Allow me to expand your knowledge a little more with "non-foklore" based on experience.?
Picture this, You are in the middle of an op session with 15 friends. You are using a Digitrax system and have several OEM QSI version 6 decoder-equipped locos. As will happen, some operator runs an open switch, causes a short, and the session comes to a halt (Pre-PM42 days) . The offender "pulls" back the loco from the short area, The Digitrax system "reboots". (which feeds a heavy spike of PURE DC current onto the track because Digitrax older systems have a HUGE resonance frequency imbalance until they settle down.?
Suddenly, ALL of the Version 6 locos take off at MACH 5 because the default settings include restoring the analog "conversion" to activate. Locos with strings of 20 hoppers with LIVE loads of coal, stones or ore literally FLY toward curves or through coal loading facilities or toward the sharpest curves not designed for high speed trains. (do NOT ask how I know this) . Cleanup will take DAYS as now there is coal, stones, and red ore everywhere that has been dumped by those trains. You also find locos in the turntable pit or smashed through the rear walls of the roundhouse because, it IS only plastic or wood. Some have even attempted to leap across the gap where you are using a gate or bridge to access the layout while someone needed to open it during this debacle.
NOW you are talking about an exciting session where mere mortals have attempted to literally catch trains hell bent on self destruction. You BETCHA that I upgraded EVERY one of those suckers ASAP.
Side note, Digitrax will sternly deny this problem as? they fixed it in later Boosters like the Zephyr but refused to upgrade older systems for FREE like their competitors .
Have a good one,
Nick Kulp
"I'm not a failure. I started at the bottom and I found it easily attainable. Life is too short to set unattainable goals"
- Nick Kulp
Michael and Nick,
My comments in that JMRI support page were based on V7 QSI decoders (QSI documentation and owning a number).
> > Trying to make the old chips work is like shoveling sand from the bottom of a hole. The original chip is unstable and a short circuit will usually reset them back to default CVs, which means that you will need to attempt to re-program them almost every time a short happens on the layout.
That probably explains the "folklore" I've heard about QSI decoders. The only problems I've encountered have been accidental resets due to motor magnetic fields from a passing loco and the almost-universal fail-closed reed switch (solved with sidecutters).
