 737-600/700 NGXu Expansion | February 5, 2020 | |||||||
| Boeing 737 NGXu Cargo Expansion | August 16, 2020 | 737-700 BDSF, 737-800 BDSF and BCF | ||||||
| Boeing 737 NGXu BBJ Expansion | October 23, 2020 | 737-700 BBJ and 737-800 BBJ | ||||||
| Boeing 737-700 NG3 | May 9, 2022[14] | |||||||
| Boeing 737-600, 737-800, 737-900 NG3 | In Development | BBJ, cargo, and MAX variants planned |
References
- ^ "PMDG 737NGX (review)". PC Pilot. No. 76. November–December 2011. Retrieved 15 September 2013.
- ^ "PMDG 777-200LR/F". PMDG. Retrieved 7 February 2015.
- ^ "PMDG DC-6 for X-Plane announcement". Retrieved 4 March 2015.
- ^ a b c Ostrower, Jon (August 30, 2013). "Almost as Cool as the New Boeing 777: The New Flight Simulator". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 15 September 2013.
- ^ "PMDG: 747-400 Queen of the Skies (review)". PC Pilot. No. 37. November–December 2005. Retrieved 15 September 2013.
- ^ "First Glance at PMDG 777-200 for Prepar3D".
- ^ "Explore the 3D cockpit of PMDG's Douglas DC-6". X-Plane. 2016-04-21. Retrieved 2019-09-11.
- ^ Martin, Calum (2019-02-23). "PMDG Cease Development for FSX/P3Dv3". FSElite. Retrieved 2019-09-11.
- ^ "PMDG Publishes 737 For MSFS Preview Trailer - Threshold". www.thresholdx.net. Retrieved 2022-03-31.
- ^ John, Alex (November 7, 2019). "PMDG Announces End to X-Plane Development | Threshold". www.thresholdx.net. Retrieved November 12, 2019.
- ^ "[20NOV20] Various Project News Updates, 777-200ER Beta and P3D Hotfix notes". PMDG Simulations. Retrieved 2020-11-30.
- ^ "PMDG 737-700 for Microsoft Flight Simulator".
- ^ "PMDG DC-6 for MSFS Release Date Announced – FSElite". fselite.net. FSElite. June 16, 2021. Retrieved June 17, 2021.
- ^ "[07MAY22] PMDG 737-700 Release Schedule Announcement". PMDG Simulations. Retrieved 2022-05-07.
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