You can use any radio transmitter (TX) to play FPV simulators wirelessly using a Betaflight flight controller, all you need is a F4 or F7 FC and a radio receiver. I will show you how to set it up in this tutorial.
Maybe your radio don’t support FPV simulator, or simply don’t have a USB connection. Maybe your USB cable is too short and you want wireless connection. Either way, you will find this hack useful 🙂
Check out my other Betaflight tutorials.
Since Betaflight V3.4, you can turn your flight controller into a joystick (HID device) when you plug it into your computer. With the commands coming in from the radio receiver (RX), you can play FPV simulators without connecting your radio to the computer!
Nice picture i know. It was late at night, this would do for now 😉
It also means that you can use all radios to play simulators, even the ones you can’t connect to the computer directly, such as the Flysky i6 or Turnigy 9X.
As it’s a wireless connection, you are no longer constrained by the length of the USB cable, and you can finally lay back and play!
I have not measured latency, but I don’t feel any more latency than using USB cable to the radio.
Only F4 and F7 flight controllers support this feature currently. F1 and F3 FC cannot do it because they don’t have enough memory to store the additional code. (This article explains the differences between F1, F3, F4 and F7 FC)
You can just use your drone for this. But if you want a dedicated FC and RX setup just for playing simulators, these are the cheapest parts I could find:
Make sure to flash the latest Betaflight to your flight controller (3.4 or newer). Check out this guide if you have trouble flashing firmware on FC, it could be a driver issue.
Connect the RX to FC, and set it up in Betaflight as you would normally do for a quad, here is a guide on how to setup SBUS. All RX protocols are supported: PPM, SBUS, PWM, iBUS, DSMX, Crossfire…
In this example, I am using the Frsky XM (SBUS) with Kakute F4 V2 AIO FC:
Power on Receiver
Most flight controllers these days powers the RX when you plug in the USB cable, and that’s great.
However, some FC’s don’t power on the RX with USB connection, so you might have to plug in the LiPo battery in order to power the receiver.
If you are doing this on a quad with LiPo connected, make sure you disconnect the VTX and other power hungry components to avoid overheating and draining your LiPo. And for safety, make sure props are removed.
Enter This in CLI
Once you’ve confirmed the RX is working in Receiver tab (channels are responding to the stick movements), you can go the CLI, and enter:
set usb_hid_cdc = on save
Select Joystick in FPV Simulator
Once it’s setup properly, your flight controller will appear as a joystick on your PC, and you should be able to select it in the FPV simulator. Make sure to calibrate it in the sim for the first time and you are good to go!
If you are doing this on a quad, you should turn off USB_HID_CDC before your next flight.
set usb_hid_cdc = off save
So I was reviewing a new Frsky radio but the software doesn’t support simulator yet through the USB port, so I made this box so I can play sims with the radio for now 🙂
I really like the “wireless” aspect of this solution, I will probably use this box with all my radios from now on 🙂
FC, RX and plastic box are all spare parts that I no longer use. Coin stack is for stability so it won’t get dragged and slide by the usb cable.
COM Port Disappeared
If you can’t connect to Betaflight again after enabling USB_HID_CDC, there’s an easy fix.
With the FC connected to your computer via USB (but not recognized and no COM port appears):
- Go to the “Options” tab on the left in Betaflight Configurator home page.
- Enable “Show all serial devices (for manufacturers for development)”.
- Unplug and reconnect USB cable, restart Betaflight Configurator.
Once this option is enabled, your flight controller will magically reappear! If you turn off ‘Show all serial devices,’ the flight controller disappears again. But with the option turned on, you can connect to your flight controller again.
Now, you can use the CLI to type “set usb_hid_cdc=off,” or you can leave it on if you wish. The only downside to leaving it on is that you can’t connect to it until you change that option.
If that didn’t work, you might need to reflash the FC with “Full Chip Erase” enabled. Hold down the boot button on the FC while connecting the USB cable, that should put the FC in DFU mode (bootloader mode), ready to be flashed.
Edit History
- Jun 2018 – article created
- Apr 2021 – tutorial updated, shared my dedicated wireless sim box
