Should the TCP-LEDs be glowing?

[stingray77]

Hi,
I experienced some trouble when using my (very) new TrackIR with the TCP (all quite well with the reflectors on the cap, though) - like when turning the head, the view immediately gets lost showing up, down or 180� back...

I read about some "leakage"/IR-shied problems here, but before triggering anything off, I'd like to know a bit more, about "how it should be like"...

Are the three green dots/LEDs (are they LEDs?) on the TCP-unit supposed to glow or shine - or do they just reflect the IR coming from the cam without doing anything "actively"? (I suppose the latter as mine do not glow or shine at all - although there are dots "seen" by the camera.)

Apart from the three "main" dots, the camera sees two more ("sub"-) dots next to each "main". How are they supposed to be shown in the cam-view? All green, or just the "main" green and the "subs" red? (Guess this can be used to adjust the shielding...)

Concerning softwares: I have been trying out the "older" 4.1.037 and the current 5.0 beta (oh, I just see, there is a "5.0 final" - that's something to update to right this evening) - above problem occurs on both versions.
In the v4-version I have the problem that the TCP is not being "seen/tracked" correctly - there is just one of the main dots green, the others all red - adjusting the shield doesn't provide much help. Is THAT a hint that I may have a faulty shield, too?
(More strange, when I disable the setting for the TCP in the v4, the movements go the opposite - moving the head left in the game (FS9 if that's of value) makes a movement to the right in the game. This can be cured by setting the the cam to 180� but then I have an up-movement going down and vice versa... Well, I'd like to go with the v5 anyhow....)

IF I have a faulty shield, how is that going to be exchanged/repaired? Guess I'll contact my German supplied ("2connect") and ask for replacement, right?


PS: I have the TrackIR5, should that info be needed

[Seth Steiling]

when turning the head, the view immediately gets lost showing up, down or 180� back...

Do you have TrackClip PRO selected as the "tracking type" when you switch to it in the software?

Are the three green dots/LEDs (are they LEDs?) on the TCP-unit supposed to glow or shine - or do they just reflect the IR coming from the cam without doing anything "actively"? (I suppose the latter as mine do not glow or shine at all - although there are dots "seen" by the camera.)

The TCP has active LED lights. It will emit light, though it is not detectable by the human eye in normal circumstances. They appear green in the software as a graphical cue to determine whether the camera is effectively tracking, but the light is not actually green.

Apart from the three "main" dots, the camera sees two more ("sub"-) dots next to each "main". How are they supposed to be shown in the cam-view? All green, or just the "main" green and the "subs" red? (Guess this can be used to adjust the shielding...)

This is not normal behavior. There should always only be three dots, and they should always be green. More than three dots means the camera is picking up on unwanted light sources. Red means that those light sources are likely confusing the tracking, causing instability. Some extra/red dots are acceptable if they are in the periphery of the camera's view. It sounds like you have a faulty IR shield. Please post a screen shot of what you're referring to so we can confirm.

Concerning softwares: I have been trying out the "older" 4.1.037 and the current 5.0 beta (oh, I just see, there is a "5.0 final" - that's something to update to right this evening) - above problem occurs on both versions.
In the v4-version I have the problem that the TCP is not being "seen/tracked" correctly - there is just one of the main dots green, the others all red - adjusting the shield doesn't provide much help. Is THAT a hint that I may have a faulty shield, too?

Yes, that probably does indicate an IR shield problem.

(More strange, when I disable the setting for the TCP in the v4, the movements go the opposite - moving the head left in the game (FS9 if that's of value) makes a movement to the right in the game. This can be cured by setting the the cam to 180� but then I have an up-movement going down and vice versa... Well, I'd like to go with the v5 anyhow....)

I'm not sure what's going on here, but it's possible that you have those axes inverted. You can invert axes individually, which is a better solution than using camera rotation, in this case. If the 5.0 software doesn't do this, it probably has the axes set up properly.

IF I have a faulty shield, how is that going to be exchanged/repaired? Guess I'll contact my German supplied ("2connect") and ask for replacement, right?

