The g1000 was designed over 10 years ago for the Mustang light jet. It is 430/530 era technology. The Avidyne is a good system but also has plenty of quirks – altitude bug for one.
A well designed interface should require knowledge about the aircraft functionality/systems only, not “knowledge” about the interface.
That does not exist in any aircraft EFIS/FMS system from Avidyne, G1000, Collins, Honeywell or in the big jets.
Never mind the fact that 99% of the users only need 1% of that functionality.
Well I use almost all of its functionality and am glad it is there. No-one makes you use G1000.
The g1000 was designed over 10 years ago for the Mustang light jet. It is 430/530 era technology.
Exactly. The 430/530 units were conceived in the early 90s. Long before the days of GUI design as a serious discipline. They are horrible. The King units of the same era are no better.
A well designed interface should require knowledge about the aircraft functionality/systems only, not “knowledge” about the interface.
I don’t think that’s possible; we have to know the failure modes and dependencies and the interface has to reflect that by being somewhat compartmentalised. You don’t care about obscure edge case failure modes in your PC – they don’t usually kill you – but you really care about them in your avionics.
Never mind the fact that 99% of the users only need 1% of that functionality.
I might not need it – but it makes my life a lot easier, so I use a lot of the functionality.
Personally, I find non-integrated systems more confusing than fully integrated ones like the G1000. In my own aeroplane I know exactly how everything is set up and how the data flows, so have a pretty good idea what failure will affect what, but when I step into a club plane – even if the only advanced kit is a 430 – I don’t know the layout of the electrical system, I don’t know which COM is connected to the failsafe on the audio panel, I don’t know that the radio has horrible interference on 132.7 …
With an integrated system like the G1000, once you know the layout on one aircraft of that type, you pretty much know them all. That is a huge bonus.
The Aspen is relatively simple. However, an instructor took my wife on a pinch-hitter flight last year and, despite years of flying light jets and all kinds of piston aircraft, he couldn’t figure out how to change the QNH, so he turned off the Aspen. He immediately lost Mode C.
Jason,
what do you mean by “altitude bug” (Avidyne?) It probably depends on the sw version, mine (8.01) has no problems.
The 430s are really not as bad as everybody makes them. They are probably the wrong system for a rental airplane or if you fly very little – but once you fly more they become pretty simple.
You had to hit the LSK twice to change the hundreds of feet. Three times to change tens.
I agree on the 430. Same as the G1000, interface is difficult and not intuitive but if you are current it is fine. Agreed, if unfamiliar it is not great in a rental. I remember when it was released, was revolutionary.
But if you have the LSK in the “hundreds mode” you can leave it there, right? Isn’t it once for the hundreds and twice for the tens?
The proline (like the Honeywell Primus) is nowhere near as sophisticated or powerful as the G1000 – the big difference is the FMS, which is a far better input and interaction device than any other method I’ve used.
The raw avionics in GA are significantly better than heavy metal and older bizjets, but the interface and ease of use (especially given many are for single pilot ops) is comparatively lacking.
I believe that corporate culture has a major impact on the look and feel of their product.
The more separated functions/departments an organization has, the more functions will be separated in the product. The more rules the developers/designers of a product have to follow, the more complicated the product will be – despite good efforts by everyone involved.
You may want to read this article about the development of the Windows shutdown menu:
http://moishelettvin.blogspot.de/2006/11/windows-shutdown-crapfest.html
The G1000 is like MS Word: Let’s put all the functionality imaginable in there and make it as cryptic as possible. Never mind the fact that 99% of the users only need 1% of that functionality.
99% of the users use a different 1% of functionality. The MS Word business unit does not invest into a single feature, unless it is requested by millions of users backed up by insane amount of real world telemetry.
In the case of software there is something called “opinionated software”. It means that the creators have a strong opinion about how to best use it to perform a given task. The software is created in such a way that it is easy to use it as intended and there is not much considerations for something else. Asking users of the system is quite low on the things one does when creating opinionated software.
Opinionated software frequently has less features but does perform them quite well. It also seems to be easier to maintain high quality.
For avionics I feel that Avidyne with R9 is more in the camp of opinionated software while Garmin with G1000 is more in the other group. I prefer R9 over G1000 for single pilot IFR operations.
