Pete Dowson

Unless there's some weird hardware problem on one of them, I can only suggest two things to try: 1. Upgrade PC2's operating system from Win98 to WinXP. 2. Try a USB-Serial adapter on one or both machines, instead of using the inbuilt serial ports. You'd be bypassing whatever drivers for the hardware that may be messing things up. As choice (2) is a deal cheaper and quicker than (1) (you can pick up USB serial connectorrs quite cheap these days), I'd say try that first. Regards, Pete

I'm assuming "Alert Pro" is some sort of program which uses FSUIPC? Have you checked with the author or publisher's support? If you want me to look, please first try again, then close FS and show me the FSUIPC.LOG file you will find in the FS Modules folder. Regards, Pete

No, it's really never been mooted. The throttle systems I know are pretty linear, on purpose I think so that it is easy to preset specific thrust needs. It sounds like the modelling of the aircraft you are using is a bit off if there's little adjustment possible in the low end. However, I'll add the request to my list. I'm afraid it won't be done immediately. Regards, Pete

Oh, I see. Well, you should be able to calibrate it well. Mayke sure you get a good centre, and take care to have FS's own rudder trim centred too. Yes. The only adverse affect it could possibly have is a slight slow down in the response rate. That's inevitable with any digital filter system as it needs to wait (delay) for several samples to operate. If you are flying fighters or performing aerobatics, then you might want the filtering off. Otherwise you won't notice. Regards, Pete

You have a rudder control represented by two buttons? That is equivalent to trying to control rudder from the keyboard!? If I were you I'd give that up and set the "auto-rudder" option on in FS. Until you get a proper analogue rudder (i.e. pedals), you are really doing yourself no favours. ErFSUIPC cannot calibrate rudders operated by button presses. Only those input from proper axes. When it is checked it applies a mild digital filter on that input. This simply attenuates changes (read "smooths out jitter") faster than a certain frequency, which I cannot remember off-hand. It works quite well with joysticks with dirty pots or bad power supplies. It won't make any difference with good inputs. Regards Pete

That's okay then. In that case the problem obviously lies with IVAP. Sorry, but this offset is a private one allocated to Squawkbox 3. FSUIPC itself does nothing with it. If the value is changing as you require, then that is the job done as far as FSUIPC is concerned. The rest is completely up to Squawkbox. Sorry, I have no idea. This is a question for them. I do not even have the program in question. I do not fly on-line. Sorry. Regards, Pete

Ah, so it is from a program you are trying to do this. It is easier to help once I know! :-) Can you check that your program is actually working correctly first, please. Use the facilities provided -- Logging options page, enable IPC Write logging and check from the log that your program is working. You can also use the FSUIPC Monitoring (right-hand side of the Logging options page). Just set 7B91 as the offset as type U8 and see if your program changes it. If it doesn't, then you have a problem in your program. If it does, then the rest is up to the program that is reading that offset. Squawkbox? Regards, Pete

Yes, if you want to. Why not? Are you writing a program for this, or do you just mean programming a key or button? If the latter simply go to FSUIPC's Keys or Buttons options (ALT M F, select appropriate Tab), and use the facilities provided. The "Offset" controls are all listed in the drop down. Choose the appropriate one (probably "Offset Byte Set") set the offset (x7b91) and the parameter value (0 or 1). If you are writing a program to do this you need the FSUIPC SDK from http://www.schiratti.com/dowson. Regards, Pete

This is because all the FS "sensitivity" does is reduce the effect of your joystick, cutting its range. That is not really what you want. Just adjust the slope -- choose the one that suits you best. The "S" shaped responses available provide full range still, but with less sensitivity (more movement for less effect) near the centre, but more sensitivity (less movement for more effect) towards the outside, so you can still achieve full deflections. Using the correct slope for your joystick should mean you can use a much smaller central dead" zone - in fact try it with none at all to start with. Yes, of course. You seem to have missed this whole facility in FSUIPC, one of the most important to get the best from your joystick/yoke. :wink: Regards, Pete

If you've already got some code and it isn't working, would you like to show it so that I can see if it's anything obvious? I'd rather do that than try to write the code for you. If you don't want to show it to everyone here, send it privately to petedowson@btconnect.com (but please don't use my email address otherwise, it gets pretty overloaded). Regards, Pete

Oh, right. So a real save is a "Save As". Thank you. Pete

Sorry, I don't understand? I was only trying to explain. Sorry, I still don't understand. What work-around? What is there to work-around? It's all pretty straight forward. There's no need for any work-around. Sorry I seem to have upset you somehow. I didn't understand your "real" adjective at all applied to this so I tried to explain what AutoSave does. For all I know you had some level D save in mind when you used that description. Oh. Did I misunderstand it that much that you didn't get the answer you needed? Apologies, if so. Regards, Pete

One of their big problems is few staff and many commitments. From the quality and variety of their product you'd be surprised (I was) at the small size of the company. Not only that, but it seems that a lot of the time the relevant guys are out at exhibitions and so on. When they are in they are pretty responsive -- Eric, the mainstay of the technical support side, works really hard and can be seen here in this Forum now and then. Hopefully he will actually see this thread and get back to you. Note that I too have to exercise patience at times: it can be days to a week or so before a response, on occasions. Regards, Pete

What's a "real" save? For add-ons to save files with their data when FS saves the main files, they have to detect this and do their part as well. The only "real" save in FS is the one MS provided. AutoSave calls the same routine in FS as you do when you press the ";" shortcut key and enter a name. All it is doing is choosing the name automatically. Other aircraft makers such as PSS certainly implement their saved files so they work -- their data files are saved when they see an FS flight being saved. AutoSave even manages the saved files for the PSS Concorde, provided it's the latest version, by deleting those when it deletes its own. If the Level D 767 doesn't detect these types of saves then I don't know how they are doing it, but whichever way it isn't the standard way and evidently isn't the best either from this point of view. I'm afraid you will have to seek further advice or support from them. Regards, Pete

