FEATURE
THE BETAFLIGHT
CONFIGURATOR
SOFTWARE
Build a drone
etaflight is a
firmware package
for multirotor
flight controllers,
that sits on the
STM32 inside
your controller,
and does its job of keeping your
craft in the air.
The trouble with a flight
controller though is that it is
not a computer like the one
on your desk, with a nice user
interface, a screen, and keyboard. It has a lot of
configurable options, but needs some means to
access them. This is something the developers
have addressed through a configuration tool, the
Betaflight Configurator.
The tool itself takes the form of a Google Chrome
extension, that can be found in the Chrome store.
It should therefore work on any platform supported
by Chrome. Once you have installed it, you may
be prompted to download a more recent version.
Assuming that your flight controller is plugged into your
computer’s USB port, you should be able to click on
the ‘connect’ icon in the Betaflight Configurator home
screen, and be rewarded by a status screen showing
some of the current settings of the board, as well as its
altitude. Try lifting the craft, and watch the diagram of it
on the screen move accordingly
On the left-hand side is a menu containing a host
of pages with all the detailed Betaflight options. The
full functionality of Betaflight is beyond this piece, and
while we would like to encourage you to read the full
documentation and learn its capabilities, it is strongly
recommended that you leave the default settings in
place until you are confident with your machine, unless
you have real reason to change them. That said, you
will probably have need to go into the configuration
screen if you have any radio issues, and the receiver
screen on which you can check the received values for
your different channels. You can also update Betaflight
on your controller to its latest version, but this is also
an advanced function, and best left alone unless you
are confident you know what you are doing.
B
THE TOOL ITSELF TAKES THE
FORM OF A GOOGLE CHROME
EXTENSION, THAT CAN BE FOUND
IN THE CHROME STORE. IT SHOULD
THEREFORE WORK ON ANY
PLATFORM SUPPORTED BY CHROME
Right
You can configure
a lot about your
controller, but start
with the basics