My Southern GP50

[jbrock27]

so w8 is the new vista?

Hardly.  The Fuss over Windows 8 is a lot about nothing.   

[Doneldon]

as far as i am concerned the ONLY drawback is the lack of flywheels. other than that it runs as well as if not better than the athearns or atlas locomotives you once used. and by converting this locomotive to dcc, you can program the acceleration and decelleration to get the flywheel effect.

Jeff-

Programmed momentum and inertia cannot really replace flywheels. The reason is that moving flywheels store energy in the form of their spinning mass. That spinning mass (or the stationary mass) accounts for the smoothing effects, but the stored energy aspect can also serve to keep a loco moving over an electrically dead spot like dirty track or turnout parts. You can't program that in. Of course, you can put a capacitor into the control circuit to maintain sound over dead spots, avoiding the annoying reboots, and to keep the loco moving until power is restored. So there is a work-around for no flywheels but simply adjusting decoder settings provides only some of the benefits of actual physical flywheels.
                                                                                                                                                                                                       -- D