Was about to get it, but I have a couple of questions first

[johncarr79]

Thinking of getting this. I am a bit on the fence though. It's the £60 odd per year subscription. There is a deal 3 months for the price of 1 at the moment and I'm tempted to try it out. Is it online only or can you do offline practice for learning tacks, time trials, testing setup, etc. What is it like online? How does it compare with the Race series of sims. I have an okay PC and a laptop, will it run okay on either:
PC
Q9550@2.83
2x2GB DDR2
GTX 560 Ti 448

Laptop
2520M
2x2GB DDR3
GT555M

[AllanGP]

Not sure about the specs, they look okay to me but no doubt a PC Guru can comment.

If you play your cards right you will never pay £60 annual subs as there are often deals for $75/year and occasionally $49/year.

You can earn upto $40 per year in participation credits and you get $5 per year credit for a continuous sub.

You do need to buy extra Cars & Tracks once out of Rookie so the first year can be costly but again it can be managed.

What I would say is try it because even if you let your sub lapse, it is all kept for you when you want to rejoin so the 3 for 1 deal is worth a punt to see if you like it.

[Kalifen]

iRacing is potentially quite expensive, at least the first year. However, it can be relatively cheap if you are either happy with limited content, or progress cleverly. This forum can help you a lot with that.

I'm not really into PC specs (particularly GFX card and processor), but from my preferences (high framerate, low texture details etc) I have noticed that there is no need for tons of RAM. You have more than enough. I also believe iRacing is a bit more friendly on low-end PCs than a few other titles.

You can practice offline, and there is something called time trial (which sort of is online). You would need to be online (and have a valid subscription) to connect to any kind of offline practice, though, but you are not required to maintain the connection.

Base content, which is "free" with the subscription, includes a handful of cars (mostly slow ones) and tracks. These are content being used by most series you would have access to from day 1. To get access to other cars and tracks, and to enter competitions with these, you would need to both "buy" them (remember: do so cleverly) and improve your safety rating to gain an appropriate licence.

Final word of warning: There is a great chance you will get hooked, and spend more time/money than initially planned. The sim/service is simply that much better than anything else I previously tried. After getting to grips with configurations (and learning a few things along the way), I suddenly didn't get any joy from my previous favourite sims. iRacing all the way after that.

[johncarr79]

So you can win potentially win your subscription back if you're good? You've raised more questions for me. I did not think I would need to ask this as I assumed you paid your subscripition and that was it. How much are cars and tracks? I read somewhere it is £15- $25 for one circuit, is this true. DLC on top of a subscription sounds, well a bit snide in my opinion. I might as well go and get a 3 month trial, and enter the rabbit hole. Cant whine until I try, I suppose.

[Kalifen]

Not if you're "good", you win it back if you simply participate according to the reward rules.

Prices are 15$ for tracks (12$ for short oval tracks, if you're into that) and 12$ for cars. But you get 10/20/25% discount by grouping the purchases into groups of 3 or more/6 or more/all remaining content. I currently own 100%, so whenever a new car or track is out, and I buy it, it costs me 75% of normal price. Then, of course, you calculate in your participation credits, sometimes also you get credits for special happenings, and you can from time to time recharge your account and get additional credits as a bonus.

Again, if you're clever, it won't cost you that much. However, the main problem is that majority of the cost comes in the first phase, when you are new. Would be nicer if it was spread a bit more out. But when you are established, it is rather cheap to keep going



EDIT: You don't actually win anything "back". You get iRacing dollars/credit, yes, but they can't be used for anyting outside the iRacing world. Basically, it makes the future cheaper, not the past.

[jayblue]

Originally Posted by johncarr79

So you can win potentially win your subscription back if you're good? You've raised more questions for me. I did not think I would need to ask this as I assumed you paid your subscripition and that was it. How much are cars and tracks? I read somewhere it is £15- $25 for one circuit, is this true. DLC on top of a subscription sounds, well a bit snide in my opinion. I might as well go and get a 3 month trial, and enter the rabbit hole. Cant whine until I try, I suppose.

Tracks are $14.95 or $11.95 each.

Cars are all $11.95 each.

If you buy any combination of three of the above you get 10% off. If you buy any combination of six of the above you get 20%.

