FSUIPC Connection Failed

[Mark Teel]

Hi, Pete new to this forum.

First off let me say that it's awesome :cool: that you not only created this program, but also follow up with updates and help with problems and questions. Kudos to you my friend!

Now that I've buttered you up.....

Here is my issue. I have been using MSFSX, FSUIPC4 and FSXpand for almost a year now and have had no problem with everything working together. Recently I purchased 737PIC from FeelThere and installed it. Due to it being summer time and me being away, I didn't get a chance to actually try out this program for about three weeks, so when I returned from holidays, (like day before yesterday) I set it up and loaded MSFSX. As soon as I went to connect the FSXPand program, an error appeared.

"FSUIPC Connection failed: IPC request contains bad data."

Now, I'm not sure if it was the install of the 737PIC that has caused this error, or if something else on my system has created an issue with either the FSUIPC program, or the FSXpand program, but now it will not connect.

I went and un-installed the 737PIC program, thinking that that was the culprit, but the error has not gone away.

Let me list the proceedure that I usualy use when going to do a flight. I start both my computer systems, (main system for FSX and FSXPand, and then my secondary computer that runs all my guages on my MIP)

Then I load FSX

Then choose the 737, the pre-created flight, like CYVR to KSEA for instance. Then before I choose fly now, I start up FSXpand.

Once loaded, I choose "fly now" and I'm in the cockpit at the gate ready to start my pre-flight.

The error appears as soon as I start up FSXpand now.

Have you had any other issues with this combination of programs? Or have you heard from anyone having this error? I have read some forums on using FSWide or something and people were getting this error, but I don't use that so I'm not sure if it would be ths same issue as mine.

So, my questions are these:

1) Should I try a reinstall FSUIPC4 (which I have purchased a license for) and try it again? and if so can I reinstall this directly over the original version FSUIPC or do I have to uninstall the original version before I re-install it?

2) Could I need to re-install FSXpand? (which I also have a license for)

3) Should I upgrade to the latest release of FSUIPC and try that?

Sorry this is so vague, but I have not had any problems with these programs and truly love flying my sim but I cannot get my guages to appear on my MIP without some help.

Here are the specs of my systems:

1st system - main:

AND Quad Core 945 Black edition processor

Gigabyte 990XA-UD3 MB

16 OCZ gigs Ram

MSI 560TI OC Video card

Corssair 850 PS

running 3 Viewsonic LCD 19" monitors

OS- Win7 Home Premium Edition

2nd system - guages (MIP)

AMD dual core 3800 Processor

Asus MB

8 gigs of OCZ ram

Radeon HD 6770 Video card

Corrsair 650 PS

running 1-15 inch Viewsonic LCD screen and 1 - 19 Inch Acer LCD screen

OS - Windows Vista (I know......don't laugh!)

In any case, I have had 100% complete success and many hours of flying since I first started, but suddenly now my airline is grounded due to this technical issue. Any help you or anyone out there could supply with this error would be fantastic, as it's costing me thousands of passenger dollars having my 737 sittiing at YVR and not flying.

Thanks in advance and keep up the gredat job!

Sincerely,

Mark Teel

[Pete Dowson]

As soon as I went to connect the FSXPand program, an error appeared.

"FSUIPC Connection failed: IPC request contains bad data."

Assuming that program is reporting this correctly (it is code in the application program, not in FSUIPC, which does the checks), this is an extremely rare error. In fact I don't remember the last time I saw it. Somehow the data being passed across in the shared memory area is being corrupted. This can happen in a couple of ways I am aware of. One is having a multi-threaded program trying to use the connection to FSUIPC in more than one thread without taking precautions to synchronise use of the memory area, and the other is bad hardware -- failing memory chips.

Let me list the proceedure that I usualy use when going to do a flight. I start both my computer systems, (main system for FSX and FSXPand, and then my secondary computer that runs all my guages on my MIP)

I'm not clear on this. What drives the gauges on the second PC? Are you using WideFS as well?

Have you had any other issues with this combination of programs? Or have you heard from anyone having this error?

No. In fact I've never heard from anyone using FSXpand at all.

