Can't download the Railmaster software - RM_setup

[mikejj101]

Hi Augustus Caesar,

As I think I said in a previous post, I did actually manage to send a help request from 'within' Railmaster.

I filled in all the required details - Activation code, Pro activation, Remote device code, Full name and address etc....

I've heard nothing back apart from the automated response email.

I did another test by attempting to 'ping' the Railmaster server and was surprized that I could not get a response until I turned on the VPN? Once VPN was on the response time was really quick - see attached screen shot

Really strange?

[mikejj101]

A-C,

Forgot to mention that I've already checked my IP is not on any blacklists.

Mike

[mikejj101]

Two working days gone and still no response from Rail-Master support.

Not good!

[mikejj101]

Day three now and no response from Railmaster support

Why on earth is it so disconnected from the Hornby website ?

Surely it should have a direct link from this website to the Railmaster support.

Keep waiting then.

[mikejj101]

I've just reformatted my old Dell laptop with Windows 7 and will only run Railmaster on there - if I ever get it running again.

Proper annoyed with the support system for Railmaster.

[Chrissaf]

Why on earth is it so disconnected from the Hornby website ?

 

 

My understanding is:

RailMaster has the Hornby brand name on it via license in name only. RailMaster was developed by a completely separate and independent organisation now called HRMS (Hornby RailMaster Support). HRMS was previously known as "Invicto Systems Ltd". The 'Invicto' company no longer exists and its core business was writing a shop till 'point of sale' software system. Based upon a 'press report' I read on the Internet back in 2013. The owner of Invicto Systems [Richard Prokop at that time] wrote the original RM application and got Hornby to take an interest in it as a product in a joint collaboration. Invicto Systems Ltd was a very small software company run by Richard virtually single handed.

Hornby no longer sell RailMaster as a 'stand alone' product. R8144 [RailMaster on CD] has been discontinued. RM is still bundled by Hornby with the eLink controller hardware, but for how long is anybodies guess [perhaps only as long as current stocks last]. Hornby never ever provided any first line support to RM. Support was always provided by Invicto Systems that is now HRMS. All monies generated by RM software [i.e main RM application licenses and PRO license upgrades], now go directly into HRMS coffers via a within RM payment system. Hornby do not get any of this generated revenue stream and as purchase of new licenses dimmish, then I suspect there is less revenue to fund ongoing development of the product [this development statement is just my personal assessment and opinion of the situation, and not based upon any known fact insider information]. Given all this background information, it is not surprising that there is little emphasis with regard RM and RM support on the Hornby website.

[mikejj101]

Thanks for the info Chris.

Your explanation makes it clear that it's probably time for me to think long and hard about an alternate DCC control system. I can appreciate now why it takes so long to get a response from the support system.

Hopefully I can get it working again for the time being as I've got a whole setup based on it.

Thanks Chris.

[Chrissaf]

Personally, I would still consider your IP communications issues as being suspect. As well as the IP address blocking as previously discussed, there have also been many instances reported on the forum where HRMS have responded to the 'help request' system, but messages have failed to be received by the user. In those instances, Hornby Customer Care have acted as the 'middleman' to pass forward the messages from HRMS to the end user. HCC do publish a telephone number to access a Hornby person who has access to HRMS. This number is the published 'Technical Services' telephone number.

In my experience I have always found HRMS very responsive to help requests, and there have been feedback reports on the forum from members who have even had contact from HRMS outside normal office hours and on Bank Holiday days as well.

So the fact that you have not yet had any contact indicates to me that you still have a core communications issue to resolve.

If you do contact 'Technical Services' be sure to tell them about your 'help request' attempts and IP address blocking experiences, asking them to contact HRMS on your behalf.

[Sydney_railer]

 

 

I've been trying for a few days but the site rail-master.com hangs.

Getting a "This site can't be reached" error

Please help

 

 

Moderator message: I have removed most of your post because you had copied a long reply from Chris above. Please do NOT use the Blue Button to reply. Just scroll to the bottom of the page a type your reply in the white box.

[RDS]

@Sydney_railer

I am not surprised you cannot get anything on the web address you have posted above. That is not the correct address to download the RM software.

The correct address was posted on this thread by Chrissaf (Page 1 at 13:14:45 on the 19th May 2021) and it works perfectly - I have just tried it.

[Chrissaf]

@Sydney_railer

What AV software are you using?

What browser are you using for the download?

[Sydney_railer]

@Sydney_railer

What AV software are you using?

What browser are you using for the download?

 

 

I've just stumbled on a solution. I opened browser Microsoft Edge and rm_setup.exe downloaded first go. I still cant get it working on Chrome.

rgds

Simon

[Chrissaf]

Which is the very reason I asked you what browser you were using. Chrome was highlighted as an issue on Page 2 of this very thread.

In Chrome, instead of 'left clicking' the download link for RailMaster. Right click the download link and choose "Save link as". See screen shot below.

Choose where you want to save the file in the next Window that opens. Chrome will then open a dialogue box at the bottom of the page warning you that the file is deemed 'insecure content' but will also give you an option to override the security and save anyway. To see the 'Keep file' option click the 'down arrow' icon as 'Discard' is displayed by default. A bit of a faff in Chrome, but this described method works every time. You can also see the 'Keep file' option if you open the Chrome 'Download Status' page after using the 'Save link as' option above. See screen shot below:

[SmarTrains]

Hi All, long time no post...

