Oh, Ryan! I have been looking for something to replace FOC with recently - it's support is now non-existent and no more navdata updates. You've given me a glimour of hope! Cheers for the link - I didn't know anyone was planning a new one. It looks like it will be the only thing that will really match up to FOC (and no doubt better it).Cheers,Rudy

Hi,PFPX will be a flight planner no less no more. If you are looking at take off / landing loading sheets you will still need TOPCAT, if you need weather datas injected into MSFS you will still need ASE or REX or similar, if you need charts and moving maps you will need Aivlasoft EFB or FSC. What I am trying to say is that there is no software which will be an all in one solution. Having said that one must recognize that putting too many different functions under one hood rarely give the perfect tool you dream of. In my opinion the guys at TOPCAT are really good at what they are currently doing so are the guys at HIFI and Aivlasoft, so let them continue to be specialists in their own field rather than demanding a mix of expertize in one software. The important issue is that these above average softwares must interact with each other either directly or through MSFS.Cheers

Very interesting discussion. But isn't there ONE tool that covers the functions of both FSBuild and EFB? I'm lazy so I'm not much for googleing around for maps etc. Would like to have all info I need in one place, readily available.

No, there isn't.Guess you'll just have to stick with the "pre-googled" online chart links already provided for you.

Very interesting discussion. But isn't there ONE tool that covers the functions of both FSBuild and EFB? I'm lazy so I'm not much for googleing around for maps etc. Would like to have all info I need in one place, readily available.

The best you can get is to have all the charts through Aivlasoft and flightplans from route finder (or any other net source). For fuel calculation you can try one of the calculators in the AVSIM library.Don't know if it applies but if Aivlasoft EFB doesn't export flightplans is a pity, as this is a very useful tool. I only tried the evaluation period and am saving money for purchasing the full license so I cannot verify it right now...

I only tried the evaluation period and am saving money for purchasing the full license so I cannot verify it right now

The manual is downloadable and the forum can be joined without purchasing. Ask the questions and Urs or one of the team will answer. There is a version 2 in the offing hopefully in the not too distant future.

I'm in the market for a good flightplanning tool, maps/charts included.Platform will be NGX, route areas mostly US and Europe. Pricetag must be reasonable, but I'm not on a strict budget. iPad 2 - compatibility is a merit. (At this point I'm not considering expired Jeppessens Packs. Want something electronic.)Which would you prefer: the Aivlasoft Electronic Flight Bag (http://www.aivlasoft.../efb/index.html), or the FSBuild (http://www.fsbuild.com/)?Or something else alltogether?Thx for your advice!

Peter, I use FS Build or Vroute for flight planning. For my charts I download them from either Flightaware or EuroControl. Then I upload those charts to Box.net and access them with my Ipad. This is the best solution I could find as EFB only works with FSX and I use both FSX and FS9.

I see one objection in the description of this product if I read it correctly. The item I object to is real-world real-time weather. I prefer not use use system time but a time a set in a saved flight to load into FS because of time zone differences. Many of the European routes I use have departure times of six to eight hours ahead of my normal waking hours at my reidence here in the US. In order to get the correct weather effects due to solar influence I down load using Active Sky the current day archive for my FS time of departure.FS build, as described in another post, can do flight planning from the weather snapshot loaded into Active Sky notably winds aloft and surface METARS to aid in fuel planning and airport facility planning plus aircraft performance entries. Maybe there are some others.I get my airport diagrams from sites like Eurocontrol and Flightaware (FAA) and a few others.

EFB can be set to provide weather data from NOAA (among other web based sites) or to display from what is going on in FSX.

No, there isn't.Guess you'll just have to stick with the "pre-googled" online chart links already provided for you.