There is really no need to be concerned about things like that now however, just take the 3 month for the price of 1 offer up, try it out, then decide later if you want to invest the money and time into the sim.

It is purchasing the extra content that will empty your wallet, not the subscription costs. As others have said iracing does have its own place in the market a present and offers a lot of things other sims are missing. Most importantly it offers the best net code around and a real sense of achievement when you do well in a race!

[MickeyMouse]

My specs are:
Q9550 @ 3.4 ghz
4GB
GTX 260

I usually get 120fps with most things maxed.

[jayblue]

If you haven't already pulled the trigger and subscribed John use this code at the check out - PR-ISRWatkins

You will get a 3 month subscription, all the base content, Watkins Glen track and the Riley Prototype car for $15.

[johncarr79]

I had fun trying to get it purchased with debit card. Had to register my card with paypal, which takes a little while. I will pick it up in the morning though. Looks like one hell of a rabbit hole, once you get going. These reward discount things make it look like racing sim crack. I assume it makes forza 4 and gt5 look more like mario kart than they do already. I have one of them 3d vision kits, anyone tried one. Does it work well in stereo 3d?

[AllanGP]

Originally Posted by Kalifen

You can practice offline,

Not strictly true you always need to connect to iRacing to initiate any Session, even private testing but once connected you can carry on without the connection - however given the extremely limited server downtime this is not actually a problem at all.

John, don't forget to use the referral system when you sign up to give someone a $10 credit for referring you.

[AllanGP]

Originally Posted by johncarr79

and enter the rabbit hole.

Take the "red" pill, your Sim Life will never be the same again!

[darock]

The discounts have been mentioned, as have the credits. However, just the mention of the credits haven't done them justice.

They are credit for running series for the season. To get $10 credit every 12 weeks, you will have to run 3 series. The valid series all require you to purchase a car and a number of tracks that aren't part of the base membership. You'll have to get out of rookie. It'll take some time. The base membership starting point is rookie. There are a number of other details. Just don't look for the participation credits being significant to begin with and don't look for them being very significant until you have spent a fair amount.

Look at the iRacing structure once you're a rookie member. The true expense of it becomes clearer after you can see how extensive it is and how much is required in order to partake of each series etc.

It's kewl and quite fun, but it's not a simple service, nor is there any way to do it cheaply. That's one detail they nailed the reality on.

[Domey]

And the one selling point that they don't really sell, but should, is the quality of on-line competition. There are a lot of drivers here that are great matches for you in ability. When you get better, there are better drivers too. That's who you'll be matched up against when you race. The system they have is very good at creating parity and giving you close competition. At least that's how I've found it to be. It seems like there's always one or two other cars in a race that are very evenly matched with me which makes for great racing and I don't care that we're racing for thirteenth place out of fifteen cars. There are some very helpful people as well and it's okay to ask for help in practice sessions (not during races, qualis. duh). Most people will share advice and/or setups. Some won't, but the community is very good overall (imho). That's the thing that's going to get you. A mostly high quality community of mostly serious racers. But remember, we told you it can be very addictive.

P.S.
As far as cost goes, it was a bit pricey at first, or so I thought. But if I look at it in the frame of $/hr. It's practically free!

[Kalifen]

Originally Posted by AllanGP

Not strictly true you always need to connect to iRacing to initiate any Session, even private testing but once connected you can carry on without the connection - however given the extremely limited server downtime this is not actually a problem at all.

Which is why I followed up with this sentence:

"You would need to be online (and have a valid subscription) to connect to any kind of offline practice, though, but you are not required to maintain the connection."



On a few occasions, this comes in handy. Like when you know ahead there's gonna be a downtime due to maintenance - connect before the downtime with the car/track combo you would like to practice, and have it available as long as you wish.

[scootergeo]

wait another year and you will get it for half price of what it is now.

it will be worth the wait. when iracing gets down to like 15 bucks a month and include all content for that price... no race game will be worth playing anymore. lol.

imagine how full iracing would be with that plan? they would make money hand over fist.

[wpsracing78]

A big part of keeping it moderately expensive is to keep idiots away.

I've already paid the big bucks to get all content so it doesn't bother me!

if the price is lowered too much the competition will degrade horribly.

