Scared to death of Iracing ! Need suggestions please.

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turdhat

turdhat

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United States
Pleasure Ridge Park, Kentucky
Been stewing on the idea for a long time. Love game like Forza but I know they are a joke compared to IRacing and find it very intimidating ! I race offline most of the time and hotlap because I am sooo tired of crash up derby that is so common with other games and love the fact that Iracing makes you race clean or suffer. I need some feedback on my setup before I plunk down the cash. Appreciate any advice.

First, I have no interest in Nascar or Oval racing. I prefer road cars and sports cars and a little F1. With these preferences in mind should I even bother ? Despite me being from the US I really prefer EU style racing by far. Is there enough of this content in Iracing to please someone with similar racing taste ?

I notice so many have triple monitor setups and I see why. You need that side vision to race clean. I know it can be done single monitor but it seems like a huge disadvantage. Here is my setup. My home theater is my main gaming and racing setup.

I7 2600k at 4.6 ghz
gtx 680 (highly overclocked)
primary resolution will be 1080p on a 55 inch screen and will be about 3 feet away from it.
Fanatec Gt2 firmware 681 (cant stand anything above it due to feel and run it in g25 mode on pc most of the time due to better driver support)
Csr elite pedals.
Rennsport wheel stand V2.

Thank you for any tips or advice. I have watched countless getting started videos and understand basic racing etiquette.
 
Don't be afraid. Go for it!

You have the ability to practice alone as well as with other players, so there's plenty of oppurtunity to learn to drive cleanly.
 
Just get a couple more 55" screens and your good to go. Actually, one screen isn't horrible. The spotter tells you when there is a car beside you and you can have it so you just press a button to look to the left or right (which you should do on Forza or GT anyway). But three screens is awesome.
 
you are ready from what all you listed... I'm a oval racer but love to get a few road races here and there... you have a better setup than me too
 
Go for it. I was the same playing the f1 2010, 2011, TOCA Race Driver and Gran Turismo 5. I play of a rubbish HP Laptop connected to a 23 inch monitor and a DFGT. My advise is that the rookie racers can be very hectic with some turn 1 pile ups but once you leave you will never turn back. You can run practice by yourself, and run time trials where you can compete for points. Try one of the discounts like Half price membership on the website
 
Thx for the replies. I intend on giving it a shot. I just wanted to make sure I have everything I need and wanted to make sure that there was enough of the kind of racing I enjoy to justify the learning curve involved. Any fanatec specific tips ?
 
Come join us on the dark side! :)
You have an awesome rig! It should have no problem running iRacing.


As other have stated here it is best to approach iRAcing as one would approach racing in the real world.

This is not GT5. You should not expect to jump into a car and expect to be competitive in one day. Do not expect 3 lap bashes. It is a steep learning curve, so start with low HP cars, learn car control, learn the racing rules, learn the game system, etc etc. Take time to practice, practice, practice. Develop your racecraft - when you enter your first races with other iRacing members aim to finish the race and do not race for position, etc. etc.

good luck! let us know how it is going.
:)
 
Go for one of the 3 month starters. You are like me, I only road race ATM. Get the MX-5 and practice, alot. It is an easy car to drive, once you have put in a lot of seat time. It can't be said enough, iRacing isn't for everyone. However you seem to have a great attitude for it so go for it.

Your PC sounds like it will be perfect for iRacing, I run 2 GTX 670's in SLI mode and triple 55" HDTV's. One screen will work no problem, down the road if you can afford triples then go for it. Triple screens are the best upgrade one can make IMO. Good luck.
 
turdhat
Been stewing on the idea for a long time. Love game like Forza but I know they are a joke compared to IRacing and find it very intimidating ! I race offline most of the time and hotlap because I am sooo tired of crash up derby that is so common with other games and love the fact that Iracing makes you race clean or suffer. I need some feedback on my setup before I plunk down the cash. Appreciate any advice.

First, I have no interest in Nascar or Oval racing. I prefer road cars and sports cars and a little F1. With these preferences in mind should I even bother ? Despite me being from the US I really prefer EU style racing by far. Is there enough of this content in Iracing to please someone with similar racing taste ?