Then there certainly must be something wrong in the Autoroute installation or settings. Pete

Sorry, no. I've replaced parts in PFC things myself -- they send the part with instructions, often with photos, to show you what to do. If it's the control board they mean (don't see why a panel would fail) then that's the electronic motherboard with all the main stuff on it. It is probably cheaper to replace the whole board rather than determine which specific component is at fault. I don't think you'd find it too hard to do, but you'll need the part sent over. Whereabouts are you in the UK? I might be able to help, but I don't travel. [Later] Oh, I see, way down south. That's unfortunate. [Later still ...] I just remembered that there was a stand at last year's Blackpool FS exhibition with loads of PFC gear on it, so someone in the UK most certainly does sell it and so may be able to service it. I'm sorry, but I don't recall the name at all. Maybe a web search will find them, or ask the Blackpool conference organisers. Regards, Pete

That looks completely right. There's something wrong with its settings then. There's no other possibility. Hypertermnal proves it. Anyway, try selecting only the GGA sentence in GPSout and making the interval 1000 (one second). Regards, Pete

I'm sure it doesn't say that. A key purchased for FSUIPC version 3 is valid for version 3 -- there's no time limit imposed, none whatsoever. No it isn't. The current version is 3.48. The version number 6.47 is of WideFS, which happens to have been going for several years longer than FSUIPC. Keys for version 6 of WideFS cover version 6 of WideFS, again with no time limit. Regards, Pete

AhI'm glad it is sorted. In that case you can ignore my reply to your other message. BTW it would be better to stay in thread than create a new subject and thread each time. Regards, Pete

I really don't think Simmarket would say that if the email address didn't work! Their attempt to send you the receipt wouldn't have worked. Please go back and fill in a problem ticket. There's really nothing I can do at all, I am not involved in the sales at all, only development and techincal support. What is much more likely is that they have not charged you for it because of the rejected email -- you would have no receipt. I'm surprised you have an order number even. How did you get that with the wrong email address? Regards, Pete

That looks a bit like the speed is wrong. Assuming GPSout is set for 4800 and hyperterminal is set for 4800 as well (and 8 bit no parity) then it appears as if your cabling is incorrect. That's the only thing left to go wrong really. Also, you say that hyperterminal is receiving this rubbish continuously? No gaps at all? Set the interval in GPSout to, say, 5 seconds (5000). Is it still continuous? If so, then it certainly isn't getting anything related to what GPSout is sending. Maybe the COM port you've identified is wrong, either end or both? You can check what is coming out to the serial port on the FS PC by using "PortMon" on that PC, a handy utility freely available from http://www.systeminternals.com. Try that so you can be sure -- run it before starting FS. Regards, Pete

First of all, try out various things using FSInterrogate rather than rewriting and recompiling programs. It will be much quicker and less error prone. FSInterrogate can write to any FSUIPC offset as well as read them all. Have you tried using any of the failure controls? The engine ones are at 0B6B, part of a list there. Another list appears at 3BD6. Regards, Pete

I haven't tried Autoroute for years (I don't have it now), but I seem to remember that the GPS part of it was an optional install, not part of the normal installation you got. I don't recall if the speed is adjustable either. As noted in the short text file in the GPSout Zip, the only NMEA sentence which AutoRoute 2001 seemed to recognise was GGA. Does the data look right? It should be all normal text data, one sentence per line, normally starting $GGA,or whatever sentence it was. If so then you need to double check how you've setup AutoRoute. Maybe there are other users here. Sorry I'm not much help with programs I don't have. Regards, Pete

FSUIPC isn't a hardware driver program. Frank's answer is correct. The best (most flexible) way for any input device is to get it recognised by Windows. Potentiometer circuits needs some sort of AtoD (analogue to digital) conversion first in any case. The only way you can directly connect analogue pots to a standard PC is via the old syle Game Port, which has almost disappeared. USB has become the replacement, but building the circuitry for a USB device is beyond anything I know. So if your friend doesn't know either, I think the best you can do is get a USB-to-Game Port adapter and use that. A standard game port supports only 4 axes and 4 buttons, so you'd need two. Aother alternative is to use a ready-made AtoD system like EPIC or one of the more recent hardware interfacing systems. There seem to be plenty around now --- ask in a cockpit building Forum. Once you have solved the actual connection problems, then either you have something which looks like a joystick input to Windows, so you can then calibrate in Game Controllers and thence use it in FS and FSUIPC, OR you just have something which a program can read values from, such as via a serial or parallel connection. In the latter case you could interface to FS via FSUIPC. You'd need to write a program to read the values from your AtoD device and send them to the appropriate parts of FS via the relevant "FSUIPC Offsets". To find out more about this alternative you need the FSUIPC SDK -- http://www.schiratti.com/dowson. If you use of of the proprietary interface devices (EPIC, FSBus, Phidgets, whatever) you should find that they provide the drivers which do the interfacing to FS/FSUIPC for you. You program them via paramters or internal programs to do just what you want. Regards, Pete

Ah. That says "for GPS only, not for use with other serial device" and "ends with male DB9 - connect to PC serial cable of your GPS ", so it may just work. Or it may have the read/write connections the wrong way round. If it does you'll still need a crossover ("null modem") cable to link from that to your PC. But try it first. The important part of it is the other end anyway -- the plug for your PDA. At the worst it would be possible to snip off the DB9 plug and fit your own with the correct connections. :wink: Good luck! Regards, Pete