REFLECTOR: Blue Mountain EIFS

Sun Apr 22 23:09:32 CDT 2007

Alex,

I too have a BMA Efis One gold box and an Efis Lite G3.  I am not flying yet
so I can't tell you how well they actually work yet but so far all the
testing I have done looks good.

I agree with Richard's opinion of how he was sold on the upgradeability of
these units.  The same things were told to me too.  The difference with me
was my expectations.  I took a very close look at the Efis One and pressed
Greg on a few occasions to see how he felt about the upgradeability of these
units.  When asked directly, he could never guarantee that the units would
be able to do all the weather, traffic and map scaling.  I had my doubts too
but I purchased the units anyway.  At the time (Oshkosh 2005) they were
still, by far the best units available and I do not regret my decision.
Yea, I'm bummed out that I will never see traffic and weather on this screen
but I kind of knew it may come to this.  I'll have to look into those $200
units the get what I ultimately want.

One thing all of us who lust after glass panels are going to have to get use
to is how quickly this equipment is going to be obsolete.  It's not just BMA
who has these issues.  All the manufacturers are in the same boat.  Even
Garmin.  Just watch.  In 5 years the +$80,000 G1000 will be replaced by
something that will makes it look like an Atari 2600.  The Garmin 396 wasn't
even out for 1 full year when they announced the 496.  Anyone who bought the
396 can't be too happy about that deal.

There is nothing you can do about it.  It's the nature of the business.

Darrell

-----Original Message-----
From: reflector-bounces at tvbf.org [mailto:reflector-bounces at tvbf.org] On
Behalf Of Alex
Sent: Sunday, April 22, 2007 9:46 PM
To: 'Velocity Aircraft Owners and Builders list'
Subject: Re: REFLECTOR: Blue Mountain EIFS

Well- no effect for those who have not received theirs yet/ or have the G4
unit- so all is well for you guys- my main problem was that the big sell (
and I want everyone to tell me if I am wrong about this) is that their unit
would be software upgradeable to keep it fairly current- the only upgrades I
have heard anyone getting from Blue Mountain have been related to map
currency or problem fixes. - they claimed when I ordered and paid for mine
that it would eventually  display WX-500 data, and current weather,  and in
the future, and that they were working out how to display traffic. I
received mine in Feb of 2006- not too long ago- it is the older style with
the separate gold box- new units have everything built into the display
unit- I was watching Greg do his schpeal and noticed that the new units have
a USB port on the front- so I just asked how exactly I get my updates via
the internet so get current with the software- he determined that I have a
G2 unit (not sure what happened to G3) and that the technology in that box
is 10 years old, and NOT Upgradeable, in fact, I found out that the
manufacturer of the board is no longer in business, so I am not sure how
long they will be able to support it if there is a physical problem. I did
find out that I can get a basic terrain view, but it is on only a single
pre-set scale- I was a bit shocked about this since I have flown with a $200
PDA that had fully scaleable mapping, in fact it would auto-zoom when you
reached your destination so you can see where you are in the airport
environment. Greg just said repeatedly " it does exactly what it did when
you bought it" and it isn't his fault that the features like WX-500 display
(dropped apparently due to lack of interest) and weather depiction are never
going to be available on a "gold box" unit, nor is map scaling.  
The second day, I went to visit with them after sleeping on this, and spoke
with Larry and Sheila about this situation, since Greg was not there when I
arrived- they got pretty agitated with me even asking about this subject and
gave me a "too bad for you" kind of response- even asked me if I had asked
anyone at blue mountain specifically if the maps zoomed  before I bought it
and thereby if they had lied about that- my response was that I did not ask
because it is such a basic function of having a moving map that I would not
even think to ask- kind of like asking of the radio in your new Mercedes
receives FM signals- not to mention that EVERY other moving map company
represented at SNF - and there were a lot of them - had zoom- and lots of
other features not present on the $15k Blue mountain-   they just kept
saying that the hardware in the gold box is 10 old technology,(despite the
fact that I had it only 14 months),  that not physically upgradeable (non-
socketed processor and memory) and it was too slow to allow for map zooming.

My main reason to buy their box was the fact that the magic internal
workings were software related and would be regularly upgraded as new
features became available, I believe that this was the basis of their sales
pitch- at least it was to me-  I know I was promised WX display and WSI
weather- even checked their sales brochure when I got home and said right
there in big letters about that too- so now I will see how many other folks
have this problem or feel that this is a problem, and take it from there.

-----Original Message-----
From: reflector-bounces at tvbf.org [mailto:reflector-bounces at tvbf.org] On
Behalf Of Richard J. Gentil
Sent: Sunday, April 22, 2007 3:49 PM
To: Velocity Aircraft Owners and Builders list
Subject: Re: REFLECTOR: Blue Mountain EIFS

Hey Alex,

I have a new Dual EFIS/ONE waiting for delivery when I am to the point of
installing my panel.

What did you find out?

Richard

Alex wrote:
> Hello Everyone-
> Just back from Sun N Fun, and I had an "interesting" talk with the 
> Blue Mountain folks about what the system does and does not do, and 
> what they promised would be available for those of us who purchased 
> it- can I please request a show of hands from anyone that has/had one 
> of their EIFS one units for some further discussions on this 
> subject........ Anyone else that is not on the reflector - Rvators ect.
would also be helpful to speak with.
>
> Alex
>
>
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