Railmaster and iPad

[Chrissaf]

Hi everyone,

I’m looking for a wee bit help with setting up railmaster on my iPad. I have read the manuals but I’m none the wiser. Is there a guide for dummies on this anywhere?? 

[Chrissaf]

I have never installed and set up a 'Hand Held' for RailMaster and I don't own an iPhone or an iPad ... so I can't do my normal type RailMaster 'how to' reply and write a custom 'dummies guide' for you.

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I have not seen and I am unaware of the existence of any such 'dummies guide'. This does not mean that one does not exist, I'm just not aware of anything of that nature on this Hornby website or forum.

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But I did recently (7 days ago) provide some guidance to someone setting up an iPhone for the first time to enable the poster to get over the first hurdle which was to set up the IP Addressing that is a pre-requisite to getting the Hand Held installed and working. I can't see that there is much difference between an iPhone and an iPad. Once that poster got over the initial hurdle I helped him with, he seemed to manage the rest of the setting up to achieve a working system himself with very little effort .... follow my posted link at the end of the linked thread below for the final bit of the jigsaw.

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Anyway, you can review this recent previous post here:

https://www.hornby.com/uk-en/forum/iphone-as-handset/?p=1/#post-327156

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[Sumplug]

Hi thanks for think much appreciate. I will give it ago and let you know how it went 

[Chrissaf]

ADDENDUM to my last reply.

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I have read the manuals but I’m none the wiser.

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I have just taken the opportunity to review the manual, and for me (with my IT background) I found it very clear indeed. But I can see why it would confuse others.

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The two pages in the manual that I can assist with are reproduced below:

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/media/tinymce_upload/2849d1d868a1accdb3379498c0b00761.jpg

/media/tinymce_upload/164fd0882e1b26a3fd3e4b18a4009770.jpg

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Once you get to the screen reproduced on Page 41 of the manual (first image above). Look for the bluish button (highlighted in yellow) and click it. This should take you to the screen shown on Page 42 of the manual (lower image above).

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This is the screen where you have to enter the IP Address that your RailMaster PC / Laptop is using as mentioned in the text highlighted in yellow.

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Note: The IP Address of your RailMaster PC / Laptop is what the APP is calling the "Server IP Address" and your RailMaster IP Address goes in the box at the top on the right hand side just under the bluish 'Back' button.

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In order to find out what IP Address your RailMaster PC / Laptop is using. Refer back to my other thread 'linked to' in my original reply above.

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I have replicated the applicable part of that thread below:

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To display the IP address currently being used on your W10 RailMaster PC / Laptop .

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1. In the bottom left task bar search box, type CMD
2. In the search results list, click 'Command Prompt' at the top of the list.
3. In the DOS 'Command Prompt' Window that opens, type IPCONFIG followed by 'enter' or 'return'.

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Look for the line IPv4 Address ....... 192.168.xxx.yyy where xxx and yyy are the sub-network and host octets for your particular PC / Laptop home network.

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Once you identify this IP Address, enter it into the iPad APP and continue with the guidance in the manual.

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Note that the manual instructions state clearly that RailMaster must be running on the RailMaster PC / Laptop

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Note also all the comments in my 'linked thread' about how the RM / PC automatically gets its address using DHCP. So if you do not configure a 'fixed address' for your RailMaster PC / Laptop then your IP Address is liable to change over time and the APP will stop working until the IP Address is edited in the APP to match again with the one used by your RailMaster PC / Laptop.

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EDIT: As an alternative to using the 'Command Prompt' (IPCONFIG) method to find your RailMaster PC IP Address described above. You can find this information from within the RailMaster application itself, by hovering your mouse cursor over one of the small oblong green boxes in the bottom right next to the clock. The image (example) below demonstrates. As I don't use a Hand Held, my IP Address is not a 'Static' address, but one assigned via DHCP.

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Note that your IP Address will almost certainly be different to mine displayed in this example.

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/media/tinymce_upload/602708014d4746a985202c537e5c3be7.jpg

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[stewart_jones]

Hi, sorry to jump on the back of this post from 2 months ago, but my question follows directly on from your reply Chrissaf.

The problem I am having is I cannot for the life of me get the app to use or remember the IP address of my railmaster PC.  As soon as I start the app it tries to connect to the default 192.168.0.1, so I click on the settings, type in the IP address of my railmaster PC, click the restart button but it just goes right back and tries to connect to 192.168.0.1.  

I have the latest version of RM open and running on my laptop, and my iPad has the latest iOS.  I have tried everything I can think of.  I have removed the app from my homepage, deleted my browsing history, cleared the cache, re-installed the app but the exact same thing every time.

I tried with my iPhone and it worked first time and it remembers my railmaster PC IP, but the iPad just doesn't do it.  I tried with my wifes iPad and exactly the same thing - it only wants to connect to 192.168.0.1 and ignores the IP I give it.

