FSS - my opinion

[-VR- Max Factor]

Which it isn't. Because you're not able to quantify it.

Of course I can.

FSS: You do the honk, open the FSS and it gives you nothing of any value on its own.

ADS: You do the honk, open the System map and you get a whole lot more useful information.

Simple.

It contradicts: "The old ADS is more of a one hit wonder as after one hit you had precise coordinates of every planet/moon in the system and after clicking on a planet you had basic information and you could ascertain what the exact type of planet it was. It is far more of a one hit wonder then the FSS is. "

edit: So make the ADS produced system map not interactive, problem solved

I added the "and" to make it separate from the most important part, thought that was obvious.

What I would do is have gravity distortions of the planets/moons which can't be interacted with in the system map. There is no information and you can't highlight them and there is nothing in the nav panel.

In the FSS, I would have it that when you hover over the gravity signal (when the little circle appears) you have discovered the location of that planet, it then makes it targetable from the system map and it appears in the nav panel. You still don't have the information until you either zoom in on it in the FSS or you fly to it.

It would give a lot of option, wouldn't make the FSS obsolete and would make it faster for people that want to just blast through it to get to the system map. Hell, it doesn't even need to be separate module, it can be built into the FSS.

 

[marx]

Okay, this is going to be long, so I'll just include a tl;dr:
I do a calculation of time spent scanning, flying and mapping bodies in a system based on the EDSM/EDDN data, before and after the FSS, and show that with Darkfyre99's estimate of the time spent using the FSS, a player going after ELWs and WWTCs would spend 24.8 seconds per system now, while with a modded old DSS (which was only available from 2.3 on), they would spend 79.2 seconds. Thus, Darkfyre99 is wrong when he estimates that it's more, not less. For his "typical ELW hunter" who only maps ELWs, the number would be even less, 21.2 seconds.

There's also no significant increase in the rate of new systems visited (the metric Frontier uses), and if console players contributed 4% of systems only (a more realistic estimate would be 20%), then in total, EDSM/EDDN uploaders contributed slightly more earlier than they did after DW2. There's no significant loss and no significant gain there.
Let's not forget though that the official data did show a -27% decrease from before.

I'll put the detailed reply in a spoiler tag then, so as not to mess things up for those who scroll through the thread.

Spoiler

First, let's recap. Riverside said that the ADS was universally popular (as opposed to the BDS and IDS), which you (Darkfyre) took as meaning that the "old style" of exploration was more popular than the "FSS style", and countered that since in your interpretation, people visited more systems over time in the FSS era even after the DW2 players dropped off than they did before the ADS, that means the FSS is more popular. This was your argument for it. Now, I listed the omissions that you made, and how they combined mean you're wrong on people visiting new systems more now than they did before. Especially if you look at the official numbers.

Your response to this is to seize on the words "exploration activity" in themselves, and suddenly bring in time spent per system, which you didn't bring up before and we have no data on, so you've gone from analysis to guessing.
I would guess though that people also spend less time per system. Why? Because Frontier stated that they want them to spend less time flying, they can scan bodies and find surface POIs much faster, and the content plus reasons to stay are pretty much the same and of the same length as before, so no changes there. (The only larger content addition was that of NSPs, and they are so rare that in practice, they contribute a tiny amount of extra time spent in systems.)

While I definitely overlooked the addition of consoles to the mix, it would be useful to know the overall distribution of contributions by platform, to determine if the 10% uptick in visited systems represents console players.

What 10% uptick in visited systems? Based on the official data, it's -27% in visited new systems. Based on the EDSM data, even assuming a current contribution of 0% of systems uploaded to EDDN by console players (which is provably false, but I'm only using it as it would be the minimum), it would be 2019 July to 2020 February would be an average of 955k systems per month, while 2018 January to 2018 August would be 909k then. (The FSS's reveal was in September, so it already started effecting things, soon plunging the new systems to its lowest point to date.) That's less than a +5% uptick, and remember, no console players: it's +5% at best. If we assume that console players would contribute 5% of the systems, which is already quite conservative, it would be 958k. From then on, it's more - and bear in mind that the range I chose was already past the prime of exploration.

So, I'm sorry, but even according to the third-party data, there's no 10% uptick. (Even that wouldn't be significant, mind you.) What there actually was was that during DW2, there was a new peak of 1.752 million new systems in a month, up from the previous peak of 1.484 million. The fact that current levels are nowhere near that would prove that it wasn't due to the FSS, but due to DW2 adding much more activity.
In other words, systems can't be used as proof if you wish to say that the FSS is more popular than the ADS.