I went to download the latest RM setup file today to update after a few years not touching it, and found it has been marked as a virus by both Microsoft Edge and Windows Defender, and not just a suspected virus, but that it specifically contains the Trojan:Win32/Zloader.DHA!MTB threat. This occurs regardless of the direct HRMS location or those additional Mega NZ links.

This will cause a number of people issues in downloading the new setup file, including download timeouts and being blocked even if it does.

You can override this in Micrsoft Edge, but for Windows Defender (and frankly being an IT professional - I do not agree with anyone here who tells you to disable firewalls and anti-virus), you can allow the file manually.

What concerns me the most is that this is publicly available commercial software. It should be properly signed with a security certificate, and in addition, free from viruses.

This is rather amateurish, and I still can't believe it's going on all these years later.

[96RAF]

I suggest you tell that to HRMS and see what they have to say about it. I am sure the lack of a sign off has been discussed on this forum long time ago.

[Fishmanoz]

While I haven’t tried it, it looks to me the posts above in this thread have a range of solutions?

[Augustus Caesar]

The setup file is not contaminated by any virus. The problem lies in that certain strings of data used in the file is falsely detected by certain av programs that search for particular data strings which match their definition files. This is NOT unusual. Nor is it the fault of the authors of RM and Hornby. What you are getting is a false positive and as an IT pro this should be known. It is not exclusive to RM software by any stretch. It is the av detection routines that cause the issue.

I am an IT pro myself involved in all aspects of the field since the mid eighties and wrote a few programs years back when this kind of thing was regular. Even Defender is guilty of this false positive detection on a regular basis.

Firewalls have no influence on this issue and disabling av software is not necessary either.

[P-Henny]

Followed the link to re-download the Railmaster setup and it keeps timing out.

Anyone know why I can't download it?

 

 

I know the OPs original question above dates from May 2021, but as a result of the recent post that resurrected this old thread I have some additional and potentially relevant info to add for future readers of this thread.

When I saw the recent resurrection post, I tried to download the setup file from the Railmaster site and just like the original OP's post, I got the 'time outs' on any and all my devices (PC, Laptop and Tablet). In all other respects, my Broadband was working fine i.e. email & general web browsing etc. After checking all the obvious things on my devices, I logged out of my ISP Router and logged into my next door neighbours Wi-Fi broadband (with his permission using the Wi-Fi PW he provided me with). The Railmaster setup file then downloaded normally on all my devices without making any adjustments to any of my device settings. This indicated to me that the issue was with my Broadband. I powered everything down. Router and devices and rebooted first the router then booted my devices in turn to find that normal communication and Railmaster setup file download was restored. This is the second time (many months apart) where I have had to reboot my router to restore Railmaster setup file access. I deduce that there must be a DNS or other data cache in my router that gets corrupted and cleared by the reboot. Strangely, I have never had this issue with any other website download that then subsequently required a router reboot to fix.

[goor]

Hi Guys,

I am new to Hornby and as much as I love the idea of DCC and software running my sets I cannot believe how bad the software and security around it is.

I have 20 years of IT experience and it took me hours to get 10 year old Railmaster with eLink system installed and running on my Windows 11 laptop.

I am proud of myself that I managed to win the battle with getting software transferred from CD to my laptop, getting it installed, activated, eLink disconnected mode fixed, and my locos running. I spent a lot of time looking through posts on this forum and I greatly appreciate help this community provides, especially Chrissaf.. what a legend!

Now I am posting in here as I am still trying to get the version of Railmaster updated to 1.74.5 as the self update only goes as far as 1.74.0

As someone posted already the application installer is available for download from unsecure http site and is blocked by modern browsers and Windows defender.

I am just wondering how is this possible that in 2022, year of ransomware attacks, that we have reputable companies like Hornby making users accessing unsecure sites, disabling security features like antivirus or firewall, downloading and installing unsigned software.

It costs peanuts to get the issues addressed, so why is this going on?

I refuse.. I will rather run outdated buggy version..

[96RAF]

Big Error - using the CD which is definitely several years if not over a decade out of date, as are the drivers on it.

The forum advice is always to download the very latest version from this site ignoring Windows false alerts - but not until after you have connected the eLink and allowed Windows to load the correct drivers. If you load the software before the controller then you get the wrong drivers which causes no end of problems.

The download false alert has recently been explained on this forum by our IT Guru Augustus Caesar who wrote the exemplary RM help site accessed from the sticky post linked at the top of site. It is common to see these flags when downloading such files. I see it all the time on my PC, with special handling required to get round Windows over zealous traps. MS trying to flog us an unnecessary safety certificate at a cost which is a lot more than pennies.

Only then should you start faffing about, else you end up in all sorts of trouble.

If you hover over the bottom RH corner of the screen at the version you will see the exact rev state pop up.

[Augustus Caesar]

@P-Henny

It's not just specifically your BT router that is causing the issue and requiring a reboot. It's all routers. They all have caching issues which, when this problem occurs, is usually just put down to the site visited having the problem.

Of course this is mostly due to the end user not being knowledgeable enough to be able to blame the router.

Some sites don't help either and routers can easily be convinced to throw a tantrum.

A simple restart of your router cures the caching issue and this can occur purely at random.

Some routers fail on more than one site when this happens and, again, it is random. Some users will say this has never happened to them... but it will have. My own router, top end business model from Draytek, does it, rarely, so that tells you something.

AC