Digikeijs DR5000 for beginners

[NS Peak]

Hello,

 

santa was very generous and gave me a Digikeijs DR5000 command station.  (Hay I am sitting here in the Netherlands and my other half saw an offer email).  

 

Until  now I have just really been pottering about and am (after a lot of e-mails to unlock a licence code) happily using railmaster and an elink.   I have had a play with JMRI pannel pro and decoder pro but I find these really hard to get my head around and honestly can’t afford 100 euros plus for the likes of ITrain which looks amazing but is out of my league.

 

now my question...  is it actually worth moving from railmaster for my very modest set up and if it is what would be the most user friendly software option to use with the DR5000 that would enable me to use a throttle and pannel on my iPad?

 

thanks for your help 

 

Stephen 
 

 

 

 

[WIMorrison]

Just use the Z21 app that is free.

[jamespetts]

I also recommend updating the device's firmware to the latest version as older versions have some issues.

[KingEdwardII]

Stephen,

 

I too have a recently aquired DR5000 and I am using it to provide computer control of my layout. I have described my efforts in this direction in these threads:

 

and

 

 

I think the main thing you need to ask is what you want to achieve.

 

For me, there are the twin goals of a) controlling the physical aspects of the layout (turnouts, signals, etc) via a large touchscreen. and b) controlling locos through a handheld mobile (a smartphone). Longer term, I'd like some automation to allow me to run multiple trains on the layout without me having to pay close attention to all of them. I recognise that this will all take time since I am building my layout from scratch and there is a lot of work to do outside computer control.

 

So far, I have been investigating RocRail and JMRI as software packages and the Engine Driver app on my Android phone - and these enable me to achieve my goals. I also have the Z21 app on the menu for investigation, as mentioned by Iain.

 

I notice that you mention Railmaster - which provides some of these capabilities, but which is tied to Hornby controllers and to Windows PCs. Why did you acquire the DR5000 if you want to stick with Railmaster?

 

Yours,  Mike.

[NS Peak]

Thanks Gents,

 

I suppose my goal is to control my railway using an iPad without needing to turn on my windows PC, while being able to use the features of a panel to operate my function decoders without having to memorise all the dcc addresses of my points and signals.

 

Iain, the Z21 app looks intriguing and looks like it should be able to directly connect to the DR5000 but I need to get used to recreating a panel and building up the loco database in the app.  I did look but there does not seem to be a windows version that I could create everything with and then export (I like my iPad but I hate the keyboard) 

 

Mike, I had been following your thread, but it looked to go beyond what I was looking to do,  I need to have a look at the set up you mention as I am curious on the costs and suspect the components at the moment are beyond my budget.  But it has peaked my interest.

 

(sorry for the delayed response work has been a bit manic) 

 

Stephen 

[WIMorrison]

The Z21 app is only for use on mobile devices though you can load an Android emulation onto the pc which you can run the Z21 in, create everything using keyboard and mouse then export (via email) to your tablet or phone.

 

a good emulator is Bignox

 

 

[KingEdwardII]

Stephen

 

One possibility to consider is using a (much) cheaper Raspberry Pi installation than I am using - say a Pi 4b, with no fancy touchscreen.

JMRI runs very easily on the Pi and does not take up resources.

 

I have been able to use JMRI to define all the stuff on my layout - locos and turnouts - and I can use all of those definitions directly from the Engine Driver app.  This even includes the graphical panels, although I must admit that the size of the panel displayed on my smartphone screen is a bit small. So I can both run locos and switch points, etc, entirely from my smartphone.  With the advantage that I only have to enter data once - in JMRI on the Pi - and I can smoothly move between the Pi screen and the smartphone for any operation.

 

However, now that I have my large touchscreen, I ain't giving it up... 

 

Yours, Mike.

[Nigelcliffe]

13 minutes ago, KingEdwardII said:

..........  This even includes the graphical panels, although I must admit that the size of the panel displayed on my smartphone screen is a bit small. .......

 

Design custom panels for the screen size of the phone....   Its pretty simple from where you've reached. 

 

 

- Nigel

 

[NS Peak]

I think I will investigate the Z21 option more and have a go with the emulator and see how that works as a first step.  My thinking is that an iPad should have enough computer power to run a pannel and throttle through a DR5000 without the need for a separate pc or raspberry pi.  

 

this is where I come clean gents, as my logic is more that while I sit taking hours of conference calls on my work laptop (which is a locked machine and as its not mine I can not and will not install other software on it). I just want to be able to pick up my iPad and operate my railway and not have to start up another pc with another monitor.  

 

there must be a way that I can just use my iPad and the Z21 option looks like it might tick the box. 
 

I did think about the sprog pi option when writing my letter to Santa but what can I say,  Santa is not into model railways and is a sucker for a bargain when sent directly in an email  
 

stephen 

Edited February 6, 2021 by NS Peak
Typo I hate iPad keyboards