Now, as for time that might have been spent. Sorry, but I think you're forgetting that the old DSS had mods, and you didn't have to fly as close to the planet as you have to map it now, leading to considerably less time spent. There were some video experiments measuring the exact effects of the various mods, but I don't know of any comparing the same flight routes with the DSS.
That said, let's see. Planets / systems peaked at 0.9 during the ADS era (it's quite interesting that it had a slow but constant upward trend), but let's be pessimistic and go with 0.66 planet per system then. By comparison, after DW2, we have an average of 5.3 planets per system FSS-d. How much time per system?
Let's go with seven seconds per body in the FSS (based on figures others quoted before, I think that's generous), and two minutes per body with appropriately modded DSS. In that case, time spent per system scanning bodies is 37.1 seconds with the FSS and 79.2 seconds with modded DSS. Which means Frontier did achieve their stated aim of reducing time by removing flight.
So let's move on to mapping then, shall we? Obviously, pre-FSS this wasn't a concern. Now, with ELWs / Systems making up 0.5% after DW2, let's be generous again and say that the majority of explorers would fly to WWTCs and ELWs to map them (our example explorers likes credits), and they would find 4 WWTCs to each ELW, and for the sake of simplicity, let's assume that these are spread out evenly across systems. (Which they likely wouldn't, which would lead to less time spent flying.) So, they'd map something in 2.5% of the systems they visit: that's 0.025 mappings per system. Median distance to arrival would be 1100 ls (source of this is statistics I've made on ELWs), which would be a bit over two minutes (source if the Fuel Rat formula): I'll round down to two because to DSS, you don't have to arrive at the exact destination.
So that's an average of three seconds spent per system on travel time to map a body. Now, I don't really know how much time doing the DSS to completion takes on an ELW, as I never measured it, but surely it can be done in a minute. That way, we're up to 4.5 seconds per system.

Summing them all up: based on the uploads that players have made, 41.6 seconds per system scanning and mapping with the FSS, 79.2 seconds per system scanning with the old modded DSS.

However! That was with seven seconds per body with the FSS. You yourself said only one second per body, and a required 15 seconds per every system. I don't quite agree with this, but let's see the results if we use them. 20.3 seconds spent FSS-ing each system instead of the 37.1 I estimated above, adding up to a total of 24.8 seconds per system spent scanning and mapping. Versus the 79.2 seconds per system before.
I mean, that proves nicely that Frontier did decrease the time players would have to spend, but your point was that players spend more time exploring, while this says that based on what the more dedicated explorers upload, they're spending significantly less time on scanning and mapping than they did on just scanning.

Of course, you could still try to argue that they are spending more time on other stuff, even though we have no data on that. I think everyone can judge whether or not they spend almost thrice as much time per system average as the time they spend on scanning, flying and mapping.

It would be useful if we knew the median and average bodies per system, but players are engaging with the FSS at least long enough to resolve about five bodies per system.

Can't tell you the median unfortunately, but the average is around 10-12 bodies per system, depending on which area of the galaxy you're looking at.

So far, the minimum amount of time spent in a system, assuming your typical ELW hunter, is twice what it was during the ADS era. If the overall exploration population remained the same, then I would've expected the number of system visited to have dropped by at least 40%.

Assuming "your typical ELW hunter", WWTCs are out, so we're down to mapping in 0.05% of systems. That means... 21.2 seconds.


Now, some other stuff:

You forgot the fourth option that explorers chose: they didn't explore at all.

Um. Surely you can see the contradiction in calling someone who doesn't explore an explorer. (You replied to Riverside's "When the ADS was available, what proportion of explorers do you suppose chose to fit a BDS (quite a few, it was pre-installed on every new ship), the IDS (basically nobody) or an ADS (almost universally popular)?", for context.)

For example, in principle, I'd like to do some PowerPlay. But in practice, it was designed bad enough that I don't want to play it. Would I call myself a, hm, PowerPlayer? Of course not.

Again, I didn’t. I thought exploration activity was exploration activity. After all, why track other statistics like average number of stars, planets, ELW. and AWs scanned if they’re not representative of exploration activities?

