rtraincollector posted:BOB WALKER posted:What we are all experiencing is a tremendous amount of innovation in train control. It would be hard to classify LionChief as an entry level product line since it's the technically most sensible way to remotely control a train.
I disagree with your thought as the most technically sensible way to control a train. To me the most technically way to control a train was either TMCC or Legacy. But they had to take that out of the equation ( for reasonable priced trains) ( my point of view they make more profit by doing so, from Lionchief and lionchief+ ) Ever notice, to have a engine you can run in conventional, you have to go out and buy a Lionchief +. That they do not come in sets. ( or didn't, I haven't kept up with it as feel technically they took us backwards, As before I could run up to 98 different engines off of one remote. Now I think it's 5 before you have to reprogram/buy another controller to run that 6th engine you have. But for some strange reason ( or because it was forced on us ) Most jumped for joy with it. And gee all I had to do was connect one wire from the base to the U/outside rail and the two wires from the power source to the track.
But for you and the rest who enjoy reverse technology ( and that is actually it is ) more power to you, and enjoy. I'm glad your happy with it.
TLDR version: Saying LC/+ is worse tech than TMCC is like saying a Lamborghini Huracán is inferior to a golf cart because the person driving the Lambo decided to drive it at 1MPH after taking the wheels off.
While I've gone into this on many other posts we can rehash it here again. While TMCC and Legacy allow you to do more things than LC/+ that is not the fault of the underlying technology. TMCC and Legacy both use the same method to exchange information between trains and the control system; a 455KHz radio signal propagated through the air from your house's wiring. This was an amazing technology when it was introduced to the public as the x10 system for home automation back in the 1970's allowing wireless control of lamps and security alarms, however it has many drawbacks the have been eliminated by modern digital radio systems. Lionchief/+ in it's current form uses what's known as BLE, or BlueTooth-Low-Energy. This is a two-way digital signal on the 2.4GHz band. Bluetooth is a proprietary system designed to allow two devices to stare real-time data, most often used to stream audio for wireless headsets and speakers. it uses very good error correction and is very easy to implement with off the shelf parts which makes it ideal for things like LC/+ engines. The connection between the Legacy remote and the Legacy base works in a similar fashion, however with a simpler data protocol with out all the benefits of a well designed protocol like Bluetooth. The underlying tech of this is the 2.4GHz digital signal which is the same thing Wifi is built on as well. It's hard to say that wifi, providing the entirety of the internet to your computer, is a downgrade from TMCC. Bluetooth is actually a more complex system than Wifi.
The reason TMCC can do more is simply that the implementation was designed to do more. Remember that everything you can do on that Legacy remote is happening through an older, less advanced 2.4GHz standard than even the most basic LionChief engine uses. The design for LC was a simple remote with a couple functions so it was east to use, but that doesn't change that the actual technology is far, far, more advanced than what is used in any other system.
All of TMCC's abilities comes down to being able to send a one way transmission of a number from 0 to 65536, that's 16 on/off switches. 16 bits of data. Legacy adds about twice as many bits of data to the mix, plus a couple special cases where they future-proofed the system to allow larger transmissions of data. In general, however, legacy sends 2 to 4 bytes of data for a command. In computer talk, 1 letter typed on the screen is 1 byte of data, so all that amazing stuff TMCC does is really just 2 letters, while legacy is 3 or 4... and it is one way communication. The engines cant report back to the system. LC/+ on the other hand, sends 32 bytes of information at a time, checks to see if there are any errors, and can talk back to the controller if it wants to. it is a vastly more powerful system...and the same one all modern wireless communication is built on.
Sorry for the mild rant, but it bugs me when folks confuse implementation with ability.
