Green status light 'stuck' on

[Mobileadam]

Hi,

I can't effectively reproduce my problem but I often get a situation where Railmaster and / or Elink are refusing to process commands. Now the interesting thing (for me) is that when this occurs the status icon / square thingy near the top is always solid bright green which I believe means processing. I find this can stay lit for quite some time (I need to do some testing) but it also disappears and returns back to unlit square when I click on the settings options for example. I can then issue commands and they are executed. 

I didn't know if it's my laptop, Elink or the software which is freezing - any ideas?  I'll test some more to see if I leave it without going into the settings if it comes back .

 

thanks 

 

[HornbyRailMasterSupport]

The green DCC activity indicator on the main RailMaster screen should only flash for a fraction of a second.  If it is staying on for seconds at a time this indicates that your PC is not communicating correctly with your controller.

Start by checking the basics like the BAUD set correctly in Windows' Device Manager (115200 for eLink and 19200 for Elite).  Also ensure the driver is installed correctly and if in doubt reinstall it (a Windows upgrade can affect the driver).  

To reinstall the driver choose Uninstall when right clicking on the "USB Serial Port" entry, ensuring you also click the box "Delete driver".  Then unplug the USB lead, wait five seconds and plug it back in.  Windows should then download and install the driver afresh.

A subtly faulty USB lead can also cause this to happen.

[Mobileadam]

Thanks Support. 

I'm happy that the baud rate and driver are correctly confgured (I'm running Windows Vista) but I was thinking of upgrading to Windows 7 as I've found Vista in the past to be slow to respond at times. 

I'll do some testing over the next few days to see if I can reproduce the problem and time how long the 'freeze' is - I'm assuming it's a hardware problem but other than getting another laptop I haven't decided the way forward. 

Might try another cable too. Thanks

[96RAF]

If your PC is running vista it may be LO-spec, not that RM needs much horsepower anyhow, but it could be you are running stuff in the background that you don't know about that is dragging your RM performance down.

 

look in system info to check RAM installed and in task manager to see what processes you have running. You may be able to stop some of them to improve RM state Of play

 

upgrading to win7 is a good idea as vista was not the best of op systems And it is stable with RM and known to work for Elite upgrades.

[Chrissaf]

If your RM is version 1.6x.x then might also be worthwhile trying the railmaster.ini modification as documented in the last post within the locked "Railmaster: Setting Up & Getting Started" thread. Ignore the reference to W10 in the title. See page 33 of the 1.64 RM user guide manual. I'm referring to the reference to Alternative comms & Check controller lines.

[GWR Greg]

I have all the relevant settings correct. But this "green" light issue is a problem. I have had instances where a derailment nearly occurred because a command was ignored by my elink. I understood others were experiencing this problem and this was known to HRMS.

[Hairy]

I had the same problem last night, running win10 and up to date rm software and up to date elite firmware.

I restarted rm to see if it would cure the problem, but got a message that I was using elite settings and that rm had detected that I was using an elink!!!! Very strange as I am definitely using my elite controller, elink is firmly screwed down under my inglenook shunting puzzle layout.

So using the standard I.T. support procedures I restarted rm again, and all seems ok.

Will test over the weekend if I get the time.

Chris

[Fishmanoz]

I'm surprised HRMS didn't first invoke Rule 1, which states first download the latest version from the link at the top of the RM forum and upgrade over your existing version, no matter how short or long it is since you last did that.

 

Now go to the top locked thread in the RM forum titled Setting Up and Getting Started, scroll to the bottom post titled Windows 10 (ignore the title, it covers all versions) and make sure your ini file contains the two lines mentioned there and they are correctly set for your setup.

 

Did that help?

[Nick_]

This may or may not help, but if you have one try using a different USB cable to connect your eLink to your PC.

[96RAF]

I had the wrong controller flag (elink vs elite) at startup a long time ago and it was supposedly fixed.

 

I cant remember if it was a software fix by update or a procedural one in that I was told to fiddle with settings, delete a particular file, etc  - at least I havent seen it again.

 

Fishy's suggestion to look at the .ini file may be the answer.

[Mobileadam]

Hello from the OP. 

 

Sorry the delay in offering my thanks - I'm only allowed to post 3 times a day as a new user!