Sorry, but you're twisting my words again. I said that "exploration activity" there was often, but not always, short-hand for exploration activity via number of new systems visited. Surely you can see why I wouldn't type that out at each and every time it would come out. And surely you can see that I didn't mean that exploration activity doesn't exclude other stuff. However, it's what we have the best data from Frontier on.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Because my answer to your question was the same as my reply to @Faded Glory. Namely that when gamers don’t like a game, or game mechanic, they don’t play it.

You can't tell from that graph the ADS wasn't popular.

What I’m seeing is is marked increase in exploration activity. That means that explorers who didn’t like the ADS, and quit exploring as a result, but at least tolerates the FSS, outnumbers those who don’t like the FSS, and have quit exploring as a result.

Whether that's right or not, it doesn't indicate the ADS was unpopular

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Of course I can.

FSS: You do the honk, open the FSS and it gives you nothing of any value on its own.

ADS: You do the honk, open the System map and you get a whole lot more useful information.

Nope. What you just did is not quantifying. "A whole lot more" ....

FSS, you do the the honk, open the FSS and it tells you what planet types there are. If there are ELWs they're easily spotted, found and scanned. Something which wasn't possible with the ADS.

As I said. Circumstance.

 

[marx]

As I’ve said to @marx repeatedly, what I’m seeing from his exploration data isn’t a drop in exploration activity. Exploration activity hasn’t even remained constant, unless console activity represents the majority of exploration activity uploaded to EDSM, which I find unlikely.

What I’m seeing is is marked increase in exploration activity. That means that explorers who didn’t like the ADS, and quit exploring as a result, but at least tolerates the FSS, outnumbers those who don’t like the FSS, and have quit exploring as a result.

As I've said repeatedly, you're looking at the wrong numbers, and comparing apples to kumquats, as you said. I assume you meant exploration activity via number of new systems visited here, but you're citing numbers that include revisits, which were often 13% higher. So going with the actual new systems uploaded, even if there were no console players contributing systems (obviously false), at best it would be +5%. That's not a marked increase - and the real number is lower than that.

And well, when you talk about this, let's not forget the official number: -27%, down from the peak of the pre-FSS era. Granted, there are some months in that before the FSS was revealed, but the majority of the time period was after.

I do wish we could talk about a significant increase, mind you. In that case, I'd say sure, the FSS is probably more popular, if we measure popularity by the number of new systems visited. But one way or another, it's at best pretty much the same, at worst a significant decrease. Would you count any of those as a big accomplishment from the only significant update to exploration in years? I wouldn't.

The meaningful change it did bring, curiously enough, is that EDSM/EDDN numbers were much more stable over a long period than they were before. I mean, just look at this:

From the end of DW2 until the -80% holiday sale, there's half a year of stagnation, which if you look at the whole chart (from before the FSS), wasn't seen before. Thankfully, there was a significant increase in January and February then, with some "mystery event" being responsible for most of it. Looking at the preliminary March data, it seems activity in systems is decreasing to previous levels.
In bodies scanned per system though, it increased with the sale and has been going back after its peak then - but the variations are considerably smaller there.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

Nope. What you just did is not quantifying. "A whole lot more" ....

FSS, you do the the honk, open the FSS and it tells you what planet types there are. If there are ELWs they're easily spotted, found and scanned. Something which wasn't possible with the ADS.

As I said. Circumstance.

You need to inspect the wave forms to determine what planets are there as there is so much overlap. You can't just look at the wave forms without inspecting them and know for sure what planets are there.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

For a change, here's a slightly different perspective, a little meta you could say: I tried to find a comparable thread on Redit. Maybe I didn't search thoroughly enough or the topics I was looking for did not contain FSS or ADS. But... can you do better? If not, and it turns out that this particular thread only appears in this forum, but never on reddit, and since you can interpret statistics so well, what would that tell you?

I have a few ideas, but first of all I want to give everyone the opportunity to prove me wrong and find one or more similar threads on Redit (and silence me immediately).
So, your turn please...

I never go to reddit. It's an ugly place, a bug place.

And I'd never want to silence anyone. Where's the fun in that?

You need to inspect the wave forms to determine what planets are there as there is so much overlap. You can't just look at the wave forms without inspecting them and know for sure what planets are there.

Yes you can. There is no overlap. You can just look at the wave forms without inspecting and know with as much certainty as looking at the pictures in the ADS what planets there are.

edit: Something by the way, I don't think is a negative for the FSS. I am glad you can. It's less busy work, and I have used it extensively in the time I played around with it.

