Flightline Media A-10 CD Rom

Review by Steve Bamford

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Price $19.95.

The A-10 Thunderbolt II or Warthog is an ugly aircraft that has captured the heart and imaginations of aircraft enthusiasts around the world.  The A-10 was conceived to fight the Soviet tank threat in Europe during the Cold War.  With the fall of the Soviet Bloc in the late '80's, the A-10 was slated for retirement.  With the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq in Aug of 1990, the need for the A-10 to remain in the USAF inventory became quite apparent.  The A-10 was one of the weapons systems used in Gulf War I to destroy Iraqi tanks and hunt for Scud missiles among other missions.  The A-10 is a relatively inexpensive aircraft with a durability not shared by many aircraft past or present.

This CD from Flightline Media contains over 250 images of the A-10 and most of these photos are huge 1600X1200 high resolution images.  This CD covers all the areas of interest to the average modeller.  This CD does not include photos for Modellers interested in reference photos to permit them to open all the panels on the fuselage of their A-10 model.  These are basically airshow type photos......but the cockpit photos and landing gear bay photos are better than you could usually take at an airshow.

So what do you get?  The CD arrives in a sturdy standard DVD case much like you get when you buy a DVD.  There is one CD contained in this product.  Inserting the CD Rom into my computer was all it took for the product to load.  Upon loading I was treated to a very professional presentation including A-10 engine sounds as the CD loads.  There is of course a skip into button.  From there is launches directly into the CD and you are on your way.  I can not stress this enough....this product loads quick and is very simple to surf through.  Often programmers like to show off their programming skills by making products very fancy and a pain to use.....thankfully Flightline has avoided this mistake and their CD is a treat to use the first time out.

What about content?  This CD contains over 250 images and most of them are 1600X1200 resolution.  The general plan is when you are building a model......you would pull up the necessary photo and print out the whole photo or just the part of the photo you need for the area of the model you are detailing.  This permits the modeller to have exactly the photo they need for the job at hand.  Now....many modellers have a computer in their modelling area and this CD can be loaded into the computer, the desired image quickly found and loaded to the monitor.  A neat feature is the use of various size images.  You do a quick search through general categories of the aircraft.  You select an area and you are presented with thumbnail photos of that area of the plane.  You quickly scan the photos, find the image you want and you can load that image and use it as is or you can go one step further and load the larger high resolution image.

You also get a section of "Specifications" about the A-10, another section titled "Description" which tells about the aircraft and another section with line "Drawings" of the A-10.

Main Instrument Panel Nose Gear Bay Detail LAU-68 Launcher Detail Gun Mechanics detail Fueling Port Detail

Below is a typical photo page from the CD......this is of course a small version of the actual photo on the CD.....but it give you a rough idea of the high quality on the picture. 

As a bonus....there is a link on the CD called "Web Extras".  This takes you to the Flightline website for A-10 wallpaper images and likes to various A-10 model reviews on the internet and other such items.  This permits Flightline to keep this section of the "CD" up to date....a smart move.

A nicely done product and a pleasure to use.

They also have other info on their website for such aircraft as the F-117, P-51, B-17, P-40, F-100D, A-24, F-14, Me-262, Corsair, PBY Catalina and B-36 Peacemaker.  this A-10 CD is their first and a CD for the TBM/TBF Avenger due the end of May 2004.

Recommended computer specs on the package list as follows:

But this worked just fine in my daughters very old and slow P-100, so don't let the specs worry you too much.

Steve