Re: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] Yeager Automation CNC PRO software?????

At 10:36 AM 11/17/2004 -0800, Russ wrote:

>Hi all, are there any users of CNC Pro software in the group, and if so,
>tell me what you think of there software.

Russ, CNCPro is basically a solid program, but there are random keyboard
lockups that occasionally happen while jogging. Doug put out a patched
version that supposedly cured that, but at least in my case it didn't help.

I sprang extra for the professional version, specifically to get the
constant-velocity contouring. CV does not work at all, even when I tried
it on 1.4GHz machine running DOS 7.01 (the DOS that Win98SE was built on).
In fact, CV causes the machine to pause slightly at the end of each move--a
killer when trying to do 3D surfacing.

The final straw is that CNCPro has not undergone any development for
several years, and Doug does not seem interested in ever really fixing the
keyboard lockups or making CV actually functional.

On the other hand, TurboCNC is under very active development, the
development team is extremely responsive to user bug reports, comments and
feature requests. CV is under development for an upcoming release. In
version 3.x of TurboCNC the user interface was very rudimentary (lots of
single-key picks up and down menus, like nested batch files almost) but
version 4 has a single-screen user interface much like CNCPro, with
pulldown menus for setting stuff up.

There are more parameters to set up for sure, but that makes TCNC even more
versatile than CNCPro. For instance, while still using CNCPro I wanted to
be able to adjust the step pulse width and was not able to.

If you get CNCPro I would advise against spending the extra money for the
pro version. For CNCPro I spent $20 or 25 for a third-party PDF manual
that was effectively no more useful than the help screens. It contains
gems like "The Jog Speed determines how fast the tool will jog on an axis
from one position to another in response to a keyboard jog command." If
you know anything at all about CNC and running DOS programs you can safely
pass on the manual.

If you decide to try TCNC (it is uncrippled shareware and really really
worth the $60 it takes to register it) there is a large, active and helpful
user community that will be happy to help you through the learning curve.
TCNC, even the unregistered version, has a very useful illustrated manual
that will walk you through the setup and use, and has a great g- and m-code
reference section.

I used CNCPro for several years before switching to TurboCNC. I do not
regret the move.

Best regards,

Randy

Randy Gordon-Gilmore ,----.___________ ______________ _________________
ProtoTrains // = = === == || == == == = || == == == = == =|
Rio Vista, CA, USA /-O==O------------o==o------------o==o-----------o==o-'
zephyrus@... http://www.prototrains.com