 

[marx]

For a change, here's a slightly different perspective, a little meta you could say: I tried to find a comparable thread on Redit. Maybe I didn't search thoroughly enough or the topics I was looking for did not contain FSS or ADS. But... can you do better? If not, and it turns out that this particular thread only appears in this forum, but never on reddit, and since you can interpret statistics so well, what would that tell you?

I have a few ideas, but first of all I want to give everyone the opportunity to prove me wrong and find one or more similar threads on Redit (and silence me immediately).
So, your turn please...

Let's see. The subreddit for exploration in Elite: Dangerous is /r/eliteexplorers. A quick scan at it shows that the vast majority of posts there consist of screenshots and videos. (Couldn't find any "look how cool the FSS is" videos either. But then, I didn't want to spend much time looking through it all.) Even the rest generally seems to be discussions mostly by beginners. I'm not disparaging them: you won't find people who know what things were like prior to the FSS there, nor discussing how things could be made better.

I suppose you could expand to mostly- and entirely unrelated subreddits then, or hey, to the whole internet. I mean, I find nothing on the FSS or the ADS on most of the sites, news, papers etc I read. If your local newspaper carries articles of Elite, well, I envy you
Let's not forget that Reddit's voting system pretty much inevitably leads to echo chambers as well. (Earlier on, you complained about "people calling other poster trolls for not going quite conform with the general gist of your opinions". Funnily enough, Reddit is much better at that: you needn't even bother with responding to other opinions, just click that downvote button and soon it'll be hidden well.)

So, what's your point in singling out one site, in this case, Reddit? Why not SomethingAwful, 4chan, Facebook, whatever?

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Even if I had been the only one in the world who had an issue with the removal of the ADS, I still would be here posting and making my case.

Fallacy ad populum be damned.

I am discussing this because I feel I can make good points to support my case. Not because there are more than X people agreeing with me.

Friends was a popular sitcom. I rest my case.

 

[Stigbob]

Because my answer to your question was the same as my reply to @Faded Glory. Namely that when gamers don’t like a game, or game mechanic, they don’t play it.

As I’ve said to @marx repeatedly, what I’m seeing from his exploration data isn’t a drop in exploration activity. Exploration activity hasn’t even remained constant, unless console activity represents the majority of exploration activity uploaded to EDSM, which I find unlikely.

What I’m seeing is is marked increase in exploration activity. That means that explorers who didn’t like the ADS, and quit exploring as a result, but at least tolerates the FSS, outnumbers those who don’t like the FSS, and have quit exploring as a result.

Makes perfect sense. Individuals adapting to the game is far more common than demanding its adapted to the individual.

 

[Faded Glory]

Of course I can.

FSS: You do the honk, open the FSS and it gives you nothing of any value on its own.

ADS: You do the honk, open the System map and you get a whole lot more useful information.

Simple.

FSS - I know from opening and charging the FSS which takes about 5 seconds (I never bothered to honk, that's just an additional, extraneous step)

Precisely how many signals and how many bodies are in a system.
How many of those bodies I have scanned.
What percentage of the system I have scanned.
What type of bodies are in the system.
Whether there are NSP's present.

All of that without moving anything but my eyes. There's as much (or little) ambiguity in the energy spectrum as there was in the system map reveal in my opinion. Very little overlap, the most significant being that between small ELW and RIW, and that takes seconds to resolve with certainty.

Sure I don't know where the bodies are in relation to each other, and nor do I know precisely how many of each type there are. I have to say though, that for me, that's not an issue. If I find a signal in the ELW range, it hardly matters if there is just one, or if there are two, I'm either interested in scanning it / them, or I'm not. Likewise, it isn't relevant to me how many rocky or icy bodies there are, because if I choose to scan the system because it is interesting in some way, that information is largely irrelevant since it will take very little time to scan them.

ADS - I know after the 5 second honk and opening the system map

A rough idea of how many bodies are in a system - I'd have to actually count them if I wanted to be exact.
I know where the bodies are in relation to other bodies, but not where they are in relation to me. The system map is a 2D representation of a 3D system, bodies could be in front of me, behind me, above me or below me.
A rough idea of what types of bodies are in the system - for ELW's in most cases I'd need to zoom in and examine in detail, perhaps try and listen to the audio signal and / or check the HUD representation to rule out it being a WW or even an HMC.
I would be able to see at a glance if there were some kind of outlier that I was interested in such as a GGG or an unusual planetary orbit, and those are the only things that the ADS does better than the FSS, because the FSS simply doesn't indicate them at all.

