I bought myself a LoupeDeck Live as a Christmas gift. I haven’t opened it yet. I have a Stream Deck MK.2 and there is a thread about setting it up to which I contributed with how I have mine setup.
I would love to see some input of how others have set-up their LoupeDeck. So I get get it up running quickly on Christmas.
This is the Stremm Deck discussion link:
Just opened up my new LoupeDeck Christmas present. I have only so far installed the plugin from it’s Marketplace which is free and created by CaliBx. I also found a free profile in Flightsim.to made by brockwier which I downloaded, but I haven’t installed yet.
In the LoupeDeck Market place there is a small free Icon Pack for Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 which has 27 icon. I opted to purchase their entire pack which has 477 Icons for 20 pounds. I found discount coupon and used NOOBIFIER for 10% off, so I think it came out to be $21.70 USD.
I’ll post some more screenshots after I play around with it and do some customizations. The top three yellow buttons are folders that open up options under those categories.
This a great addition to to the Stream Deck I also use.
This is a good video for the LoupeDeck Live.
I have watched all three of the LoupeDeck videos, standard LoupeDeck keyboard shortcuts, and the last two videos that use LoupeDeck and SpadNext MIDI setup.
My question: Why use SpadNext?
Are there more SimConnect events than there are keyboard shortcuts in MSFS? Does SpadNext have better fidelity (movement of dials) than using keyboard shortcuts?
Thanks for your reply.
I think SpadNext is used for things like opening specific doors which the sim itself may have specific commands and mostly study level planes.
I just set mine up yesterday and haven’t gotten SpadNext. I did do a hour flight with it to see it in action. I’ll do some more flying today.
Heck, I’m struggling getting the multiple screens to display on the PC so I can modify. In the video where the guy mention SpadNext, he mentions that this plug-in was written in C#, so not sure if that is the reason why.
When I hover over the numbers at the bottom, on the PC software, they show the values and when I press them on the LoupeDeck, they do bring up the appropriate screens. But, they do not show on the PC interface to add items to them. I can only add stuff to the main display, which you can swipe and has two pages. You can un-assign a function/button or change it to something completely different.
Eight Buttons on Bottom:
0 - Works as Back Button and will always return to your Home WorkSpace as a Finish Point after multiple presses.
1 - Airliner
2 - AP
3 - ATC
4 - COM
5 - Lights
6 - Not Assigned
7 - Not Assigned
The developer of this plugin has a thread. I will link it to this message. Hopefully he can explain some of details of how it works. But I really glad he took the time to build this very nice plug-in.
I have found a few button that do not work. Such as when in Airliner, FLC doesn’t work (it does light up when I turn it on from the plane or Stream Deck). I have also found a few others that also do not work, but since I still have them in my Stream Deck, I use that. I really like the rotary dials in Airliner and AP modes (1 & 2) button on bottom.
I will start documenting button that I find that do not work and which plane I was using. The bugs could be related to specific planes. Oh one nice touch on the second page of the main screen it shows the name of the plane you are flying. In the Longitude it has two N/A to the right of it. Maybe they do something when flying airliners.
On Button 4 he put COM, and it only does the Comms radio, which I let the AI Co-Pilot switch frequencies when told by ATC, so I don’t manually do.
It only handles the COM radios and it doesn’t have an interface for NAV radios. And that I use a lot for ILS approaches. So I use my Stream Deck to do NAV1 with I mostly use. Since I use GPS for flight plans/navigation I only use NAV1 for ILS and haven’t used NAV2 to old style flying VOR to VOR where you would use your second NAV radio often.
With the modern glass cockpits with GPSs you pretty much don’t use NAV2.
As other have said in videos, there is a big difference in the feel of the square button. In the Stream Deck you actually have to press the button, on the LoupeDeck, they are touch screen so you just touch and not press them. That takes a little to get use to. But the LoupeDeck does have a haptic feedback when you touch a button. The haptic feedback can be modified to short, long or off. I didn’t much of a difference between short and long.
Since for whatever reason, I can’t get the other screens, other than the main, I will take photos and upload them later.
I will also look into the C# programming that is mentioned in the video. I know of C++, but C# (C-Sharp) is a programming language developed by Microsoft that runs on the .NET Framework. Maybe time to learn a new language. I took a quick look and it looks pretty simple. I use to be a Programmer/System Architect/Consultant before I retired. So maybe an old dog can learn new tricks 
But, overall very happy with it!
Here is a link to the Developers thread:
I too am an old C/C++ programmer and went down the C# rabbit hole, for just a little while. Visual Studio is such a beast that tries to do everything for everyone and its not my cup of tea.
I have the large StreamDeck that I was using back-and-forth between iRacing and MSFS and it’s time to dedicate a single controller to MSFS. iRacing doesn’t have much need for dials (except brake bias) so I think a new LoupeDeck is better suited for MSFS.
That makes sense that there are some lower-level functions, via SimConnect, that control different things (Airliners?) for different aircraft that the LoupeDeck and StreamDeck are not suited as well for.