I notice so many have triple monitor setups and I see why. You need that side vision to race clean. I know it can be done single monitor but it seems like a huge disadvantage. Here is my setup. My home theater is my main gaming and racing setup.
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There is waaaay more Oval content which is unfair on us road guys but what do you expect when iRacing is made in the US where Nascar is based, and after all it is much easier to scan an oval than it is a road circuit, same with the technology in certain cars (FW31 vs a Nascar for example.) I would say there is enough content on the road side for now, and by the looks of things they have pretty much got everything those oval fans need so maybe they'll concentrate on us road guys.

As for triple screens, I don't use them and neither does a lot of other people on iRacing, including some of the DWC's. (Stephen Michaels for example)
 
SKIDMARX
There is waaaay more Oval content which is unfair on us road guys but what do you expect when iRacing is made in the US where Nascar is based
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I don't think that is true at all!!! There might be a few more oval tracks but on the car side I think road racers have more. Besides, not all North Americans strictly oval race. I only road race ATM even though I own all the content.
 
One thing I do wish. I wish there was a rally game with the attention to detail that is in Iracing. Rally is really the only thing I play online at this point and it is simple. There is one car at a time, no crash up cluster**** in the 1st corner and other cars bashing you off the track so in rally racing where you place it up to your skill alone and if you crash you have no one to blame. I look forward to tying some of the suggestions here and I am getting ready to download and begin Iracing in just a few minutes. I need to do some reading on my wheel though. I refuse to upgrade my fanatec gt2 above firmware 681 because I do not like the feel so I have to be as sure as I can that it will work properly. At very least I can use it in g25 mode if I have to. I am looking forward to getting the mx-5 and practing here shortly. I hope the fact that I have played a lot of Forza with no assist with throttle control being a huge focus will help. I watched some great videos on newb mistakes about running races with the goal of finishing and not winning to advance from rookie level and play to follow that advise to the letter. Thx for the great advice ! Seem like this is a great community.
 
You will love it I just made the jump from GT5/Forza a few weeks ago and I must admit I was a little intimidated at first,but I did a bunch of solo testing,then started to run time trials to start building some safety rating and after a week of that started to run some practice sessions with other cars on the track to get the feel for running with other drivers. Then on this past Wed. I jumped in both feet first and ran my first race I managed a 6th place Finnish out of a 18 car field with no contact and only 3 off track excursions. Had a couple of good clean battles for a couple of laps. Now I can't wait to have another go at it.

Good luck with the new iRacing career
 
left888
I don't think that is true at all!!! There might be a few more oval tracks but on the car side I think road racers have more. Besides, not all North Americans strictly oval race. I only road race ATM even though I own all the content.
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What more do ovals need car wise though? Not disagreeing though. Both sides are well sorted at the moment. A few more touring cars on the road side would be nice though. I know the civic and BMW are coming soon though.

Regarding oval tracks, I believe once Fontana/Auto Club Speedway is built and released then that's every sprint cup/nationwide/truck series track done.
 
I know several people have requested home tracks like Evergreen Speedway instead of just USA, SoBo, and Lanier. There will always be something more to add on both sides. Keep in mind that iRacing was based off of a NASCAR game, and the quantity and quality of the tracks and cars on both sides are pretty considerable..... Sorry for going off topic.

I've played GT5 a lot and Forza 3 (3 only a little, but not 4) and iracing trumps them by a long shot. When you join iracing chances are that you'll only want to run between 1-4 classes, 4 is pushing the max of not what you can run but of what you'll want to run because you just won't have enough time in a week to practice and race all 4, even 3 series is tough

If you get stuck, you always have GTP and the iRacing member forums to fall back on.
 
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MildAshers
What more do ovals need car wise though? Not disagreeing though. Both sides are well sorted at the moment. A few more touring cars on the road side would be nice though. I know the civic and BMW are coming soon though.

Regarding oval tracks, I believe once Fontana/Auto Club Speedway is built and released then that's every sprint cup/nationwide/truck series track done.
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That is true, there is nothing more ovals need, car wise and that was sort of my point. As mentioned iRacing was based off of NASCAR and now it has a great showing of road cars and it's only going to get better.

