Posted before, Vistanav looks better than most www.vistanav.com - thought
they were at OSH

Cheers,

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
oups.com...
Mary and I spent several long days at OSH this week, researching our
in-cockpit weather options. Because the manufacturers of our current
GPS receivers (AvMap and Lowrance) have stupidly decided not to pursue
in-cockpit weather for their hardware, our options were extremely
limited. They included:

1. AnyWhere Map. This software runs on cell phones, PDAs and tablets,
and relies on bluetooth transmitters to both the GPS and XM weather
radio antennaes.

2. Tablet-Based Software. There were two main players at OSH, NavAero
and NavAir. Both relied on the new Windows-based tablet touch-screen
PCs. (There were some REAL high end players, too, in the $7K and up
range, that we didn't even consider.)

3. Garmin's 396 or new 496.

All these systems have advantages and disadvantages.

Early in the week, we looked at NavAir, and were duly impressed with
the Motion LS 800 tablet PC. Since we were looking to replace our
laptop, too, we thought "Hey, this will kill two birds with one stone"
and make the $3800 (or 3.8 AMUs) price more palatable. After all, we
could take the tablet with us whereever we went, and use it as a PC.

However, NavAir software had small, Windows-based menus, and the
hardware required a stylus to use. I simply couldn't imagine using it
in turbulence, so we kept looking.

Next, NavAero looked REALLY promising. Their software incorporated BIG
touch-screen buttons that you could push with your finger (no stylus!),
and the NavPad tablet PC was extremely durable looking. The software
didn't have as good a flight planner as the NavAir, however, so we
quibbled and made no decision that day.

Later that evening, however, we decided to buy the NavAero system the
next day. The GPS and weather depiction on that huge color screen were
simply unbeatable.

That night, however, we had a beer with this group's Hai Longworth at
our campsite in the North 40. Hai is an expert in PCs, works for IBM,
and she warned us to stay away from ANY tablet PC that used a hard
drive, simply because of the altitude restrictions that they inflict.
(Because a hard drives head floats on a cushion of air, it can't be
used reliably at high altitudes where the air is thin.)

So, dammit, that forced us to consider the new "solid state" tablet PCs
that utilize "flash memory" instead of hard drives. However, for
reasons known only to the manufacturers, these units cost $1000 MORE
than their hard-drive-equipped equivalents -- even though they have far
fewer moving parts.

So, we were now rammed up into the 4.9 AMU price range -- which, with
tax, would exceed 5 AMUs. This was no longer an option.

So, we reluctantly looked at AnywhereMap.

This software, designed to operate on almost anything, from a cell
phone to a tablet PC, has been around quite a while. I have known
people that owned it and loved it -- but I also know too many people
that started with it and dumped it. It's just futzy to use (a stylus,
again!), and (like the other tablet-based systems) it uses a blue-tooth
connection to both XM and GPS antennas. I personally know a guy who
has had many problems with this set up -- and if you ran it on a tablet
PC, we were right back to the hard-drive thing. And the PDA software
took over FOUR SECONDS to update, after making a menu selection -- so
we discarded them as an option, too.

This left only one player on the field: Garmin.

With great reluctance, we went to the Garmin booth. Mary and I have
been so spoiled by the AvMap and Lowrance color displays, that the
Garmin products simply look like toys by comparison. My two-year old
AvMap is literally THREE times the display size of the 496, and the
Lowrance 2000c is nearly twice the size. And both display in portrait
mode, as they should.

But, we wanted weather, so we had to go look, before we gave up
entirely.

Garmin had a 20-something year old pilot demonstrating the two units
side-by-side, and his enthusiasm was infectious. It was obvious that
he really loved the unit, and used it -- a lot. He gave a great demo
that completely changed our attitude toward the product.

The 496, as most now know, is Garmin's incremental improvement over
last year's 396. It is the same box, but with an enhanced processor
and greatly expanded database. Here's what it can do:

1. Aviation GPS. The Garmin menu system is extremely intuitive, and we
were able to figure it out without referring to the manual. The
refresh rate is very fast -- much faster than the 396 -- which means
you can actually use the "virtual instrument panel" to fly the plane.
In fact, when you raise the unit up over your head, the virtual "VSI"
actually registers the movement! (I played with this virtual panel on
the way home, with Mary flying, and can verify that it perfectly
mimicked every move of the aircraft.)

