Mach3 vs Mach4

[John S]

Basically M4 release or lack of it is Brians fault.
He announced it far to early and now he's being pressurised.
I can't make decisions for him but going back Art released the first beta of Mach 3 to the public and got them to do testing on the grounds that 100 users would probably find 100 faults, Art would probably miss all these as he was too deep into the program and blinkered.

Whilst that was going on he then worked on other things, screens, wizards etc.

Brian OTOH has done the screen designer and the new wizards for M4 when the program doesn't even exist in beta ?

Linux definitly has a place for the more experianced used, they just don't realise they have the experiance.

Currently I'm working with a linux guy on improving my hobber.
Simple he says just do a bootable USB stick and we will work from this.

Follow these instructions.

UNetbootin - Homepage and Downloads

Now scroll down and there are 52 versions of Linux.

At least mach only needs W2000 or XP, hardly rocket science.

[Boyan Silyavski]

In the spirit of this conversation is worth noting that a separate computer to run the machine is a must. I have 2 in fact, old Dell cost me 30eur from a local boot sale and has win xp installed and is running fine.

Another thing is that i have 2 BOBs , the second one for closed loop and some extra inputs and outputs and it took me a lot of time to fiddle with printer port cards, PC BIOS and how to make them both work and in which mode each. Its worth researching before, about the exact modes needed to run the board you have or the integrated port, cause some computers LPT boards or LPT cards will NOT work due to lack of a certain mode.

[John S]

Don't get me wrong, I'm not knocking Linux it works and works well it's really how the people who fully understand how it works just can't understand that others are not at their skill level.

Where M3 scores is that it's so easily configurable and there are far more users prepared to help which in turn helps the total number of users.

Linux or EMC didn't help them selves earlier on by being very clannish and to be honest having a very superior attitude to anyone who couldn't follow what they were doing.

Anyone remember the BDI version ? it stood for Brain Dead Install and was aimed at talking down to non linux users to show just how easy it was and what they were missing.

Problem was it didn't work for many of the users who tried it. they followed instruction to the letter, no joy and then followed instructions on how to get it to work.

Rather comical to read the posts of the day, Linux users getting more infuriated that the user couldn't get it to work, the user getting more confused from the curt one liners that they obviously never understood until finally the whole exchange petered out.

Linux geek scratching his head wondering why they couldn't understand something so simple and the would be user scratching his head and wondering if he needed to learn Serbo Croat to fully understand Linux.

[i2i]

maybe this thread could be compared to the Betamax versus vhs debate many years ago. Betamax being the vastly superior system never caught on, maybe because vhs got a foothold in the marketplace first.
Now the amount of windows users (yes it is m/soft) is massive compared to Linux (it's not m/soft), so the average guy/girl who wants to use a cnc machine may well be familiar to windows and probably even have a pc with windows already on it.
So what would be his or her best option.?

[birchy]

the average guy/girl who wants to use a cnc machine may well be familiar to windows and probably even have a pc with windows already on it.
So what would be his or her best option.?

99% of the time, they will choose Windows because they are already familiar with it. People don't like change, no matter how easy or difficult it may be. That's why M$ have done so well...

[birchy]

Now scroll down and there are 52 versions of Linux.

Yeah, I often laugh at that because the overwhelming choices puts off potential newbies. Lots of choice is great but it doesn't help the inexperienced.

Generally speaking, a bootable CD or DVD is the easiest. You download the O.S. as an ISO file and burn it to disk. Boot the PC from the CD/DVD and job's a good'un.

Forgive my ignorance, I don't know what a "hobber" is (EDIT: duhhh - just realised you mean a gear hobber)....If you're installing LinuxCNC, then you'll want their CD/DVD as it is a complete O.S. and software package. For anything else, Linux Mint is the way to go. It's newbie friendly and works straight out of the box. No need to install security packages (Norton, etc), Flash plugins, Java plugins, movie codecs, MS Office, etc..they're all pre-installed.

EDIT:
For your purposes, I think your friend is suggesting you install UNetbootin (which is the software used to create bootable USB sticks) BUT use the LinuxCNC ISO rather than one of those 52 choices! UNetbootin has an option for "Diskimage", so you'd need to choose that and point it at your downloaded image.

[John S]

Yeah, I often laugh at that because the overwhelming choices puts off potential newbies. Lots of choice is great but it doesn't help the inexperienced.

Birchy,
You have hit the nail on the head, anyone moving from windows / mach3 will be inexperienced and after reading that page he'll also be confused

Is it any wonder they just give up ?

Seriously I'm not knocking it [ Linux ] but after all this time and with the amount of join man hours on the program you would thing that more time had been spent attracting new users instead of patting each other on the back.

Many low end motion packages have that amateurish appearance to them.
M3 in default screen looks like the flight deck of a 747
Most of the USB controllers look very similar like they have all been done in MS Paint
Linux looks like their screen is just an afterthought, looking neither amateurish or professional.

M3 for instance has different screens for lathe and mill to match the machine.

[birchy]

I think that Linux's main downfall is the sheer number of versions. Because it's open source, anyone can develop an O.S. and although it has been beneficial long term (i.e. many hands make light work), it has resulted in a bottomless pit of choices. The Linux Mint project has done a lot to address this issue (and done it very well), but newbies may not discover it and give up because they tried some other flavour of Linux. It's a shame really.

I'm not massively into LinuxCNC yet but understand there are loads of custom screens available. How easy they are to install and/or use is something I've not investigated yet...

[JAZZCNC]

End of the day it shoudn't be about the OS and that's not the case for me.! . . . Like I say couldn't careless if it run Wonker vision.
My machines only run MS OS because thats whats needed to run Mach3 and they don't have anything else what so ever installed.

All folks want is a controller that is easy to install, setup and ultimately easy enough to use. They can't or don't want to mess about with OS issues or learning some coding skills to make it work like they would like. They want sympathetic help when they are challenged not made to feel like idiots because they can't do the lingo.!! . . . . Like John this has been my experience and feed back form others with the EMC or linux CNC crew in the past.

They both work Well just Mach suits newer users and experienced users alike better IMO.

[John S]

I mentioned before about the screens and was taken to task by an experienced Linux user who told me it was quite simple and sent me three pages of code to alter the screen but no instructions on what to do with the code or where to put it.

OK to him that was simple but I don't even have to write G Code in this day and age.

It would be nice to just get a system that loaded up and ran but why cannot they do this after all these years ?

As regards CV, a friend of mine who is a programmer, looks after windows and linux systems has this on his machines as well as Mach.

He's done tests and filmed then using same file, same machine, same code, same everything and M3 outperforms LinuxCNC on his router, you can see it slowing for corners.

However on his lathe LinuxCNC beats M3 hands down, especially as M3 is useless at threading with the one slot encoder.