As the title suggests, I’m getting my layout back up and running (dormant since about 2008 or so) and I’m going through my motive power to see what I’ve got. Fortunately, as an early adopter of JMRI I kept a back of the roster.
I have about 25 locomotive units (Proto, Athearn, Rapido, Atlas, BLI) and I had equipped them all with decoders. Six or seven have NCE D102EU’s, about a dozen have Digitrax DH121’s, a couple of DH163’s. Two units have SoundTraxx DSD-100LC’s. The BLI’s have their own sound decoders. I’m running a Digitrax DCS100 with a DT100 and a DT400 throttle, a PowerPax, a new PR4 and a bunch of autoreverser boards of unknown brand.
So I’m looking to possibly upgrade some of the decoders as I’m guessing there may have been some improvements over the past 10 or so years [:D] and I have some questions.
Is it worthwhile keeping the D102EU’s and the DH121’s or the DH123’s? Do newer decod
Hi Kris, [#welcome] to the forum. Your initial posts are moderated and they eventually appear in chronological order, which means they are not near the top of current posts.
I left the hobby, pre DCC and only came back a couple years ago so I cannot compare and contrast older vs newer, but this thread will cycle to the top of recent threads and help should appear shortly.
It does look like some digitrax decoders let you download a new sound. I have loksound and they definitely let you do that with a lokprogrammer.
Today it seams that ESU’s LokSound Selects and Soundtraxx Tsunami 2s are the most common and popular decoders. Most RTR equipment, especially in the higher price ranges, come with one of these two. To me it seems the LokSound is a bit more popular, but not by very much. These decoders are miles ahead of what was available ten years ago. Their sound is mich better and they have new features like LokSounds Drive Hold (were you can rev up the engine without changing speed).
Digitrax, NCE, MRC and TCS also continue to make decoders as far as I am aware, but have kind of vanished into obscurity. Few of these decoders are used in RTR locos, but they still work…
I personally am a proponent of RailPro. It’s a newer system that controls loco with radio instead on DCC. If that sounds interesting check it out, if not ignore what I just said.
Also if your satisfied with your current decoders, you could keep them, they still do the same thing, just not everything modern decoders do.
To quote Home Improvement: “I don’t think so, Tim.” TCS is very much alive and well and as good as (if not slightly better than) Loksound for motor-control. And, despite a concurrent thread about the problems of programming a TCS sound decoder in a Bachmann steamer, I’ve been very happy with the performance and sound of the TCS WOW decoders and would choose it over a Tsumani any day.
Relating to TCS, I guess they may be third most popular in terms of decoder manufacturing. I just don’t have any experience with them. I believe Bachmann puts TCS in their engines, but I avoid Bachmann products (I just don’t think they produce quality equivalent to what you pay). The more popular LokSound comes in most Atlas, ScaleTrains, Rapido, and Bowser locomotives, Athearn uses Tsunamis and other Soundtraxx products, so TCS is a bit less used in RTR locomotives, at least in my experience.
I’m with Tom on this one. I really don’t think you can find a poor decoder manufactured today. I prefer MRC 1700 series decoders for my locomotives, they sound and run great. I have several Digitrax decoders and I will purchase more of them in the future, personally I would think Digitrax leads the pack in popularity.
I have a TCS decoder in one of my Rivarossi Cab Forwards and it has the best Cab Forward sound out there, the motor control is also very good.
Thanks for the hearty welcome guys…nice to be back amongst friends!
And of course thanks for your comments and opinions. Funny, but as I get older (I’m of the mid-50’s), I have less patience so I’m trying to get back up to speed as quickly as possible and I appreciate the help.
Thankfully, the layout is in excellent shape and almost everything electrical is working fine. Track and motive power wheels have been cleaned, motive power tested and very minor repairs underway. I got JMRI back up and running and have managed to remember how all of this works! Now I’m looking at decoder upgrades.
Last night I ordered a TCS WSK-WAL-1 kit for my very sweet P2K 0-6-0. So I guess I’m really committed now. (also re-subscribed to MR [:D])
Two more things:
I’m pleasantly surprised at how much spare parts, supplies, tools, etc. I keep discovering; feels like Christmas morning!
And…the lure of those nice, well ballasted, parallel rails on my good sized layout was always tempting me back, but it was ordering two of Rapido’s about to be shipped Royal Hudsons that pushed me over the edge.
Those oold NCE decoders you have are probably not ‘silent running’ type and may have a buzz to them. I used to use a lot of newer NCE decoders, because at the time you could get a 10 pack for under $120, and they were pretty good decoders. I don’t need a whole bunch of light functions for my era and prototype either.
I originally got a couple of Digitrax decoders when I bought my system. But I’ve removed them. Frankly, I don’t like their implementation of BEMF. I haven’t tried their newest ones because I’ve found a standard I like and I see no point in changing. I feel standardization is a good thing.
Sound-wise, I use only ESU. I have one leftover Atlas loco with a QSI sound decoder and it works fine, so for now I keep it as-is. I tried SOundtraxx, an old DSD-100LC and then a Tsunami, haven’t tried Tsunami 2, but the horns for diesel Tsunamis are downright horrible sounding, no matter how much you play around with all that fancy equalizer and reverb stuff. I like the ESU because they have great motor drive and the sounds are user loadable - if I feel like adding a decoder to an F7 I don’t have to hope the shop has an EMD decoder in stock, I just load ESU’s EMD sound set in any available decoder. Or if I want to do an RS3, same thing. The only reason they have multiple decoder options is for different sizez - the micro ones, regular wired ones, board replacement - other brands have all that times however many different sound options they offer.
For non-sound, I’ve been using TCS, but they have gotten rather expensive lately so I may switch to ESU’s motor only decoders going forward. But I’m not going to rip out all the existing TCS ones, they work fine.
Yes. Most of mine are 126, or the 123. I threw out the last 121 I had, resetting it wasn’t working any more, so I switch it out.
The 166 is a 6 function decoder.
I only need the 2 function decoder, as I don’t normally do sound, and the 2 function gives you good motor control, and front and rear lights.
Others have been chiming in with the decoders of their choice, all good advice, except the post about a certain few decoders “falling into obscurity”, not true.
The RTR market is using the better decoders, with sound, like ESU. If you want to dig deep into ESU, and serious with doing programing with it, you’ll need to buy their programmer. I think simple CV changes can be made without, but I think sound files and such require their programmer.
Like I said, I only need motor control and lights, and using the prewired pico size LED’s I use, I can still have other lights, like ditch lights.
The TCS site has a lot of install pictures, sound and nonsound.