Once we can determine that your IR shield is faulty, we will probably have you contact 2Connect for a replacement.

[stingray77]

Thanks for your reply - here's my feedback together with a yesterday's screenshot of the camera-view...

[color:#FF0000]TCP selected as tracking type?[/color] - Yes! (see screenie)

[color:#FF0000]TCP lights not to be detected by human eye[/color] - okay, very good to know.

[color:#FF0000]Three dots normal[/color] - okay, that's different/wrong with my TIR5.

[color:#FF0000]Yes, that probably does indicate an IR shield problem.[/color] - well, good on one hand side, as I will not have to live with an unsatisfying situation; bad on the other, as exchanging the TIR will "ground" me for the duration of its exchange... ('Cause using the Vector-clip works quite well...)
Maybe we can arrange that I get a new set sent and return the faulty unit THEN!?!? :whistle:

By the way, how do you ensure, that you send out units without defects? Or do you repair the faulty units? (Guess that will take even longer...)

[color:#FF0000]inverted axes[/color] - I checked that out... Well, I preferred the v5.0 anyhow, so don't bother with what went wrong (or maybe I did wrong) in the v4.

[color:#FF0000]Once we can determine that your IR shield is faulty, we will probably have you contact 2Connect for a replacement.[/color] - Yes, hope you can identify from the screenie, if my unit needs replacement and I will contact them then.
Hope that
1) they are as good/helpful/fast as you are here and
2) that there will be a way of getting a new unit shipped before returning mine.....

So, here's the screenshot.

[img:left]http://s5.directupload.net/file/d/1883/cwotje9x_jpg.htm[/img]

You can see the three "main" dots (at the moment of the shot all green) with five "sub-dots" (this time all red). "Usually" there were six of the "sub-dots" and sometimes they were seen green by the cam, too... That screwed up things a lot as the cam seemed not to be able to identify which dots to track. Sometimes the "subs" were detected (green) making "mains" to go red instead... No good!
You can also see the settings for IR-illumination and shielding - changing the values did not enhance the situation - with the shielding low and illumination high the dots "blurred" a lot. Turning it the opposite made the dots go red. No setting in-between worked well...

Hope you can help from that.

Thanks
Oliver

[Seth Steiling]

Maybe we can arrange that I get a new set sent and return the faulty unit THEN!?!? :whistle:

If you purchased from 2Connect, you will need to exchange the product through them. I'm not sure how their return policy works though, so only they can answer this.

By the way, how do you ensure, that you send out units without defects? Or do you repair the faulty units? (Guess that will take even longer...)

All new units that we've manufactured over the past month or so have undergone tests here at NaturalPoint to make sure that this problem is prevented. Unfortunately, there are still units in stock around the world, in our dealers' possession, that might have this problem. So, it's possible that another unit would get sent out with this problem. You might ask 2Connect to test your replacement unit with a TrackClip PRO before they send it, to make sure that this problem doesn't pop up.

Yes, hope you can identify from the screenie, if my unit needs replacement and I will contact them then...
http://s5.directupload.net/file/d/1883/cwotje9x_jpg.htm

This is definitely a faulty IR shield. Please contact 2Connect about a return.

You can see the three "main" dots (at the moment of the shot all green) with five "sub-dots" (this time all red). "Usually" there were six of the "sub-dots" and sometimes they were seen green by the cam, too... That screwed up things a lot as the cam seemed not to be able to identify which dots to track. Sometimes the "subs" were detected (green) making "mains" to go red instead... No good!
You can also see the settings for IR-illumination and shielding - changing the values did not enhance the situation - with the shielding low and illumination high the dots "blurred" a lot. Turning it the opposite made the dots go red. No setting in-between worked well...