[AllanGP]

Pricing today, for me is a bit the wrong way around, overall I would not reduce the cost but I'd have less deals driving the subs down, I only paid $49 for last year and lower the price for Cars & Tracks, or have more deals on them.

I rather suspect however they know far more about why they price things they do than us.

One other point I've made a number of times before is they need a mechanism to make your first full Season out of Rookie cheaper. That's another thing they could do, keep the subs a bit higher but offer a one of discount on your first 6 tracks one you get out of Rookie (in addition to the 20% off for six).

[darock]

No matter what they charge, they could keep down the wreckers by stricter enforcement. They apparently are going in that direction. Look at the changes they've warned the membership about. They are about to put more than one employee to work judging protests. Now that's about time, wouldn't you say. And they're working on an automatic ejection system that should nail some of the blatant wreckers.

Those changes show the direction they seem to have mapped out for the service. AND IT'S ABOUT DAMN TIME they started correcting a really lame system.

[darock]

Originally Posted by johncarr79

I have one of them 3d vision kits, anyone tried one. Does it work well in stereo 3d?

You've been a member for awhile now, how do you rate the 3D?

[AllanGP]

Originally Posted by darock

No matter what they charge, they could keep down the wreckers by stricter enforcement. They apparently are going in that direction. Look at the changes they've warned the membership about. They are about to put more than one employee to work judging protests. Now that's about time, wouldn't you say. And they're working on an automatic ejection system that should nail some of the blatant wreckers.

Those changes show the direction they seem to have mapped out for the service. AND IT'S ABOUT DAMN TIME they started correcting a really lame system.

I like the direction they are taking with this but I suspect it will be really easy to kill the service (membership wise) if it is done wrong. Even within the 30,000 odd members today I bet less than 5000 are truly "hardcore", so if they want to increase the membership significantly there is a fine line between sorting the idiots out and keeping the system simpler for the casual (but safe) user.

So whilst I'd like a solution to the wreckers tomorrow I'm prepared to wait for a "great" solution for a few months yet.

With all the recent announcements, the above, cars, tracks and relationships, I like the general direction we are headed in.

[darock]

I'm not convinced there is a 'fine line' in that service anywhere. Look at how the membership basically ignores the protest system. Hell, they'll live with about anything. In fact, you say that you're prepared to wait for a great solution, and don't expect it for a few months. No fine line about to kill you off. And an unused protest system accepted by the masses. Also, their description of the coming changes is so vague there really isn't much reason to expect 'great' improvement, much less a solution. However, with tuning, the improvements can be just that, improvements. Because hopefully, it should kill off some of the few who rack up huge kill counts in sessions. Killing them off should make more sessions more fun for the more serious members.

It really appears their present membership has boiled down to the people who accept 'no fault' incidents they have no protection from and others who get decent racing from their own skill. The latter are fast enough to start up front and run in the top split. Look at the top split races and you'll see the top finishers started in front and had good races among themselves. Their iRacing experience is a world removed from the majority experience. And that majority always shows up for the next race, don't they.

I'd say the best thing they have going for them is the blind acceptance by so many of so little.

[AllanGP]

Well it has obviously touched a nerve with you but on the Road side I've never really had any issues worth getting upset about. Maybe it is different on the Oval side?

[darock]

Allan, honestly, just because I've offered an observation that appears to be negative to you doesn't mean I'm either upset or a nerve has been touched.

From what I've seen running a couple of road series and 4 oval series almost daily is that both sides are filled with members who obviously aren't working the protest system sufficiently for it to work properly. It really appears the membership isn't anywhere close to leaving if iRacing were to hit them with an annoying rule.

"They say you've cut the course and you'll have to slow down and give back the time" hasn't done it.

"Looks like you have wheel damage" after a zero inc impact hasn't done it. Heck, I'm not sure we have room to list all the things they seem oblivious to.

No, they don't seem upset. And they don't seem to be the types that'd leave if hit with more things like landmines, idiotic point awards, or the such.

[AllanGP]

Well you are running a lot more races than me so your experience is different, I just haven't seen, to the degree you have, these issues.

That's not to say they should not be addressed and I see iRacing are starting to do that.

Personally (having not see the level of issues you have) I don't have an issue if it takes them time to sort them out properly but they do need sorting.

