AVSIM Commercial Hardware Review GF-45 "Buzzbox" AVIONICS

Eureka!

For a long time now I have been looking for something that will convey the radio stacks that appear in real aircraft to an external unit that allows interaction without the use of the mouse or key presses. Yes, I know there are various facilities out there, but for one reason or another I have chosen against them for a multitude of reasons. Not so long back I saw on the home page of AVSIM these new devices called "The GF-45". Like most of you, curiosity got the better of me and I went to take a look. The link took me to the homepage of Goflightinc.com. On reading through the pages on the site; this looked just the deal that I was looking for. Having recently attended the Flight Simulator exhibition at Birmingham, I was lucky enough to meet with Doyle Nickless who is one of the masterminds behind this product. Supporting Doyle was Robert Orchard from Dragonfly Interactive, who is the distribution agent for European sales.

Doyle and Robert at the Birmingham show

I spent a great deal of time with Doyle who had flown in from the States for the show and to promote his new product. He demonstrated to me first hand the versatility of the units, the configurations that it can be set-up for and some of the ideas he has for future development. I was sold within about 10 minutes, and about 30 minutes later my wallet was significantly lighter! So, without further ado, lets get down and see what there really about.

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History

Most seasoned simmers will no doubt have heard of the ThrustMaster line of products that catered for us flight simmers back in the early days of flight simulators. Doyle used to work for Thrustmaster and was involved with many of the creations that adorned the shelves of computer stores throughout the world. He started at ThrustMaster in 1995 and eventually became manager of the software engineering group, helping transition the company's software to Windows support for all new TM products. He was responsible for developing the firmware and completing the driver for ThrustMaster's first USB joystick, working closely with engineers from Intel and Microsoft

Along with one of the founders of the Thrustmaster range of products, Frank Bouton, the two of them created, and are now co-owners of GoFlight who bring to us the GF-45. Frank was the inventor of the WCS I (TM folks called it the "Weapons 1") which was the first flight sim peripheral to use keyboard emulation to enhance the flying experience. Frank also invented the analog point-of-view "hat" that is on the FCS (Flight Control System—first Thrustmaster joystick), and invented the method for downloading key code data from the PC to a keyboard-connected device using the keyboard port.

Now, correct me if I am wrong here, but with the background of these two guys, hasn't this has got to be a recipe for an ideal partnership? The concept for the GF-45 came from an idea that was devised by Doyle and shown to Frank late in 1999. The original idea was to build individual units for COM, NAV, ADF etc, but after consultation with Buzz Hoffman (yet another ThrustMaster founder and real F-16 pilot) he suggested that a "universal" box would be better as opposed to unique individual boxes. Sadly Buzz passed away last year, and in his honor Doyle and Frank "code-named" the GF-45 the "Buzzbox".

So what have we got?

The GF-45 unit in Comm1 mode

The GF-45 is, as you can see, a graphic display that imitates various avionics on the panel of an aircraft. It is of a sturdy metal design and has an easy to read alphanumeric display. Two dials on the front of the box change the various displays and frequencies. With multiple units, they can be positioned in various configurations of your choice. Side by side, stacked, on top of your monitor... the choice is endless.

From beginning to end of the flight, making the necessary changes to frequencies and headings is made easy with the GF-45s. For the duration of the flight, it made for a much more realistic feel to flying. With the versatility of the units and the configurations allowable, you can change them with ease for the nature of your flying. Since the addition of the autopilot feature, it's pretty much hands off flying.

Conclusion

My initial reaction to the GF-45 was much the same as the comments I heard from many different people. "Boy, are they expensive" (nothing comes cheap in this world I'm afraid). After talking with Doyle for a great length of time and seeing first hand the features that are available, I could see the reason behind the price.

After looking seriously for a while now for something to fulfil this role, the GF-45 is for me the best option by far. They give all the necessary functions that you would find in a radio stack. They are easy to set-up; being of USB architecture there is no complicated software to contend with, and dials are easy to manipulate.

The team at Goflightinc are looking to consistently update and improve the features for the units. The design that has been used makes it versatile for future enhancements.

I have given this GF-45 a 4½ rating. It is an incredible product and brings the "As real as it gets" feeling that one step closer. The price of each unit makes it an expensive add-on. This unfortunately is not going to be within the price range of a lot of flight simulator enthusiast.

GoFlight is currently running a competition to win a GF-45 unit, check out the GoFlight site and see if you strike it lucky.

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