All of the above, from either device, are no more than an invitation to the player to examine things further, unless one scans systems just because, and doesn't care what is in a system, and I doubt there are many players who do that.

At this point, obviously it's much quicker to scan (not probe) a system using the FSS. My own feeling, and I have said this often, is that if players want the advantage of fast scanning from a distance, then the prerequisite for that should be that they need to use the FSS to locate the body. That's entirely fair, just as it is fair to expect a player who wants to use fixed weapons for their potency to actually be able to aim them.

Hence my suggestion of a non targetable system map reveal, or a targetable nav panel with unexplored items. Neither of these would enable people to 'cheat' and avoid having to use the FSS to locate a body in any meaningful way.


And this is not aimed at you in any way it is simply a generic observation, but I have to say, I cannot help but wonder what is going on when people seem to think doing something faster when we are supposedly playing a game, having fun, doing an activity that we presumably enjoy should be the goal. Frankly, if I'm enjoying doing something while playing a game (or indeed anything), I'm not sitting there wondering how soon I can get the fun over with...

 

[[VR] optimal_909]

Nope. What you just did is not quantifying. "A whole lot more" ....

FSS, you do the the honk, open the FSS and it tells you what planet types there are. If there are ELWs they're easily spotted, found and scanned. Something which wasn't possible with the ADS.

As I said. Circumstance.

Actually, with ADS I could spot an ELW instantly with 99% accuracy. The only outliers were the very hazy ammonia worlds, those often looked like icy worlds.
However, with FSS very often it happens that a wave appears at ELW, then I realize it isn't and I move the slider one pixel to reveal an ice world.

 

[[VR] optimal_909]

....
I would be able to see at a glance if there were some kind of outlier that I was interested in such as a GGG or an unusual planetary orbit, and those are the only things that the ADS does better than the FSS, because the FSS simply doesn't indicate them at all.
....

See, that's the point. After hundreds of thousands of systems, I'm not that interested in another mundane ELW. I am, however, interested if it is a ringed ELW with a landable moon. I'm equally interested if there is giant gravity well HMC, a suqashed gas giant with an interesting color or if there is a potato shaped tiny planet. That is what kept me going and the FSS hides these things behind tedious radio tuning.

 

[Darkfyre99]

You took issue with a straightforward expression that the ADS was almost universally popular. I could use different words & add a load of caveats, it doesn't change the basic point that when people had a choice between limited range and infinite range, infinite range was the choice the vast majority took.

Other options were available, people could do parallax discovery if they wanted to, most didn't.

And there was a reason why. The BDS lacked two important pieces of information that would’ve made parallax discovery viable: whether you should start, and when you should stop. Without those two pieces of information, parallax discovery was a bit like trying to find POIs before the FSS era: you could waste a lot of time trying to find something that was never there.

In terms of numbers of players choosing to explore however many there are post-3.3 there would be more had the old stuff remained. Nobody would have explored until the 3.3 update, then stopped exploring because the old modules were not removed

On that we agree.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

I understand. Have fun!

I will, I am. Will I am, wait ... I am, will.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

You are Will?

I'm not sure anymore. Ziggy I am. Ziggy jam.

No, no, this is leading to silliness.

Back on topic: Yay system map! \o/

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

FSS - I know from opening and charging the FSS which takes about 5 seconds (I never bothered to honk, that's just an additional, extraneous step)

Really. I honk while I get the ship into scooping orbit. Saves time.

Precisely how many signals and how many bodies are in a system.

Yup, never denied it.

How many of those bodies I have scanned.

Neve denied it.

What percentage of the system I have scanned.

Sure, and?

What type of bodies are in the system.
Whether there are NSP's present.

Cool. NSPs weren't around during the ADS.

All of that without moving anything but my eyes. There's as much (or little) ambiguity in the energy spectrum as there was in the system map reveal in my opinion. Very little overlap, the most significant being that between small ELW and RIW, and that takes seconds to resolve with certainty.

So you can tell what planet he rings on it with just your eyes? You can tell how many of a certain planet is in system with just your eyes without fail. Sorry,.but I just don't believe that as its not possible.

