Can everyone with a "bricked" DD write me a PN so we can back and forth there more easily? Coming back after the holidays (having 1000+ comments across different discussions) and getting an idea out of what happened to which one of you and where it's solved or not is quite hard and having a nicer overview of the current situation would help me to check and inform our developers.
As soon as I get a better idea of it by your messages or feedback from our developers I can post my update here for everyone to see as well.
The first case which was sent to me via PM was not that the base got bricked by updating the firmware, it happened after some driving and having the base in idle. It sounds more like a coincident and could have happened with the previous firmware as well as he now got the base exchanged by support which works fine since then.
DThompson, comments like this doesn't help anyone here and make it harder to get the information we need as we have to scroll through things which are unrelated to the topic and pick what's useful. Just wasting time for everyone coming back here to check if useful information got posted. If you want to relief some frustration without any constructive feedback, there are plenty other discussions or forum sections.
id like my ticket from december to be addressed, and I ask questions in here and other beta threads about my v2.5 problems but they always get ignored in favor of the DD customers.
I'm curious as to what the plan is going forward... will there be a production-quality release that fixes the jolts (and any other open issues)? It feels like we've been in perpetual beta for months with no end in sight.
I appreciate the response, but it's not what I asked. The problem isn't that issues aren't fixed fast enough, it's that there's never a release that fixes issues without adding new ones. At what point does delivering a defect-free release take precedence over adding the next feature?
Unfortunately that's how it goes when updating electronic devices...any time you add New features or change any 1 thing No matter how Simple its Not Simple at all and can introduce other unwanted side effects with other features/functions.... It takes time to work out all the kinks...Hence the Motto "if its Not Broken Don't Fix it" because fixing 1 thing often breaks or has unwanted side effects on other things.
The Features that Fanatec is adding to their wheel line up are Revolutionary/ its Only Fanatec wheels that have these features thus far...Wireless Data and Power/USB Cord Free Wheel, Buttons, Data/Telemetry Display in wheel and on wheel base....While it may be a Tad Frustrating waiting for the perfect Dr/Fw in the End I'm sure we will have the Best and Most advanced Sim Racing Gear on the Market for Years to come.
There's nothing stopping them from fixing existing bugs before writing new code. It's simply a question of priorities. When your market differentiator is "we make everything and it all works together", then making sure "it just works" is step zero of that process.
That'd be disappointing if their attitude towards quality was "that's the best we can do". When something is broken in my code, I stop what I'm doing, go back, and fix it before moving on to new features.
which is exactly what Fanatec did. They released the Driver 347 with Firmware 664 and Motor firmware 34. Podium Users pretty much all hated the feeling of the new firmwares which were then rejected by Fanatec so driver 347 was only compatible with CSW and CSL and no longer DD compatible then. They improved the firmwares for this next release with new features which were neccessary to get rid of the negative things which were introduced with firmware 664 and motor firmware 34. But, as you can see, some issues just dont happen on every machine, therefore this software package was released as another beta package to get feedback from much more users with many different pc configuartions which is sometimes just neccessary to find some weird bugs.
You can be sure that the next big release will fix many of the reported issues.
Just wait and see what the future brings. For sure there will be a release driver soon as already confirmed several times, this beta is to get the BME running and to get feedback for the new features which were necessary to implement to get rid of the negative reports from driver 347.
accurate, but if you look at that driver with todays knowledge then that driver has a ton of issues more than todays recent beta drivers. So, even when they are called beta driver, they usually are FAR better then any other "stable" release driver as things only get improved.
Anyway, this discussion leads to nothing and is pretty much useless. A new release driver will be coming (maybe after another beta driver or so) - just be a bit more patient.
The track record doesn't suggest that patience would be rewarded. The release cadence is feature beta after feature beta; there's never a stop-and-fix-what's-broken release.
Unfortunately the distances from beta to beta are too long. If you see what the current beta is causing system crashes. A good one has the whole, I know now again how a bluescreen looks like, I haven't seen one since Windows 98 until Fanatec released these drivers ;-).
The last non-beta driver was v335. If you have a Podium Hub, which is not a new product, then there are no non-beta drivers with support. And even v335 has an unfixed freezing bug - it’s been months since it released, when at any point they could have compared their commits between v334 and v335 to isolate which one caused the bug. That’s why you stop to fix bugs... the more commits you pile on top, the harder it is to find the breaking change and cleanly revert it.
