While delaying my trip today watching cells pop up everywhere on radar, I've decided to go ahead and spring for a 396/496. In trying to decide on one or the other, I came across a comparison of the two and the Flight Cheetah FL 190. Other than never having heard of it before and knowing nothing about the company, the initial price, subscription price and capabilities appear to give Garmin a run for the money. Has anyone used the 190 and have an opinion for or against.
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496 vs Flight Cheetah FL 190
- Thread starter Wiley
- Start date
rickmellor
Well Known Member
I haven't used the FlightCheetah but I did look it over in consideration. A couple of thoughts:
* The 190 is a Samsung UMPC. The screen is 280 nits (pretty dark for a cockpit. And unless FlightCheetah has its own OS (I don't know if it does), it could be running Windows under the hood. This will give you a several minute long boot time and the OS isn't really suited for use in aircraft.
* Weather is not integrated. You've got an external WxWorx antenna that you have to deal with. Plus it's $595 more. It erodes the cost benefit a bit.
* The 396/496 integrate with the SL-30 for frequency propagation and are known to work with various EFIS/Autopilots.
In general I think the price is way too high for someone who isn't Garmin and for a product that feels kind of cobbled together.
Just my opinion.
-Rick
* The 190 is a Samsung UMPC. The screen is 280 nits (pretty dark for a cockpit. And unless FlightCheetah has its own OS (I don't know if it does), it could be running Windows under the hood. This will give you a several minute long boot time and the OS isn't really suited for use in aircraft.
* Weather is not integrated. You've got an external WxWorx antenna that you have to deal with. Plus it's $595 more. It erodes the cost benefit a bit.
* The 396/496 integrate with the SL-30 for frequency propagation and are known to work with various EFIS/Autopilots.
In general I think the price is way too high for someone who isn't Garmin and for a product that feels kind of cobbled together.
Just my opinion.
-Rick
pierre smith
Well Known Member
Incredible amount of info
Hi Eric,
I've used a friend's 396 and was very, very impressed and avoided some really bad wx on that trip. I bought a 496 and it never ceases to amaze me. It even has the entire AOPA database in it! Garmin claims ten times the info as the 396. Phone numbers and addresses for the nearest point to your present position or destination of restaurants, car rental agencies, motels, gas station...and on and on...Alot of information, plus auto-zoom and your location on the taxiway!. The wx subsricption of $29.95/month also gives you real time Metars, TAF's and also very fast real-time weather updates. In my opinion, you can't go wrong with either 396 or 496.........daylight readability is excellent.
Regards,
Pierre
Hi Eric,
I've used a friend's 396 and was very, very impressed and avoided some really bad wx on that trip. I bought a 496 and it never ceases to amaze me. It even has the entire AOPA database in it! Garmin claims ten times the info as the 396. Phone numbers and addresses for the nearest point to your present position or destination of restaurants, car rental agencies, motels, gas station...and on and on...Alot of information, plus auto-zoom and your location on the taxiway!. The wx subsricption of $29.95/month also gives you real time Metars, TAF's and also very fast real-time weather updates. In my opinion, you can't go wrong with either 396 or 496.........daylight readability is excellent.
Regards,
Pierre
N395V
Well Known Member
Eric,
I have several hundred hours flying a flight Cheetah 210.
The 210 is a proprietary unit not a PC with enough nits to see in direct sunlight under a bubble canopy.
It is still PC based technology running a streamlined version of windows 2000.
Several minutes to boot and the fear of a windows type hangup though I never had a problem. It does require an external weather RCVR but then again so does the 396/496.
My reason then for the Cheetah over the Garmin was cockpit space.
The Cheetah had Low enroute Charts and approach plates and in an F1 Rocket IFR there just isn't a lot of room up front.
The features of the Garmin that the Cheetah did not have were the ability to easiy query location(airport/air space)
The Garmin is easy and intuitive to use the Cheetah is not difficult but takes many hours of practice best done on the ground to be comfortable in it's use.
The Flight Cheetahs all use a disk drive that will crash somwhere between 10 and 12,000 feet. The only exceprion is a Cheetah FL 210 with an added charge for a solid state drive.
So if you wish to compare the costs of flight cheetah to Garmin compare the Cost of the 396 plus 1 year of updates to a Flight Cheetah 210 plus the weather reciever plus the software plus a solid state hard drive plus the updates you want for 1 year and you will see less of a price difference.
Don't get me wrong the Cheetah 210 is a wonderful unit and had I not made the decision to no longer fly IFR it would still be in my plane as opposed to a Garmin.
Forget the FL 190 or any PC unit in a canopy airplane. They are just not readable on a bright day and any tablet based system is going to have all the issues we all hate about windows.
I have also used the 396 and 496 quite a bit and have not found significant benefit in the 496 to justify the cost increase. The added features are at least,to me, not that useful.
If you are looking for XM music the Garmins will deliver it right to your audio panel or headphones. The XM reciever with the Cheetah will recieve and output the music but you will also have to buy an audio control unit ie "Roady"to hook it into your audio panel.
Hope this helps.
I have several hundred hours flying a flight Cheetah 210.
The 210 is a proprietary unit not a PC with enough nits to see in direct sunlight under a bubble canopy.
It is still PC based technology running a streamlined version of windows 2000.
Several minutes to boot and the fear of a windows type hangup though I never had a problem. It does require an external weather RCVR but then again so does the 396/496.
My reason then for the Cheetah over the Garmin was cockpit space.
The Cheetah had Low enroute Charts and approach plates and in an F1 Rocket IFR there just isn't a lot of room up front.
The features of the Garmin that the Cheetah did not have were the ability to easiy query location(airport/air space)
The Garmin is easy and intuitive to use the Cheetah is not difficult but takes many hours of practice best done on the ground to be comfortable in it's use.
The Flight Cheetahs all use a disk drive that will crash somwhere between 10 and 12,000 feet. The only exceprion is a Cheetah FL 210 with an added charge for a solid state drive.
So if you wish to compare the costs of flight cheetah to Garmin compare the Cost of the 396 plus 1 year of updates to a Flight Cheetah 210 plus the weather reciever plus the software plus a solid state hard drive plus the updates you want for 1 year and you will see less of a price difference.
Don't get me wrong the Cheetah 210 is a wonderful unit and had I not made the decision to no longer fly IFR it would still be in my plane as opposed to a Garmin.
Forget the FL 190 or any PC unit in a canopy airplane. They are just not readable on a bright day and any tablet based system is going to have all the issues we all hate about windows.
I have also used the 396 and 496 quite a bit and have not found significant benefit in the 496 to justify the cost increase. The added features are at least,to me, not that useful.
If you are looking for XM music the Garmins will deliver it right to your audio panel or headphones. The XM reciever with the Cheetah will recieve and output the music but you will also have to buy an audio control unit ie "Roady"to hook it into your audio panel.
Hope this helps.
