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Thread: GGS LX launch monitor
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03-28-2014 04:19 AM #1921
- Join Date
- Mar 2014
- Location
- Ho Chi Minh city
- Posts
- 5
Tanks, Dax, i will look through the forum...but Its my first experience in forums...and in this business....soI am looking for the advices and information... What did you mean by 'build yourself'?
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03-28-2014 09:05 AM #1922
- Join Date
- Nov 2013
- Location
- Calgary
- Posts
- 323
Golfclub,
What I meant was that there are a lot of things that you can do yourself rather than paying others to get that professional look. Everything with respect to my build has come from online ordering or from on of my many trips to the home depot. For instance, my frame structure that holds my netting and screen is made of 1" electrical conduit that I bought at the home depot for around $300. The fittings to hold all of the pipe together came from a company called Canopy Mart out of the US (I think I paid around $200 including delivery). My netting was expensive, but I went with top quality netting as the build is in my garage and so I have a lot of other expensive things that I am trying to protect. There are cheaper alternatives to the $1,500 that I spent here and have seen others post their netting finds of a few hundred dollars. I ordered my screen material and putting surface from Cory at Par2Pro (he is really good and informative and has a lot of what you might need) and will likely order a few more things through him. My hitting matt was around $700 (Truestrike) and that I bought online and was delivered to me in a couple of days. My projector, a Benq 1080st was bought on amazon at a great price. All I need to do now is buy the monitor, which I will likely make a decision on today and the computer will likely be ordered this weekend from a local company here that does a great job building computers.
Hope this helps, but please ask if you need any clarification. (I hope to have pictures up once my set up is more complete, sans the monitoring device, and I get my screen material up, which will hopefully be this weekend).
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04-05-2014 10:13 AM #1923
- Join Date
- Mar 2014
- Location
- Ho Chi Minh city
- Posts
- 5
Thanks Dax for the info
I decided go with proTee, couple months away from ordering
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04-05-2014 10:47 AM #1924
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04-16-2014 11:34 AM #1925
- Join Date
- Jan 2014
- Location
- Pittsburgh
- Posts
- 35
Update - Week ??? - It's all a blur
Well, progress has finally been made. There is definitely a bug in the software - FYI, I'm running a clean install of Windows 8 for this system - that may have been a mistake, as it seems that Martin develops in Windows 7 and only ports to Windows 8, so that may be part of the issue. What is happening is this: When the system is used for "Normal" shots, the cameras capture in the correct order: 1-2. As soon as the ball lands on the green, the system switches to "Putting mode" as indicated by the "Putting mode on" indicator light in the control panel. In putting mode, for some unknown reason, the system captures the camera images in reverse order: 2-1. The system then analyzes the images and decides that it must have been a bad capture, because the ball is moving backwards. However, if I manually (CTRL+SHIFT+DEL) reverse the camera order, the system correctly interprets the images and calculates and launches the putt. It took a long time to figure out what was happening. By fortunate accident, I had a foursome over to play, and the system stopped working. After fighting with it for a while, I sent an e-mail off to Martin and then sat down with one of the guys to figure out what was going on. With him hitting shot after shot, and me at the analysis screen watching what was going on, I finally realized where the problem was. After I reversed the cameras, we were able to practice putting, and then when I reversed them back, the drives and approach shots were working. We managed to play 9 holes with full functionality - we "just" had to switch the cameras back and forth when we got on or off the green.
I reported all of this to Martin, and mentioned that he hadn't updated the Win 8 CP for a few weeks, despite multiple Win 7 updates. There's a new Win 8 CP out there this morning, and although there is no mention of a fix for my bug, I'm optimistic about the prospects. Either way, I now have a system, bugs and all, that will allow me to simulate all of the aspects of a round of golf! I've found that the detection is a little too easy - to the point that when putting, it pretty much always calculates a straight path, even if you are trying to putt off center instead of aiming the shot - however, there are dozens of little fiddly switches that I plan to play with until I start seeing results closer to what I am expecting. The good news is that I'm at that point, instead of still trying to get the shots to register at all!
