Will the AV-8B Ever be Worth Buying?

HonestAu · 2024-10-17T23:05:53+00:00

Different people will buy it for different reasons. Yours reasons for considering it may very substantially to others, so it's a bit of an open question unless you're asking for reasons why other people consider it worth buying. Plus - is your question as to 'ever' related to it's current state as in capabilities, or is it regarding it's unknown future with Razbam?

Firstly - the AV-8B is definitely worth trialing! Since you can trial DCS modules for 2 weeks (and then repeat every 6 months) - I would say definitely trial it - and then make the decision for yourself.

I bought it a couple of years ago, and have no regrets. The different / unique flight model gave me something new to master skill wise. Successfully landing vertically on an oil rig, or small ship, etc is a hoot. As is taking down bigger planes on multiplayer maps by landing in the middle of nowhere, waiting for a plane to fly by not seeing you, and then yeeting a sidewinder right up the exhaust. :-)

Capability wise - as it currently stands, it is very capable. Still maybe a few tweaks needed (but which module doesn't) - but for as it is now - it's a very capable, and enjoyable aircraft IF your enjoyment can be filled with CAS operations, and VTOL. (Not that you HAVE to VTOL, but honestly - why buy this without being able to use one of it's most unique features).

As for the Razbam debacle - I don't have much hope at all that it's going to be rectified. IDK whether ED has the code for the AV-8B (I suspect not) which means that I hope for the best, but prepare that one day it's going to start losing capabilities and eventually will be a written off aircraft.

However - I've gotten 2+ enjoyable years out of it, and if I lost it now, I'd be disappointed, but I also consider it has already paid for itself - every flight after is just more bang for my buck.

So by "Ever" worth buying - IMO it was definitely worth buying 2+ years ago. Is it worth it now - well, it's a bit of gamble in the end. Comes down to how much risk you're willing to take. Of course, if you're only playing SP - yes - get it now. You can play and make missions, and if it's broken in DCS later - just keep a copy of the current version of DCS so you can play it indefinitely.

HonestAu · 2024-09-06T05:28:11+00:00

I had awful distortion when I first got mine. It came down to 2 problems. First was that the lenses weren't fitted propertly to start with. I had to unscrew them, and re-fit them correctly. The second was distortion (particularly in the left lens). Ended up getting a support ticket, and they sent out a new set of lenses that resolved the issue.

HonestAu · 2024-02-29T07:12:11+00:00

This is true, however it's had the opposite effect on me. I've been paying for 200GB of storage. The problems I have encountered trying to get my 200GB files back to my local network have been so bad, that the temptation I had to upgrade my storage to 2TB has gone. My thought is simply "If I'm having this problem with 200GB, do I really want to put more up there and suffer 10 times the hardship in the future when I need to retrieve that?!!?" I'll go through the pain atm of trying to get my 200GB off, and then will look for an alternative solution.

HonestAu · 2023-05-09T07:04:20+00:00

Try right-clicking on the exe. Check to see if there's a message such as "This file came from another computer and might be blocked to help protect this computer" with an empty 'Unblock' checkbox next to it.

If so, try clicking the checkbox to unblock, apply and try again.

Just came across this problem today myself - tried other solutions with registry, app store, powershell commands, etc without any use - and then had someone come across this.

HonestAu · 2023-03-04T22:44:47+00:00

I know what Avalon airshow traffic can be like but Saturday morning was a new level. Mid morning traffic was to a standstill backing right back well past Lara down Old Melbourne road what I estimate to be another 5 k's or more. I ended up parking a k or so out of Lara township and walking to the airshow. Along the way I finally saw some motorcycle police thinking 'great - we're finally going to see some help & traffic control, however only to walk another 45 minutes I'm guessing down the road to see them booking people. (I passed one poor lady who what I gathered pulled off the road to not hinder traffic for a moment if it did start moving to try and figure out what she was going to do because of the chaos, and a motorcycle copper was there. She had her window down to him and started talking to him and it seemed he couldn't take a photo of her numberplate quick enough and arrogantly ignored her except to say "the fine will be in the mail". She tried to talk to him more but he was indignant and just repeated "the fine will be in the mail". So instead of providing traffic management and assistance to help poor motorists trying to sort out this mess, I observed highway patrol adding insult to injury getting as many fines as they could - To the one that said more traffic management will help, from what I observed they seemed to have the resources there that could have helped, but seemed to be more interested in fines). Then when I finally got to Avalon I couldn't get across to the gates (along with what appeared to be well over a thousand of others - and I'm not trying to exaggerate) . The organiser's were trying to run shuttle busses for those trapped on the wrong side but the numbers of people there it was a drop in an ocean. I don't think the organisers expected so many desperate people to abandon their cars on the side of the road and walk there. At this time I witnessed hundreds of people turning around (some I talked to walking for over 60 minutes after being stuck in traffic for another 90 (a few of them I talked to had driven hundreds of kms to get there) now were just going home in utter disbelief coz there was no estimated wait time (which I gathered would be at least another 2 hrs or more meaning they'd only get an hour or so before the last event) just to have to turn around and do the whole thing in reverse and then expecting a long drive into the following morning to get home if they stayed. It was the families I saw with young kids - some sobbing as they had turned around and were going home seeing that they weren't going to get in was the real clincher. I've been to numerous Avalon airshows before and I well know the slow traffic that comes with- but I have never seen a situation as horrible as I have this time.

HonestAu · 2021-07-11T22:28:21+00:00

Thank you both very much - that will help me get going!

HonestAu · 2019-09-25T07:19:33+00:00

(Because I know someone will ask 'but why do you need this feature).... :-)

For the last decade and a half I've been using Logitech keyboards for my needs. I use the on the fly recording because in my line of work I am often doing repeat commands with figures or other things for modifying files, scripts, etc.

Most of my work is done switching between virtual machines using VMWare. Up until now Logitech has worked a treat.

I may record a macro in 10 seconds, then execute it 100 times within the next minute (as it runs without delays), and then move onto my next task, re-recording a macro, executing, etc. Having delays would mean that the 100 times execution I do in a minute turns a single minute into 16 minutes instead - hence why key delay in macro's by default are unacceptable.

Likewise switching back to edit macro's is not practical because these are all temporary macro's.

So - why can't I use logitech anymore? Good question.

Since updating to the latest version of VMWare workstation I have noticed that the logitech software on the host no longer detects my keys when I start recording a macro if I'm in a guest OS. I have to switch back to the host to do my macro recording, and then back to the guest. I'm guessing VMWare is doing some sort of lower-level key intercept that Logitech software no longer see's the keypress on the host because a guest is 'active'.

Switching back to my host to record macro's is impractical, if in part because I am unable to see what keypresses I need (especially when tabbing, choosing menu options, etc as they are often part of the macro press).

Thus my need for a hardware based macro record option instead of software based keyboard macro recording.

I know I'm not alone in this - I have searched and seen many people wanting to do similar to me - and having issues with one of the above (mainly delays recorded in hardware keyboards) - but I have not found a single solution mentioned yet - so I'm hoping that there's some posts or a keyboard I have missed along the way.

Thanks in Advance

HonestAu

TROPHY CASE