Hi Guys.
I have a Mack II Blue 12Gb Player. Just Great. I've been using it for almost two months, every day, and I am absolutely happy about it. Just one problem: the BLUE screen looks GREAT, but during the day I just can't read it! Unless it's cloudy, there's almost no way to read it clearly. How can I solve this? I already have the brightness set to its maximum value. Does anybody have any solution? Also, empeg guys, my suggestion is that you make a brighter display for future versions of RIOCAR. Thank you all. Taym

Taym

It should be easy to read, unless the sun is shining directly onto it. Do you know anyone near you with a player for comparison?

Rob

Unfortunately not.
Maybe it depends on the fact that on my car (VW Polo III, latest model) the empeg is pretty much exposed to the sun. However I guess several cars may have the same layout. Is there any way to increase the brightness even more?

Taym
empeg mack II blue 12Gb

Congrats on your new toy.

Have you checked out this FAQ entry on the subject?

___________
Tony Fabris

Hmmm... A somewhat unrelated data point; I also have a new Polo
(00/01) and my MkI with the blue face (which, IIRC, is different than
the MkII blue), mounted in the upper slot of the double DIN opening,
was quite readable except when the sun shone right at it.

/Michael

Have you checked out this FAQ entry on the subject?

I have a bit of information that might be relevant as far as the FAQ goes...

This weekend I finished my empeg installation on my bicycle (yes, really!) and it works just fine---except that the display is virtually invisible on a sunny day, whether the sun is shining on the display or not.

In my car, it is readable even when the sun shines through the rear window directly onto the display.

The difference? On my bicycle, the empeg is powered by means of a small 12-volt battery hooked to the "Home" power input on the back of the empeg -- so the empeg "thinks" it is at home, not in the car (or bicycle). And of course in the "Home" mode, there is no brightness setting. Is the display in "Home" mode significantly dimmer than the range of settings available in the "In-Car" mode?

Is it possible that the people who have problems reading their display "In-Car" on bright days have displays that are functioning in "Home" mode? I can tell you that my empeg is completely unreadable outdoors on a bright day when operating in "Home" mode, but is extremely readable in the same environment when in the "In-Car" mode.

Just a thought...

tanstaafl.

"There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch"

This is good information, if it can be verified. Is the display deliberately dimmed a little when running on the AC adaptor?

___________
Tony Fabris

Another thought: are any of the drive spin controls or the caching different for different power settings? Is there a "power saver" mode for car installations?

Paul G.
SN# 090000587 (40GB Clear)

I'm reasonably sure that the drives and cache behave the same regardless of where the power is coming from.

To verify this yourself, you can activate the player's hard drive icon the next time you're poking around in Emplode.

___________
Tony Fabris

No, the display is locked at 100% when "at home".

It may be your battery is sagging a bit under the load, though ISTR the switch-mode 60v PSU manages to keep stable down to about 8 or 9 volts.

Hugo

Ok. A brief update concerning this problem:

I just realized there are both AR and non-AR screens. First of all thanks to all among you who told me this. I am new in this forum, so please forgive me for not knowing previously discussed issues.
So, guess what, I found out my screen is non-AR, so I just contacted carsupport@riohome.com to order a new blue AR screen for my Mack II. As a matter of fact, what I noticed is that, although not extremely bright, the screen would still be readable during the day if not because of the reflections. So here is the first question:
1) Is there anybody in here who replaced his/her "plain" screen with a AR screen, and actually saw real improvements in the readability? I would assume so...

Second, I read the FAQ regarding this issue. Again, thank you to those who poiinted that out, I did not think about it. I made the "dim" test, as suggested, to find out whether my screen is broken or nor. Well, during a quite bright day I set the screen dim to 0 and could still read it by going very close to it. I assume this means that at night I should be able to read it without significant problems. I'll test it. However, without going very close to the screen, I would just seen few dfots here and there.
2) Does anybody confirm this is normal?

Also, I got my empeg in amber, with a blue screen as a "gift". This is because I had ordered a blue one, but they were all sold out, so empeg guys, very nice as usual, decided to give me this special treat :)
3) Is it possible that when I replaced the amber screen with this non-AR blue I made some mistake and now it is not working properly and not giving me the full, optimum brightness?

