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Success at last!

KerriganKerriganOGR Forum Member
For those who follow we folks usually lost in DCS upgrade land, you'll remember I've had a really bad time over the past year trying to do TIU and Remote software upgrades. The XP machine with multiple ports just would not let the MTH Loader program find any workable or usable ports. Then the new machine, with WIN7, wouldn't do anything right with the loader, especially trying to clone remotes. After days and days of messing around I finally did get one remote to clone, once.
So out of total frustration and just refusing to give up (after 40 years in IT,) I bought a literal junker IBM Thinkpad T20 with one port. No NIC, no USB, just one serial port. Upgraded the OS to XP SP2 and .Net 2.5. That took 4 hours.
Then I downloaded the new DCS Loader and all the 4.2 software from MTH.
Tonight I took it down to the trainroom and WHAM! Upgraded two TIUs and the other remote in less than 15 minutes!
Now we're flying with 2 remotes and 2 TIUs in Supermode, all running the latest 4.2!
Just needed to "get back to basics" and give up on the new computers and their fancy-dancey operating systems.
Good ole XP and T20 pull it off!
A very good couple of days.
Just goes prove Galaxy Quest was right: "Never Give Up; Never Surrender!"
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KerriganKerriganOGR Forum Member
Yes it is.
But, I couldn't get the old machine with XP to work. It had multiple ports, a USB card, etc., and the loader could not locate and attach to an active port.
Altering the BIOS etc didn't help.
Both the eMachine with WIN7-64, and the older box, wouldn't catch an active port.
But the very old laptop, with only one serial port, and nothing else, running XP Home version with SP2 installed, works great.
The loader was originally written a long time ago, and I'd guess the "new version" just has some code added to the base program to handle the expansions.
Old code works better on old machines with old operating systems, is my guess.
FM Former Member
quote:
Originally posted by Russell:
Dave;
Just a thought, Is your Win 7 a 64 bit Version?


I've successfully done remote and TIU upgrades on both 32 and 64 bit Win7. I have an i7 desktop with Win7-64 at home. At the NWTL I have a 32 bit version of Win7 running in Parallels on an 8 core Mac Pro. Both work great with older TIU's connected with Radio Shack USB/serial adapters and Rev. L's with either a serial adapter or USB.

quote:
The loader was originally written a long time ago, and I'd guess the "new version" just has some code added to the base program to handle the expansions.


Actually, V2.0 of the loader was a ground up re-write. That's when the loader moved to the .Net framework.
gsn1gsn1OGR Forum Member
Originally Posted by dave hikel:
quote:
Originally posted by Russell:
Dave;
Just a thought, Is your Win 7 a 64 bit Version?


I've successfully done remote and TIU upgrades on both 32 and 64 bit Win7. I have an i7 desktop with Win7-64 at home. At the NWTL I have a 32 bit version of Win7 running in Parallels on an 8 core Mac Pro. Both work great with older TIU's connected with Radio Shack USB/serial adapters and Rev. L's with either a serial adapter or USB.

quote:
The loader was originally written a long time ago, and I'd guess the "new version" just has some code added to the base program to handle the expansions.


Actually, V2.0 of the loader was a ground up re-write. That's when the loader moved to the .Net framework.

I have Win7-64 and a Radio Shack USB/serial adapter.  Where did you find the driver for WIN7.  The original disk only had 98, vista and XP?

KerriganKerriganOGR Forum Member

When I was successful I used the serial port, COM 1, and had told the loader to look there.  This time it can't find the TIU, either on automatic scan or being directed to COM 1.  The laptop only has the one serial port, and one USB port.  Now I can't get any of them to work I guess.

Tired it on two different TIUs which appear to be working normally on the layout.

Bummer as I would like to clone my remotes (as I did before), load a sound file (which I did two weeks ago on the GG1,) and update the Rev L TIU with the fix.

Now somehow I've stranded myself.

I also tried it on an eMachine on WIN 7 with the 64-bit loader, no joy.

Also tried the Radio Shack USB-Serial converter and it didn't work either.

Just can't figure out how I screwed it up ...

I even downloaded a fresh copy of the Loader and installed it, but it didn't seem to make any difference.

FM Former Member

Go into device manager and check that the native serial port is actually assigned to COM1 (it is possible from them to change on their own).  Assuming it is assigned to COM1, check the port settings.  They should be....

 

BAUD = 9600

Stop bits = 8

Parity = none

Flow Control = hardware

KerriganKerriganOGR Forum Member

I used the RS-232 port on the IBM ThinkPad T20, which worked fine as the laptop only has one serial port so when I told the Loader to use Port 1 it found the TIU right way. I only use this laptop for MTH upgrades, so this is the first time it was used since I loaded sound file into the GG1 and cloned a remote.

Can't figure out what may have changed.

Wondering if it's the TIU somehow that is the problem.

I'll try a factory reset tomorrow.

 

Originally Posted by dave hikel:

Hi Kerrigan,

 

Did you use the USB port or the RS-232 port?

 

Either way, was this the same as when you successfully updated?

 

Dave

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