Mission Planner Advanced Installation

This article explains how you can change where Mission Planner is installed, and how to install older versions if needed (not recommended).

Installing Mission Planner In a Different Location

Sometimes you may want to keep or install the current or different version of Mission Planner in a folder different from the normal location used by the MSI installation. You can do this by downloading the “zip” version which contains all the files necessary and placing the files into a folder of your choice.

Download the most recent Mission Planner ZIP Files

You can find all the different versions of Mission Planner zip (and MSI) files here. The most recent version of the zip file can be downloaded from here.

Download and save the zip file to your computer.

Install (Un-zip) the files to the desired folder

Here is how you “install” a version into a different folder:

• Unzip the downloaded zip files into the folder where you want them installed. (see your winzip manual)

  We suggest un-zipping to Program Files folder where the normal installation is, but with a different folder name I.E. a folder name like Mission Planner-xxx where xxx is the version number.

• After you do the un-zip, you should have all the files necessary to run that version of MP in the new folder.

  • You can run this version by double clicking on the MissionPlanner.exe file in the folder’s root.

  • Be sure to answer “no” to the upgrade notice if you want to stay with the version you are using in that folder.

  • To create a desktop icon for that version do this:

    • Find the file MissionPlanner.exe in the folder’s root.

    • Right click and hold the file name and drag it to your desktop

    • Select the ‘Create a shortcut here” option when you release the mouse button.

    • Right click on the new icon and select Rename.

    • Change the name to include the version number or some text to identify the icon to start this version of MP

Using older version of Mission Planner

Using older versions of Mission Planner is discouraged because the latest version should work with most platforms and will have fewer bugs.

However if you are using an older APM with an older version of firmware that is working well for you it may make sense not to update the firmware. Alternatively you might have more than one platform (for instance a plane and a quad copter or two planes) and you want to keep a different version of the Mission Planner for each on your ground station. This keeps the configuration files, the log files and saved parameter files separate - making life much easier.

Warning

Use older versions of Mission Planner at your own risk. Do not attempt to upgrade firmware with older versions. Each new platform firmware update usually requires the latest Mission Planner version.