HomeBoy

Since I help a lot of people with their TrackIR4 devices, I have been developing this document that details all the elements of setup. Thought it might be helpful to share it here. Hope you find it useful. -mark

I've been rooting out all the commands and trying to figure out which ones are relevant to OFF. In the process, I've come up with this Command Key Card. Please check it out (feel free to use/edit it) and let me know of mistakes you find. Thanks -mark

Not so! There is one. Bullethead!

Hi Peter, I've commented about this before (you can do a search for my id and you'll probably find it) so I won't rehash all of it. I was a long time user of TIR4 and recently switched to TIR5. The primary difference between the two is resolution. I found I had to do all sorts of tricks with the response curves in TIR4 to get smooth, responsive movement. When I tried those same curves with TIR5, the views just jumped wildly around (because TIR5 is so much more responsive due to it's greater resolution). I found that the default curves with TIR5 were very reasonable and I ended up tweaking them only slightly. TIR5 is so much more natural feeling than TIR4 I was amazed. There was always a little jumpiness with TIR4 that I never was able to completely smooth out. I personally feel that it is worth the upgrade going from TIR4 to TIR5, especially for in games like OFF where the viewing system is so very important. On the other hand, lots of guys here have posted good results upgrading to TIR5 software and not upgrading the hardware. It appears that the software is better able to manage the lower resolution and it does improves things a bit. I don't know that first hand as I have no way to test that but if you haven't tried that, it won't cost you anything to get the TIR5 software and try it. Good luck whatever you decide. I do know TIR makes some folks feel nauseous. I always got car sick as a child and I'm amazed TIR doesn't bother me but it never has. I do notice that sometimes it's difficult to walk a straight line after playing for several hours because of vertigo (or whatever) but I never really felt sick from it. I sure understand those that do though.

Just a little fun here... I remember some years ago (pre TrackIR) when doing battle in Aces High using my trusty CH Products Fighter Stick with the "coolie hat" set up to control my views that I would go to bed with the tip of my thumb completely numb from working views for hours at a time. I would wake up in the morning with this really sore red spot on my thumb. One of the first blessings of TIR was that my thumb completely healed! It actually took me almost six months before I could keep my thumb off the coolie hat after getting TIR. In fact, I had to program the coolie to perform no functions at all because I was constantly messing up my view with them. I know I've been gaming too much when I resist turning my head to check the time on the clock that sits beside my monitor in the office during work because I am being careful not to "change my view." I know I've been gaming too much when I want to "recenter" my view while driving my car. I know I've been gaming too much when I find myself being careful when looking around a telephone pole or street lamp so that I "change only one axis." I know I've been gaming too much when I watch a YouTube video of someone flying and can't keep my head still. I was at a movie with my wife and there was a scene of a guy flying an airplane and my wife poked me and said "stop moving your head!" I know I've been gaming too much when I put my "antlers" on just to browse the web.

I was working on something completely non-OFF related this evening when my AVira antivirus program popped this up on my screen: I clicked on "Repair all" which quarantined my OFFManager.exe. Of course that just won't do. I had been meaning to update my mini-patch (was running 132.e) so I went and downloaded 132.g and when I tried to install it, I got the same error message about this TR/Dropper.Gen virus. I looked it up and from everything I've read, it is a "low threat" so at least for now, I've chosen to ignore the warning from Avira. I'm just curious if anybody has seen this and if this is real. I don't want to get too smart for my own good assuming that Avira is falsely recognizing something in the file as having this virus. OFF seems to run just fine. I'm not sure what I should do about this. Thanks! -mark P.S. Sorry I've been a bit AWOL lately, I've gotten tied up in other things and haven't paddled my way back here yet. Looking forward to getting back into OFF. Hope everyone is doing well!

Hi DerMo, You must have a configuration problem of some sort. When I discovered this problem and submitted a report about it to Avira, they had a fix out in less than 24 hours in which I verified. Upon seeing your post, I made this screenshot to show that Avira indeed has no false positive against OFFManager.exe. Notice the date of the last update was yesterday.