I was flying the TBM in heavy winds on Friday and there was no way to control the VS, UP/DN. I could not operate the dial via the mouse. The plane was moving around far to much to do it! That is what makes the StreamDeck and LoupeDeck superior to anything else out there right now. There is something to grab onto and hold on to. The downside of a simulator that does not have a real-life dashboard that stays stationary like the pilot does. Sigh… It’s always “sompin”.
Thanks for your reply, CaptainAS007!
Here is another Profile for LoupeDeck from Flightsim.to. I downloaded it, but haven’t installed it yet. I will give my opinion after I try it.
Update:
I unzipped it and it created a file call MSFS Loupedeck Profile v2.lp4, but unfortunately it failed to install. I will leave a message for the developer. Maybe I have a new version of the LoupeDeck software and it’s not compatible with it.
Update on the bottom Buttons:
I did find that in Microsoft Flight Simulator Plugin there is a Folder that when you expand, it has the Airliner, AP, ATC that are assigned to the bottom buttons which in a lot of cases I think people use them for Workspaces.
Anyway I did find a NAV one that does have NAV1 and NAV2 on it. So I assign (Drag and Drop) to button 6. I then decided to make additional changes.
I have included the old default and what I changed mine to. I don’t think I will be using the ATC one, so I moved to button 6. Need to figure out what to put on 7. I’m lazy so for now I just made it AutoEngine.
Eight Buttons on Bottom (OLD):
0 - Works as Back Button and will always return to your Home WorkSpace as a Finish Point after multiple presses.
1 - Airliner
2 - AP
3 - ATC
4 - COM
5 - Lights
6 - Not Assigned
7 - Not Assigned
Eight Buttons on Bottom (NEW):
0 - Works as Back Button and will always return to your Home WorkSpace as a Finish Point after multiple presses.
1 - Airliner
2 - AP
3 - NAV
4 - COM
5 - Lights
6 - ATC
7 - Not Assigned
Going out for a flight and will try to do everything with the LoupeDeck and not use the Stream Deck at all. I will document anything that doesn’t work and I have to do it from the plane or my X-56 Hotas, which I do have a lot of things assigned to it. I can pretty much do everything for the AP from the HOTAS, but it nice to do it from the Stream Deck/Loupe Deck and have visual representation of what is on when in third person mode.
I tend to do that a lot that. I takeoff and land from the cockpit, but after i like to go outside and do sightseeing. I go back into the cockpit from time to time to check GPS and other stuff. But I do spend a lot of time outside since the views on the sim are so great.
I did a flight on the TBM 930 and only used the LoupeDeck and everything worked fine on it. The previous failures I had were on the Longitude, so I need to check that out again.
I used the Airline profile since the TBM has pretty much everything except AutoThrottle. On the TBM I always used VS instead of FLC. VS just works better for me. FLC without the Auto Throttle just doesn’t seem to work for me. Maybe, I’m doing something wrong. Since the TBM has FLC, I guess it should work and I’m just trying to use it improperly.
But, the LoupeDeck worked flawlessly for the entire flight. It was an IFR flight with an ILS landing.
Hi,
For now there is some limitation with the Loupedeck SDK, plugin and MSFS airplanes :
The 5.4 of the SDK is out and I hope to make the WASM for the end of the month so I hope that will allow a good handling of all aircraft but you will have to config to bind H/L var to the loupedeck inputs.
As I myself have been working through recently, SpadNext (or AAO etc.) is needed with complicated aicraft like the PMDG 737, iniBuilds A310 or Fenix A320, as many of the simulation events are only accessible via the LVARs. For example: I wanted my Loupedeck Live to control the FCU on the A310. Most, if not all, of the functions on the FCU do not have corresponding key commands. Binding them to the Loupedeck involves first creating MIDI buttons/dials per the SimHanger video above and then identifying what the correct LVARs are for the functions you seek to assign in Spad. Took me quite a while to get right, but I’ve now got a fully functional FCU on my LD Live.
Thanks for that follow up, Greg! That was what I was suspecting. Isn’t there like 1250 LVAR’s? It’s a big number (reply not required). There is no way to handle that many variables via keyboard-shortcuts. At least half are “gets” and not “puts” but still 625 “puts” still blows out the keyboard K.I.S.S. method.
Thanks, Greg!
Hi,
Do you have already used/set-up the icons you bought?
I’m wondering how you can assign the on and off icon to the same touch button in Loupedeck Live.
I see that it’s working with the nice profile of Calibx. But I can’t find a way to change those icon’s.
I was also on the brink to buy the icon’s addon package but would first be sure if it is possible to have the on and off icon assigned to the same Loupedeck touch button.
I’m curious for your feedback.
Thx and grt
Fedcup
I do not believe that you can make any changes to the Calibex actions. That was all written in C# based on video from SimHanger and I have not found a way to change them.
I did buy the Icon pack, but unfortunately it only brings installs/profiles for the Stream Deck 15 and 32 key units. and no install for the LoupeDeck. You need to installed them manually.
As far as I can tell, it doesn’t support the sub-folders that the icons are in.
