LX S80 or ERA 80?

On Tuesday, November 28, 2017 at 11:42:32 AM UTC-7, Dirk_PW wrote:
I've had the S80 for 2 years now. The user interface can be customized to be as complicated or simple as you like. For me... I don't like the thermal helper, so I turned that page off. I don't like the airspace markings on the small moving map, so I turned them off. I don't use the task page, so I turned that page off. I didn't need all the fields on the vario page, so I turned some of them off. I love the flexibility it gives you since I like to keep things simple. Of course, this requires some investment up front to figure out what you want and configure the instrument accordingly. If folks complain that the instrument is 'too cluttered', they simply left everything 'enabled' and decided not to learn how to customize the instrument.

For me, the best feature of the S80 is the customer support from LXNav. In the past, I've made some complaints about certain features missing or minor bugs and LXNav has responded with software updates. Awesome!

I've had the S80 for 2 years also. I like it much much more than the 302 that I had before and I think it is the perfect vario for me, a fun-fly x/c pilot (without a clearnav, Ultimate, or LX90XX) that follows the good wx for distance. It's changed the way I use my navigation tools in the cockpit much to the better. It does require a lot of setup and experimentation up front, mostly because the manual is so bad (better for non-English users?). Most of the fields, options and parameters have only the most basic description, so if you don't know, you don't know, and have to experiment. That said, the basic features are straightforward and the vario was very useable on the first day. With the large S80 display, I use it for almost everything, speed to fly, waypoint selection, task, and thermal assist (the best I've seen imho). The biggest benefit is that I look in the cockpit much much less. Instead of tapping at my oudie, I much prefer hitting the buttons on the S80. It's much faster and the button gets the result I want, where a tap on the oudie in a bouncy cockpit might not. I know it's much faster to select the waypoint I want to go to. Nearest, spin the dial to the waypoint and push, done. I don't look at my Oudie much anymore, only for big picture things when I have the time, and that is the way I like it. Now I just need a stick controller...

I installed an S8 two years ago. At the smaller 57 mm size, the navigation screens aren't much help but I really like the 4 data options in each of the task and navigation screens.

I have linked the S8 to my Flarm and an Oudie 2. As opposed to a previous post, I use the Oudie 2 almost exclusively for navigation with the S8 as a backup (I think the Oudie 2 "programming on the fly" is much easier than the S8.)

I use the S8 primarily for vario functions and some Flarm display. (Flarm is also shown on the Oudie 2.)

I tried really hard to fit the S80 into my panel but just could not make it work.

As always, YMMV -

Lou