OpenCockpits MCPv2 and PM MCP s/w

Dear All,

I hope you are managing to find time for your sim's, something I struggle with.

I've bought an OC MCPv2 seems a nice bit of kit although I cannot get it to work as required with PM MCP software.

There seems to be a mass amount of disjointed reading material on the OC site, read most now completely confused!

The MCPv2 unit works fine (plugged into the FS9 PC) with the FS9 default 737. This being achieved by installing SIOC 3.5 (on the FS9 machine) and changing the sioc.ini and sioc.txt as described in the MCPv2 manual.

I have the PM MCP software running on another machine and thus ideally want to connect the MCPv2 hardware to this. This raises many questions!

What software do I install / configure on this PC (PM MCP s/w PC) such that it communicates with SIOC on the main FS9 PC?

Any help / simply guide to solve my problem is much appreciated. I'm pulling my hair out and there wasn't much to start with!

Regards,
ID.

Dear ID,

To achieve this some questions need to be answered.

1 - Which airplane you would like to use? Default 737 or PMDG?

2 - Are you using wide server and fsuipc from Peter Dowson?

3 - Is this setup between different PC's in terms of network is correct?

4 - What will be your final decision to use? i.e. PM MCD or PMDG MCP or default B737 MCP?

Once these are clarified I might suggest a couple of ideas

Best regards,

barkay

Hi Barkay,

Firstly, thanks for your reply, its always nice to share problems and I appreciate your help.

My PC network is working fine and comms is using WideFS and FSUIPC.
I'm using PM MCP and the aircraft model PMDG 737-800 but since I'm using PM software any model should be ok.

What I've tried today is having SIOC 3.5 s/w on the networked PC which talks to FS9 via WideFS (FSUIPC being on the main FS9 PC). On this PC is also the PM MCP software. This seems to work but I need to test it further!

I originally thought I would need SIOC running on the main FS9 PC and then something like IOCPServer on the networked PC but it seems just having WideFS and FSUIPC works fine. It seems IOCPServer may be an alternative to using WideFS / FSUIPC.

My next thought is to add further I/O cards from Opencockpits. Thus I wondering if I can run SIOC 3.5 on other networked PC's in parallel with each other i.e. one networked PC with the MCP and say another networked PC with some Opencockpit I/O modules? All communicating to FS9 via WideFS.

I would be interested in your comments (and anyone else) so I can have an idea of the requirements for using Opencockpit equipment on networked PC's.
Is IOCPServer useful?
How would it be implemented and communicate with FS9 over the network? Does anyone know of a well documented text re the Opencockpit system which would help with my understanding the basic principles?

Back to the sim for some more testing.

Regards,
ID.

Hi Again,

As the things are more clear here is some comments;

1 - Only one copy of sioc wtith the full code sould be running. You can not run more than one sioc to control the same simulator (I mean technically you might but it is absolutely unnecessary)

2 - All necessary I/O cards required for the full sim to be working with can be connected to a single PC using self powered USB hubs and programmed via single sioc.

3 - This program then can communicate via wideserver/client to main fs PC thus saving a lot of performance issues.

4 - IOCP protocol will be used to communicate between the modules that are programmed via sioc since wideclient seems to be more than good enough in terms of performance.

So my reccomendation to ypu is to connect everything to one PC with SELFPOWERED USB hubs and run the sioc there and conect to your main fs PC via Wideclient.

I hope this helps

barkay

Hi Barkay,

Thanks once again for your help. I have used your advice and have the MCP running successfully now and want to add the Opencockpit USB EFIS panel.

Do I have to add the relevant code (for the EFIS panel) to the existing MCP.txt file for compiling by SIOC or can I ask SIOC to work on one or more files at the same time.

For the MCP I had to change the sioc.ini file and add MASTER 0,5,1,0 for the MCP to work, do you happen to know what I add for the USB EFIS panel. I've tried many variations but to no avail.

Regards,
ID.

Hi,

For anything to work on the SIOC system you have to write one sişngle code and run it on single SIOC so it can control eveything.

http://www.mycockpit.org/forums/showthread.php?t=13084

Check this tread. This is my code and everything around it to run MCP and EFIS on PMDG. Proven many times as you will readt the whole thread.

So the answer is yes you need to add the necessary lines into your main code and compile it.

WARNING: For efis to work you need SIOC version 3.52b. Otherwise EFIS won't work as it will not be recognized by sioc.

Let me know the progress

Best Regards,

barkay

Hi Barkay,

It's working!
Thanks so much for your help. I ditched the so called autoconfiguration s/w from OC and did it maunally.

The change from SIOC 3.5 to version 3.52b as you suggested did the trick.

I'm pleased with the OC hardware but installation details from OC could be better.

Thanks once again.

Regards,
ID.