PMS GTN 750 Premium worth it?

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

7 hours ago, divinglyc said:

1.Does TDS have a touch screen in the VC?? If so, why do I read some comment saying that they have to struggle to handle the TDS unit?

2.Because the Navdata of TDS is not up-to-date, would there be some trouble while importing flight plan from SImbrief or LittleNavMap?

Re 1.  I believe that the users that are having problems have moved the GTN to a separate screen.  In the VC, it works like the actual unit, including rubber banding the flightplan on the map.

Re 2.  I import flightplans from LittleNavMap all the time, without problems.

If you are used to the real unit, either from your airplane, or from having used the Flight1 or RXP units in P3D, the TDS unit will feel very familiar.

[divinglyc 3]

2 hours ago, FPStewy said:

The problem with TDS is that it's about 6-9 months back in cycles and you need to somewhat "constantly" upgrade it and you simply don't know what is and what is not in sync.

Thanks a lot for your detail sharing! What do you mean you need to constantly upgrade the TDS? Can you manually upgrade the Navdata by yourself? As far as I know, we cannot change the Navdata by ourselves?

[divinglyc 3]

45 minutes ago, Bert Pieke said:

Re 2.  I import flightplans from LittleNavMap all the time, without problems.

Thanks... but I know its Navdata is not the latest one, so what if the LNM or Simbrief uses some waypoint that TDS doesn't have.. what would happen when importing it into the TDS?

Do we have to manually add or edit the waypoint in TDS?

 

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

3 hours ago, divinglyc said:

Thanks... but I know its Navdata is not the latest one, so what if the LNM or Simbrief uses some waypoint that TDS doesn't have.. what would happen when importing it into the TDS?

Do we have to manually add or edit the waypoint in TDS?

 

Possibly..  it depends on how you do your flight planning.

If you create complex plans in Simbrief and expect them to show up perfectly in the GTN, I can see the possibility of missing waypoints.. that would be true even with the latest Garmin navdata.

If on the other hand you want to use the dynamic flight plan management capabilities of the actual GTN, you do need the TDS unit.

Edited November 4, 2022 by Bert Pieke

[divinglyc 3]

4 hours ago, Bert Pieke said:

If on the other hand you want to use the dynamic flight plan management capabilities of the actual GTN, you do need the TDS unit.

When you say dynamic flight plan management do you mean that you edit your plan on the TDS screen (eg. just pick an appropriate "point" along the route) and not by LNM or Simbrief?

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

1 hour ago, divinglyc said:

When you say dynamic flight plan management do you mean that you edit your plan on the TDS screen (eg. just pick an appropriate "point" along the route) and not by LNM or Simbrief?

I use LNM for the initial flightplan, but sometimes make edits enoute.

[VBHB 298]

It's defiently worth it. I love using it in the Black Square King Air. I paid for the year.

[FPStewy 538]

14 hours ago, divinglyc said:

What do you mean you need to constantly upgrade the TDS? Can you manually upgrade the Navdata by yourself? As far as I know, we cannot change the Navdata by ourselves?

I don't use the TDS but if it's like the RXP then they use the Garmin Trainer data that Garmin updates every few months, I don't know the schedule of the release but then TDS has to update their GTN and then you have to update the TDS. The difference is small but TDS will never be in sync with MSFS.

With the PMS50 I don't need to rely on them, whatever is in MSFS is in the GTN. If a Navigraph airac cycle comes out tomorrow, it means that tomorrow MSFS, LNM, Simbrief, pms50 GTN will all be sync'd to the latest cycle, end of story.

Like I said, TDS or RXP are not bad products, but I spent 10 years in P3D always trying to sync the P3D Data, with the RXP-GTN with LNM and Navigraph and it was a nightmare. Those days are gone.

[FPStewy 538]

14 hours ago, Bert Pieke said:

If on the other hand you want to use the dynamic flight plan management capabilities of the actual GTN, you do need the TDS unit.

Can you elaborate on this, are you saying that you can't change the flight plan in the PMS ?

[Bobsk8 12,702]

18 minutes ago, FPStewy said:

I don't use the TDS but if it's like the RXP then they use the Garmin Trainer data that Garmin updates every few months, I don't know the schedule of the release but then TDS has to update their GTN and then you have to update the TDS. The difference is small but TDS will never be in sync with MSFS.

With the PMS50 I don't need to rely on them, whatever is in MSFS is in the GTN. If a Navigraph airac cycle comes out tomorrow, it means that tomorrow MSFS, LNM, Simbrief, pms50 GTN will all be sync'd to the latest cycle, end of story.

Like I said, TDS or RXP are not bad products, but I spent 10 years in P3D always trying to sync the P3D Data, with the RXP-GTN with LNM and Navigraph and it was a nightmare. Those days are gone.

