FltPlan Go .. ing.. Going... iFLY!!

MuseChaser

MuseChaser

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Feb 23, 2019
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MuseChaser
Just a quick-ish PIREP ...

Been flying with FltPlan GO on Android and a Stratux for a year or so. Loved the price, and always worked well. Only complaint was the ongoing, longterm yet never fulfilled promise to incorporate AHRS on Android (only available on the iDevice version). Got sick of waiting so I downloaded iFly two days ago and am using the 30-day trial period to get acquainted with it.

Holy Toledo. I had no idea. SOOoo much easier to use, faster to get to the information you want, and the AHRS/synthetic vision is beautiful. The screen did look a bit more cluttered to me at first, and at least on my tablet the scrolling, zooming, and some of the redraws aren't QUITE as fast or smooth as w/ FltPlan Go, but the onscreen instruments are infinitely more customizable (and therefore more usable), the data download procedure is easier (although neither is bad at all), but in pretty much every area it's not even a close competition. This is coming from someone who was perfectly happy with FltPlan GO... and I'd have no problem continuing to fly with it. iFly, at least after two days of minimal experience and poking around w/ the manual, is orders of magnitude better.. runway information w/ winds, recommendations for nearest emergency airports based upon airplane performance, ease of creating flight plans with winds incorporated... it'd take forever to list all the pluses. Not saying, necessarily, that FltPlan Go can't do some or most of these things... but not near as easily, intuitively, or quickly.

Looks like I'm going to be out $139 soon. If you're an Androider and/or are using Avare or FPG, but would consider a paid product, maybe check out iFly. Not connected with the company in anyway; just messed around with it only to see if I was missing anything by not having AHRS support, and discovered that I was missing much more than just that.
 
It's a great app, plus I haven't seen a company who's more responsive to user input...good stuff.
 
iFLY, if you're listening, I would consider your product if you offered a "lifetime" option.
 
Thanks....Just getting ready to start cross country work. I was planning on using avare, but the flight planning piece isn't great, so I'm back to looking. The aopa website has one that works really well and can upload to several of the efb's, but not avare. I'd like to find one app that does flight planning with accurate fuel & time to climb/ descend calculations, ahrs, winds, and taxi diagrams, and works with stratux. So basically foreflight on android.
 
iFly is about as solid a performer as one can find out there. If you are interested in multiple operating systems, nothing else comes close. Not perfect, but what is?
 
I've been a highly satisfied iFly user since their original iFly700 device, before tablet devices were a thing. Love the software, and their engagement with users.
 
Jim K said:
Thanks....Just getting ready to start cross country work. I was planning on using avare, but the flight planning piece isn't great, so I'm back to looking. The aopa website has one that works really well and can upload to several of the efb's, but not avare. I'd like to find one app that does flight planning with accurate fuel & time to climb/ descend calculations, ahrs, winds, and taxi diagrams, and works with stratux. So basically foreflight on android.
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If I am reading this correctly you are beginning the cross country work for your private? If this is the case, I would strongly recommend that you do all of it the old fashion way with E6B, plotter and paper charts. This will not only give you a good understanding of what is going on with the planning the EFB is doing, but will give you an introduction to the world of navigating and flight without GPS. In the event of equipment malfunction or satellite blackout, you will be better prepared to use the backup tools. Then after the private, go on and get deeper into the EFB.

Don’t believe that the satellites can’t black out or that you can’t have equipment failure.

My $0.02,
 
MBDiagMan said:
If I am reading this correctly you are beginning the cross country work for your private? If this is the case, I would strongly recommend that you do all of it the old fashion way with E6B, plotter and paper charts. This will not only give you a good understanding of what is going on with the planning the EFB is doing, but will give you an introduction to the world of navigating and flight without GPS. In the event of equipment malfunction or satellite blackout, you will be better prepared to use the backup tools. Then after the private, go on and get deeper into the EFB.

Don’t believe that the satellites can’t black out or that you can’t have equipment failure.

My $0.02,
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I wholeheartedly agree. I figured that since I had a hand drawn, calculated, & written flight plan, it would be a good time to experiment with plugging those waypoints into an efb. By doing this I learned that avare doesn't have a way to account for climb and descent time and fuel burn. I would like to find a good one though, so I can train both methods.
 