I must say I'm thrilled to be amid such diverse and cultured folks as the OFF community. I feel like sometimes that I have so many hobbies that everything I do is a hobby. Anyway, here is a quick list off the top of my head: -Modding/building game controllers. I can be sitting in a doctor's office, watching a movie, concert, etc. and dreaming up some contraption and then have to race home and give it a try. It's a real sickness! -Furniture building, detail carpentry, etc. I used to do a lot of 18th century repo stuff (carving and such). I've gotten lazy and haven't done much in the last few years but I still have the "ole spark" in me. -Guns. Target shooting, ammo reloading, etc. Very relaxing. In fact, here is my latest project if you're interested: http://snomhf.exofire.net/shooting/chronyLights.html -Figuring things out and writing "how to" articles. Weird. I don't know why I like to do this but I really do get a charge out of making Command Cards, etc. -All things aviation. I collect diecast airplanes. My family never has a problem trying to figure out what to get me for Christmas, my birthday, etc. as they can never go wrong getting me a little airplane. Any time we go to a WalMart or K-Mart type store, I always go to the toy section and see if there is an airplane that I don't have. I especially like WW2 models but I have all sorts. One of my most treasured is a wonderfully detailed A10 Warthog (oh how I love that airplane):

Update.... My Avira auto-update downloaded a new update tonight. I suspected it might be the fix and sure enough, checked for virus in OFFManager.exe and Avira is indeed happy with it. So, not bad for free software! Pretty responsive bunch that Avira!

FYI, Just got a note from Avira saying they analyzed the 1.32g minipatch download link I sent them and since they were unable to find a virus in the OFFManager.exe they are going to change the way they identify the TR-DropperGen trojan and release an update. Thanks for all the help (especially Erik for that great step-by-step) and Pol for the list of scanners. This has been educational for me at least as, like I said, I've lived a charmed life and have not seen anything like this before. I suspect that if you are using Avira, you will get your OFFManager.exe quarantined at least until they release the new version which I suspect will happen pretty quick.

Thank you Erik for the detailed instructions. I have followed your instructions. Results follow. Done. Sent the report to Avira. Ran this and it did not find ANYTHING. Strange that Avira flags the file yet it's removal tool does not find any problems. Downloaded MBAM and it found no problems. Here is the log: Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware 1.41 Database version: 2907 Windows 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3 10/5/2009 12:56:01 AM mbam-log-2009-10-05 (00-56-01).txt Scan type: Full Scan (C:\|D:\|) Objects scanned: 420749 Time elapsed: 55 minute(s), 50 second(s) Memory Processes Infected: 0 Memory Modules Infected: 0 Registry Keys Infected: 0 Registry Values Infected: 0 Registry Data Items Infected: 0 Folders Infected: 0 Files Infected: 0 Memory Processes Infected: (No malicious items detected) Memory Modules Infected: (No malicious items detected) Registry Keys Infected: (No malicious items detected) Registry Values Infected: (No malicious items detected) Registry Data Items Infected: (No malicious items detected) Folders Infected: (No malicious items detected) Files Infected: (No malicious items detected)

That is an excellent point Olham. I didn't even think about that. Sorry for all the trouble I've apparently caused! What a way to return to the boards huh? Since I posted last night, I've been running several other scanners and though they've found other things, none have complained about this particular one. Avira is complaining now about other files as well however. I see some of my LockOn files have gotten infected as well. Something certainly appears to be going on. I guess I've lived a charmed life. This is the first time I've really seen this. I've gotten the occasional temp file but nothing like this. Pol, I've been out working all day and am just now reading the boards, mail, etc. otherwise I would have changed my title right away. I see someone took care of that. Thank you! Feel free to delete this thread all together if you want, I was just asking for advice; never intended this to be any sort of indictment on OFF. Thanks too for all the links to scanners. That's been helpful. Looks like I've got some work to do here.

Howdy RC et. al. I'm around. Just haven't had a reason to post lately. Also, I've gotten distracted by some other projects. I have a hard time multiplexing.

Hi RC, Glad to hear you got your game pad to work together with your joystick. A word of caution here about using a FF gamepad. I found when I tried to introduce a FF gamepad to my system, I lost all FF control because my joystick (Logitech Wingman) is also FF. Apparently if you have two FF controllers on the same system it does not work properly. When I finally replaced the FF gamepad with a non-FF version, I got the FF working again properly on my joystick. This is all under Win XP. Vista may work better, don't know that. It could have been something I didn't have configured right but I couldn't figure it out and just gave up. I hate to discourage you from getting a FF gamepad. I'll just say I had trouble. You're mileage may vary.

