I noticed that SoundTraxx doesn’t mention SuroundTraxx on there site any more. I haven’t thought much about it for a year or so. [:I]
Did the MTH lawsuit kill it or was it not yet feasible?[:(!]
Thanks,
Hi Jim,
Well, back in Nov-Dec we were wondering about the status of the MTH lawsuit against QSI. Mum was the word and speculation was that it was likely reaching a stalemate. A lot of the “hoopla and heated debates” over this suit have calmed down on these forums. Hopefully the suit will “fade away”. Things have moved forward
One person who may know is Bruce from Litchfield Station. He knows the Workmans and communicates with them regularly. I’ll send him an e-mail and ask if he has any news on Surroundtraxx.
Just my opinion, but I doubt that the lawsuit is interfering with Soundtraxx’s plans for Surroundtraxx. Soundtraxx recently released the “Steam Locomotive” Tsunami decoder. The diesel version is next, which is still some months into the future, so it’s likely we may be hearing about Surroundtraxx after that. Again, I’m only guessing.
One of the stumbling blocks about being a “mom and pop” operation, even if involved with developing technology, is that progress is considerably slower than larger manufacturers with the personnel and higher production capacity to bring items to market within short time spans.
Last I saw was they were going to start working on SurroundTraxx again after the Tsunami was finished. However, maybe they will start over since originally it would only work with Digitrax Transponding, and now there is the NMRA Bi-Dir standard.
–Randy
What is with MTH? Why do they sue everybody?
Todays motto:
If there’s a buck to be made, SUE EM!
It’s a sad state of affairs in the patent and medical fields these days.
Whatever happened to beating the guy with a superioir product? (ie: Kadee and tortoise)
LSIModeler,
MTH, Lionel, and Williams primarily produce the larger scale toy and classic trains. There’s a lot of history dating years back. Basically at one time or another these companies have sued each other over patent and copyright issues. For years it seemed to be the norm.
Back in 2003, MTH sued QSI because of a speed control feature used by QSI that MTH claims was their development. It allowed model locomotives to be accelerated or decelerrated in scale “one mile per hour increments”. From my limited understanding, the claim was “Prior art and Intellectual property rights”.
So it was the speed control method that QSI was being sued about, an electronic feature that was part of the command control set up…so hence the link to DCC, even though it was not directly DCC.
QSI disabled the Back EMF feature on the new BLI locomotives and the DCC manufacturing world reacted instantly. Some DCC manufacturers were contemplating disabling similar features as well. Of course, HO and N modelers were caught off guard and didn’t take it very well. The attitude was that the lawsuit was freezing DCC’s advancement. Manufacturers might not share information so easily as a result. So for a while there was a lot of heated feelings toward MTH by many HO, N and even O scale modelers. I’m guilty of fanning some of those flames and have tried to do my part to be fair and cool it.
Now there was a rumor that MTH sued several DCC manufacturers----Not True, QSI was the defendent.
Anyway, that’s the simplified jist of it. You can go up towards the top of this page, click on “Advanced”, and on that screen just enter MTH and those topics should pop up. You could read the posts made then. Some are interesting, some are very heated, some silly, and some very intelligent.
I’m not an MTH fan, but I do hope that Mike Wolf makes an effort to work with the NMRA and clean up his Public Relations. The fires have
The new Tsunami Soundtraxx uses back EMF.