Has anyone tried this?

http://www.aero-news.net/index.cfm?Cont ... 8d3e70009&

Not yet but as soon as I get home tonight I figure 10 bucks is inconsequential to see if it works. The second version of the reader has a pretty good screen, only thing I am worried about is use at night. I will post a report if Gustav does not interfere.

RAS

Richard,

I look forward to hearing your report.

I want to transition to an entire paperless cockpit eventually, but I just haven't felt comfortable with the selection and reliability yet. These baby-steps might be what I need.

Stay safe.

Me too!

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AARGHH.

AARGHH.

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Mike,

Thanks for taking the time to do all this research. I'm getting really interested in this project.

I've had a lot of interest in electronic plates for a long time and have resisted spending two or three thousand dollars to have them. Even though I live in an area that gets a lot of fog, clouds and rain, and I fly a couple of hundred hours a year, I still don't make more than a dozen approaches to airports out of my area during that time. I keep local states' approach plates current and download/buy the others on an as needed basis. To have all of them in such a compact package will be a really great thing. To have them at a reasonable price is an extra bonus.

Keep us up to date on the project and post the source for the charts/plates as well, please.

Great job!

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Mike!

OMG man, you did an awesome job with this!

You are REALLY tempting me to go and get on of these gizmos.

I wonder is Sony has a larger screen model waiting in the wings?

Amazing PIREP, Mike!

I think personally I'll have to wait for a better solution though... no backlight and no zoom are kinda big deals for me. I think I'd even go the CSOB tablet PC route if I could find a place to get low enroute IFR charts as well as the plates.

Great job. I appreciate you doing all this work. Is there a kind of "lock" button, meaning if you brush the wrong button once you have your IAP on the screen and you're at the middle marker, can you get screwed up and have to start finding the thing from the top? Or once you get can you lock it down? Thanks

Mike,

Nice job, I do not have to post up the pics I took!

First, if you want to go this route make sure you get the newer version of the reader - the screen is substantially better. The original is part number PRS-500, the newer version is PRS-505. Makes a big difference. There may be other digits in the part number that id case color but the "505" is what matters. Sears carries the reader and has a 30 day return no questions asked policy also.

On review_ Mike's pics do lay out the device and images well. Wish a zoom worked but no zoom. Zoom-like function is obtained by rotating 90 degrees which displays half the plate - effectively about a 50% zoom.

Indexing of the plates by state and airport works well, nice to have every plate for every airport in a package this small. I think the process of selecting the necessary plate and getting it displayed is no less nor more cumbersome than using the books - with the advantage that if you drop either the Sony reader will be right where you left it when you pick it up - no more worrying about clips coming off the book! OTOH, while battery life is excellent, any electric device can suffer from smoke release at any time - I am thinking about how to have a backup.

I have not been up at night so I tried to simulate in a dark room with a red flashlight - not too good to my 50 year old need reading glasses eyes. I am also going to try the blue-green light I have, just too busy now with Gustav prep. Sony also makes a small clip on light that flips over to cover the entire screen and project light down onto the screen - it is designed for reading at night so I may try one out. Can be seen at http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/sto ... 1665480080

The unit can pop right out of the cover - may very well just put a square of velcro on the back and mount it that way to the yoke or a knee board.

Outdoors in sunlight the thing is great - really sharp images, I was surprised that reading the small type on the plate was so easy, even with sunglasses on. I have sunglasses that have built in reading lenses in the bottom 1/3 - plate is completely useable with them. Anyone that does not need reading glasses would find this thing very useable I think - my 14 year old daughter says it looks very good to her, she has good young eyes tho!

The data only permits download of the entire US - about 1.2GB. The download takes about 45 minutes over a very fast connection - I have a high speed cable to my house. Over a dial-up this is not a useful system - the file is simply too big. Even over slower DSL this might be an issue. There is no warning or notice that the file is that big, so buyer beware depending on the speed of the connection. Mike may not have noticed but the process of buying the plates subscribes you to their system at $9.99/month - you have to unsubscribe if you do not like. Again, just a buyer beware. Another issue to note - I had to have the reader itself connected to a computer to download the plates. This may have been a simple fact of the first time use of a new memory card but I am not sure that you can download directly to a memory card - it may have to download through the reader unit (maybe copy protection?)

Overall a nice solution to a problem, not as good as books in some ways, better than most other electronic solutions since the reader is so simple and does not depend on hard drives, MS software or having a big battery. I have used plates on a tablet PC in flight (specifically a Samsung Q1 and a Fujitsu 1610) and I like this better even though the screen is not as large. If I can solve the night use issues this looks like a winner.

RAS