Oak Leaf Merlot from WalMart. $2.99 a bottle. Sure fools these ole country bumpkin taste buds!

I figured since I spent so much time working these settings, I should put them together where I wouldn't lose them. Maybe you would benefit from it too. These settings are a result of reading the FAQ, all the posts here, and experimentation. I am very pleased with the results on my system. The game runs smooth as glass. Enjoy!

That is an excellent question Barn. I have no idea why this worked before but does not now! BUT, I'm happy as a clam to be having my missions recorded with ESC - Enter! You can believe that when I get ready to exit this life, I'm going to press the "ESC" key!

Hi Olham, So you are saying you think TIR5 software works better with TIR4 hardware? I wouldn't have thought that to be true. The only thing available when I got rid of my TIR4 was early versions of the 5.0 beta and it was really bad with TIR4. With all the resolution translation that has to happen for TIR4 I would certainly have thought those with TIR4 should stick with the 4.0 software. Perhaps I was wrong about that. Nice to hear it's working well for you! Those NP guys are something else!

Just for the record and not to let Condor go down as the only "dummy" in the group. I'm a DUMMY too!

That's a tough call sir. TIR4 works really well. You know that, I know that. Everybody that has one knows that. What TIR5 offers over TIR4 is greatly enhanced resolution (I'm too lazy to quote you specifics, I'll give you that as a homework assignment. ). Now, that might not sound like much but the difference is much smoother and easier to control head movement. A reasonable analogy that comes to mind is my giving up my beloved 21" Sony Trinitron CRT monitor for a 24" widescreen LCD. I scoffed at everybody who was touting how much better the LCD was than the CRT. I remember saying almost exactly these words: "Why should I get rid of a perfectly good monitor for one of these LCDs?" Well, when I finally broke down and did it, I loaded up that CRT and rushed it the the recycling center so fast you wouldn't believe it! I feel almost the same way toward the TIR5. ...but, each to his own. I sure would not argue that there is absolutely nothing wrong with the TIR4! Hope that made a little sense anyway. -mark

Please check out the changes I made to the summary card following my "goose egg" problem. Thanks -mark

Please check out the latest change I've made to the command card. I'm sure you may be aware of the difficulties that Condor44 and I have been having with our so-called "GooseEgg" campaign missions. The problem was we were flying missions, landing safely and "exiting" only to discover that our flight was not being recorded at all. Winder and Pol were very patient with us to work through this problem to discover that we were exiting the mission improperly. We were using the "Quit Game" command (CTRL + q) from my summary card not realizing that we should be using "Escape" followed by choosing the first menu choice "End Mission" (or just pressing Enter will work) which DOES record or mission. Duh! My first inclination was to just delete "CTRL q" as if it does not exist. Then I thought that it does have a legitimate purpose (you can abort the mission without it recording at all) and it would be wrong for me to take that option away from the user. Sure, people would argue that it provides a way to escape a mission without penalty but if someone wants to "cheat" in their campaign missions, who am I to deprive them of that? So I left it in with a clear note as to what it does (hopefully). Pretty embarrassing I must say..... Stung by my own summary card! Comments are welcome.

Check out the change I made to the Command Card. Let me know if you think it is ok the way I've left it. My first inclination was to just delete it as if it does not exist. Then I thought that it does have a legitimate purpose (you can abort the mission without it recording at all) and it would be wrong to take that option away from the user. Sure, people would argue that it provides a way to escape a mission without penalty but if someone wants to "cheat" in their campaign missions, who am I to deprive them of that? So I left it in with a clear note as to what it does (hopefully). Thanks -mark

Thank you Winder and Pol for hanging in there with a couple of blokes about this. This is really embarrassing but because CTRL-q takes me back to the same place, I just never even thought about it. I see now that the exit messages are different but I swear I've never payed a bit of attention to that before. Sheesh! I can't believe how much smarter everybody is about this than us two. Condor, we are a small club indeed!

I don't play FPS games that much but I really enjoyed Medal Of Honor and the follow-ups Call Of Duty and Call of Duty 2. I also enjoy EA Sports NHL Hockey (being a big hockey fan). I'm been sorta itching to get a new FPS game to use my new "Frankenstein toy" with: