A build for grandpa
My wife's grandfather is a former air force pilot. He mainly flew transport aircraft. I think he might have flown C-130 Hercules. He is 86 years old and has reduced mobility in his hands. I want to build his a Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 rig. I think he would really enjoy it. I know computers and plan to repurpose some of my old equipment if I can. I don't know anything about joysticks vs wheels, throttles etc. I want to build something realistic enough that grandpa will know how to use it. But the articles I've found seem like this can be a very expensive hobby. I want to get whatever the good basics he will need to enjoy flying.
Thanks for suggestions.
Posted Dec 30, 2020, 2:25 AM UTC
115
I would say your best bet is probably wait for the Xbox version. It’s coming soon, Q1 2021 I hope. And you are right. Building a PC just for playing MFS is going to be pretty expensive if you want a good experience. Like around $1.5k I’d say. Plus you need to buy monitor, peripherals etc.
For Xbox version coming later. You can just get a Xbox Series X and a supported joystick/throttle
I second this.
Xbox version is planned for Summer 21. https://www.google.com/amp/s/news.xbox.com/en-us/2020/12/10/microsoft-flight-simulator-coming-to-xbox-series-xs-summer-2021/amp/
I like the idea of the Xbox since if he doesn't like it I would get a next gen console.
Joystick vs Yoke Grandpa has reduced dexterity in his hands and very little sensitivity in his fingers. I'm assuming the controls translate well? Him getting frustrated from not being able to control it properly is one of my major concerns. I'm certain a normal Xbox controller wouldn't work for him at all.
Any specific joysticks or throttles you would suggest if going Xbox or PC. Specifically for grandpa which might mean bigger buttons instead of best performance per se.
The PC build benefits from me having spare parts. I have a cases, power supplies, some ddr4 ram (8gb), and an EvGA GeForce 1060 GTX 6Gb, SC graphics card I'm not using. But all of my old CPUs/motherboards are at least 5+ years old. So I thought I would have to step up there. Grandpa has a 42" lcd in his office I was planning to use. It won't have the refresh rate, but I wasn't sure how critical that was for the application.