Also, in the faq it is said that " the VFD should be so bright that it hurts your eyes if you've got it at full brightness during the night. (...)" .
That is not really my case. I ALWAYS have it at full brighthness, during the night, and it is just as bright as the rest of my car intrumentation. Maybe somewhat dimmer. I have a Polo III with the new VW blue instrumentation light set at maximum, so some of you who have the same car can give me an answer. So
4) Is my screen broken?

Thank you all in advacnce. You're just great. This BBS is precious, it reminds me of the good old times when I was a Fidonet SysOp! :)

If it can help, my empeg SN is 090000923

Taym
empeg mack II blue 12Gb

1) Is there anybody in here who replaced his/her "plain" screen with a AR screen, and actually saw real improvements in the readability? I would assume so...
I've reinstalled my green non-AR screen after driving with a blue AR screen for about 3 months. I do personally think the non-AR screen is better readable when the sun shines in directly. This is due to the fact that the AR screen diffuses the light making the entire display unreadable. A non-AR screen works like a mirror, so only a small section of display is unreadable. An AR screen also makes the display more fuzzy...
These observations are probably specific to my car; it is impossible to have the sun shine on the display and reflect the light direct into my eyes, because the empeg is mounted very low in the dash...

Frank van Gestel

That is surprising. However my empeg is mounted very high in the dash, so the sun actually hits id directly quite often. I see that it really reflects light a lot, so I was assuming that a AR screen would work better... I don't know...


Taym
empeg mack II blue 12Gb
S/N: 090000923

>you can activate the player's hard drive icon the next time you're poking around in Emplode

Could you please explain this better? My HDD icon (is that the one on the top right of empeg display) actually turns on when the empeg is reading from the hdd when IN THE CAR

Thanks

Taym
empeg mack II blue 12Gb
S/N: 090000923

Could you please explain this better? My HDD icon (is that the one on the top right of empeg display) actually turns on when the empeg is reading from the hdd when IN THE CAR

Right, that's the one. Whether or not it's activated is a setting option, you can turn it on and off from the configuration screen in Emplode. The icon shows when the unit is reading the hard disk. The icon changes depending on exactly what the hard drive is doing, there's a FAQ entry describing this as well. The icon works equally for home and car. My point was that, by looking at the icon, you should be able to notice that the disk behavior does not change between home and car.


___________
Tony Fabris

Well, during a quite bright day I set the screen dim to 0 and could still read it by going very close to it.

This means that your display doesn't have the "known problem" where there's a blown circuit. This is both a good thing (at least it's not faulty), and a bad thing (there's no obvious reason why you shouldn't be able to read your display).

Is it possible that when I replaced the amber screen with this non-AR blue I made some mistake and now it is not working properly and not giving me the full, optimum brightness?

Unlikely, unless you damaged some circuitry on the display board. If you were careful, you probably didn't hurt anything.

Also, in the faq it is said that " the VFD should be so bright that it hurts your eyes if you've got it at full brightness during the night. (...)" . That is not really my case. I ALWAYS have it at full brighthness, during the night, and it is just as bright as the rest of my car intrumentation. Maybe somewhat dimmer.

Assuming you've set it to 100 percent in "lights on" mode, this surprises me. I don't own your particular kind of car, so I don't know how bright its instruments are. But in my experience, these VFD displays are distractingly bright at night. When I owned the Mk1 (before they had dimmers), my wife made me turn off the visuals and text at night because it was painfully bright. Bright enough that she would hold her hand in front of the display until I switched it off.

___________
Tony Fabris

The problem with diagnosing this is that it is extremely subjective. I consider a blue empeg display (AR coated or not) easy to read on a sunny day provided the sun is not reflecting directly onto the screen. Another person, looking at the exact same setup, may have a different perception.

It doesn't sound like you have a faulty display, as those really are VERY dim - about the equivalent of 20% brightness of a normal working unit. But then, I can't rule it out either. Your comments are far from typical of most owners.

