Hey guys, Finally home from travelling all over the bloody place for work this year, and trying to get some things done. Anyhow, wifey bought me a Digitrax SDN144PS today. Not sure HOW, since we were together the entire time. She works in mysterious ways sometimes. Got it installed into an N-scale Bachmann Class J 4-8-4 with no problems. Fired up Decoder Pro with the PR3. When I showed it to her, it was working no problems. It was reading values properly, and the Digitrax Sound Loader program was working. Fast forward an hour. I get the engine reassembled, and now Decoder Pro and the Sound Loader aren't seeing the locomotive on the track sometime. Checked and rechecked the connections thinking maybe one worked loose when I was shoehorning the decoder and friends into the tender, but they are all good. When Sound Loader does see it after multiple tries, it's showing the voltages bouncing around from 11-15v. I'm guessing that I need a booster for the programming track to keep things more consistent? Or should I be chasing down some other demon?
No booster is needed. I have programmed and installed this same decoder many times. The decoder will not read without a load from the motor. Assuming that you have no shorts anywhere, my question would be about the motor itself. Bad brushes, a dirty commutator, you may want to cheack it out. A resistor in place of the motor is a good way to test the decoder. 100 - 150 ohms is the one to use.
Gave that a try, but didn't change anything. edit: Forgot a couple of things. Was trying to get everything out of my head before I forgot the details. But the loco is brand new. Brand new as in I got it for Christmas last year, and have just now had time to do anything to it other than make sure it wasn't DOA when I received it. I scrubbed the living daylights out of the programming track (again) and that seemed to help a little bit. Everything looked perfect, and I managed to wipe the flash on the decoder, and when it was trying to put the new sound project on, got "unable to communicate with programmer" when trying to load the SDF portion. Then it decided to go into reverse at top speed and fly off the programming track. I also tried using another computer with the same results. So now I have no sound files on the decoder (put it on my test track with the Zephyr and it's running beautifully, just no sounds). Checked F8/mute and nothing happens. Can't find that particular type of USB cable in my pile of cables, so have to wait a couple of hours to get a new one. Seems to be my next course of action. I wished they used a more normal type of connection instead of USB A/B cables.
Dug around and found a new USB cable. Decoder Pro is now working consistently. SoundLoader and Decoder Pro just won't write a sound file out now. SoundLoader gives me the "Unable to communicate with programmer", and Decoder Pro gives me "Download aborted; PR2 not ready" right after erasing flash. Then either get motor/speaker noise, and that's that. Even tried some other sound projects for kicks.
Just a little update if anyone is following.. Had a bit of a back-and-forth with Digitrax through email, and after exhausting all options, they said to send the PR3 in for testing/repairs. With the shipping (total close to $50 to/from Canada to not take the slow boat), not to mention shipping time, holidays, and then ~20 day turn around time for the repair, it's easier to just pick up a new one. Hopefully the new one solves the issue. If not, I have two PR3s.