Ok point understood...I only Now with the PBME got a Podium Hub and had No clue there were still unresolved issues/Bugs with it still.
I'm on PC and My PBME w/Podium Hub is working as Expected... I haven't had any PC crashes or Notable malfunction that I am aware of.
Dr 353 Even the flickering while in the control panel between Xbox and Podium Hub seems to be gone when using the Podium Hub...It seems this flickering Between Xbox and Podium Hub is more Xbox Hub Related because just to see what happens with the Podium Hub ,PBME mounted on My DD2 as I'm typing this there has not been 1 flicker between Podium Hub to Xbox hub and I have had the control panel Tuning menu open for 20mins or more.
Edit: Ok Just had My 1st PC Crash and it Definitely seems to be related to having the Fanatec Control panel open when shutting the wheel off and this screen being open!!! I have been able to Reproduce this issue 3x in a Row.
If the control panel is open and the DD2 base OLED is showing just the Fanatec Logo and wheel is powered Off everything is Normal...No PC Crash I have replicated this 3x in a Row also.
I dont know what other wheel base OLED screens will cause the PC crash issue...Im Not going to test them all but having the screen that I posted open with the PC tuning Menu screen open at the same time and you turn the wheel Off will definitely cause a PC crash.... It can be reproduced...i did it 3x!!! in a Row.
On My PC when the Control panel Tuning Menu screen is Open and I have My DD2 base set to this screen (pic at botton)100% of the time it causes My PC to Crash if I turn the wheel base Off...Tested 5x!!! and every time PC Crashed.
I tested to see what happens if Tuning Menu is open and Shut DD2 Off while base is just Showing "Fanatec" on the screen and all was Normal/No PC crash and wheel turned Off....Tested 5x and No PC Crash.
Also Note I Left wheel base OLED showing "Fanatec" and Did Not Feel any Random FFB Thumps!!! <--- This Needs Further Testing as I only Drive about 30min but again I felt No Random FFB thumps🤔
Its a really weird Bug and a very Random find because most probably Never shut their wheel base off while in the Tuning Menu...Other than this drive
I dont know what other wheel base OLED screens will cause the PC crash issue I did Not test them all.
Other than this on PC Dr/Fw 353 the FFB feels Great and seem to be working as intended and has Great Potential which is more than likely why this Bug/Glitch has been sooo hard to Isolate.
Note you Must have wheel base set to this screen and PC control Panel Must be on Tuning Menu page where you can adjust the on wheel settings from the PC <--- Did you have that screen showing on your PC <-- If Not this could be the difference because this screen Directly interacts with the wheel to Control on wheel settings. Please test again with the specific screens open and Report back.
For just one second guys , if we can leave behind all the bad things this dr/fw brought to us , beside the fact that we have jolts , my tv flickers, my mclaren gt3 wheel shifters goes in any direction they want and none of the direction i want , BUT, and there is the good thing, and now i am addressing to you Fanatec stuff , guys , please , reproduce this ffb feeling in a good stable driver. The ffb with this dr/fr is the best i have ever felt. I kindly ask you to remember this and do not lower the ffb feeling in future dr/fw becouse i love this but i cannot use it. I respect you guys , i love your products as all we are here and beyond, we payed a shittload of money for them products love them but we want this feeling and more. Please keep this in mind. Much respect. Always Fanatec.
I was now able to reproduce it and forward the method to our developers. I know it's bad to have issues like that with drivers but you have to see that this is really weird stuff and not that easy to even find exactly which exact situation was causing it. Thanks a lot for that report.
Comments
Can everyone with a "bricked" DD write me a PN so we can back and forth there more easily? Coming back after the holidays (having 1000+ comments across different discussions) and getting an idea out of what happened to which one of you and where it's solved or not is quite hard and having a nicer overview of the current situation would help me to check and inform our developers.
As soon as I get a better idea of it by your messages or feedback from our developers I can post my update here for everyone to see as well.
Thanks
so much for Fanatec being "Plug and play"
The first case which was sent to me via PM was not that the base got bricked by updating the firmware, it happened after some driving and having the base in idle. It sounds more like a coincident and could have happened with the previous firmware as well as he now got the base exchanged by support which works fine since then.
