Windows 7 problems **NOT SUPPORTED**

[cipria]

Hi Umberto (Virtuali Administrator)

I understand the reasons why you no longer provide support to customers who use your GSX program on a Windows 7 operating system.

Clearly the solution for everyone would be to switch to Windows 11 but:
1. as far as I know, this would require reinstalling FSX, scenery and addons purchased or modified over years of using FSX
2. from research on the web, it does not appear that FSX can run smoothly with more recent operating systems.

Another solution would be to install MSFS 2024 which is certainly fascinating especially for the graphics; however this would involve:
1. a further significant cost to have the simulation software, the software for new airplanes (eg PMDG for MSFS), the most current hardware in terms of performance and compatibility as well as the adaptation of the internet connection in terms of greater download speed
2. the loss of all the addons (some paid) installed over these years of using FSX.

Now, regardless of the above considerations (completely personal), I wonder if there is a possible solution that allows me (but also many others) to use a version of GSX that works, in fact and even without assistance, in a Win 7 environment.

I can confirm that until April 2025 (in the version active at the time) GSX worked very well on my PC, in the absence of any Win7 update (which is no longer possible).

I am (we are) enthusiastic about flight simulation where GSX has introduced appreciable elements of realism that have enriched the flight experience of FSX users.
Giving up on GSX would be a significant loss.

So, is it possible to find a solution?
For example, would it be possible to make available an "dated" version of GSX but with the latest (not the very latest) options, that works with Win7?

Thank you for your attention and I hope that my request is understood and evaluated.

[randika50]

Dear Umberto,

     Is this error appears due to Windows 7 issue ?

[virtuali]

I made a bit of research about that error, and these are a few suggestions you can try:

Download all of these from Microsoft:

Visual C++ Redistributable for Visual Studio 2017 (v141)
https://aka.ms/vs/17/release/vc_redist.x86.exe

Windows 7 Service Pack 1
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/update-to-windows-7-sp1-for-performance-improvements-f6469085-6dc4-59ef-3102-8d515e67651a

KB2999226 (Universal C Runtime update for Windows 7)
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=49077

No idea if they work, but it's worth trying.

[HB-ESY]

The answer suggested by Umberto, that the updates he mentioned (see links) for windows 7 users could possibly solve the problem, do not work...

It seems that there is no possibility for windows 7 and FSX users to use GSX in the future, because there is no support.
So I ask myself as a longtime user of GSX, why you can use FSX live updates under windoes 7 up to
Version 3.4.7 - April 28th, 2025 without any problems.
There was never any indication that these updates were unsuitable for FSX unter windows 7 and could crash the GSX program.. Also hints that FSX users with windows 7 should not make any updates (since the discontinuation of support windows 7 for FSX) were never given. In any case, I have never noticed or read such information in the forum.

So if FSDT does not offer us the possibility to update either the last working
version 3.4.7 - April 28th, 2025 separately or a corresponding update with the solved problem,then it's done for us with GSX as of now.

The current listing of FSX in the Couatl-Updater (without a note that the updates are not for windows 7) will be obsolete in the future...

[virtuali]

There was never any indication that these updates were unsuitable for FSX and could crash the GSX program. Also hints that FSX users should not make any updates (since the discontinuation of support for FSX) were never given. In any case, I have never noticed or read such information in the forum.

Apart for the fact reading the Sticky thread about Windows 7 should have been abundantly clear that you couldn't expect Windows 7 to continue to work "forever", but every time somebody asked, we always stressed the same concept: it might work today, but it can stop working at any time, for reasons beyond our control:

https://www.fsdreamteam.com/forum/index.php/topic,30864.msg198032.html#msg198032

As explained there, if it worked back then or until now, there's no guarantee it will always work, since any update to the C++ runtimes libraries by Microsoft that we MUST use to be sure everything is working on currently supported OS, might break compatibility with unsupported OS at any time, and there's nothing we can do to prevent that.

