I was thinking about getting one of these and wanted to know if anyone had used the DT300R throttles and how they compare to the DT100R's? My club has the Chief system and uses DT100R's, but as more and more members go DCC, the club throttle time is decreased. Thoughts?? Harold
I will try to get Dane to answer that question for you. He helps on the demo layout table at train shows for digitrax. We have the Chief (not the Chief 11), but I would maintain anything that makes the throttle easier to use is a good thing. The original throttle isn't "hard" to use, remembering the commands to use it can be hard, if it a command you don't use often. It reminds me of DOS commands, in pre-windows and pre GUI days. The DOS commands weren't hard, but they were if you didn't use them a lot. You had to go to the book and look them up, then make sure you input them exactly. Definitely have a note book at your layout with the commands written down, so you can look them up quickly, this will save you many cursing sessions latter on. I seem to recall Dane prefers the new throttle. If I don't have a senior's moment and forget, I will draw his attention to this post. Dane works with "Bill" at a model rail road store on the weekends, "Bill" is one of the very few Digitrax trained techies in Canada. Bill likes to use Dane as an operator on the Digitrax display as it frees him up to answer questions at shows. You can send an email directly to Bill through the stores web site. It is WWW.Central-Hobbies.com Make sure you address it to Bill. He will be pretty good on giving you the scoop on it. PS. Too make sure you get a full reply, tell him Rick and Dane Nicholson sent you to their site. [ 15 May 2001: Message edited by: rsn48 ]
Rick, ALthough I did not talk to Bill, I have gotten quite a bit of positive feedback on the system, mostly from Chief I users. Thanks for your help, and I still may contact him. Harold
The 300 is just a glorified 100R. All that it has over the 100 is a better screen, a much better screen. It shows the locomotive number on the bottum right hand corner and has the speed in the standard location. I prefer this throttle. The wheel (knob) for speed control; is also alittle different too. It has something that makes it have a hard "click" when you spin so it is hard to excellerate/decellerate too fast. There is no alot different other than that, the clock is easierr to get to aswell... Happy Railroading! Dane N.
BTW- Digitrax currently making the 300, they are spending al their time on deveeloping the 400 at this time and they probably wont start making the 300 again for a month of two. Dane N.
Thanks for the input... I ordered and received a 300R this week, and am looking forward to putting it to use at our upcoming club layout show ( a GATS show). I would have probably tried the 400R, but only the 400's (non-radio) are supposedly out right now. I have placed an order for a Chief II system as well. I guess its time to get to work on a home layout! Harold
LOl...you are like us...we owned the Chief before we even started our "larger" layout, over our present small one. But psychologically it is easier as you can be "more ready (bad english)" when you start running trains on the new layout. We have about 20 engines of which 14 are decoded. It is kind of depressing at first when you have only one engine decoded, but by plugging away at it, you slowly get more. So when we are ready to roll the trains, they will be ready for us.