So you have to create folders in /user/AppData/Local/Media/Icons/MSFS Auto Pilot Etc for each of the icon flooder. In each folder you need to create a metadata folder. Copy the metadata from MicrosoftFlightSim2020 if you downloaded the sample package . Then edit the LoupeDeckPackage.yaml and change the name, displayName and description. The name: parameter MUST match the directory name or it won’t be found.
Here is my Auto Pilot Folder. It’s a copy of what I unzipped from the purchased package and added the IC in front of it.
type: iconLibrary
name: IC Auto Pilot
displayName: IC Auto Pilot
description: Icon City MSFS 2020 Icons
version: 1.0
author: iConCity
copyright:
license:
licenseUrl:
homePageUrl: https://www.iconcity.co.uk/
You could put them all in one directory, but it will be harder to find stuff since it has 477 icons. After unzipping they are all by category and I decided to keep them in separate folders.
I recommend to create the first metadata folder and modify as desired and then copy that folder into all the other folders and them modify each one. I first used a rename of the folder just to copy the name and then pasted that into the yaml files. Less typing and less room to mistype the name and it not be found.
I did email Icon City and complained about them not including an install for LoupeDeck and giving those few free icons and then making us those all this manual work to install them. They never responded. Maybe they are off for the holidays and hopefully they get back to me and they do the right thing and created a LoupeDeck installer.
Unless you are going to use them on the Stream Deck, I would bother buying it for now. And if you are, maybe send them an email about them not having an install for the LoupeDeck and that you won’t buy until they create one. A lot of people are starting to buy LoupeDeck and they to an easy way to install the icons.
So far I have only use the existing Calibex stuff and have not added anything new so I haven’t put any of the new icon on the LoupeDeck.
I’ve migrated 4 icons folders and still have 18 to go. It is time consuming and a pain to do it manually. This package is clearly not yet setup for LoupeDeck and is designed for Stream Deck. Even in the READ ME file all they mention is Stream Deck.
Maybe tonight or tomorrow I will try to add something new myself and use one of the icons from the Icon City package.
Since I hadn’t heard anything back from Icon City, I just posted a message in their Discord about the lack of an install process for the Icon City MSFS pack.
Hopefully they create one. It really is a pain in the neck to install them manually.
That’s really sad to read.
I hope that icon city will read your request as indeed a lot of customers do have the Loopedeck now.
I’m disappointed because on their site they announce the package as compatible with Loopedeck.
I didn’t know it was such a hassle to install the icons.
I have asked them if their package was compatible and if it was possible to have both the ‘green’ on icon and ‘red’ off icon assigned to the same touch button on the Loupedeck.
They answered with a link to Simhanger video and that he discussed the icons.
However the video of Simhanger only shows the installation of one state of the icon.
I received my Loupedeck live yesterday and tried out the default profile from CaliBx. I was happy to see that it’s possible to have an on and off icon for the same button.
I hope that Iconcity at least creates a basic profile that uses their icons. If you watch there video for Streamdeck I hope something like that.
Their icons are so beautiful. It would be sad if we cannot fully utilize them.
For now I will hold off to buy and wait the feedback of them.
At last I would like to thank you for the well described guide above.
I will try that out with the free icon’s.
Grt
Fedcup
The free Icon package from the LopieDeck Marketplace does get installed automatically, but not the one you purchase and that one you must install manually and is really a pain and time consuming.
Also, if you join their Discord, they do not give you fulll access unless you have purchased an Icon package and then only for the package you purchase.
So if you buy for example Farming Simulator package, you don’t get full access to Flight Simulator.
I don’t recall how the accessed change. I joined their Discord and mentioned that I had gotten a LouoeDeck and bought their MSFS Icon Package and they had me go to a specific section and click on a certain item and from there I had to provide my Order Number and eMail address before they gave me full access.
I don’t recall if before getting full acesss, I could already see the Flight Simulator Channel.
I haven’t been back to their Discord to see their reply to my comment.
Currrenty on my iPad and don’t have Discord installed on it.
I went and looked at their Discord and basically they are taking no responsibly for them not having an install for the icons on LoupDeck.
Jame, I guess the owner, even went as far as sayin* that they are Icon City and not Profile City. Yet they create profiles for the Stream Deck.
They just don’t want to accept that by them automatically installing the sample pack, the the expectation that the fulll package would be installed in unrealistic.
They claim that it’s only advertised for Stream Deck, but fail to say why they have a sample set of icons that automatically install.
They do have some decent looking icons, but I’d you elect to purchase it for the LoupeDeck, be prepared to have to manually installl the package yourself.
I a few post above, I mention how to do it. But it is time consuming and a pain to have to do it manually!
In my opinion, this package is not yet ready for the LoupeDeck.Hopefully James will reconsider and create an install for the Icons.
That all I asked them for. I didn’t ask for profile or anything lease. Just that the Icon automatically install, like the sample package, on the LoupeDeck.
Thank you for your advice and warning!
It’s a shame because the icons seems really beautiful!
I will hold off for now and wait.