The map itself is quite clear, and easy to read. Unfortunately, it's
displayed on a dinky little screen, and it can't be displayed in
portrait mode, which severely limits its usability in the plane.

2. AOPA Directory. The 496 has the entire AOPA directory built in,
making finding restaurants, hotels, hours of operation, etc., a snap.
This will eliminate hauling around the AOPA directory, a
phonebook-sized paperback that always takes up too much room.

3. Airport Diagrams. You now have REAL airport diagrams, with labeled
taxiways and runways. Your little plane appears super-imposed on the
real deal, which will make taxiing around unfamiliar airports a snap.
No more "progressives"!

4. Automotive GPS. The 496 now comes with the full-blown automotive
GPS system, too. What's cool is you can select a restaurant from the
AOPA directory, above, select "Go-to", and get turn-by-turn driving
instructions to the food. Or the hotel. Or whatever.

5. XM Weather. This, of course, is the killer application we were
looking for. The 496 has "smoothed out" the pixelized presentation of
the 396, thanks to its faster processor and somewhat higher resolution.
As with the 396, it also displayed winds aloft (at all the various
altitudes), radar, satellite imagery, icing levels, TAFs, Metars, TFRs,
prog charts -- you name it, it's all there. This thing will literally
eliminate the need to call Flight Service, because you now have more
information than they do!

This ability to see and avoid weather is what we were looking for, and
the 496 gave us everything we were looking for, in an easy to use,
logical, menu-driven, non-Windows-based machine.

The 396 was temptingly priced $600 cheaper than the 496, but the
automotive database and better weather depiction made the decision for
us. (And, believe it or not -- Garmin has actually REMOVED THE STUPID
MAGNET from the 496's XM antenna! That alone is worth something...
:-)

Sadly, Garmin's control of the market meant that they were able to
dictate a hard-and-fast price of $2795 at OSH '06, no matter where you
shopped or what you offered. A buddy of mine who worked at one of the
avionics shops told me that Garmin would threaten his rights to sell
their products if he under-cut the competition -- so, in effect, there
wasn't any.

So, we simply bought it from the shop closest to our home, for ease of
support. Although I felt good about helping the smaller shop (The
Avionics Place, in Rockford, IL) over the giants (like Pacific Coast
Avionics), I really resented Garmin's interference with the free
market.

Because we almost always have two pilots on board, and because of the
superior displays of our AvMap or Airmap, we have decided to put the
496 on the CO-pilot's yoke. This enables the "2nd in command" to screw
around with the weather, thus keeping the pilot's eyes outside, where
they belong. And, because our other GPS's display their navigational
information on a larger screen and in a clearer fashion, leaving them
in front of the pilot's station made more sense -- simply because the
PIC can see, at a glance, more pertinent navigational information on
the larger displays.

Even though I'm not exactly ecstatic with our purchase, the damned
thing works great. Today, leaving OSH right after a major storm, we
departed into somewhat iffy VFR conditions. The 496 showed EXACTLY what
was happening, in virtual real-time, so we knew that the showers in the
area would diminish to nothing just a few miles southwest -- and
launching into ugly skies became an effortless, much more relaxing
experience.

Just like the display showed, the ceilings lifted and the skies grew
sunnier all the way home. Easily checking METARs and TAFs ahead --
again, in real time -- ensured that the situation wasn't changing for
the worse, and we enjoyed one of the most relaxing cross-country
flights ever -- thanks to XM weather.

The situational awareness that XM weather provides is simply
astounding. While Mary was flying home, I was able to check the
current weather conditions on the west coast, just to see if Jack and
Steve Allison were going to be able to make it home to California
today! It felt like science fiction, but I was able to do it with a
few button strokes, effortlessly.

It's a real shame that Lowrance and AvMap have dropped the ball with
weather. They would be absolutely cleaning Garmin's clock right now,
with their superior displays -- but apparently they lack the vision and
financial capability to pull it off.

It's an even bigger shame that the tablet PC-based weather software
companies have not filled the $2500 - $3000 price point that would make
them a VERY strong competitor for Garmin. If they had a slightly
smaller -- yet still larger than the 496 -- display in that price
range, sans hard drive, they would have been the "killer app" at OSH
'06.

With the 496 we've now got precisely the right application running on
an immensely inferior piece of hardware (our 2-year old AvMap's display
is STILL head-&-shoulders above the 496's) -- but right now it's the
best choice out there, and we've exponentially improved our situational
awareness and safety by purchasing it.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"