Wolfman

My condolences to his family. Makes me sad to hear this, but the good memories of him will stay. RIP

It's too early to make a statement here. The offset is very small, so it's within a deadzone you would set anyway. The stick is sensitive mind you. Saitek also offered a solution if the centering is really a issue (some registry stuff). The point I'd criticise is that there is no button or command to recenter the stick (even more needed for the mouse stick). Feels weird for a product like this or maybe I'm making too big an issue here :smartass:. Well it depends on the size of your hand. If you ain't got big hands you can't operate that hat with the hand remaining on the handrest anyway. You have to raise your hand a little to reach the hats (except the lower right one). If you do have big hands, then it is possible in the heat of battle... :joystick: One thing I forgot to mention. Keep the stick in front of you and at a distance. Otherwise the LEDs under the hat might disturb you. And one more thing. There is only one metal plate in the box to increase stability for the stick or the throttle. I'd say better use screws or screw clamps to fix both the stick and throttle on the table or your chair. And for people thinking they won't need rudders. Think again, I at least am not able to just apply rudder without disturbing the other axes. Cause unlike an old fashioned stick, you can't see if your still holding the x and y direction still. But that's me and people might say "practise young padawan". Cheers

Hi, I own a Saitek X65F for a day now and used it for 2 hours. Tried it with Falcon4. So there are a little more issues that I'm not too happy about. But more on that later. The stick, stick base, trigger, throttle and throttle base are all solid metal. I wouldn't use it as a hammer though, too little weight on the head and it handles weird for that purpose ;). Everything else is plastic (including the bottom of the stick- and throttle bases). You can't operate the stick alone, you have to connect it to the throttle. The throttle has a USB cable (length 2m) and the cable to the stick (PS2 type, length 1,75m) attached. There is another cable for the displays and switchboxes, also of type PS2. So all cables are non removable attached to the throttle. Everything you can push gives an audible and tactile feedback. There isn't much force needed to push. The hats offer almost no resistance in moving them. In my opinion that stands in stark contrast to the rest of the setup, because it gives you a feeling of holding a very cheap piece of hardware. As an example, the mouse cursor is pushable, but you can't really push without moving the mouse it's so easygoing Overall impression: I like the force sensing, but they have to work on the centering issue (it's a little bit offset) The stick is good, the throttle not. The movement of the throttle offers too much resistance, the hats and buttons are not ergonomically placed, the mechanism to hold the two throttle levers together can't hold them together without play. And coming back to what I mentioned at the start of the post, I miss a rocker switch like on the TM HOTAS Cougar. But that is a special for the F-16. But why make a force sensing stick, which is only used in a F-16 AFAIK and not have a replica of the real F-16 HOTAS setup? Licensing I guess... [edit] I saw also a little spiking of the throttle and rotaries in the Falcon4 setup screen, but not in the Saitek Test Center SW. [/edit] The hats are exchangeable on the stick. To sum it up: too expensive right now Cheers Wolfman

Well I'm currently working on MFD displays for my F-16 Pit. Same problem here. I plan to have a double usage on a row of buttons (which leaves the need for one switching button, on the MFD the contrast switch offers itself). Normal Mode> ABRIS buttons (or MFD Buttons 1 to 5 in my case) Display Mode> Display buttons You will still need a multiplexer or switch IC to switch between modes. A CMOS 4016 IC might be the right thing. Keep up the great work!

Thank you very much, that'll keep me busy for a while... :book: Check six Wolfman

Hi folks, last weekend I met Matthias of the DCS team at LLTM and we talked a little, about how little people know about real life helicopter operating procedures, training and stuff. He told me he read some books of apache pilots and I was wondering why nobody has posted up some literature covering this topic. This would give people more hindsight to what is actually required to fly an combat helicopter. So please post links of pdfs or titles of good combat helicopter avation literature here. ps: thanks to matthias for the talk and attending LLTM '09 :thumbup: pps: I know people like to :joystick: instead of :book:, but I guess there are others that feel there's a lack of pilot stories, too.:pilotfly: Wolfman

dynamic campaign I think what most people like to see, is that destroyed units (buildings, bridges,..) stay destroyed in the next mission, regardless if you advance or didn't fulfil your objectives. Next thing is that (unlike gunship 2000 afair) units on the battlefield follow their own mission. Moving to strategic points, fighting the enemy, etc. The F4 campaign additionally offers a time line, which enables units reemerging (being produced in war factories) and destroyed runways to be repaired. I'd say DCS with the ability to "remember" for the next mission what is destroyed and what units are in what area should be sufficient. What F4 did to create the immersion of being on a battlefield is radio chatter of events that actually take place of other flights. I don't know if russion KA-50 pilots do actually chat alot over the radio. That would be the task of the manual to explain to the player. Looking at red flag videos on video.google.com there is also the saying that russion pilots are told what they should do. is there a Forward Air Controller doing that job, changing mission objectives during a mission? I hope DCS sets the priorities right and first makes sure the Ground AI acts convincingly (dispersion). Cheers Wolfman

paypal request Hi there, I also only have the option to pay per paypal. no credit card and no, the suggestion to ask someone with a cc is no option. So please add paypal to the existing payment options. Thanks Cheers Wolfman [update] uh, just read on a different post that paypal is somewhat "uncooperative" when transferring customers money to russian companies. so I guess paypal won't appear on the list in my lifetime...