[PhilH959]

One thing I didn't see answered.... Since I-racing is subscription based and it must conect to their servers as pointed out earlier, all content becomes unusable IF you stop your subscription.

Phil

[Jack B]

Originally Posted by PhilH959

One thing I didn't see answered.... Since I-racing is subscription based and it must conect to their servers as pointed out earlier, all content becomes unusable IF you stop your subscription.

Phil

Yes, you are correct Phil.

With GTR2 for example it's much cheaper and their is no subscription fee.

iRacing is like cable TV. No subscription. No cable.

Prices have dropped over the past 4 years as more subscribers have joined. It used to be about $12 a month at launch, but now is around $1 to $5 a month with discounts like the $49 a year specials and participation credits etc.

[Domey]

Originally Posted by PhilH959

One thing I didn't see answered.... Since I-racing is subscription based and it must conect to their servers as pointed out earlier, all content becomes unusable IF you stop your subscription.

Phil

Jack B is right. It's like cable television. If you want to race at the higher levels, which you will, you'll have to buy extra content (cars, tracks). But, once purchased, it's available to you as long as your sub is active. If there's a lapse, the content will still be there when you re-join. As he states, the cost for subs can be quite low. The content can be expensive at first, but there are ample things to do here with the content you are given at the start.

The thing I would ask you is what do you want from iRacing? If you want it to be easy, you'll probably be disappointed. If you want to compete against very evenly matched human opponents, with a bit of everything that implies, then you should be going to the signup page right now. Forget the content cost for right now, sign up with “PR-2FREE” on the Subscription page and you'll get 3 months for $12. You'll have plenty of time to see how things work. Don't like it, you're only out 12 bucks. If I were to calculate only the time factor into my cost for iRacing, cost per hour, it would be well under $0.25. So that's about a buck for 4 hours worth of top-notch entertainment. The thing is, as time goes by, and my investment into content that allows me to participate in some truly great racing enjoyment gets averaged out over a longer period of time. My costs will continue to fall. There will be new content I'll need to purchase now and then, but I have what I need to race Skip Barber and Star Mazda and they are both worth the cost, imho. Put one of us as a referrer, and we get a little credit for that as well. Thanks if you do! We'll see you on the track. (Find iRacing names for No Grippers here: http://www.nogripracing.com/forum/sh...d.php?t=207008)

[darock]

Originally Posted by AllanGP

Maybe it is different on the Oval side?

I'm sure the oval side is a mystery to anyone who hasn't run any races there, but there are a lot of similarities. There are also quite a few differences. Over half the membership appears to be there too.

iRacing really is quite a diverse place. When I run the Cup car every so often, those races are quite different from what I see in the Modifieds and Late Models I run often. But the driver lists seem to have the same proportion of loud mouths and short tempered few. When I run a Jetta, Vette or Radical there are loud mouths and short tempered as well. In either case, the few drivers on both sides who I have seen cause trouble enough that I noted their names are usually still causing the same trouble next time I notice them. There is an interesting technique to help you notice them later.

I once protested 3 kids who made a game of practice sessions. They even teamed up in cars sporting identical paint jobs. I discovered that after seeing them block a turn in an Okayama race I'd spent a couple of days preparing for. After the protest, I set them up with special "Warning" paint schemes. I really didn't expect to see them for awhile but did it because I'd just read about that technique. I saw them again and again that week. That was back when Okayama was brand new. I checked their history about a month later and saw they hadn't missed a day of "fun" since my protest. They often totalled inc counts into 3 digits. They were active on the road side mostly. I looked through one of their histories and it didn't seem to have a single gap and was solid with huge inc counts in sessions.

I really think iRacing seriously needs some improvement to a number of their systems.

[darock]

Originally Posted by Domey

The thing I would ask you is what do you want from iRacing? If you want it to be easy, you'll probably be disappointed. If you want to compete against very evenly matched human opponents, with a bit of everything that implies, then you should be going to the signup page right now. Forget the content cost for right now, sign up with “PR-2FREE” on the Subscription page and you'll get 3 months for $12. You'll have plenty of time to see how things work. Don't like it, you're only out 12 bucks. If I were to calculate only the time factor into my cost for iRacing, cost per hour, it would be well under $0.25. So that's about a buck for 4 hours worth of top-notch entertainment. The thing is, as time goes by, and my investment into content that allows me to participate in some truly great racing enjoyment gets averaged out over a longer period of time. My costs will continue to fall. There will be new content I'll need to purchase now and then, but I have what I need to race Skip Barber and Star Mazda and they are both worth the cost, imho. Put one of us as a referrer, and we get a little credit for that as well. Thanks if you do! We'll see you on the track.

