Cubdriver, that was a great informative post. I've been working with CAE-manufactured simulators, and here's a little bit of information I can pass along from my experience.

Most simulators of aircraft with advanced avionics / glass cockpits use the actual aircraft hardware boxes to interface with the simulation. CAE's newer 5000 series simulators don't actually have as much of the "behind the scenes" hardware... they emulate the entire function of each component and its input/output strictly through computer programming code. As long as it's done correctly, the crew doesn't know any different since the cockpit hardware remains the same.

Along with the switch to a Moog electric motion platform instead of hydraulic, apparently it's less expensive to build and operate the sim. How they do all that technically is amazing to me.