I have noticed in my 2 years with the service, the people that complain the most about not enough road cars/tracks are the Europeans. For the most part I find this unfounded. Road racing is well represented in iRacing and as mentioned it's getting better all the time.
 
left888
I have noticed in my 2 years with the service, the people that complain the most about not enough road cars/tracks are the Europeans. For the most part I find this unfounded. Road racing is well represented in iRacing and as mentioned it's getting better all the time.
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That's because in Europe we don't have any Oval racing as big as Nascar or IndyCar and the type of racing that is popular in Europe is stuff like Touring Cars, Formula 1, 2, 3 and 4, Formula Renault 3.5 (aka GP3), GP2, GT Series, Le Mans Series, hence why most Europeans prefer Road racing as it has the biggest influence on us. And we have some of the worlds best and most challenging tracks in Europe like Nurburgring, Circuit de la Sarthe, Spa Francorchamps and street circuits like Monaco so that's why challenging tracks appeal to most of us rather than ovals. Take Kansas for example, besides its progressive banking it seems just like Texas to me, in fact the Texas setup actually works there.

Now I know and understand that iRacing is based off a Nascar game originally, but in order to call themselves the worlds most professional online simulator then they will have to start to recognize the European and Asian market more than they are doing now. This means they need to include more road circuits (which they are currently scanning, but it still seems like much of them are based in the USA) because frankly I don't see Formula 1 races happening around Laguna Seca or Sonoma or Road America or whatever else iRacing has put on the calender anytime soon.

And for the love of god, the new Silverstone layout was supposedly scanned a couple of years ago, but since then there has been no news or anything on it and a million billion more Oval tracks have since been scanned and created.
Silverstone is in need of a remaking as club corner on the original layout makes iRacing tyre model look terrible, and since they already have the original circuit to use as a template it shouldn't be as difficult or time consuming as scanning and creating a circuit from scratch.

In other news I am looking forward to the release of Long Beach Street Circuit (also scanned after Silverstone and is going to be released before hand.)
 
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Well I tried it and I have to say that I guess I don't like it. If this is realism I guess I want a mix of arcade and realism. Forza 4 and Gt5 are about as real as I want it. I consider myself a good racer with many top 50 times in Forza but to me I just do not have the time to put in to this game that would be required to begin to be competitive.

I still have a month to play around with it but man it is soooo freaking hard and unforgiving which I guess is realistic. I really lack patience honestly and I think that it why this isnt working for me. I will give it another go as I was having some fun testing out the Mazda but man when I tried to higher class car I could not hardly make a corner without spinning and I lack the patience for it. It's not for everyone and I have enjoyed watching races quite a bit. Thx for the advice folks. I do plan to try it some more I am just afraid that it will also make me loose my skill at Forza 4 which I really enjoy since I would get used to iracing and how it feels. Wow, it is sooooo hard !

Am I missing something or going about it wrong ? As I said I lack patience and I think that is a requirement for this game. Just feels so overwhelming and unforgiving. The feel of weight transfer and FF is amazing though.
 
There's intro videos to watch on the home page, watch those.
I challenge you to give it your best shot for the next month or however long you have it, it takes awhile to adapt initially but it's worth it. Just remember to relax and go your own pace in a practice session, the key isn't to be fast, it's to be consistent, speed comes from consistency. Personally, I'm not particularly fast (tbh you could probably run my speed just starting if you're a really good rookie) but my ability to avoid wrecks and stay on track for an entire race is what enables me to be just above mid pack and sometimes up front at the end of a race in my area of stats and in the club, otherwise I'd be just below average.
My point is to just go your own pace and when you get reasonably consistent lap times you'll be singing a different tune :)
 
I have to wonder about my wheel and FF settings. I am not having too much issue with the mazda after about 30 laps on one of the road courses. Very fun I must say but the moment I try a car with any power it is unreal that I can not even hardly keep it on the track. I really expected that playing Forza 2,3 and 4 never using any assist and always with a wheel that I would fare better. I do expect a lot from myself quickly. As I said, patience isnt a strong point. I just want a racing game where people play cleanly online.
 
I have seen a ton of setting suggestions for fanatec wheels. Any suggestions for in game settings ? Thx.
 
FFB @ 12-15 depending on car/wheel/personal liking (I leave it at 12 for most cars (G27/DFGT))

Brake curve factor @ 0 for both potentiometer and load cell style brakes

Out of curiosity what is/are the "high powered car(s)" you refer to?

