Coolest DCC System yet!

I found a REALLY cool, rather new item while visiting Trainfest this last weekend. I’ll sound like late night commercial here but, REALLY, you just have to see this! I would have written about this a few days sooner but I had a lot of research, interviewing, and translating to do for the article… (and at the same time we bought a house and are now in the middle of the move). Anyway, it’s a new type of DCC system that comes with NOooooooo, I said NO hand controller! It doesn’t use one… well not a conventional controller anyway. It’s called the Z21 Digital Center by Roco and it uses your present Smartphone or Tablet-PC as a handheld controller instead.

I did an article on it over on www.zrailroads.com I'll tell ya, this thing is simply NEATO!

(And yes, the first paragraph above is stollen right from that article, but how else could I say what I said in that paragraph?)

Joe

It is pretty neet! Almost looks like running a Wi-Throttle server in JMRI and using your smartphone.

Yup, I think it really is “THE” up and coming device for DCC. A lot of people are talking about it online. Well, maybe not on ZCS but around the web, people into DCC are.

Since I don’t use a smart phone myself, I just bought my first Android Tablet PC. [You know now you can get those things for like 69 bucks!] Now at least I can play around with the software before I buy the system. I can’t wait, but first I need to remodel my basement for a larger layout.

Joe

From what I read I can see that I have quite a bit of learning and read ing to do for this scale. Because I find it amazing that the conversation let alone the ability to put DCC in Locos this small and detail them. WOW!!!!
But it made me think that I thought the same way when I first say N scale and I got fairly good at detailing them and installing decoders. SO I hope I'll look at z scale one day.
In the meantime you guys that have the abilities keep doing what your doing. I'm learning and thanks for the lessons.

I’ve posted an update to the Z21 DCC control center. Get this… MUing is now available, plus the ability to operate using “Loconet”… plus a Big Boy virtual “cab”, plus games can now be played on it as well. And for those into more than Z, an HO Camera Locomotive that allows you to look out the front window of the display watching your own scenery move by as you go around your own layout! Now can we get them to shrink that Cam Loco down to our size?

The update is posted here… zrailroads.com/

Joe

Good stuff Joe,

Will be interesting to see how Z friendly these folks become. We can only hope.

tealplanes wrote: Good stuff Joe,

Will be interesting to see how Z friendly these folks become. We can only hope.

Thanks Loren... and “friendly” might be the optimum word here. I can’t really ever see them getting into Z, however since DCC knows no gauge or scale, they’re doing something we Zer's can take advantage of. And if we bug them enough, I see no reason for them not to produce the virtual cabs for a few of our little locos as well as the big ones. After all, they may be one in the same.