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Windows CE R/C Transmitter
Si24601 writes "Futaba has released details of a new radio transmitter, the 14MZ, that incorporates a 640x240 colour touch screen, runs Window CE and uses a Compact Flash card. As someone in the midst of building a semi-autonomous model yacht, this screams to be used for telemetry feedback. Fly RC Magazine has a review of the 14MZ."
Marty: "you've got that thing hooked up to the...car?"
My only question is can I stick a digicam on my gas powered R/C plane, and get the live video feed from it right there on the R/C controller?
The possibilities boggle me (somewhat evil) mind...
Why do I need a GUI on a device that requires that I dedicate my full attention to something *else*.
If I am watching the screen, my aircraft is headed for the lake.
Not everything electronic in the world needs a display.
"Rocky Rococo, at your cervix!"
Music can be played (Windows Media), and voice commands can be assigned to switches, e.g., "flaps up"
:)
I would find it incredibly distracting trying to fly my plane and hear someone nearby have "what's your vector Victor" come out of their remote control everytime it updates the screen
1. This thing runs WinCE?
2. Why WinCE? Linux could do so much better.
3. Anyone try this with a modded Linux XBox?
4. Why Linux? BSD could do so much better.
5. Why BSD? BSOD could do so much better.
6. In Korea, only old people BSOD.
7. In Soviet Russia, BSOD blue screens you!
8. Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these!
9. Profit!
The SmartYacht detects the R/C Coast Guard helicopter and knows how to outrun the R/C Coast Guard cutter as it races the miniature illegal drugs to the 2" high drug lord standing on the shore.
"Rocky Rococo, at your cervix!"
Now you won't only be crashing because of wind, visibility, or crashing into another plane (didn't happen to me personally, but happened at the club I belong to, and I was there), but now your RADIO can crash too!!
I can't see this as a good thing. I'll stick with my older Futaba radio. It does what I need, and has never shown me a blue screen of death.
Erioll
Flying Model Airplanes for 9 years
TowerHobbies (www.towerhobbies.com) had this listed yesterday for a little over $2k. A little pricey for me. As a long time rc pilot, I love the features. Give it 5 years and every computer radio will have this kind of technology.
In any event, the most useful R/C plane telemetry generally isn't visual -- it's audible. You're too busy looking up at your plane to watch a display on your radio (looking at your radio while flying is a recipe for losing your plane), but a variable pitch tone that's telling you if your glider is gaining or losing altitude can be very useful in determining if you're still in that thermal. Full scale glider pilots use the same system, but of course in that case it's not done via radio.
Again, looking at your radio in flight is very bad, especially if several people are flying at once or your plane is way up there. MANY times somebody has looked down at their radio for some reason, and looked back up and never found their plane again. Or looked back up, found their plane, and kept flying it for a while longer but then realized that it wasn't obeying their controls anymore. (Eventually, they learned that they `found' the wrong plane up in the sky and that their plane had crashed shortly after and they didn't even notice, because they were `flying' something else.)
The author is building a model boat. She likes the idea that data (direction, fuel level) can be sent from the model boat to the remote control device.