This is good advice, but there is something in it that should be made a bit clearer.

iRacing starts you out in Rookie, and you WILL NOT get an honest look at the service in Rookie. You'll see how the system works mechanically, and it's extensive. You will have a chance to learn how to do all the unique things the service requires you to do. But the drivers you encounter aren't going to give you much of a preview of what the drivers or racing is like in the upper classes.

Not only that but iRacing really has no way to give you excellent all-encompassing advice about everything. In fact they don't even give much about, nor emphasize how important iRating is to your experience. It is what helps you race with good drivers. It is what will condemn you to running with fools and idiots. I'm sure they would like to make it clear, but it appears they chose to focus on SafetyRating knowing how little most new members would pay attention to all the documentation and videos available.

You really do need to be patient when you jump in. Run some in ghost mode and do some TimeTrials and such. "and such" is important, and there's lot of it.

It's worth the money and worth the effort.

[scootergeo]

Originally Posted by AllanGP

Well you are running a lot more races than me so your experience is different, I just haven't seen, to the degree you have, these issues.
Personally (having not see the level of issues you have) I don't have an issue if it takes them time to sort them out properly but they do need sorting.

No offense I hope but I wish I had a dime for every road racer that says.. I see no problems with iracing.

Most of those people (road racers) don't run anywhere the amount of races oval racers usually run. Being that I ve down both extensively I can say after 1st lap its like comparing apples to oranges.
After 1st lap one car generally can't cause huge pile up like take for instance on a track like Richmond. One car or driver that races like a goof can screw up the entire race just by blocking or spinning every lap. While on a track like Silverstone or Sebring you just go around people like that.

They need to make hosting free. Let the leagues train drivers, I've said that since day one in beta. Instead JH was quibbling about how much hosting should cost in thread that went on for a month or more in beta .

They already reduced the cost of hosting and should just drop the charge or make it a monthly charge of unlimited race hosting for say 20$ to 30$.

I used to host 10 races a day in other games that would cost a small fortune to do at iracing. I don't like being forced to race with people I don't like or people I consider wreckers.

Originally Posted by darock

iRacing starts you out in Rookie, and you WILL NOT get an honest look at the service in Rookie.

I somewhat disagree with this. You can be a rookie never move up and experience all IR has to give and maybe more. By cars and tracks your interested in and just league race.

If more people do this it will prove that leagues are more important then IR's glorified league.
That is exactly what Ir is a glorified league. I was there when they were strongly against on there forums leagues because they had a fear that leagues would ruin there tier system or take away or thin the driver pool out.

Now there basically begging leagues to join because I think they realize that trying to stamp out or discourage league play is bad in every way. Community's race clubs and leagues build our hobbies game interest, this site is proof of THAT!

[MickeyMouse]

Originally Posted by scootergeo

They need to make hosting free. Let the leagues train drivers, I've said that since day one in beta. Instead JH was quibbling about how much hosting should cost in thread that went on for a month or more in beta .

They already reduced the cost of hosting and should just drop the charge or make it a monthly charge of unlimited race hosting for say 20$ to 30$.

Making the hosted races free would drive down normal participation I think. It would also be like the N2K3 days where 95% of the open races will be at the same few tracks with the same cars, ie, boring.

Originally Posted by scootergeo

If more people do this it will prove that leagues are more important then IR's glorified league.
That is exactly what Ir is a glorified league. I was there when they were strongly against on there forums leagues because they had a fear that leagues would ruin there tier system or take away or thin the driver pool out.

That's also exactly what many want iRacing's structure to be, a 'light' league. Many people can't, or won't, commit to a scheduled league. No open racing will be as clean, competitive or courteous as a real league, but since open racing in other sims is so horribly messy, iRacing's structure really is the best option for those people. I personally think iRacing has a good balance between open and hosted racing as it is right now.