Or here:
https://www.fsdreamteam.com/forum/index.php/topic,28870.msg188185.html#msg188185

As explained in all threads related to Windows 7, we don't test anything with it anymore, but we don't explicitly add code to prevent our software to work with it, if something like this ever happens, it might just caused by updates to the various runtime libraries we use that might be released by Microsoft.

Or here:
https://www.fsdreamteam.com/forum/index.php/topic,27489.msg180142.html#msg180142

We urged users to upgrade to Windows 10, because sooner or later a Microsoft update (.NET most likely) that we *must* use to support current OS, would made the programs unusable on Windows 7, you were just lucky it worked for so much time, but now there's just nothing we can do to fix this.

Or here, about doing BACKUPS:
https://www.fsdreamteam.com/forum/index.php/topic,26008.msg171436.html#msg171436

My point was, once you have an installer that WORKS for you, YOU SHOULD DO A BACKUP, because that's what you are supposed to do BECAUSE you must surely KNOW you are using an unsupported OS so you can't just demand we'd keep an history of legacy installers, which adds to our server bandwidth fees every month, JUST to cover for users of unsupported OS that don't do their backups.

So, again, if you really want to continue to use Windows 7 ( WHY ? You know very well you WILL end up with a newer OS, sooner or later, or you really think your hardware will last "forever" ? ), now that it seems we found out you can use the CURRENT version of the installer, with the 32 bit of the executable, I hope THIS TIME you'll do your backup so, if and when even the 32 bit version will eventually stop working, which we can't obviously know since we can't test it, you'll be at least able to use the version you DID a backup of.

So the current listing of FSX in the couatl updater will be obsolete in the future...

What FSX has anything to do with this ? FSX is FULLY supported, your issue is the OS you are using, Windows 7, went completely out of support more 5 years ago! FSX works just fine in Windows 10/1.

[HB-ESY]

Hello Umberto

I am trying to solve the problem with Windows 7 that I can restore the status of version 3.4.7 BEFORE the update of version 3.5.3, i.e. before the switch to Stackless Python 3 codebase.
In the first step, I therefore restored the installation file gsx_fsx_setup.exe, which was installed after the purchase.

When starting FSX I  get now the message that the program cannot be started because “python27.dll is missing. reinstall the program to solve the problem”.

If I reinstall python.27.dll, would that make couatl.exe run again?

Another suggestion would be if you would be so kind and provide us numerous window 7 users with the last working update version 3.4.7 here in this post as a download link?
That way we could at least continue to use the program without future updates and would be very happy with it.

Many thanks and best regards

[virtuali]

nother suggestion would be if you would be so kind and provide us numerous window 7 users with the last working update version 3.4.7 here in this post as a download link?

We don't have such version anymore, because it was created by many only updates over the last full version, which is 2.9.8, dated July 2023, that's the only full installer we have.

[HB-ESY]

Umberto, thank you for your feedback.
Can you please give me an answer to my question about python27.dll ?

Many thanks !

Btw:
Would an installation of the full installer 2.9.8, dated July 2023 solve the problem so that the program works again, even if without the latest updates?
If so, where could we download this version?
If this makes the program playable again, you would be spared other users with the same problem in the future and a few hundred customers would be made happy.

[virtuali]

Can you please give me an answer to my question about python27.dll ?

No idea, no plan to test this, you surely are missing files.

an installation of the full installer 2.9.8, dated July 2023 solve the problem so that the program works again, even if without the latest updates?

It should, as it would have if you installed GSX in July 2023.

If so, where could we download this version?

As I've said, the one and only installer we have for FSX or P3D is 2.9.8. Just be sure you block the updater, maybe install with the network disabled.

[HB-ESY]

You wrote....
"As I've said, the only installer we have for FSX or P3D is 2.9.8, just make sure you block the updater, maybe install with network disabled."

Well, where can we download this version?

[virtuali]

Well, where can we download this version?

In the Products and Download page of our site, FSX section. You didn't know you can download our installers at any time

[Erickcc319]

Guys, I recommend to move Windows 10, I just did it, everything working perfect again