"I was just looking into this and here is what i found:
my versions: APM V3.1.4, MP is current.
the command is now only in the full parameter list.
"LED Mode"  default is 9.
Explanation is here: LED modes
I have not confirmed it works yet, but it is…"

"Thanks, i think my confusion is the way things are labeled.  The instructions refer to the outputs as "RC1-8" and mission planer/firmware labeled the inputs RC1-xx.

This line here caused the confusion:
(*Tricopter note: If the direction of your…"

"@Ralp or Wessie,  have you tried running the numbers through ecalc to see if it is close?  Im not sure how well a Y6 vs hex compare for efficiency.  http://www.ecalc.ch/xcoptercalc.htm?ecalc&lang=en
 
What is your thrt value at when your are…"

"Is it possible your APM came loose and tilted?  Could that explain why it flew away then did not come back in RTL?  it thought it was coming back and couldn't exceed the tilt angle?  that would be a odd coincidence though.
 
If there was no wind,…"

"I agree with wessie, your PIDs are off.  Maybe not much but your P is probably too high.

Here is the best place to ready through.  and watch the video in the link at the top.
http://copter.ardupilot.com/wiki/tuning/"

"I took a look to see if I can see anything, but not much stands out to me.
 
Only thing I notice is a big throttle input just before it looks like you lose control.  I see this by graphing throut and thrin on the left with PitchIn and Pitch on the…"

"I believe you can get this from the GPS : time info from your logs.
if you take your start and stop times and divide them by 60000 (since the time is in ms) you should your time in min.
for example, total flight time:  ( 44193800 - 4370220 ) / 60000…"

"Just an FYI, you can arm without the GPS installed and leave the failsafes on.
I didn't try with out the compass though."

"Hi,
 
only things you can do is move your compass further away from you power board or add some mu-metal under your apm (normal copper will not affect the mag field much)
 
you might get a 20% improvement with the mag shield, but it also lowers your…"

"For the motors spinning, check and see if it went into land mode.  Might have been caused by a low battery failsafe.  If it did, check the min throttle it is set to.  mine was high enough to keep my quad a few inches in the air.  it would also keep…"

"I know you mentioned you check the motors are in the correct order, but I would triple check those, order and rotation.  at default PIDs, the motor order was the main reason my quad would flip when I was figuring this out (well still am).
 
If they…"

"I had the same thing happen to me.  Is it now enabled by default in 3.0.1?
 
I went ahead and left it in, I just lowered it from 10V to 9.6V and also be sure to adjust your min throttle.  Mine was set to high by default and caused my quad to scoot…"

"I am having the same issue on my surface.  Any luck on figuring it out?  I have tried to go through the .net installs and all should be ok."

"I just had my power unit fail on me.  For some reason the 5V out stopped working after a bunch of compass testing.
 
Anyways I just got this part from digi key and replaced it.  Its not much cheaper, but it is easy enough to do.
TI PTH08080WAH…"