 

Anyway, after some further testing I found I could reproduce the problem if I pressed the loco stop / pause button 7 to 10 times in very quick succession. 

 

So, I spent a painful day upgrading to Windows 7 which left me with finding drivers to get the Serial USB to appear - eventually RM was back online and the exact same problem occurred using my testing example. 

I then tried Chris's suggestions for the Alternative Comms and Check Controller, my settings were both set to 1. I'm not sure if they are paired together or dependant on each other but I tried changing both to 0 and re-tested with great success.  I can issue lots of rapid commands with no stuck green light, infact it hardly appears. 

I tried changing the Check Controller back to 1 but then had problems getting RM to work. if I change both back to 1 I can use RM but my original problem occurs. So, I have a solution but not sure why it works. Thanks for all the help. 

 

I apologise for no clear paragraphs but the forum seems to lose my blank lines after I'be used them on my phone. Is there some way I can enter the required HTML to make my posts more readable?

[Chrissaf]

Adam,

.

To get clear paragraph spacing

.

As I have reproduced here in this reply

.

Just put TWO consecutive 'carriage returns'.

.

The first 'carriage return' is stripped out by the forum software, leaving one behind.

.

My personal work around, purely optional, is to place a full stop at the start of the blank line where I want the paragraph gap to be. Not strictly needed, but I have just got into the habit of doing it that way, as I can then see in the editing where the blank line will appear.

.

PS - there is no hard and fast rule regarding making these two .INI lines =0 or =1

In principle 0 is correct for Windows XP, Vista & 7 and 1 is correct for Windows 8.x & 10

 

........at the end of the day, whichever settings work best in your particular set up are the correct values.

[Mobileadam]

Following on from this post - with my recent .ini file changes to ensure Alternative Comms and Check Controller are both set 0, I now no longer get the Short Circuit error message in RM. I can get the message if I change both settings back to 1, but then I get the freezing problem! If I change just Check Controller to 1 then I get a cycle of error messages from RM saying it can't connect to eLink (although it can as between the messages I can issue commands). 

 

I would love to know how the two settings influence the code of RM, why doesn't Check Controller = 1 have the same behaviour / routine regardless of the Comms method? These settings seems tied together but I don't know how.

 

Basically I need the reliability of Alternative Comms = 0 and the short circuit protection of Check Controller = 1. (I have tried removing the Check Controller line from the ini. file but I get the same cycle of error messages with RM upon startup). Logged with HRMS.

[GWR Greg]

Modileadam. Have you received a reply from HRMS? Does the problem still happen? I certainly still have this issue when using the throttle either small or large. I am on Windows 10 so Alt Coms & Check Cont must be 1 or RM does not function correctly. Anyone else experiencing the green status light saying on?

[Nick_]

I sometimes get the green light stuck on for a good ten  seconds or so. It often seems to occur in association with the bug where you've down-clicked on the small throttle bar, moved the throtte to the desired position and then up-clicked and then moving the mouse off the throttle causes the throtte to continue to move up or down for a while. I wonder if this generates a huge queue of throttle commands to be sent to the eLink which is why the green light stays on. 

I'm using Windows 7 with Check Controller=1 and without Alt Comms (so I guess Alt Comms is defaulting to 0). Short circuit protection works with the dialog box beig displayed as expected.

[GWR Greg]

HRMS replied to a question I raised on this matter as follows. Check all the recommended settings are correct. Done all correct. Then either the elink has a fault or the computer. Used a different computer and same green light sticking. HRMS say then the elink USB is at fault and is not able to cope with the data speed. HRMS suggest returning it to Hornby for testing and fixing/replacing.

[96RAF]

I have had similar unrelated suggestions from HRMS that did not accord with the question asked, thus totally ignored.

 

My best advice is to download the latest iteration of RM from the web page link, install, restart and try again To see if anything has changed.

 

There are many reported bugs in RM yet to be fixed, including the 'sticking to the mouse' throttle mentioned above and the second expanded throttle not working properly to stop a loco when scale speeds are selected, etc ad infinitum.

[Nick_]

I should have said, I am definitely using the very latest version of 1.64

[GWR Greg]

I have to say I believe the sticking green indicator is 'bug' not an elink fault as, beside those issues mentioned by RAF96, elink & RM work as they should.