I swear by FSBuild. I've been using it for over 5 years and it still hasn't given me a route error or incorrect fuel loadout. A majority of the user interface is customizable too. You can create custom tabs on the side, and these tabs and have sub-tabs that link to various websites.For example: The program comes with it's own default tabs, Route, FlightPlans, OnlineATC, Aircraft, Options.The tabs you see after that (Web, Pre_Flight, Tools_Docs) are able to be edited, as well as child tabs that appear on the bottom. The Route page shows your current route after you've put it into the blue FLIGHT PLAN box on top and hit BUILD to generate all the waypoints. It displays the route both as a list with distances, headings, airway IDs, altitude, LAT, LONG, wind, etc etc etc and graphically on a map of the world that you can zoom in/out pan around.So a string you could put in the blue box could be KORD PLL PLL275065 FOD J94 BFF J157 MTU J148 DTA RUMPS OAL MOD3 KSFO.After putting in KORD the DEPARTURE box on top automatically fills in. The runway and SID can be selected but not necessary. You can even enter ORD5 in the blue box if you wanted to and FSBuild automatically puts all the waypoints associated with that SID in the flightplan.It's smart enough to know that after PLL you have to fly on a heading of 275 for 65nm, and a waypoint is placed on the map to show you the location. Airways like J94 automatically have all the waypoints within it generated since FSBuild can be updated with Navigraph's monthly AIRAC cycles.Say you don't have a route and you want FSBuild to build one for you. Just put in two airport pairs in the blue box, i.e. KORD KSFO and hit AUTO GENERATE. A route is automatically selected for you based on closest VORs, high altitude airways. But wind isn't factored in for fuel conservation.That's why I always get my routes from FlightAware and copy/paste them into the blue box.FSBuild can also download the daily NAT tracks and display them all on a map to show you at a glance the best way to cross the Atlantic. The blue box also accepts any LAT/LON waypoint, such as 54N50, 5570E etc. It also can hook into VATSIM and show you all the current controllers online with active centers highlighted on the graphical map display.You can also connect FSBuild with Active Sky to get winds aloft for enroute and descent planning. Visa versa you can export flightplans from FSBuild into Active Sky to get winds aloft data at various altitudes for each waypoint in your route.You can even export into the default FSX flightplanner if you want your route displayed on the default Garmin GPS too. You can create a performance profile for any aircraft in the world, provided you have the performance data from a website (Boeing/Airbus) or an addon developer's user manual.Most of the popular addon aircraft like LVLD, PMDG, Wilco already have performance profiles created for them. I expect the NGX will be no different. FSBuild allows you to export any flightplan you create to a number of addon aircraft as well, namely all the ones just mentioned plus more. So what I typically do is, I'll choose a departure and arrival airport. One of my custom tabs is labeled Pre_Flight which includes my virtual airline website, a scratchpad for notes (it's basically the default notepad), FlightAware.com, the NOAA ADDS website (Aviation Weather), Fltplan.com weather for specific locational RADAR loops, and TWC.com if I want sunrise/sunset info.I'll go to FlightAware.com within FSBuild (I never have to open another window when I plan flights...everything is customized so that FSBuild is a one stop for flight planning), get a flightplan for my city pair and just copy/paste it into the blue box. I add in the cruise alt, make sure the aircraft I want to export to is selected, and then click BUILD. The flightplan gets exported across my home network from my laptop to my desktop into my LVLD directory as a .rte route file, where I can then select it on the plane's FMC and activate it without inputting a single waypoint (I like this because it simulates an ACARS system which gives most real world commercial pilots company routes).FSBuild also exports flightplans to SquawkBox and FSINN so it's easy to just load them and send them to the server.After the flightplan generates in FSBuild, I can go to the NAVLOG page and see everything I ever wanted to know about my route: This shows you everything. Fuel for various stages of the flight, total time, total distance, zero fuel weight, cargo weight, destination airport elevation, and every waypoint with all sorts of data attached to each one.There's more to FSBuild, but I'll take up several pages talking about it all! Yeah I went a little overboard, but I'm used to writing technical manuals for various projects so this just comes naturally to me.Hope I shed some light on what FSBuild can actually do. I never fly without it.(and no I don't work for FSBuild...I just enjoy the program!)

The FSbuild interface looks like software from the early 90's.They could do with a few good software engineers.

The FSbuild interface looks like software from the early 90's.They could do with a few good software engineers.

Doesn't look like that on my computer Fred. Not sure why it does on his. Anyhow. Aivlasoft EFB is FREAKING AMAZING. It has a 30 day free trial. I'd definitely check it out. I use Air Display App on my ipad while im flying. Its actually like having a real EFB in front of you in an aircraft. EFB is obviously more complicated than FSBuild. But I can't even compare the two. I only use FSBuild for generating FSX .xml flightplans based on routes I generate using either vRoute or rfinder, so that ATC can follow my flight correctly. I use the Aiv. EFB for completely different purposes. Mostly flight path progress and general flight charts, but I suppose it does exactly what FSBuild can do as well. If you can get over the 80$ damage bill then go all over the EFB! As far as flight plans go. FSBuild is simpler to use. Oh and ref. one of the other posts made - iPads are the new charts of today's aviation http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_18743896

The only con i see with Aivlasoft is the the MDA/DH for all the charts are default to 200. 100, and 50 for CAT I, II, and III. The fact the EFB read the data from the AIRAC to build the chart, make it imposible to set the real world MDA/DH because that info doesn't come in the AIRAC

For charts: For Europe apply for the free registration at Eurocontrol: http://ead-website.e...ic/pu/login.jsp Once you get the temporary PW register with it and then change to something sane: Then after logging in Select Enter Applications and select IAP. You'll get an error messsage about no query. Select in the dropdown the authority such as UK (it will show EG in parentheses). Select Search. A list will come up based on alphabetical order of the ICAO description in the right column. I estimate in this case what page EGLL would start on and the go back or advance with the arrows in the page box. Here is the second page with EGLL. Save link as will not work. Click on the .pdf to the left of the description and it will open up in Adobe Reader. From there you can save it. Give the file name as something meaningful to you. There is an advanced search but I have not been successful yet with it. For FAA charts got to flightaware.com. Enter on the bottom left the ICAO and click Info. Click the IFR tab. I recommend downloading the full bundle and it will open up in Reader. Save it. If you want browse to and print the diagrams you want. Organize these files into folders by ICAO code. Either on a second monitor or using the I think .pdf utility that can show a .pdf in the kneeboard you can show what you need.

You're basically paying for charts.Why bother? There are many places online you can get free charts from, i.e. http://chartfinder.vatsim.net./ , http://www.airnav.com/ , http://skyvector.com/ , http://www.flightcen...et/Default.aspx.For international charts I always visit http://charts.vatsim.net/ which lists almost every country that offers free navigational charts.If you look in the right places you can find recent Jeppesen charts that aren't current but provide good references anyway. EFB might be streamlined and look pretty but it can't export flightplans into SB4, FSINN, addon aircraft, Active Sky, FSX, vasFMC, etc.I hate typing in waypoints and airways by hand.

Agreed... EFB is nice looking and i used it during the trial but after that I went back to airnav.com for my charts

I installed in demo mode EFB. Looks nice BUT ,,,,, when flying the plane symbol does not move in the moving nap unless I click the map with the mouse.

FS Commander shows the modement of the plane withput having to touch themap with the mouse

Am I missing a setting i  EFB?

 

 

I didn't see any export flightplan option in the features list.If it doesn't have that, no go for me.

 

That's also a no go item for me, its nice to simply load a company route and go.