Sure I don't know where the bodies are in relation to each other, and nor do I know precisely how many of each type there are. I have to say though, that for me, that's not an issue. If I find a signal in the ELW range, it hardly matters if there is just one, or if there are two, I'm either interested in scanning it / them, or I'm not. Likewise, it isn't relevant to me how many rocky or icy bodies there are, because if I choose to scan the system because it is interesting in some way, that information is largely irrelevant since it will take very little time to scan them.

The earth like range is tiny and over laps with other planets. Sure you can make an educated guess, but to know for sure you need to inspect. Or you have superman eyesight, which I doubt.

ADS - I know after the 5 second honk and opening the system map

A rough idea of how many bodies are in a system - I'd have to actually count them if I wanted to be exact.

Yes you can count then. Takes seconds. It's all there after the honk. Its not about time and I never mentioned time.

I know where the bodies are in relation to other bodies, but not where they are in relation to me. The system map is a 2D representation of a 3D system, bodies could be in front of me, behind me, above me or below me.

Not sure what's relevent about that.

A rough idea of what types of bodies are in the system - for ELW's in most cases I'd need to zoom in and examine in detail, perhaps try and listen to the audio signal and / or check the HUD representation to rule out it being a WW or even an HMC.
I would be able to see at a glance if there were some kind of outlier that I was interested in such as a GGG or an unusual planetary orbit, and those are the only things that the ADS does better than the FSS, because the FSS simply doesn't indicate them at all.

Yup, I mentioned that already.

All of the above, from either device, are no more than an invitation to the player to examine things further, unless one scans systems just because, and doesn't care what is in a system, and I doubt there are many players who do that.

Wow, really.

At this point, obviously it's much quicker to scan (not probe) a system using the FSS. My own feeling, and I have said this often, is that if players want the advantage of fast scanning from a distance, then the prerequisite for that should be that they need to use the FSS to locate the body. That's entirely fair, just as it is fair to expect a player who wants to use fixed weapons for their potency to actually be able to aim them.

Probing is still scanning, you can't leave that out.

Hence my suggestion of a non targetable system map reveal, or a targetable nav panel with unexplored items. Neither of these would enable people to 'cheat' and avoid having to use the FSS to locate a body in any meaningful way.

For me, both the system map and Nav panel would need to be untargatable until you find them in the FSS, but you don't need to zoom in.

And this is not aimed at you in any way it is simply a generic observation, but I have to say, I cannot help but wonder what is going on when people seem to think doing something faster when we are supposedly playing a game, having fun, doing an activity that we presumably enjoy should be the goal. Frankly, if I'm enjoying doing something while playing a game (or indeed anything), I'm not sitting there wondering how soon I can get the fun over with...

I completely agree. I'm looking forward to the time when I spend days or even weeks in one system, to me that is how it should be, not a quick flash in the pan which is what it's like now and during the ADS days.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

See, that's the point. After hundreds of thousands of systems, I'm not that interested in another mundane ELW. I am, however, interested if it is a ringed ELW with a landable moon. I'm equally interested if there is giant gravity well HMC, a suqashed gas giant with an interesting color or if there is a potato shaped tiny planet. That is what kept me going and the FSS hides these things behind tedious radio tuning.

I am also interested in those thing, but I prefer to do gameplay to discover those thing.

 

[marx]

The earth like range is tiny and over laps with other planets. Sure you can make an educated guess, but to know for sure you need to inspect. Or you have superman eyesight, which I doubt.

Despite such claims from a few people, I've yet to see any proof that any planets' signal ranges overlap. But if you do have any proof, please do share it, it would be good to know.

As for not knowing for sure, and needing "superman eyesight": that's a first I heard. Say, what's your resolution, your screen size, and what distance do you sit from it? Have you had your eyesight (visual acuity) measured? (I've known people who thought they had good sight, but after they went to a doctor where it was actually measured, it turned out that they needed glasses.) You might need to adjust where you sit to see better.

 

[Faded Glory]

I completely agree. I'm looking forward to the time when I spend days or even weeks in one system, to me that is how it should be, not a quick flash in the pan which is what it's like now and during the ADS days.

Well do it then, neither the ADS nor the FSS preclude you from spending days investigating a system - although the FSS would certainly cut the scanning time down.

Or... Are you taling about how long it takes you to discover what's in system? If so, then I can't really help you, because the FSS is really very, very fast.