We can ship the unit back and find out instantly if it has a problem, but if it were working perfectly we would have to charge you for the carriage. It would be much better if you could see another owner's player - if anyone in Italy reads this perhaps they could make themselves known.

This BBS is precious, it reminds me of the good old times when I was a Fidonet SysOp!

altman - 2:252/102
rob - 2:252/106

many years ago

Rob

Yes, and Rob was one of the first to run my BBS software (ARM-based, naturally - and this was '88-'89) :)

Hugo

I think it really does depend on the vehicle, the mounting angle, how high it's mounted & so forth. For me the 'AR' works better since it's high it doesn't reflect everything that passes by the windows like my 'non-AR' did. If it was mounted lower like my car there's not much to reflect off of because of the seats. It seemed the 'non-AR' Blue screen was somewhat brighter than the 'AR' Green I had, especially at night, but I haven't been able to compare the same color of both types. During the day, the 'non-AR' Blue reflected more of the scenery coming thru the windows, making it hard to read not because of the brightness but from stuff constantly passing what looked like in front of it, so your eyes focus on the scenery more.

#695empeg-car Mk2GRN& a mere 12Gig
"buyers regrets,NO"

Fidonet in 88/89? WOW That was the beginning! I knew you guys had to be in Fidonet in the past! I was 2:335/633, in Fidonet snce 1993 :) A directory with Maximus, Binkley, Squish and all the rest is still on my HDD .

Going back to empeg (no off topic posts :)) I'll test the amber screen. Maybe that's AR. Unfortunately I don't have it here, so I'll have to wait few days. Just by curiosity, is there any way to know whether the fascia shipped with a specific player is AR from the player SN (see my signature)?
It seems to me that if it wasn't for the reflections the display would be readable, so trying an AR display would definitely help to understand.

FYI, my Polo's intruments light is exactly as bright as the Beetle's, and of the same color. I assume. Still VW. Maybe this helps to give you an idea of how bright it is at night. And the blue does match almost perfectly with that of the car. My empeg at night is slightly dimmer that the instruments. I'll keep you posted.

10x again.

Taym
______________________________
empeg mk II blue 12Gb 090000923

The screen that shipped with your player had an AR screen on it-based on the serial number.

Sean

Actually it probably didn't have AR - very few empeg players shipped with AR screens fitted.

Rob

Yes, and you charged me 90 quid for it *ouch* - my contribution to your MX5 I suppose

At least one ArcBBS board is still online: http://www.arcade.demon.co.uk/

Rob

Doh. I just made a bad assumption. Are the rios shipping without a/r on the screen? I thought that after several people complained about daytime readibility, empegs would ship with a/r screens.

Sean

Doh. I just made a bad assumption. Are the rios shipping without a/r on the screen? I thought that after several people complained about daytime readibility, empegs would ship with a/r screens.

They do ship with A/R Screens. I can tell because mine is one ^_^

Damien Heiser

RioCar 12GB Blue SN: 120001043

2:292/113 back in 88 as well. Towering Inferno it was called, ran on everything from Frontdoor to Binkley. Huge phonebills too. But then I doubt anybody needs reminders of those.

Hans

Mk2 - Blue - 080000431

All Rio players have AR screens - only the very last of the empeg players did.

Rob

My empeg came with an non-AR blue. I wanted a Green screen to try and match my car display and those kind and wonderful empeg people shipped out an AR one for free. I found that the brightness was greater on the Blue than the Green and the Green was was slightly easier to read in sunlight. It was mounted high up in a Golf dash. I have now changed my empeg into my Escort where it is mounted quite low and at a slight angle. I recently had to contact those those kind and wonderful people at empeg about my control knob and asked when the screens would be available on the site. Within 2 days I got a new control knob and an Amber display. I have found that this is not as bright as the Green screen and is difficult to read in sunlight. Not much more than the Green, actually. But, when it's sunny I tend to be wearing sunglasses and this doesn't help. I find if I peer under the glasses then I can make out the display.

I am seriously considering going back to the Blue for several reasons. First, the Amber didn't match my display as I'd hoped. Second, I don't really have any instrumentation close enough for it to make a difference and it is all a kind of off-white anyway. Third, I was recently trying all my screens in situ for a photo session to put on the web and found that I actually quite liked the Blue. Finally, my Escort is Blue.

