Sir TophamHatt

I edited this to make the poll close in a couple of months but now it's just saying "poll is closed to new votes". Could a mod take a look at it and see if it can be re-opened?

Next time you buy a loco, will you hunt out a sound project to listen to before buying? If so, the option is in the "Yes" zone as buying a sound loco is now something you consider more than not. If you then only want/are interested in sounds for specific locos, then that's the option to pick. The poll has changed wording now so hopefully it's a little clearer. For example: I bought a Hornby 08. I wasn't interested in sound at all at the point of buying as the little use it would see didn't warrant the cost. For my HST and Class 68, I specifically bought those with sound because those are some of the best in my fleet, so want them to have the best. I've been looking at another loco and my first port of call was to see if there was a sound option available. 4/5 years ago, I didn't consider sound an option when buying but looking for a sound version of a loco is an automatic consideration. I didn't think people bought a model for the sound

Yeah. But I didn't want people to all click "yes" (because that's always a preference) or "no" (because of funds). But then I suppose that's the weight of the choice. My elocution isn't great sometimes

I've had one in my drawer for months now. Didn't think about using this. Good tip!

Perhaps too early to know but: 1) Did the EM2 fit without much problem/milling? 2) Do you know what speaker is due to be fitted to the factory sound versions?

That's right. And I suspect many people will leave Chrome for it. There is an installer around the web (I can try and find the one I used if interested - message me). Here are some thoughts: 1) It's basically Chrome with no spying. 2) There's only a small handful of extensions. 3) It works in the same way as Chrome. 4) After discovering LastPass, I will be ditching Chrome as soon as "Edgium" is out properly. 5) It's very nearly okay to use as a daily driver as it is. I appreciate that MS try hard with their products, like phones (although they didn't try too hard with this!) and Edge (a reinvention of Internet Explorer). They try really hard to help legacy systems - there's loads of stuff in Windows 10 that is only needed for older systems. But then there was a strong suggestion that Windows 10 would be the last full iteration of Windows. From now on, it'll just be the twice yearly major updates, hence giving it away for free for most people - Microsoft's attempts to get everyone on the same system so they can stop supporting older versions sooner.

Do you have a video? Interesting as I have had quite a few locos that do this in the past but since changing my layout, I rarely see trains stopping then restarting by themselves. My Hornby HSTs are some of my most reliable. What livery are they?

I was looking at a model the other day and my first instinct was to look on the good old YouTube to see if there is a sound version and what it sounds like. This has changed from a few years back when I was just happy to get the model by itself. I usually look at after market options, but for my 08 I used the Hornby TTS chip as that sounds okay enough for the use that loco will get. Edited poll to be a little clearer. Added a second question to show preferences on sound projects.

I'm not saying I don't accept it, but I bet bottom dollar "rising prices in China" isn't the whole truth. It's for another topic anyway.

Although I half read something about the next update not playing well with external drives during the update. Whether this is Windows installed on an external drive (why?) or what, I don't know. Might also be worth looking at some size detecting software (TreeSize is quite good). It'll show you in nice pie charts and tree menus what is taking up space and where it is.

But there is something quite unique about model railways that people appear to just shrug their shoulders and accept the price increase, blaming it on every other excuse possible, apart from a company simply wanting more profit. All it's doing is separating those who can afford Toy trains, and thus have no hope of being a serious modeller, and those who buy the all-bells-and-whistles version of a loco, who will always be able to afford it. What it does, is damage the core group of middle ground people who can't always afford a loco, but save and manage to buy. This group is more likely to aspire to be in the "I'll pay more for a loco" than the "toy train" route. They're more likely to throw in the towel all together. Never seen price rises such as those accepted without much question in model railways in any other hobby.

Yet, millions of devices around the world, including my own (2 PCs) seem to update fine But then again, I don't know why there is an expectation that computers will upate fine, with no problems, every time. In fact, I don't think I have had any updates that have gone wrong. It's usually me updating something manually that breaks something. There are some basic things that every PC needs to work. First one is No Anti-Virus. They cause more problem than they're worth. Any version of Windows worth using comes with an inbuilt one that does fine.