I emailed RM support and the response I got was "you simply type in your Railmaster PC IP into the app settings".  Yes, I know that... but the app won't use/remember the IP !

Any ideas?

Many thanks.

[Chrissaf]

As I said, in my original reply I don't use these APPS and I don't own either an iPhone or an iPad.

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I have no personal experience to draw upon.

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RailMaster support have only told you what I would have said, which is you open the APP settings page and adjust the settings there using the 'blue' button as highlighted in my ADDENDUM reply directly above your post.

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Sorry ... If I had a solution for you I would offer it ... but not knowing anything at all about Apple products does not help.

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But just in case it gives me a clue .... answer me these three questions.

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1. What is the IP Address that RailMaster reports that it is using? [Hover the cursor over the green box as shown in my last image in my previous post]
2. What is the IP Address that you are typing into the iPad APP?
3. Does it match the same address displayed hovering over the green box? [but with the caveats documented below].

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Also, when you type the IP Address into the iPad APP settings screen ... do not include the :xx where xx is a two digit number. This :xx is shown as :50 in my example image in my previous ADDENDUM reply.

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A valid IP Address takes the form AAA.BBB.CCC.DDD

[Note that you do not need to show leading zeros, so 003 is written as 3 this is why my IP address syntax above shows four blocks of three letter characters. Each block of numbers for an IP Address have a valid range between 001 and 254 but 001 to 099 are written as 1 to 99]

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It may be that the reason your iPad APP is reverting back to the default address is because you are not typing in an IP Address with the correct syntax or you have added the :xx on the end when you shouldn't have done.

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Also the separator between the four IP Address numbers needs to be a full stop also termed a period [ . ] with no spaces, not any other character such as a comma [ , ] or a colon [ : ] etc.

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I am assuming that the address you are using is correct, valid and typed in correctly else it wouldn't work with the iPhone. But just humour me in answering my three questions above.

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TIP: As a relatively newbie poster on the forum, just be aware that the 'Blue Button with the White Arrow' is not a 'Reply to this post' button. If you want to reply to any of the posts, scroll down and write your reply in the reply text box at the bottom of the page and click the Green 'Reply' button.

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See also – further TIPs on how to get the best user experience from this forum.

https://www.hornby.com/uk-en/forum/tips-on-using-the-forum/

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[stewart_jones]

Thanks for taking the time to reply Chris.

 

Why is it as soon as you post a question it suddenly starts working!  I’ve spent the last few days searching forums trying to find the answer to this before posting, but now I have it.

 

Okay, so the Apple settings screen looks slightly different to the image in the manual above which at first I thought might be from an Android device, but it does say ”we shall use Apple iPad in this example”, so maybe it’s just an out of date image.  Anyway, the current (latest) settings screen has 2 buttons next to each other. One is a ‘back’ button and one is ‘restart’ button, whereas the image above only has the ‘back‘ button.

 

After updating the IP address I was clicking ‘restart’, assuming this would save the changes and restart the app whereas ‘back’ would ignore my changes and just exit the setting screen. Turns out it’s the complete opposite! Back saves the changes and restarts, but restart just exits. Maybe ‘save and exit’ and ‘exit‘ would be better button names.....

I‘m sure I tried both buttons before and it made no difference, but there you go.  I probably just got lucky on the iPhone and hit ’back’ by mistake given the buttons are next to each other and the screen is smaller.

Connects perfectly now, the only odd thing is it only shows me the full screen (controller for 2 locos and a track plan with point control) after I rotate my device 180 degrees (so it’s still landscape). If I continue 180 degrees back to landscape i get track plan only. Both portrait orientation is track plan only, which is fair enough. Anyway, not the end of the world, just strange why I don’t get ‘full screen’ in both landscape positions.

Thanks again for replying.  

[Chrissaf]

The additional information you provided about the two buttons will help others, so not a wasted post.

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Regarding the switching between plan and throttles, this previous thread might help. It was written for an iPhone so I assume 'same or similar difference'.

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https://www.hornby.com/uk-en/forum/exetersteam-has-a-question-about-using-his-iphone-app-with-railmaster/

 

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[Kevin Hodges]

 The main issue I found was fiddling around with my static IP settings inevitably screwed up my laptops internet settings etc. A total pain.

 

I gave up in the end and have since gone back to DC.

 

Kev.

[Somerset Modeller]

Kev

If you create a static IP just on your computer and don't reserve it on the router you will have issues with other devices being given the same address.

Best option is to reserve the IP address against the mac address on the router and your PC will always be given the same IP address. And other devices will never be given that IP address.

[Kevin Hodges]

 Hi Somerset Modeller,

 

Thanks all the same, but I think I'll leave well alone 😬

 

Kev.