eLink internet connection

[goodsvan]

A week ago the internet confirmation light (top right hand side of screen) failed to light up. I have Norton protection on my pc, so I contacted them and their help desk spent around two hours going through their system with us and confirmed that it was not their system preventing the Hornby link-up. The internet works perfectly well with other systems without any problems. Has anyone else had this problem?

[96RAF]

From your initial statement it appears that this used to work but does not work now. Is that correct.

It is RM that handles internet connection, not eLink which is just a dumb control box that passes RM commands to the track - no internet involved.

Have you checked that your AV and firewall are set to allow RM access, despite the help desk fiddling with your PC.

[Yelrow]

I have used norton for last 20 years. It has never blocked, or interfered with Railmaster. I am with RAF, taint a norton problem.

[Chrissaf]

In principle, Internet connection issues with RM is the number one most raised issue with regard anything related to RM. However, Internet issues that are raised on this forum are usually related to first time RM installations or transfers from one PC to another. They rarely get raised as issues after a period of working normally as you indicate as being your case.

Did this coincide with any recent Windows updates. From Microsoft's point of view, Hornby RailMaster is considered not to be trusted. This seems to be because RM is written as an XP application and all the security certificates have expired. Maybe a 'Windows Update' has changed something to break RM's access to the Internet. If not a 'Windows Update' was there a Norton AV update'. I do find Norton Security to be an overly aggressive Anti-Virus package and it seems that most aggressive AV applications seem to have problems running with RM.

That said, I run my RM on a fully patched Windows 10 Laptop running the latest version of RM with all currently available Windows Updates installed and my RM Internet icon is green and normal and shows the 'Internet Active' pop-up when hovering the mouse cursor over it [just this minute fired up my RM laptop to check].

There was a time when I was an advocate of using Norton products, but once Peter Norton sold the brand name to Symantec Corporation I have lost faith in the later product ranges and find that some Norton [symantec] branded products can cause more problems than than they are worth. I notice that Symantec Corporation has now been rebranded again to NortonLifelock Inc. The early Norton products were very good and gave very little trouble.

The Norton products usually include a Windows Firewall replacement. I find in general that AV provided firewalls seem to give RM the most grief.

[goodsvan]

@96RAF

Yes that is correct. The firewall and AV was disabled to check but made no difference. We found Norton were very helpful and we have been with them for twelve years or more, and are very satisfied with their service.

[96RAF]

@goodsvan

You should be able to look in your AV and Firewall settings to see if RM is definitely listed as an exception. Disabling AV and Firewall does not guarantee a free passage, although I would have thought their remote help would have taken the necessary steps to list RM correctly.

As Chris says has there been any recent update (Win or Norton) to override previously good settings.

You could of course ask HRMS to do a remote login and see if they can configure things for you. They have helped many others with similar problems.

[goodsvan]

A big thanks to all those people who responded to my request for help.

Good Van