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RSS >  FF Is disabled on my wheel whenever I start Freetrack?
Charc0a1 #1 21/11/2008 - 13h52

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Hello All! First off I want to say What a great program! I have a 3 LED setup and am using an Eye Toy with XP drivers. I am amazed at how well it works! Awesome!..  I do have one problem though and was wondering if any technically minded people could help me somehow..
I am using XP I have a Microsoft Sidewinder force feedback steering wheel
the serial port kind (lol its old). When I use it with Live For Speed the force feedback Is really good I can feel everything.
The problem is however, as soon as i start freetrack the steering wheel goes limp as in returns to the center and goes in normal mode no force feed back effects, then when i turn Freetrack off i can feel everything from the game again, i have no idea whats causing this. Is Freetrack using or conflicting with the serial port i have my wheel plugged into? or is it using some core components of Xp that have to do with FF effects ?  the wheel is plugged into the serial port on my creative soundblaster Live card unfortunately I dont have any serial ports on my other pcs i could try.
I really hope there is a simple solution that i overlooked  :gene:
Thanks In Advance for any help And thank you for your time.
didja #2 21/11/2008 - 18h22

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Hi,

Is the PPjoy (joystick emulation) output enabled ? If it's the case, try to uncheck it.

Try also to update your directX version.

Good luck.

Rémy
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Charc0a1 #3 21/11/2008 - 18h43

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OH wow thanks so much for your quick reply!!  ok having a look right now thanks you are a champion ill let you know what happens
Charc0a1 #4 21/11/2008 - 19h27

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Ok darn I updated my direct x and the option for ppjoy  is greyed out I cant click on it but the box beside it is unchecked. it had a controller number in there it said 1 I changed it to random like 14 but still no luck!...   What i did was i put live for speed in windowed mode.. when i click on my desktop the wheel stops and does nothing as soon as i click in the LFS window the wheel jumps back to action instantly.
so what i think is happening is that when i have freetrack on it is making the wheel think that the game is not on i mean that it is not the highlighted window anymore im just guessing here it could be something totally different but i am really keen to sort this out lol everything is working so sweet i just cant have the two together : ( even when i fullscreen LFS oh and it does the same with all my games as soon as i close freetrack the wheel starts working.
also i see that when i bind a key in freetrack to center my view i can click a button on the wheel and freetrack see that and allocates it..  so maybe something to do with that....? when i go back to LFS is freetrack still seeing? the wheel ready for input that takes away the ability to get input from the games? Freetrack Is running different privileges or user mode thing? darn i dont know rofl   and im the only one with this problem because of the whole serial port thing? i would have figured that some of the flight sim guys may be running old joyport FF sticks.... ...  scratches head.....
And again thank you so much for your help it really is appreciated!
Edited by Charc0a1 on 21/11/2008 at 19h32.
didja #5 21/11/2008 - 20h18

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What I can just think of is to try this :

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I'm not a developper myself so I can't really help you. Don't worry about the PPjoy thing, it's ok.

I think it's due to DirectX which manage the input like hitting a key or force feedback, but I'm not really sure about this...

Rémy
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Charc0a1 #6 21/11/2008 - 20h24

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ok ill try that for sure!  i cant thank you enough for your help hope I can get it sorted soon : ) and thanks for the awesome screen shot i appreciate your extra effort to be clear. shows thoroughness and thoughtfulness. ; )
Charc0a1 #7 21/11/2008 - 22h46

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no go unfortunately however i seem to have maybe found a temporary workaround at least until someone can help me. I have no idea how it worked but i had LFS running.. open freetrack.. no force feedback then i go to task manager close freetrack then i find in processes an svchost that was using 21,436k memory i terminated the process. then i reopened freetrack and woohoo i had both , headtracking in game as well as force feedback.. Great!...
but when i exit live for speed then try to open it again it throws up a red error saying could not enable FF or something or rather the wheel still worked in game but no FF even with freetrack off! lol ok so a restart of the pc and everything was back to normal again LFS opened with no errors and force feedback working but then when i open freetrack no force feedback! lol  so i repeated the above procedure.. killed the process then opened freetrack bingo! both working in game again.. so if anyone has any idea whats going on here their input would be greatly appreciated.


Ok i can officially say that this works tried like 7 times now every time a winner.. but please i need a permanent solution, hahah!!!

method: start live for speed...  open task manager... remove a certain svchost that is using 21,436k memory on average... open freetracker and Im good to go..     anything else that i have tried has failed so far.. what could this be!!!????   :blink:

also anyone know how to  find out exactly what this particular svchost is for? as i have like 6 or more svchosts in task manager  :wacko:  if i could find out what it is it would be of greater help to someone more knowledgeable im sure.
Edited by Charc0a1 on 21/11/2008 at 23h07.
didja #8 22/11/2008 - 11h27

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I think svchost is a Windows file which manage DLL running... Can't really help more, I'm sorry...

Good luck with finding ou an other solution... Maybe try the today update ?

Rémy
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Charc0a1 #9 22/11/2008 - 11h32

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ok thanks heaps ill check the new release out! Excellent support! you guys run a real tight ship  : )
Charc0a1 #10 24/11/2008 - 01h57

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unfortunately still having the same problem even with the new update, Ill have to live with the temp fix untill I get a new steering wheel  : )  fanatec 911 wheel to use on the xbox and PC as well when they bring them out... Yeah!! I am so there.. lol
If anyone has any ideas im open to suggestion  thanks again for your help.
didja #11 24/11/2008 - 05h54

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Srory for not having found a real solution...

Rémy :)
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Charc0a1 #12 24/11/2008 - 06h40

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don't be sorry! : ) thanks for all the help you have given, some very valid input.

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