There is one possible solution, if you're interested. It will allow you to keep the product, and often times will still allow it to work sufficiently (results do vary a bit). If you manually decrease the Exposure setting in the Settings.xml file, it will sometimes filter out those unwanted dots while keeping the primary 3 visible. So, change:

Code: Select all

<Exposure>350</Exposure>

to something like:

Code: Select all

<Exposure>75</Exposure>

If 75 doesn't remove the unwanted dots, try 50. If that doesn't, try 40, 30, 20, and then 15. The goal is to reduce the exposure until the unwanted dots aren't seen, but no more.

To edit this setting, open the Settings.xml file, located in Program Files/NaturalPoint/TrackIR5, in notepad. Make sure the TrackIR software is not running. Find that entry, make the edit, save the file, and close it. Then, open the TrackIR software to test the results. You can then close the TrackIR software and open the .xml file, just to make sure that the save persisted, and your new setting is present.

Of course, if you just prefer to return the product, you're completely free to do so.

-Seth

[stingray77]

Thanks for the "workaround", Seth.

I tried right away (yesterday evening - back in the office now - we're 9hrs ahead of you).
First: strange - when opening the "Settings" (with "Internet-Explorer" which seems/seemed to be my standard) the Exposure was not displayed as "350" but "150". Opening it with "Editor" and "WordPad" showed it to be "350" then (if I recall this right).
Then: after changing the Exposure to "75" I was unable to save the changes in the same file! (Maybe some Vista-problem/"speciality"?)
"Saving as..." didn't work either, as neither "Editor" nor "WordPad" allowed/offered me to save the "Settings" in .xml-format.

Eventually I wasn't able to get that one working... Some other thing I might try/how I can get that workaround work for me?
What actually does this workaround do? To me it sounds like decreasing the "illumination" - but does this not decrease the TIR's performance in other respects? I figure, it decreases the perception of the "wanted" dots at the same time!?

So, I will contact 2Connect to ask for a replacement anyhow - and ask if they can perform a test before sending out a new unit...

Thanks for your support! At least now I know that I did not screw up...
Oliver


Edit: Okay - I contacted 2Connect and arranged to exchange the TIR with a tested unit. What I also thought about, was opening the settings.xml "as admin" - maybe that will allow me to save...

[stingray77]

Edit edit: just tried to open "as admin" - no success when trying to save. How do you save your changes in the NaturalPoint-folder in Vista then?

[Seth Steiling]

I usually manually open it up in Notepad, but Wordpad should be fine too. After I've made my changes, I just hit file > save. I've never had a problem beyond that. But, you have UAC on in Vista, the file is likely being duplicated here:

c:\users\xxxx\AppData\VirtualStore\Program Files\trackIR5\UserData

If you can find a settings.xml file there instead, that's likely where the changes should be made.

As far as what the fix does--it lowers the exposure. This causes light sources to be dropped from the sensor's view. With this problem, there is usually a middle ground where unwanted light sources can be eliminated while the desired TCP light will still be tracked. If you reduce this number by too much, however, it will disrupt the tracking.

[stingray77]

c:\users\xxxx\AppData\VirtualStore\Program Files\trackIR5\UserData

In Vista the "AppData"-folder seems to have some other name - in my "users/..."I only have folders named like "Documents, Downloads, Music, Saved Games..." No AppData, unfortunately.
I searched for AppData in there, which did not bring up anything...

As far as what the fix does--it lowers the exposure. This causes light sources to be dropped from the sensor's view. With this problem, there is usually a middle ground where unwanted light sources can be eliminated while the desired TCP light will still be tracked. If you reduce this number by too much, however, it will disrupt the tracking.

So this serves the same purpose as the IR-Shield (turned way up) itself, right?

Anyway, I packed my TrackIR for returning it to 2Connect and have it replaced. (No new to be sent out, before the faulty one is received, unfortunately. So I have to live without it "a couple of days" - hopefully not too many.)
Thanks for all your help and service!

[Seth Steiling]

[quote=stingray77]So this serves the same purpose as the IR-Shield (turned way up) itself, right?[/quote]
Nope. The IR shield filters out unwanted visible light, so only IR light can be seen by the sensor. Exposure is just a blanket limitation on how much light gets through. So, similar, but different.

[stingray77]

I understand - thanks for the explanation...