Garmin backing away from additional GDL-69 features for 430/530 products?

[Andrew Gideon]

Take a look please at the bottom of:

http://www.aviationsafety.com/gdl_69_comparison.htm

According to this, the WAAS upgrade for the 430/530 will no longer include
as a side effect access to the "additional" features of the GD-69.

My understanding, from speaking with a Garmin rep months ago, was that the
430/530 products need to have a hardware upgrade so as to exploit features
of the GDL-69 that were not available in the GDL-49. You can see what
these features are at:

http://www.garmin.com/products/gdl69/

The list of features available for 430/530 users is much shorter than that
list for MX20 and G1000 users.

[And no mention of the 480, which I find interesting.]

Does anyone know of Garmin backing away from the WAAS upgrade also adding
the ability to better use the GDL-69?

- Andrew

[Jonathan Goodish]

In article e.com>,
Andrew Gideon > wrote:

> Does anyone know of Garmin backing away from the WAAS upgrade also adding
> the ability to better use the GDL-69?


Don't know about the WAAS upgrade, but I think it was this month's AOPA
Pilot where the author quoted a Garmin employee as saying that the
processor in the 430/530 was "maxed out" with the current weather
products (NEXRAD/METAR/TAF) and that no more weather capability would be
added to the 430/530 platform.



JKG

[Andrew Gideon]

Jonathan Goodish wrote:

> Don't know about the WAAS upgrade, but I think it was this month's AOPA
> Pilot where the author quoted a Garmin employee as saying that the
> processor in the 430/530 was "maxed out" with the current weather
> products (NEXRAD/METAR/TAF) and that no more weather capability would be
> added to the 430/530 platform.

I saw something like that, I think, but I took it to mean that this is why
any more functionality is pending the WAAS upgrade. That upgrade involves
putting into place more capable hardware (CPU, memory, dunno).

- Andrew