LX S80 or ERA 80?
I flew the ERA this season.
My reason for choosing the ERA over the S80/S100 was mainly the user interface. I find that LX Navigation have come to be visually appealing as well as very easy to read/interpret since last year’s UI facelift. The airspace visualization is kept nice and simple – perfect as backup navigation without cluttering the small screen too much. The manipulating the UI is intuitive and screen brightness is great.
The Hardware allows for a very clean and simple installation. All interfaces come with their own socket and a nice little terminal adapter is included for easy hooking up of input signals (gear, flaps, cruise/climb switch). The GPS Antenna is a miniature version.
This year the ERA was still on beta software with new features and bugfixes coming with several software updates throughout the year. I believe that all advertised features are available by now.
The S80/S100 series devices are sure to have the more mature and robust software after being on the market for a couple of years. The ERA has turned out to have the edge in many details and will be a serious contender as soon as it reaches maturity. Especially when it comes to the interface design the ERA is nice and clean whereas the S80 tends to be more cluttered.
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