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04-16-2014 11:53 AM #1926
- Join Date
- Jan 2014
- Location
- Pittsburgh
- Posts
- 35
One quick additional note: It may well be that the bug is in the hardware, not the software. If the firmware in the LX is changing the camera order when the "Putting Mode" signal is sent, that may be the source of the problem. This can be overcome with software, of course, but it makes a lot more sense than the software arbitrarily changing the order of the captures - you would have to deliberately program that behavior, and I can't imagine why anyone would do that. It makes sense for the device to be doing it, because there is definitely a mode change (activate line scan, deactivate mic trigger) when the device shifts to putting mode, so it could be running a completely different set of internal instructions if the Line Scan triggers the cameras, and that instruction set may use a different camera call out (serial number instead of position address, or some such) which could cause the reversal. The bad part of that is that wouldn't be an easy fix (would have to flash the bios, and I don't think Martin has made provision for that external to the device), though it could be corrected for. That would, however, explain the intermittent "no launches" I get sometimes on shots - if the LS camera triggers before the mic, the frames would be reversed, and the shot wouldn't launch. Hmmm...
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04-16-2014 08:00 PM #1927
- Join Date
- Jan 2014
- Location
- Canton
- Posts
- 12
To quote bubba22 from 12/15/2013: It's really a sad story!
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05-30-2014 04:22 PM #1928
- Join Date
- Nov 2011
- Location
- Canada
- Posts
- 138
Schaedj....how are things? Some of us are still interested in your story!
And remind me please, how does your system compare to the LX Pro II or LX Infiity Martin is now showing on his site. He seems to have dropped all the others.
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09-01-2014 04:50 PM #1929
- Join Date
- Nov 2011
- Location
- Canada
- Posts
- 138
Several months and no replies? Time to bump the thread.
A quick check of the GSA site suggest the LX Pro II and LX Infinity have both gone by the wayside. I couldn't tell what, if anything, is actually shipping although the current discussion seemed to be of an LX Lite and LX Pro. A quick google search didn't produce any user reviews of an LX in the wild.
Is the LX even around these days (or Schaedj for that matter)? Anyone been paying enough attention to update us?
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09-08-2014 03:00 PM #1930
- Join Date
- Jun 2012
- Location
- Fairfax
- Posts
- 11
Lx is a non-working perpetual scam.
get:
1. GC2
2. Flightscope Xi
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09-08-2014 03:57 PM #1931
- Join Date
- Oct 2010
- Location
- Stamford, CT
- Posts
- 228
9/5 tech update - line scan trigger is being replaced by a trigger mat. Dumb, the whole point was to get away from having to build stuff into the floor.
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09-17-2014 01:35 PM #1932
- Join Date
- Jan 2014
- Location
- Pittsburgh
- Posts
- 35
I'm Baaaaack! Sorry it's been so long without any updates, but I honestly haven't had any updates since the last post. Once the golf season arrived, I spent all of my free time out on the course, which is where I'd much rather be, than on the simulator. Winter is approaching, my last night of leagues is Thursday this week (Final Outing Saturday), and I have a week of vacation planned next weekend (heading to FL to extend the summer for a week) - Once that's done, it will be getting dark to early for me to head to the course after work, and I'll be back in simulator mode once again. So, I decided to dust off the grass mats, fire up the PC and check to see if there were any updates on the LX-Pro. Wow! It looks like he's exploding development in several directions (not a good thing from an existing customer perspective) - but he has posted some software updates, some of which look like they are targeting specific issues I've experienced (trigger delays, saving settings) More importantly, there's an update - "Mod B" to the device which makes the camera timings addressable (could solve the putting mode issue) and increases the flash time! Now all I have to do is get the update... I sent Martin an e-mail - it looks like this is a mail-in program. If it is, I'm going to ask him to hook it up to his setup while he has it down there and fully test all of the functions. I may even pay some extra cash and ship my whole computer down there so he can do a complete configuration with my equipment and my device. If he can get the whole setup working at his facility and ship it to me, I'm golden. Getting excited again. Anyhow, thanks to those who dropped me a line asking for an update. Nice to know that people are reading this. I will keep you all posted if/when I find out more. In the meanwhile, I'll probably load the new version of the CP to see if it fixes the setting saving issue and what other improvements have been made, unless I have to ship it out before I get a chance to. I also have some more work to do on the whole sim enclosure, so I'm going to start planning that, too.