Also, if downshifting is a slight issue, try auto-blip until you are comfortable. The aids in iRacing aren't as looked down upon as much as GT5 because the shifts are a little slower than a good driver but not enough to really notice maybe a tenth or 2 lap time loss on road courses but it's consistency makes it up in the long haul
 
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SKIDMARX


Now I know and understand that iRacing is based off a Nascar game originally, but in order to call themselves the worlds most professional online simulator
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Um, where on earth have they said that? It seems to me you have a thorn up your backside against iRacing being in North America. Chillax brother, it just a game.





Roush_fan_99
Just remember to relax and go your own pace in a practice session, the key isn't to be fast, it's to be consistent, speed comes from consistency.
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Well said Aaron, that's the best advice for rookies that can be given. I remember when I first started, an expert iRacer told me to jump in my MX-5 and do 20 laps at Limerock (hot lapping) and do it with 0 incidents. It took me a few months before I could do it, now I can do it with ease and that's what makes a fun race, when you can get a track full of skilled racers without having a crash at every turn.
 
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left888
Um, where on earth have they said that? It seems to me you have a thorn up your backside against iRacing being in North America. Chillax brother, it just a game.
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iRacing.com owns the exclusive rights to NASCAR Racing 2003 Season
, a precursor to iRacing.com. iRacing acquired those rights from Vivendi in 2003. iRacing will protect its legal rights if violations of use or copyright are violated for any of its titles including NASCAR Racing 2003 Season which includes versions that are often titled NR2005 and NR2007 along with NR2003. We are not trying to monopolize sim racing in this regard but simply protecting our rights that we have invested millions of dollars and frankly years or decades of our lives building. There are plenty of sim racing options available to the community. We think iRacing.com is the best obviously but certainly other legal options available as well without resorting to pirated versions. We hope you understand and respect that. We take this seriously and in fact when people have ignored our requests to remove illegal versions and files we have had no choice other than to unfortunately litigate to protect our rights and valuable property. We now have publically available judgments and case law specific to iRacing and NASCAR Racing 2003 Season and its publically known modifications in iRacing versus Robinson (summary info below).
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No. We used the NR2003 code as a starting point, taking advantage of its greatest strengths, such as the net code, which allows full fields of drivers to race online in real time, and the replay system, which enables drivers to review their on-track performance. But every major section of the code has been substantially improved for the iRacing.com simulation, and large portions are all new.
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John got into simracing back in 1990, when he bought Dave's first title, "Indianapolis 500, The Simulation," and a set of controls for his PC. He loved road racing and spent a lot of time with Geoff Crammond's "Grand Prix," getting progressively more involved with the sport over the years. After he bought the Red Sox in 2002, John remembered hearing that Papyrus was located in the Boston area, so he stopped in to introduce himself to Dave, and while he was there the team showed him an early version of "NASCAR Racing: 2003 Season." John had so much fun driving it that he decided to form a league and eventually 50 or 60 of his friends were racing in it. That was the genesis of iRacing. Dave and John both shared a passion for simracing - what it was and what they both thought it could be.
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Source: http://www.iracing.com/membership/faqs/#

And on that last example it shows that David Kaemmer actually came from Nascar Racing 2003.

Now does that prove my point? I'm not saying they should stop making tracks for the US Market, but all I'm trying to say is that the Europeans/Asians/Australasians do not have 1 complete race series they can run without a US track being on the calender (often a ridiculous track that does not fit the car at all, for example the FW31 and Laguna Seca or Sonoma as is in this season). I mean is the Honda Civic BTCC or the Honda HSV GT500 going to run at Lime Rock or Laguna? Now that would be stupid.

And if I had a thorn up my backside about iRacing then I'm sure I would have ignored it and just raced on rFacor instead. But I don't, so that's why I still run on iRacing.
 
SKIDMARX
Source: http://www.iracing.com/membership/faqs/#

And on that last example it shows that David Kaemmer actually came from Nascar Racing 2003.

Now does that prove my point? I'm not saying they should stop making tracks for the US Market, but all I'm trying to say is that the Europeans/Asians/Australasians do not have 1 complete race series they can run without a US track being on the calender (often a ridiculous track that does not fit the car at all, for example the FW31 and Laguna Seca or Sonoma as is in this season). I mean is the Honda Civic BTCC or the Honda HSV GT500 going to run at Lime Rock or Laguna? Now that would be stupid.

And if I had a thorn up my backside about iRacing then I'm sure I would have ignored it and just raced on rFacor instead. But I don't, so that's why I still run on iRacing.
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That link you posted is from PC Gamer, not iRacing. iRacing is not at all saying they emulate real life racing. They are just an online race service dude.