DThompson, comments like this doesn't help anyone here and make it harder to get the information we need as we have to scroll through things which are unrelated to the topic and pick what's useful. Just wasting time for everyone coming back here to check if useful information got posted. If you want to relief some frustration without any constructive feedback, there are plenty other discussions or forum sections.
id like my ticket from december to be addressed, and I ask questions in here and other beta threads about my v2.5 problems but they always get ignored in favor of the DD customers.
I'm curious as to what the plan is going forward... will there be a production-quality release that fixes the jolts (and any other open issues)? It feels like we've been in perpetual beta for months with no end in sight.
I think some base setting parameters should be hidden, For example "for dpr spr nin " etc.
Common users only see basic settings "sen ff brf" etc, other settings are programmed into advanced settings.
Many users can't understand some parameters and seldom set them.
I agree, that's planned for the future but not that easy and quick to do without breaking things so this is not around the corner.
Of course we try to fix the issues as soon as possible.
common setting for all gamer, advance setting for hardcore gamer.
Expecting fanatec to be better in the future
I appreciate the response, but it's not what I asked. The problem isn't that issues aren't fixed fast enough, it's that there's never a release that fixes issues without adding new ones. At what point does delivering a defect-free release take precedence over adding the next feature?
Unfortunately that's how it goes when updating electronic devices...any time you add New features or change any 1 thing No matter how Simple its Not Simple at all and can introduce other unwanted side effects with other features/functions.... It takes time to work out all the kinks...Hence the Motto "if its Not Broken Don't Fix it" because fixing 1 thing often breaks or has unwanted side effects on other things.
The Features that Fanatec is adding to their wheel line up are Revolutionary/ its Only Fanatec wheels that have these features thus far...Wireless Data and Power/USB Cord Free Wheel, Buttons, Data/Telemetry Display in wheel and on wheel base....While it may be a Tad Frustrating waiting for the perfect Dr/Fw in the End I'm sure we will have the Best and Most advanced Sim Racing Gear on the Market for Years to come.
#Patience
There's nothing stopping them from fixing existing bugs before writing new code. It's simply a question of priorities. When your market differentiator is "we make everything and it all works together", then making sure "it just works" is step zero of that process.
It's just like Lorrell Waddell said...They can't fix existing bugs without breaking something else....Please read again Lorrell Waddell post :)
That'd be disappointing if their attitude towards quality was "that's the best we can do". When something is broken in my code, I stop what I'm doing, go back, and fix it before moving on to new features.
which is exactly what Fanatec did. They released the Driver 347 with Firmware 664 and Motor firmware 34. Podium Users pretty much all hated the feeling of the new firmwares which were then rejected by Fanatec so driver 347 was only compatible with CSW and CSL and no longer DD compatible then. They improved the firmwares for this next release with new features which were neccessary to get rid of the negative things which were introduced with firmware 664 and motor firmware 34. But, as you can see, some issues just dont happen on every machine, therefore this software package was released as another beta package to get feedback from much more users with many different pc configuartions which is sometimes just neccessary to find some weird bugs.
You can be sure that the next big release will fix many of the reported issues.
What "next big release"? Look at the past year. What part of that precedent suggests to you that a release driver is on its way?
Just wait and see what the future brings. For sure there will be a release driver soon as already confirmed several times, this beta is to get the BME running and to get feedback for the new features which were necessary to implement to get rid of the negative reports from driver 347.
I go by what the data says, not what people say. And the data says there hasn't been a non-beta driver since v335.
accurate, but if you look at that driver with todays knowledge then that driver has a ton of issues more than todays recent beta drivers. So, even when they are called beta driver, they usually are FAR better then any other "stable" release driver as things only get improved.
Anyway, this discussion leads to nothing and is pretty much useless. A new release driver will be coming (maybe after another beta driver or so) - just be a bit more patient.
The track record doesn't suggest that patience would be rewarded. The release cadence is feature beta after feature beta; there's never a stop-and-fix-what's-broken release.
Unfortunately the distances from beta to beta are too long. If you see what the current beta is causing system crashes. A good one has the whole, I know now again how a bluescreen looks like, I haven't seen one since Windows 98 until Fanatec released these drivers ;-).
Technically there is a Official Non Beta Driver up that can be used but Just Not with the PBME.
PBME Dr/Fw is still in Beta Testing stage because its a Very New product.