Cheers,
Dave
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10-11-2014 09:58 AM #1933
- Join Date
- Jan 2014
- Location
- Pittsburgh
- Posts
- 35
Quick Update
Sent my unit off to Martin. Haven't heard from him yet. I didn't end up sending my PC, just the unit itself. I asked him to hook it up to his equipment and validate it was working before he returned it. Will let everyone know how it goes when I get it back. Cheers!
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10-11-2014 03:09 PM #1934
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10-15-2014 10:27 PM #1935
- Join Date
- Oct 2010
- Location
- Stamford, CT
- Posts
- 228
Now Martin has moved to an IR trigger in the LX pro. Another year or two of successive approximation and he might have a working product.
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10-16-2014 03:41 PM #1936
- Join Date
- Jan 2014
- Location
- Pittsburgh
- Posts
- 35
Yeah, I'm kind of bummed about the IR trigger - turns out it's an automatic switch (according to the site, I haven't gotten it back yet) - on the one hand, good, if it works better than the line scan - on the other hand, I paid a couple of hundred in component cost for the line scan camera and it irks me to have it replaced with a $15 IR board. Still waiting for the return shipment. It's not so much patience as busyness. I'm not sure if I'd have time to work on (or play) the simulator with everything else going on right now. I thought my evenings would free up now that the season is effectively over in western PA, but my wife has been etching the honey-do list in stone for the last few months...
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11-12-2014 04:49 PM #1937
- Join Date
- Feb 2010
- Location
- Los Osos
- Posts
- 22
Here is a quote from the GSA site:
- It has come to our knowledge that the supplier of the GSA Golf Courses software has been acquired by another company.
- At present we are not sure if we will be able to offer this software anymore in the future and, if so, at what price.
- We still have a small stock of the licenses (4) but until such time that we have been informed of the new price, the current price has to be increased substantially for these last 4.
- As the company that has acquired our supplier has been selling the GSA Golf courses for a very high price (in the region of $6000 to $8000 we have heard)
- and we have been selling all the 97 golf courses in the region of $499 to $699, it is unlikely that we will be offering this software anymore.
- We will thus be going exclusively with the E6 software in the very near future.
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11-12-2014 06:08 PM #1938
Sounds to me like someone is tap dancing on some graves..