I really don't understand your point? iRacing is what it is, they don't pretend to be any Europeans/Asians/Australasian ANYTHING :D Again "Chillax Brother. :D
 
Are you blindfolded Left888? PC gamer doesn't have the right to post on iracing.com's domain.
 
No, I'm not blindfolded, but I think you are.

irace.jpg
 
I got into iRacing a little less than a month ago and I wasn't all that into oval racing at all. I thought that since I had put a lot of time behind a wheel in GT5 that it would be easy for me to get behind an iRacing car and drive competitively. Like you I had a rude awakening...spinning out all the time and just a miserable introduction to what racing really is. I got frustrated, but kept at it and finally got to where I could finish races with minimal incidents, mostly a couple off tracks.

Then about 3 weeks in, I was sitting on my couch youtubing some videos and was looking for a fast lap around a track in the skippy as I was about to purchase the car.

Stumbled upon this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQRmYMlmdqM

After watching that video, it's old and an hour and a half long, the game and car physics and mechanics just made sense. I was nearly unable to drive a lap in the SPEC ford racer before watching the video, after watching...I was able to turn repeatable consistent laps. No joke! The sim just made sense. It made me realize the cartoonism that GT5 added to racing and really made me enjoy iRacing that much more. Since watching that video I have added 3 road wins and 6 oval wins to my name and promoted out of rookie to D class in both road and oval.

Good luck to you in your decision to move forward. Hopefully this helps you as it did me. I look forward to racing with you soon.
 
left888
No, I'm not blindfolded, but I think you are.

irace.jpg
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I have seen that on the iRacing.com site since the day PC Gamer gave iRacing that award. If it would be PC Gamer it would be something like this:
http://www.pcgamer.com/review/iracing-review/

On the picture of the page you took. It say iRacing is hiring, it say 50%off on a 3 months membership of online racing and the link to the site starts with "www.iracing.com". Do you still think this is PC Gamer?

So no I'm not blindfolded, I helped LJ find these statements and PC Gamer wasn't where we looked. After all, you did ask where did "they" (iRacing) say the things LJ talked about. So this is taken from the FAQ or Frequently Asked Questions on the iRacing.com page.

You ask LJ to Chillax, and I seriously think you should do the same, sit back and you finally see that this isn't PC gamers site. It's just iRacing that is proud of getting that award so they put it on their site. And I can tell you it's been on their site for a pretty long time now.

EDIT:

Just wanted to add that the things LJ quoted wasn't about iRacing being the racing game of all time, but about iRacing was based off a NASCAR game.

If you really need iRacing to state that its meant to be the best racing game/sim of all time to understand what LJ meant, I guess the fact that they use PC Gamer's statement all over the site is prove enough for most people. But you're right, it's not their words.

But take a look at what they announce. All road stuff, Oval stuff just get released. Do they announce road stuff to annoy the oval guys? Or is it to keep the Road guys at bay, since it really lack on that side.
If you still believe the road side is complete your goal is for sure not to be the best of the best and go pro.
In Oval the cars for pro is very much up to date and they can choose from 2 cars. Real world oval have 3. And I heard they talked to Toyota as well. And how many of the real life track do they miss now, is it two?

Going pro on the road side they have a historic formula 1 car and are forced to race on tracks around America beside the few real life formula 1 tracks they do have.
My opinion from the first day I got iRacing was that it was way to Americanized, but it's understandable. It comes out of North America and I'm not stupid and I do understand that most users probably comes from there as well. But proudly announce their road pro license Grand prix is probably the least realistic about the sim in my opinion.

I'm still waiting for my iRacing carrier to start, I joined almost a year ago and I raced 70+some races. Is it because I can't race more? No I'm just bored with the race series they have and are hanging around and waiting for what they announced May 10th, 2012.

A year later and I haven't heard any more news about it.
 
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I've got my racing simulator ,my g27 all I need now is the cash for the computer, that I can find but the big problem is time. Can someone join and spend his time just practicing and racing very occasionally, if so maybe I'll go find some cash and join. It would be fun to play with people that are serious about they're racing, hard to find on gt5
 
You can race as often or as occasionally as you want. If you want to race every two hours, that's possible. Or if you want to do a race once a year, that's up to you.
 
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