If I remember from P3D,  the Garmin Trainer data was updated every 6 months or more, and sometimes it didn't include small airports. It was a major PIA to use, and that is why I went with the PMS GTN 750. 

 

[fppilot 4,368]

1 hour ago, Bobsk8 said:

If I remember from P3D,  the Garmin Trainer data was updated every 6 months or more, and sometimes it didn't include small airports. It was a major PIA to use, and that is why I went with the PMS GTN 750. 

 

Are you perhaps referring to the GNS series?  Up until 2016 both the GNS and GTN gauges shared the same NAV database.  In 2016, with the significant additon of very many new GPS/RNAV approaches, the Garmin Worldwide database grew too large for the GNS memory (real life GNS).  A new NAV database format was created by Garmin for the GTN series, which has adequate memory.  The legacy database format was retained for GNS, but that required different database versions; a dummed down Worldwide version (absent smaller airports), and still robust regional NAV databases that still included smaller airports.  I moved from use of the Worldwide database to the regional database for North America (and the Caribbean). It had all of the airports and procedures for that region, as I believe was the case with other world regions. What was confusing for the sim based gauges is that you needed to rename the regional versions to "worldwide.bin" and position them as the database in use.

I do not recall that happening with the GTN series.  Database updates for the Reality XP GTN's came annually (usually) with Garmin updates to its GTN Trainer.  Just took a day or two for Jean Luc to update the RXP versions to embrace the new Garmin trainers as those GTN Trainer updates involved more than just updated databases.  From year-to-year between updates I never experienced an issue such as a missing procedure.  What I observed is that say a SID or STAR sequenced its number, so CHIKN5 became CHIKN6.  No big deal.

Edited November 4, 2022 by fppilot

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

2 hours ago, Bobsk8 said:

If I remember from P3D,  the Garmin Trainer data was updated every 6 months or more, and sometimes it didn't include small airports. It was a major PIA to use, and that is why I went with the PMS GTN 750. 

 

You are mixing up the GNS530 and the GTN750..

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

3 hours ago, FPStewy said:

Can you elaborate on this, are you saying that you can't change the flight plan in the PMS ?

No, not at all.

But last time I used the PMS unit, I could not do things I am used to doing, like clicking on an airport on the map and pushing DTO and Activate to create a magenta line to that airport, or rubber banding a leg in the flight plan around an elevation obstacle.

If consistent navdata across MSFS and the GTN is important to you, I can see that might be a trade off you are willing to make.. 😉

Edited November 4, 2022 by Bert Pieke

[FPStewy 538]

3 hours ago, fppilot said:

Database updates for the Reality XP GTN's came annually (usually) with Garmin updates to its GTN Trainer.  Just took a day or two for Jean Luc to update the RXP versions to embrace the new Garmin trainers as those GTN Trainer updates involved more than just updated databases.

But that's what we're saying, if it was only updated annually then that would put the cycles a 6 months to a year behind. Even if RXP and F1 took a day or so to update the GTN's trainers were still between 6 and 9 months behind in cycles. Same thing is happening with TDS.

2 hours ago, Bert Pieke said:

But last time I used the PMS unit, I could not do things I am used to doing, like clicking on an airport on the map and pushing DTO and Activate to create a magenta line to that airport

I just tested it and the DTO does work either from inside the map or the button. The thing is doesn't do is show you navaid waypoints but will show VOR, NDB's. But let's say I have a flight plan from CYLS to CNA3 and click on the YMS vor and goto my flight plan and click on the insert after the YMS vor will be highlighted, you can insert waypoints if you know what they are, it just doesn't show you and/or you can't just edit the flight plan from the map like I use to with the RXP.

[fppilot 4,368]

7 hours ago, fppilot said:

From year-to-year between updates I never experienced an issue such as a missing procedure

 

3 hours ago, FPStewy said:

But that's what we're saying, if it was only updated annually then that would put the cycles a 6 months to a year behind. Even if RXP and F1 took a day or so to update the GTN's trainers were still between 6 and 9 months behind in cycles. Same thing is happening with TDS.

Again. Annual updates never caused any issue for me at any airport I flew to.  Procedures do not change often, and most commonly the change is a sequence number, not a change in the procedure itself.  To me personally it is a much about nothing matter.  Perhaps betweeen 2012 and 2017 or so it would have been an issue as airports were adding RNAV/GPS approach procedures by the 100's.  I have not found a new one in perhaps three years now.  I have ridden along in the right seat in a GTN 750 equipped Baron and to have in the simulator a trainer based GTN that best mirrors the actual GTN capabilities is of considerably more value to me.

Don't get me wrong here.  90 of my last logged MSFS hours have been in the Hjet with Hjet-developer enhanced G3000 and Navigraph data.  The other 10 hours in a Milviz 310R with TDS GTN 750.  I have a habit of checking dates on procedures I am to use and I have so far found none for my planned flights that were out of date with the TDS GTN.