Another explanation might be that Transport Canada considers that Garmin's SW development certification process to be insufficient, despite EASA and the FAA's experience. The other Canadian aircraft manufacturers do not use Garmin avionics. I know first-hand that NXI Phase II certification was held up several months for this reason. This is an unfortunate consequence of moving the DA40 and DA62 type certificates to Canada and suggests why NXI Phase III was certified first by EASA for the DA50. The relationship was an issue, and it sounds like Diamond has made progress to improve it. To the extent this happens, subsequent software releases should be more timely. And the additional delay on Phase III software is frustrating (as is the delay for V15 for legacy G1000).This not a software development delay, it's all about Diamond's poor relationship with Transport Canada.
G1000NXI Phase 1 hardware shipped as recently as early 2019 is no longer supported because new airplanes ship with Phase 2 hardware.
These are essentially the same LRU configurations, except that the Diamond Phase I aircraft have a cost-effective upgrade program (essentially half-price hardware). I've seen nothing regarding how Cessna owners get GIA64s, what KAP140 support is offered when they do (vs requiring a GFC700 upgrade), or what subsequent software feature upgrades are available for these upgraded Cessna aircraft. I'd be interested to know which of our Phase II "missing features" are supported for Cessna aircraft with upgraded NXI Panels, GIA63Ws, and KAP140 autopilots. Does anybody know what Perspective+ (NXI) upgrades Cirrus is supporting (and what they cost) for G1-G2 (Avidyne) or G3-G5 Perspective (G1000) planes?C172's that shipped with G1000 in 2008 were offered a G1000NXi panel upgrade and NXi software two years ago.
We've used the term Legacy to refer to the original hardware generation of G1000 to differentiate it from G1000 NXI. This is to reduce the risk of miscommunication when just "G1000" is used as a reference. (I suppose we could have just used "G1000" and "NXI".). This is a generational difference, separated by more than 10 years. Phase I was a half-step between "Legacy" and "NXI", possibly due to delays in introducing and certifying the GIA64, which almost certainly required flight testing because of the role the GIA plays in autopilot operations.Diamond, aircraft just 3yrs old have a "legacy" hardware configuration.
This speculation really seems unlikely in a "year or two". I suppose this might possibly be the case for a few older peripheral models, e.g. ADF, DME, etc., but even this seems unlikely. I don't see this happening with the core LRUs, i.e. the GDUs and GIAs. If there are any changes in other LRUs or sensors, I fully expect these changes will be transparent to owners and pilots. Sure, some new versions of the boxes (e.g. weather radar) may have new features enabled by newer hardware, and that's different than not providing software-centric feature updates for 2019 and later Phase II hardware configurations.Within a year or two Phase 2 hardware will be replaced by Phase 4 hardware, and Phase 2 hardware will no longer be supported.
This is overstated. The G1000 WAAS upgrade program and the V15 software update are evidence to the contrary. The NXI Phase I to Phase II hardware upgrade program is another. Are they "primarily" focused on new plane sales? Sure, and I think the other manufacturers are too. Diamond has been too slow to come around to address the long-standing issues with Legacy G1000, and there's a lot of pent-up owner frustrations.Diamond is solely focused on sales of new airplanes.
The other part of this is that owners need to plan for "avionics overhauls" like they do for engines. For some reason, the investment in an overhauled (or new) engine retains 100% value. So far, the prevailing expectation seems to be that an investment in avionics nets only a 50% return, despite that a new plane with equivalent avionics capability costs >2X more (and you may have to wait quite a while to get it). Until this economic mindset evolves, the business opportunity for avionics overhauls is limited. This is a major reason why there is no work instruction to upgrade a Legacy DA40-180 to NXI Phase II (or better). Unlike the DA42-TDI, there is no certification barrier.We can only hope that Diamond's certification link between avionics with a 10yr life cycle and an airframe with a 75yr life cycle, will at some point be broken.
I guess sometimes "what you have is what you'll always have" is sufficient capability. This is the only reason I can fathom why non-WAAS DA40-180 owners haven't put down a deposit for the WAAS upgrade program to secure their place in line. (DA42-TDI owners may be reasonably waiting for the required software to be available.)