I fitted the Hornby TTS decoder, which then makes it a squeeze as the speaker fits in the front. There are other places for the speaker, and I'm sure when I fitted mine, it seems Hornby changed the internal layout a little throughout the production but I think I put mine on the top of the motor.

This helped me too - good post!

All it needs is someone to work out which CVs to change though? There must be a small minority of people who use a DCC Controller, that doesn't allow changing of CVs and don't have a JMRI/SPROG? From comments I've read around the forum, it appears most have one or the other or both. But hassle factor = 100%! I thought Bachmann were standardising all their low drive motor PCBs (a la S Stock) to be the same (with small tweaks)? Then again, I suppose this is a specific feature rather than a PCB/decoder issue.

Hmm. But if it's a more basic version, just means I have to save for longer... or put it on the 0% credit card

Thanks for the UK supplier links. Not sure I can sink the £500 though!

Livery samples now would point to a 2019 target for release, surely? Maybe just in time for Christmas.

Was thinking about why children under 5 don't pay for trains, or why there is even a child rate. I understand an "adult" is different in different places. Ffor example at Alton Towers the adult age is just 12. Seems stupid to some people, but the reason is that the height restriction for the biggest rides is 1.4m. At 12 years old, the child is likely to be at or over 1.4m so can access everything. So why should they pay less when they can access the same amount of attractions as a 20 year old can? Doesn't seem so silly when you understand. But with train tickets (not so much under 5's I guess), why is there a child age/price? Could fares be restructured so adults pay slightly less but children 5 and over pay the full price? It's not like they don't take up a seat and so looking at the Alton Towers example, it doesn't quite make sense why they pay less. I appreciate I am probably missing something here. Poll just for added interest (difficult to nail it down to one age for everything, but if you had to choose...).

OO / HO... pretty much the same to me (Yes, I realise there are differences, but I'm not at that stage of modelling yet!)

Aren't they just a tax evasion method? I'm sure the company pays more in to the pension so you don't get paid it and thus it doesn't get taxed? Can't remember the blurb when I was encouraged to do it. I did enrole but then left that area of the railway.

Just checking... does anyone produce a OO gauge Taurus loco + coaches?

Thanks for your contributions! Perhaps I didn't explain clearly: for something that sold for 99p that was re-listed automatically by ebay after it didn't sell the first two or three times that would have netted me less than 20p at the end and considering it was the first time I'd used ebay for selling in years, meaning they did their "we'll auto relist for you", which I didn't realise... your suggestion of "not using ebay again" is a little harsh, no? It was ONE item, not a series. But hey, okay, I'll stop selling things on ebay because one example clearly means all things I sell will end up the same way... according to you. While at having a go at people "wasting peoples time", you should get on to people on Facebook. I list something for sale and get 10 messages within the first 48 hours... all have no real intention to buy as they ask questions I have already answered in the sale page.

You say that but the worst you'll get is a negative feedback. I have never found any examples of people being forced to sell an item after they've changed their mind. I've even accidently listed something myself once (99p buy it now instead of auction) and the buyer left me a negative. That's fair enough, even though it was clearly a mistake (the item was worth nearly £60). Just sour grapes on their end. Another seller bought something. I said I got too busy to post it and refunded (less than £5). Buyer was desperate for it so said they'd wait. I replied and said I really didn't have time to package and post it (I'd already refunded). I explained that as eBay had changed a fair bit and was relisting things without making it clear it would do so, that's how the sale happened. Buyer got all uppity so I blocked them from future sales. They then managed to get the item the next time around (whe I was selling a lot more) using another account. While I didn't care whether it sold or not, I do wish I would have cancelled the sale as I had a suspicion it was the same person. A bit moronic and quite simply desperate for something that isn't particularly rare either.

This is where sellers should be hot too. Add a couple of postage options - next day, 2nd recorded, Hermes... I select whatever ebay will allow me to (I don't get their selling thing anymore) and always post through Parcel 2 Go. It's cheaper than Royal Mail / Hermes and a drop off shop is at the end of my road. I still state 2-days for me to post though as sometimes it takes me that time to package it up / print off the label (don't have a printer at home) and send.