Hardware for MFDs etc?

[Father Cool]

So when we eventually get this what are the none VR guys doing for MFD's? The Typhoon has more buttons on the screens than say an F18 or F15?

[speed-of-heat]

winwing MFD's have a "hidden" black button between each pair of grey buttons, meaning they have up to 9 buttons a side... 

[Zabuzard]

Its not thaat many anyways, 6 on either side, 5 on the bottom and none at the top.

Plus, you can do most stuff through the X/Y cursor instead of hitting buttons.

[Scott-S6]

The trickier bit is the contextual labels which are on the buttons rather than on the screens.

[Spectre11]

And that helps to win some real estate on the screens, as these labels are outsourced to the buttons.

[Scott-S6]

22 hours ago, Spectre11 said:

And that helps to win some real estate on the screens, as these labels are outsourced to the buttons.

Sure, it's a good idea but it makes it significantly trickier for us to make an MFD.

Edited November 29 by Scott-S6

[Spectre11]

I'm sure the designers feel sorry that they haven't taken that into account.

[Father Cool]

Its more to do with the button lining up with the options on the screen, if the buttons aren't the same then they wont line up?

[Dragon1-1]

Worse than that: 

The labels are on the buttons. There's nothing on the screen for them to line up with, instead each button is a tiny LCD that displays what the button does. 

Needless to say, to replicate this directly would be friggin' expensive, not to mention configuring those in DCSbios would be a bit of a challenge, so to speak. I imagine one could try to get large displays that would extend under the bezel, and somehow add transparent buttons on top of it. There once was a keyboard that used a single OLED display to provide both backlight and fully customizable keycaps, so the idea has merit, but actually making that work is another matter.

[Spectre11]

There is nothing to line up with on the real Typhoon. The labels that are display on the screen surface on the aircraft need to line up with the pushbuttons, in the Typhoon that's no longer necessary, as the control is also an indicator. Ofcourse for simmers who pured money, time and work for external hardware like MFDs it's problematic though.

[Father Cool]

Hmm yes that's a major headache!

Just researched oled push buttons and they are like £50 a button! That would make for a very expensive set of MFD's!

Edited December 2 by Father Cool

[Brun]

A 32-button Stream Deck XL can be had for about £200. Suggests the hardware isn't all that expensive.

https://www.elgato.com/uk/en/p/stream-deck-xl

[Scott-S6]

On 12/1/2025 at 2:15 PM, Dragon1-1 said:

Worse than that: 

The labels are on the buttons. There's nothing on the screen for them to line up with, instead each button is a tiny LCD that displays what the button does. 

Needless to say, to replicate this directly would be friggin' expensive, not to mention configuring those in DCSbios would be a bit of a challenge, so to speak. I imagine one could try to get large displays that would extend under the bezel, and somehow add transparent buttons on top of it. There once was a keyboard that used a single OLED display to provide both backlight and fully customizable keycaps, so the idea has merit, but actually making that work is another matter.

This is also how streamdecks work - transparent buttons over a single display. That's ok probably the best bet, use Helios or similar to dress the mfd with button labels and have a bezel with transparent buttons over the top.

On 12/6/2025 at 12:02 AM, Brun said:

A 32-button Stream Deck XL can be had for about £200. Suggests the hardware isn't all that expensive.

https://www.elgato.com/uk/en/p/stream-deck-xl

The streamdeck does not use oled buttons. There's a single large screen behind the button layer.

[Brun]

On 12/9/2025 at 4:54 AM, Scott-S6 said:

The streamdeck does not use oled buttons. There's a single large screen behind the button layer.

Thanks for the clarification.