I used IFly on Android very happily for several years, but reluctantly gave it up for Garmin Pilot when we installed the Garmin 345 w/ADSB. Through no fault of IFly, you can't pick up Garmin ADSB traffic on IFly. So we went with the monopolists...
 
AlleyCat67 said:
I used IFly on Android very happily for several years, but reluctantly gave it up for Garmin Pilot when we installed the Garmin 345 w/ADSB. Through no fault of IFly, you can't pick up Garmin ADSB traffic on IFly. So we went with the monopolists...
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Ha... We wanted to replace the Garmin 496 in our plane with something more modern, bigger screen, etc. I like the Aera 660, but... nope. Since we recently installed a uAvionix EchoUAT for ADS-B, it neatly eliminated ALL Garmin GPS products from consideration. Since we want the GPS to drive the Dynon D-180 for winds and autopilot, it narrowed the field down to... an iFly 740b. Just un-boxed it today.
 
Just a quick followup.... flew two short cross country flights with iFly on a Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 (7") yesterday, paired to a GPS/AHRS-equipped Stratux. Just astonishingly useful and easy-to-use tech for the price, and so much more (or at least more easily) to offer than FltPlan Go. I had forgotten I had set a 30-minute reminder timer to switch tanks while messing with the app when I first installed it. It automatically started itself upon takeoff, reminded to switch tanks... reminded me when to start my descent automatically, annunciators for traffic, soooooooo much easier to call up weather and airport info, distance rings/predicted course arrows, flight plan, the EFIS works great (traffic shows exactly where you'd see it in 3D.. didn't expect that!)... just blown away. Have no idea how it compares to ForeFlight... not an Apple guy.. but compared to FPG or Avare, this is a QUANTUM leap forward. And.. I liked (and still like) FPG. However, since this hugely increased level of utility is this easily accessible, and I'm sure there's still other layers I've yet to discover, I'll definitely be subscribing to iFly near the expiration of my trial period.

This was really the first time I had to use it much in flight. I had it fired up for some pattern work twice before, but didn't use it much due to the workload and lack of necessity. Did have one fun thing happen the first time, though... as I was flying, the artificial horizon annunciator went crazy.. I could hear the warning signal even with my headphones on, and the screen flashed... saying I was in a dangerous attitude. I wasn't... totally VFR here and eyes outside... turns out my suction cup mount had fallen off the back window and the Stratus was lying on its side on the back seat. Still gave me a little brief excited feeling there for a sec.. ;)
 
I tried ifly, avare, fltpln go, droid efb, and foreflight. Garmin pilot won't play with stratux, so it's out. Of all of the, I like ifly the best. Much easier to do flight plans, and the basic subscription has vertical planning, altitude/ wind optimization, and time/ fuel calibrated to your airplane, including climb & descent. Foreflight definitely has more features, but you have to subscribe to the premium level to get those three. I also find foreflight harder to use, but I get the impression it's written to appeal more to those used to apple.

I will definitely revisit foreflight if/ when I go for an instrument rating, but for now ifly is my choice. Foreflight and ifly were definitely the most usable, nothing else is even close.
 
Jim K said:
I tried ifly, avare, fltpln go, droid efb, and foreflight. Garmin pilot won't play with stratux, so it's out. Of all of the, I like ifly the best. Much easier to do flight plans, and the basic subscription has vertical planning, altitude/ wind optimization, and time/ fuel calibrated to your airplane, including climb & descent. Foreflight definitely has more features, but you have to subscribe to the premium level to get those three. I also find foreflight harder to use, but I get the impression it's written to appeal more to those used to apple.

I will definitely revisit foreflight if/ when I go for an instrument rating, but for now ifly is my choice. Foreflight and ifly were definitely the most usable, nothing else is even close.
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You might discover you won't switch to ForeFlight for the instrument rating. iFly is my primary backup - and I pay more for it than I do for ForeFlight - precisely because of its IFR capability. Not only does it load in approaches and give the choice of plates over maps, but it will even prompt approach altitudes (something Foreflight doesn't do). When ForeFlight fails, there is no EFB I'd rather have be there (BTDT). I even thought about switching but I will likely stick with ForeFlight as my primary so long as I fly IFR - 80% of the reason is 8 years familiarity, with the other 20% compatibility with the GTX and FlightStream in most of the airplanes I fly.
 
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