Running Skytrak in the Cloud..

[Virtualadam]

My currently laptop works fine for the Skytrak app, but won't cut it for simulation such as TGC, which means I'll have to look at buying a dedicated gaming/simultor box, which not only is an additional ~1K, but also another computer I have to monkey with. So I was wondering if it would be possible to get Skytrak running from the cloud...

The two unknowns are:
1. Can I get the USB connection from Skytrak running on the remote server.
2. What does the lag look like (with a decent connection should be fine)

I created this thread for anyone else interested to share ideas working together on this....

[Virtualadam]

So far I created a Windows Server 2016 instance on Amazon and installed Skytrak. I then enabled "Microsoft RemoteFX USB Redirection":

https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/enterprisemobility/2010/06/10/introducing-microsoft-remotefx-usb-redirection-part-1/

In the RDP advanced setting I can see the RemoteRFX device for Rapsody and can enable it, although when I connect to the remote machine and launch Skytrak, it doesn't seem to find the USB device?

There are also some other third party USB redirection options that may work better? Also there are some cloud gaming platforms that may be a better option and provide some of the USB plumbing already. Next steps....

[Timanator]

Doesnt this mean if you get internet disruptions your simulator wont work? A PC powerful enough to run this could be had for about 3-400 dollars.

[James James]

Could you use a vpn rather than USB virtualisation? If the skytrak was on your lan and your lan was accessible from your aws machine it could almost appear local without needing additional components?

[Virtualadam]

Doesnt this mean if you get internet disruptions your simulator wont work? A PC powerful enough to run this could be had for about 3-400 dollars.

yes it would be like running the WGT simulator and require Internet. Here in Canada the high-end graphics cards alone are around 1K, and in the cloud you wouldn't have to think about upgrading in the future, etc.

[Timanator]

Virtualadam, can you not get it from Ebay?

[Virtualadam]

Virtualadam, can you not get it from Ebay?

Ya I'm sure people can find some decent hardware deals on eBay or elsewhere...

Although I think it would be ideal if people didn't have to buy any hardware for their simulator, and could simply connect through the Internet and run the software directly from REALLY high-end machines that are constantly kept up-to-date. Think of the thousands of Skytrak users that are having to buy literally THOUSANDS of computers every few years to run the latest simulator software....

Some people may want their own hardware, but I think the cloud option would be a great alternative...

[Limp_J]

I saw that Nvidia is launching a cloud platform. As a Mac owner something like this would be awesome, should it be compatible with the SkyTrak. Not sure how connection to the SkyTrak would/could be negotiated. Perhaps SkyTrak_Seth might have some insight?

If anyone happens to try this when launched and is successful I would be curious to hear.

[pdxkurt]

I think the problem you're going to run into with running "in the cloud" like you say, is that most (virtually all) server hardware have very poor performing graphics cards. Most servers that you can rent online (I have numerous ones) are strong in CPU, Ram, Disk and Network, but they put the minimal requirements towards graphics.

[SkyTrak_Seth]

Yeah, right now it's a bit of a long-shot, both with the size of the courses and also our own image processing.