Control Manager v4.51 Posted

[Bob Church]

Hi,

CH has posted Control Manager v4.51 on their site. It's the latest version of the CM. It includes Eclipse support and fixes all the bugs that have been reported to date. The file is about 2.7 megabytes.

To install it, the procedure needs to go something like this:

1. Unplug all your CH Controllers.

2. Uninstall any previous versions of the Control Manager. You have to do this via the Control Panel. In Windows it's under the "Add/Remove Programs" selection. In Vista it's in the Control Panel too, but look for "Programs and Features".

3. After the uninstall, it will ask if you want to reboot. Say "Yes". The Controllers should still be unplugged.

4. When Windows comes up again, the action you take depends on the version of Windows. If you're using Windows 98, don't plug anything in at all just yet. In XP or Vista, you need to plug in everything EXCEPT any MFPs you're using. Those don't get plugged in until after the installation in any of the OS versions.

5. In XP or Vista, have a quick look in the Windows Control Panel Game Controller applet and check that the axes move and the buttons flash. There's no reason to calibrate. The controllers aren't plugged in yet for Windows 98, so there's no point in this step at all.

6. It's a good idea to restart Windows at again at this point. Windows will usually shuffle the controllers around at the first restart and it goes much quicker if they're under Windows rather than the Control Manager. There's no point to this restart under Windows 98, the controllers aren't plugged in yet, but it doesn't matter as Windows 98 will redetect the drivers itself if need be and without bothering you with the "Wizard Blizzard" that you see in Windows XP.

7. Run the installer that you downloaded and follow the prompts. It will autodetect the Operating System version and install the correct versions of things, so there's no need to worry about which version of the installer to run, etc. It will handle Windows 98, Windows XP, Windows XP 64, Vista 32, and Vista 64.

You must be logged in as an administrator, and your "Driver Signing Policy" should be set no higher then "Warn". If it's set to "Block" then the drivers will not be installed. In XP, expect the usual flurry of New Hardware wizards. You have to all them to proceed. It may also ask you if it can go out on the Internet to look for new drivers. There is no point, there are no later drivers out there. It also helps if you uncheck all the places it should look and remove any CDs. The fewer places Windows has to look the faster it goes, and all the files are in place.

If you're using Vista, you'll get a dialog with a checkbox on it to "Always trust content from Joystick Technologies". If you check the box, the rest of the install will proceed on it's own. If you don't check the box, you'll probably have to give an okay on every system file that gets installed.

8. If you're using Windows 98, this is the time to plug the controllers in. Do them one at a time and save any MFPs for last. In XP and Vista, the controllers are already plugged in of course so this step is just skipped.

9. That completes the Control Manager installation. Plug in any MFPs you're using and they should be detected and installed automatically. Don't plug them in before the installation is complete. The installation provides the drivers, without those the MFP will be seen as an "Unknown Device" and will no be useable.

A couple of other notes that might be helpful:

1. At some point, it may ask you to insert the manufacturers CD. Don't do that. All the files are there. What it really wants is the Windows CD to pick up any missing system drivers and that's the one you should insert.

2. You may get a notification that "A driver on the hard disk is later than the one on the CD" ask you if you want to keep the newer driver. Always say "Yes, keep the newer driver.". This is almost invariably a result of an update to DirectX having been made after Windows was installed. Windows realizes it's not "original equipment" and checks to see what the difference is. When it finds out it's a later version, it realizes the newer version is the one it should keep.

3. You may encounter a dialog box with a checkbox that says something like "Protect My PC from Viruses.....". Always uncheck that box as it locks out the installation of the drivers under XP. Check this thread for more information.

4. The "CMDelete" option on the Start Menu folder for the Control Manager does NOT uninstall the Control Manager. It's used for completely removing the controllers themselves if something should go wrong, but it leaves the Control Manager system intact. As mentioned above, you must go through the Control Panel "Add/Remove Programs" or "Programs and Features" options to uninstall the Control Manager.

That should to it! Everything should be ready to go. You'll need to calibrate the controllers in the Test/Calibration screen. Also, initially, the "Download" button is grayed because you have no map in the editor, and the "Mapped Mode" button is grayed because you have downloaded anything. Once you create a map and download it, those buttons will be enabled. You must click the "Download" button to send the map to the Control Manager system to make it active, otherwise it will have no effect.

Remember - If you ever uninstall you MUST go through the Control Panel "Add/Remove Programs" option in Windows 98 and XP, and through the Control Panel "Programs and Features" option in Vista. Deleting the files is not enough, it leave things behind in the registry that will interfere with operation if you subsequently reinstall or install an update. Using the Control Panel makes it all come out cleanly, and some of the files may be under System File Protection, if so Windows will simply replace them.

Best regards,

- Bob

The StickWorks
http://www.stickworks.com

[Revvin]

There is also a link to download from the CH Hangar here.