Not a pro here but a thought as it sounds like a video conflict. Do you have onboard video? Have you tried turning off the toolpath display to see if that's it?

Hum .... thing is, the rest of the video system runs absolutely OK. I can photo-edit or run WMV with no problems after Mach disappears. But I will check if I can.

Mind you, that path display is essential during debugging!

Cheers

If it happens to me I think I will be able to tell Brian where to look, so fingers crossed
Hood

Quote from: budman68 on January 15, 2012, 05:58:58 PM

Not a pro here but a thought as it sounds like a video conflict. Do you have onboard video? Have you tried turning off the toolpath display to see if that's it?

Hum .... thing is, the rest of the video system runs absolutely OK. I can photo-edit or run WMV with no problems after Mach disappears. But I will check if I can.

Mind you, that path display is essential during debugging!

Cheers

Understood, just trying to help dbug this for you as it might give clues.

Dave

If it happens to me I think I will be able to tell Brian where to look, so fingers crossed

I noticed that on the Yahoo Group Artsoft *seem* to be putting huge amounts of effort into some very peripheral and debatable features or extensions for a couple of users rather than focusing on fixing the core problems in Mach for the vast bulk of customers. And some long-term Mach users seem to be getting a bit fed up with this. A bit like MS pushing more unwanted features into the next release rather than fixing the bugs in the current release. That concerns me. Any comment?

Cheers

My comments are well documented on that subject
But just for you, I hate it when I see people moaning about getting things fixed up in Mach3 as it tends to break something else totally unrelated. I would rather Mach be locked down as it is and Mach Rev4 concentrated on. According to Brian the way Mach Rev4 will be written means its all modules and fixing something wont break something else.
But thats just the way I feel and it is also the reason I have not nagged constantly to get Turn sorted and believe me there are a lot that needs to be done in it
 A new programmer started at the turn of the year so hopefully things will progress more quickly with Rev4.

If you want go back to an old version of Mach and see if it still happens, cant remember exactly where I think the issue may have crept in but f its what I am thinking then I will be able to pin point it when I get to the mill tomorrow.
Hood

My comments are well documented on that subject

Um - well, yes, I had noticed. Time Artsoft listened. :-)

I would rather Mach be locked down as it is and Mach Rev4 concentrated on. According to Brian the way Mach Rev4 will be written means its all modules and fixing something wont break something else.

If it is *not* modular right now then yes, I totally agree. That's the same problem MS have with Windows of course.

I do remember when DEC completely rewote their mainframe VMS OS many years for V5. The problems with V4 were well-known, and basically insoluble due to unstructured internal complexity. V5 was re-written from scratch in a hard-line modular micro-kernel form. A long wait, but so worth while. VMS is now used behind the scenes in banks, stock exchanges, nuclear reactors, USA destroyers and aircraft carriers, and is unbreakable and unhackable. The computer science community is still 'reinventing' the basic features which were in VMS, but 95% of them only know Windows. </rant> :-)

If you want go back to an old version of Mach and see if it still happens, cant remember exactly where I think the issue may have crept in but f its what I am thinking then I will be able to pin point it when I get to the mill tomorrow.

Thanks.

Cheers
Roger

Ok have just done some tests here. I dont get the issue on the home computer but did get it when I was trying out a test version for Brian on the Mill.
. Anyway version 043.022 should be a good indicator of whether the issue is related to what I am thinking it may be, if it works fine then I will let Brian know where to look, if it doesnt help then its obviously a different issue than I was thinking it could be.

As far as I know Mach is just a load of code all bundled together, it started off small and things added over the years and now is massive. I am not a programmer and know absolutely nothing about the subject so I can only go on what I am told
Hood

Anyway version 043.022 should be a good indicator of whether the issue is related to what I am thinking it may be

Yup, that's the version I am running. Go get 'im!

As far as I know Mach is just a load of code all bundled together, it started off small and things added over the years and now is massive.

Time for a fundamental redesign and rewrite of the entire beast. The core design needs to be redone. Painful, expensive, but ultimately the only thing which can save it.
Yes, I have done everything from CPU hardware design to device driver design and programming to most everything going upwards from there. Great fun, albeit sometimes verging on burn-out territory, but fortunately I was my own manager!

Cheers

You can always re-boot the USB or Ethernet SmoothStepper by unplugging the power cable....  I've probably had Mach3 crash and/or wierd out more times than most people, but I've never seen it in a state where it couldn't be killed by selecting it in the task list (NOT the applications list) in Task Manager.

Regards,
Ray L.

Hi Ray

You can always re-boot the USB or Ethernet SmoothStepper by unplugging the power cable....

Well, yes, but the installation does not have a power switch on the ESS! Very few rigs would I think. So I have to cycle the CNC power, with the possible loss of registration.

I've never seen it in a state where it couldn't be killed by selecting it in the task list (NOT the applications list) in Task Manager.

I selected and 'killed' it 4-6 times in the process list (not the Application list), to no avail. Rather wierd, actually.

Do I blame Mach, or Windows (or me)?

Cheers