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12-06-2014 12:37 PM #1939
- Join Date
- Nov 2011
- Location
- Canada
- Posts
- 138
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12-06-2014 09:13 PM #1940
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01-26-2015 01:29 PM #1941
- Join Date
- Jan 2014
- Location
- Pittsburgh
- Posts
- 35
Sorry it's been so long since I posted an update. Since the last time I posted, there has been significant progress. I sent the unit back to Martin for repair. It was around the same time he made the decision to swap out the Line Scan camera for an IR trigger and to develop the Club Cam capabilities into the LX Pro unit. It took him over two months to finally get the unit back to me. I got it back the week before Christmas... Needless to say, I wasn't really pleased with that. However, once I finally received the unit back, I was very happy! The IR trigger is much more effective than the Line Scan ever was. I still get "missed" shots about once every 10, but the majority of the shots are caught properly. The unit is consistent in it's interpretation of the shot, and the results are very repeatable. I'm still not thrilled with the calibration between swing and distance, but the ball flight is consistent. It picks up some of the lateral movement, but I would estimate it gets about 50% (If I hit 10 degrees off-line, the screen shows about 5) The putting / camera switch issue has been completely resolved, and I no longer need to mess with the cameras when I land on the green. The launch angle matches well with what I see visually. All in all, I'm please with the unit, and I have a satisfactory system in place. That having been said, there is one issue that I have with the system. It appears to base the ball size detection / calibration on the initial frame it captures when you align the cameras, and it never recaptures that frame (In the software, it is listed as Frame 1) - on every shot, it captures a Frame 2 and a Frame 3, and uses the delta for all of its calculations, but it seems to use the Frame 1 ball size to determine horizontal path. If you don't position the ball the exact same distance from the unit as it was when you calibrated it, it throws off the path of the ball flight, sometimes very significantly. Since I have an ultimate tee mat to hit from, I tend to move the ball around a good bit, and if I forget to stay in line, my shot direction can be goofy. The putting is extremely sensitive, and it's almost impossible to hit a putt that goes less than 10 feet. Also, around the green, the software is not very intelligent about putting vs. chipping, and if you don't actually select the club, you can end up with a major disconnect - somehow, the calibration makes the ball shoot 20 yards instead of the 15 foot chip you were going for.
Overall, there is a lot of calibration / adjustment that needs to be done to get the software to "feel" right. When I first connected it, a solid drive would give me a ball flight of about 180 yards, instead of the 220-230 I was expecting to see. There are dozens of adjustments that can be used, from an overall "power" control to individual sliders for each club, and I have been working my way through those very slowly. I don't have the system tweaked in to where I want it yet, but I do have a system in place that I am comfortable inviting a few friends over to play on, and my overall project cost is below $3K.
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01-26-2015 01:41 PM #1942
- Join Date
- Jan 2014
- Location
- Pittsburgh
- Posts
- 35
So, the big question is, would I buy it again? Well... Not when I bought it, I wouldn't. But, if I were making the decision to buy a new unit today, I would probably go ahead and buy the LX again. Surprising, even to me, but when it comes down to it, the cost difference between the LX and what I have seen from competitive units is a significant deciding factor. I now have a unit that I can use in my setup, or pick up and take to a driving range and record (or calibrate, as I plan to) my shots. Since the unit no longer requires separate USB boards, I can run the system on my laptop and take it on the road if I want. It's far superior to the Optishot I scrapped when I bought this, especially in durability - hitting down onto a unit is not conducive to long life. It's inferior to lots of the other more costly products on the market, if only because of the available user support community and the repeatability of those solutions. There is still a huge moving target issue with the developer. What he's making today may not be what he's making two months from now, and he may come up with a new idea that causes him to completely lose focus on supporting your product, BUT, the product he is shipping today works with the software he is shipping today, and is relatively simple to set up and use "out of the box" - If you like fiddling with knobs and buttons (I do), then it's a decent product for a decent cost, and achieves the goal. If you want a canned solution that doesn't require that sort of tweaking, I would steer clear.
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01-26-2015 04:09 PM #1943
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01-28-2015 10:12 AM #1944
- Join Date
- Oct 2010
- Location
- Stamford, CT
- Posts
- 228
Thank you for the update schaedj - hope the tweaking goes well.
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02-11-2015 11:01 PM #1945
- Join Date
- Feb 2015
- Location
- Lebanon PA
- Posts
- 21
I was just looking into one of these but this just downright scares me now !! You've put more than $3k worth of time and work to get your unit "acceptable" ! I applaud your patience !!
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02-20-2015 05:39 PM #1946
- Join Date
- Feb 2015
- Location
- Chuckey, TN
- Posts
- 3
I am very happy I read this post. I found myself looking at GSA sims, not anymore. The price is right where I want to be, but the hassel and issues that you have talked about would leave me putting a 45 ACP through it on the rifle range in the back yard.
Regards
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