The last non-beta driver was v335. If you have a Podium Hub, which is not a new product, then there are no non-beta drivers with support. And even v335 has an unfixed freezing bug - it’s been months since it released, when at any point they could have compared their commits between v334 and v335 to isolate which one caused the bug. That’s why you stop to fix bugs... the more commits you pile on top, the harder it is to find the breaking change and cleanly revert it.
Ok point understood...I only Now with the PBME got a Podium Hub and had No clue there were still unresolved issues/Bugs with it still.
I'm on PC and My PBME w/Podium Hub is working as Expected... I haven't had any PC crashes or Notable malfunction that I am aware of.
Dr 353 Even the flickering while in the control panel between Xbox and Podium Hub seems to be gone when using the Podium Hub...It seems this flickering Between Xbox and Podium Hub is more Xbox Hub Related because just to see what happens with the Podium Hub ,PBME mounted on My DD2 as I'm typing this there has not been 1 flicker between Podium Hub to Xbox hub and I have had the control panel Tuning menu open for 20mins or more.
Edit: Ok Just had My 1st PC Crash and it Definitely seems to be related to having the Fanatec Control panel open when shutting the wheel off and this screen being open!!! I have been able to Reproduce this issue 3x in a Row.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CnqxVR-k7YjRtRnNN2x_wFxKDn9YCio4/view?usp=sharing
If the control panel is open and the DD2 base OLED is showing just the Fanatec Logo and wheel is powered Off everything is Normal...No PC Crash I have replicated this 3x in a Row also.
I dont know what other wheel base OLED screens will cause the PC crash issue...Im Not going to test them all but having the screen that I posted open with the PC tuning Menu screen open at the same time and you turn the wheel Off will definitely cause a PC crash.... It can be reproduced...i did it 3x!!! in a Row.
In my opinion, there is no driver that is not a beta. Just release the stable driver.
There are new functions, and then everyone feeds back and iterates. Here, that's how it developed
Has any 1 else been able to test this???
On My PC when the Control panel Tuning Menu screen is Open and I have My DD2 base set to this screen (pic at botton)100% of the time it causes My PC to Crash if I turn the wheel base Off...Tested 5x!!! and every time PC Crashed.
I tested to see what happens if Tuning Menu is open and Shut DD2 Off while base is just Showing "Fanatec" on the screen and all was Normal/No PC crash and wheel turned Off....Tested 5x and No PC Crash.
Also Note I Left wheel base OLED showing "Fanatec" and Did Not Feel any Random FFB Thumps!!! <--- This Needs Further Testing as I only Drive about 30min but again I felt No Random FFB thumps🤔
Its a really weird Bug and a very Random find because most probably Never shut their wheel base off while in the Tuning Menu...Other than this drive
I dont know what other wheel base OLED screens will cause the PC crash issue I did Not test them all.
Other than this on PC Dr/Fw 353 the FFB feels Great and seem to be working as intended and has Great Potential which is more than likely why this Bug/Glitch has been sooo hard to Isolate.
Win 10/64bit, DD2, PBME, Podium Hub,
Dr 353 Full package installed on wheel base.
,
I am not able to reproduce this issue on my system. No BSOD when turning off the DD with this specific DD screen enabled...
I can make a Video if it will help...
Note you Must have wheel base set to this screen and PC control Panel Must be on Tuning Menu page where you can adjust the on wheel settings from the PC <--- Did you have that screen showing on your PC <-- If Not this could be the difference because this screen Directly interacts with the wheel to Control on wheel settings. Please test again with the specific screens open and Report back.
Edit: Fanalab was Not Running.
For just one second guys , if we can leave behind all the bad things this dr/fw brought to us , beside the fact that we have jolts , my tv flickers, my mclaren gt3 wheel shifters goes in any direction they want and none of the direction i want , BUT, and there is the good thing, and now i am addressing to you Fanatec stuff , guys , please , reproduce this ffb feeling in a good stable driver. The ffb with this dr/fr is the best i have ever felt. I kindly ask you to remember this and do not lower the ffb feeling in future dr/fw becouse i love this but i cannot use it. I respect you guys , i love your products as all we are here and beyond, we payed a shittload of money for them products love them but we want this feeling and more. Please keep this in mind. Much respect. Always Fanatec.
I was now able to reproduce it and forward the method to our developers. I know it's bad to have issues like that with drivers but you have to see that this is really weird stuff and not that easy to even find exactly which exact situation was causing it. Thanks a lot for that report.