gbrown
Geoff on Bkool
- Location
- South Somerset
My support call came through last night. Hard to hear what the guy was saying as he seemed to have me on a speaker phone and there was someone else talking loudly in Spanish, but I just about managed to follow him.
I explained that the readings were much closer to the powertap just in the last few days and asked if they had changed anything, but he said not. He used the remote control and said everything looked OK, then he upgraded the firmware to the latest pre-release (v3.4), which he said was better and would be released shortly. He said I had to move the trainer to within 5cm of the ANT+ dongle before the upgrade would work, so for those of you who struggle to get the firmware updates to work, you seem to have to take your bike off and move the bkool until it is almost touching the ANT+ dongle (a usb extension lead makes this easier).
Seems pointless to do it wirelessly when it has to be so close, you might as well just plug it in! (Most people who work with computer networks for a living quickly come to realise that wireless is a pain, and you can't beat physical wiring for reliability and speed.)
Anyway, he then said it was good to go and that if I had any other problems to contact them via the web site, and off he went, without testing that the system was still working.
I moved it all back into place and put the bike back on and started a test ride, only to find that the Watts figure was resolutely zero! Everything else worked fine, but 0 watts. Then I realised that they would have cleared off for the weekend and an email to say put it back to how it was would not get answered until Monday at the earliest.
Took a deep breath and applied the usual process of trying switching everything off and back on again and hey presto, everything working fine. Computer "expert", eh?
However, nothing was really resolved and the power figures agreed for a while, and then drifted away, though not unreasonably so (around 10% perhaps), so hey ho.
Can't say I've noticed anything different in v3.4 over v3.3, but they would have to update the simulator to make any significant changes.
Cheers,
Geoff
I explained that the readings were much closer to the powertap just in the last few days and asked if they had changed anything, but he said not. He used the remote control and said everything looked OK, then he upgraded the firmware to the latest pre-release (v3.4), which he said was better and would be released shortly. He said I had to move the trainer to within 5cm of the ANT+ dongle before the upgrade would work, so for those of you who struggle to get the firmware updates to work, you seem to have to take your bike off and move the bkool until it is almost touching the ANT+ dongle (a usb extension lead makes this easier).
Seems pointless to do it wirelessly when it has to be so close, you might as well just plug it in! (Most people who work with computer networks for a living quickly come to realise that wireless is a pain, and you can't beat physical wiring for reliability and speed.)
Anyway, he then said it was good to go and that if I had any other problems to contact them via the web site, and off he went, without testing that the system was still working.
I moved it all back into place and put the bike back on and started a test ride, only to find that the Watts figure was resolutely zero! Everything else worked fine, but 0 watts. Then I realised that they would have cleared off for the weekend and an email to say put it back to how it was would not get answered until Monday at the earliest.
Took a deep breath and applied the usual process of trying switching everything off and back on again and hey presto, everything working fine. Computer "expert", eh?
However, nothing was really resolved and the power figures agreed for a while, and then drifted away, though not unreasonably so (around 10% perhaps), so hey ho.
Can't say I've noticed anything different in v3.4 over v3.3, but they would have to update the simulator to make any significant changes.
Cheers,
Geoff