1) Should I try a reinstall FSUIPC4 (which I have purchased a license for) and try it again? and if so can I reinstall this directly over the original version FSUIPC or do I have to uninstall the original version before I re-install it?

Reinstalling the same version of FSUIPC does nothing, because if the existing version were corrupted it would say so and not run at all. I assume you've looked at the FSUIPC4 log file -- that's always the first place to look, that is what it is for!

You should of course always use the currently supported version, which is 4.852. If you are not using that already you should have upgraded before you came here.

And upgrading FSUIPC merely provides a replacement DLL module and updated documentation. Yu never uninstall anything and it doesn't affect your configuration.

2) Could I need to re-install FSXpand? (which I also have a license for)

No idea. You need to ask them. Maybe you are out of date with that?

3) Should I upgrade to the latest release of FSUIPC and try that?

You should always use the latest, especially if you want support. I cannot support old versions.

16 OCZ gigs Ram

16?!!! Phew! You could certainly try swapping out RAM chips then. Even 8 is well over what you need!

Pete

[Mark Teel]

Thanks for your assistance Pete. Here are some answers for you:

I'm not clear on this. What drives the gauges on the second PC? Are you using WideFS as well?

No. The guages run through the FsXpand program. It allows you to replicate the MIP guages on the original display to another display. If you look at my avatar, you will se my setup. The guages on the MIP that appear on the two screens below the three view screens above are created by the FsXpand program. The program uses the FSUIPC to drag the data displayed on the MIP on the flight sim to another set of screens. It's kind of like undocking the MIP displays and putting them on another screen somewhere else. The main computer runs the FsXpand program and the secondary computer runs the FsXpand client.

and the other is bad hardware -- failing memory chips.

I have run memory testing software on all of my memory strips in both computers and there are no errors, so I can safely say that this problem is not with the mermory in my systems.

You should of course always use the currently supported version, which is 4.852. If you are not using that already you should have upgraded before you came here.

Ok well I would have upgraded to the latest version first but was not exactly sure if I had to purchase the new version or if it was a free upgrade, and as well was not sure if I simply had to install the update over top of the existing version, or if I would have to uninstall the existing version first.

I will try a few of the things you suggested and let you know what I find.

For your information here is the link to where FsXpand is found. You should check it out and see what it is and does. It's quite a good program as well.

www.cockpitsolutions.com

Thanks again.

[Pete Dowson]

Ok well I would have upgraded to the latest version first but was not exactly sure if I had to purchase the new version or if it was a free upgrade, and as well was not sure if I simply had to install the update over top of the existing version, or if I would have to uninstall the existing version first.

There is a clear statement in the List of Supported Versions announcement (in the Announcements subforum) which will indicate that old versions are not supported. When you purchase as FSUIPC registration (which isn't necessary for FSXpand in any case) you purchase it for FS9 (or before) -- version 3 of FSUIPC -- or for FSX and later -- version 4 of FSUIPC. You do not purchase a specific release. That would make no sense, and you would lose support immediately the next version came out!

The installer simply installs the FSUIPC module and updated documentation. It changes nothing else. If you already have a later version installed it won't change it. It's simple and foolproof.

I will try a few of the things you suggested and let you know what I find.

Could it be down to performance? Is the frame rate good in FS? Possibly FSXpand has some limited timeout on its requests and insufficient retries (though if it is timing out it should detect and report that, not continue and attempt to use the bad data).

I suspect you will need the FSXpand support folks to look at your problem, because the error is occurring in their program, not in FSUIPC. However, do check the FSUIPC log file (in the Modules folder) in case it too is reporting problems. I can assist FSXpand in investigating the problem, but I cannot debug their code.

Pete

[Mark Teel]

Hey Pete,

Just to let you know that I have fixed this problem. I re-installed FSUIPC with the latest supported version and everything is now back working again.

Thanks for all you assistance on this. :smile:

Cheers,

Mark

[Pete Dowson]

Just to let you know that I have fixed this problem. I re-installed FSUIPC with the latest supported version and everything is now back working again.

Ok, glad it is sorted. Thanks for letting me know!

Pete