Sometimes it is worth buying high and crying once. Google only sends updates to android phones for three years after production ends. The new computers are expensive, but likely will not need to be replaced for 20 years, the software is intuitive and linked to the vario read outs. Hell my LXNav even reads out the thermal strength in addition to the audio. Flarm display is big easy to read and speaks to me as does vario. I can set font size to whatever I need to read without glasses... As eyes age I really appreciate the much larger screen than possible with a phone, plus it is panel mounted so nothing hanging on the canopy or elsewhere.

On Saturday, June 24, 2017 at 9:46:41 AM UTC-7, wrote:
That's the solution: order a JS3!!

I didn't realize there was much OpenVario action anywhere outside of Europe, though I do know of 2 or 3 guys in the U.S. who are experimenting with it. It's an interesting concept for the display options, the cursor options, and as an integration platform. But it's an order of magnitude greater in cost than my Kobo and Dell Streak toys, although still well below the commercial price points.

Just to clarify, I'm looking for a LARGER color display than the Dell Streak 5 so the smartphone alternatives aren't attractive.

I haven't played with a Dell Streak 7 but everything I read in the soaring-specific postings says it's not as readable in sunlight as the 5. I'd heard the same about the Nexus 7 but haven't seen it myself, although polarized sunglasses are a stopper due to my Portable PowerFLARM screen.

My device is mounted on the right side of the canopy rail and neither the Dell nor the Kobo Glo (I'm still swapping them in and out using a Ram X-Grip) obscures any of my instrument panel.

I prefer color, one reason being Top Hat's version of autozoomed climb page that gives an overhead picture of the track through the thermal and surrounding, area, color coded for lift and sink. The gray scale version just isn't as definitive/intuitive for me.

My new ClearNav Vario's thermal assistant works very well but it's a one-circle view of the thermal with an arrow pointing in the direction of the core. I can manually switch into an overhead view similar to Top Hat's that shows my path through the entire thermal area with bubbles of lift. But then I lose the thermal assistant view. So I like to have the overhead view on Top Hat at the same time.

Until last year, the device on the canopy rail was an old Garmin GPS 76 permanently zoomed in to show my path through the thermal and surrounding area, although obviously not coded for lift and sink. More than once while in marginal lift, I've moved over a short distance only to realize I should have stayed, and then unerringly flown directly back along the breadcrumbs to my previous circle and continued climbing slowly. With my new advanced technology, it's not so simple to get the same information--at least not without a few button pushes.

So I want color for that overhead view. The Dell Streak 5 is OK. A bigger, even brighter color screen would be better.

Chip Bearden
"JB"