So, after all that, what you really need is a comparison off someone who has had an AR and a non-AR of the same colour.

_______________________

Steve - 18GB Mk II Amber

Hi SysOp-oldtimes,

FidoNet, 2:231/103. It was called Infiltrator BBS, and was quite a nusiance to the people who got my phonenumber after I moved :-)

I ran (among other things) RA, FastEcho, GoldED(betatester) on an older Commodore PC10/II.

http://www.phreak.org/archives/The_Hacker_Chronicles_II/phreak/europe.txt

Lists both mine and Hugo's "World of Cryton" (that was the one, right?).

Any other closet SysOps here?

'Tis indeed a small world.


Lars

Ooo, freaky. Not heard that name for a long time :)

Yes, my one was TWoC (the world of cryton). "Rich in Paradise" (252/307), ran ARCbbs too...

Hugo

I was never a sysop (due to not being able to afford the phone line at the time), but I was a co-sysop on The Watchman BBS here in Colorado Springs. I can't remember the Fidonet number off hand anymore, but I do remember every time the sysop left town, something broke that I usually couldn't fix remotly

I was on quite a few BBS's years ago, until I found the internet. Right around 94 was about my last regular logon to any BBS.

I was quite an avid BBSer here in the 303 (Denver CO) quite a few years ago. I ran a moderately large board called Ethereal Passage. I never got on FidoNet (as the hubs here in the area were complete asses, and I didn't want to pay LD charges on top of the $10 a month FidoNet charge) I was however a member of some some smaller localnets here in Colorado.


Damien Heiser

RioCar 12GB Blue SN: 120001043

i'm serial number 09000910 have i got an AR screen when did the AR screens start to appear.

While i think of it how about a history of empeg production with changes listed like AR screens, incar serial port prob, hot glued hard drive cable.

i'm serial number 09000910

Oh wow, didn't know they stamp empeg owners these days.

On a related note, can somebody who purchased a Rio Car recently post its serial number? It'd be interesting to know how many units have been sold total (assuming the same numbering scheme is still in effect).

Borislav

Guys, this is great Is there anybody who was NOT a member of Fidonet? Good to find you all here. I put so much time to set up The Millennium Empire (2:335/633) that hopefully it will be on line again via telnet. I'll let you know, if anyone is interested in seeing again some ANSI graphics on their monitors :)

Taym
______________________________
empeg mk II blue 12Gb 090000923

That isn't really possible - the serial number is applied to the main board before assembly. Sometimes a board will fail testing and go back for re-work, before finally resurfacing days/weeks/months later. Therefore an early serial number could benefit from late production enhancements.

Interestingly, we just received two Mk.2 empeg players from the factory last week with 0900xxxx serial numbers. I'm not sure what took them so long, or what they expect us to do with them!

Rob

If it is a huge problem give one to me i won't complain the girlfriend wants a new stereo for her car.

If you are thinking of selling them off cheap i would be intrested.

I also was a co-sysop in the early nineties. We converted the BBS to a website some years ago. We converted a lot of ANSI graphics to gif images, which looks quite cool.
You can see it here

Frank van Gestel

Ok, let's go back to my readability problem with my blue fascia. Finally a got a RED fascia to test on my empeg, and this is what I noticed.
The red fascia is MORE TRANSPARENT than the blue I had. Simply put, I can SEE the diplay itslef, it's frame, the components around it, the led on the top right of teh empeg, etc. I don't mean I can see when they are lit (that's obvious), I mean I can see also the plastic components and all the rest. Now, this NEVER happened with my blue fascia. With this RED one (AR), I definitely experience the same readability levels as many others here: unless the sun is DIRECTLY on the display, I can ALWAYS read it. In the worst cases I can only see the brightest of the 4 available "colors" of the display, but I can still read with no problem! Which is definitely great, of course. On the other side, I have to say that the emepg looks better with the blue fascia, when you can NEVER see what's inside it. But I prefer to be able to read, no doubt.

Now, what I have with the RED fascia, somebody else had with the BLUE, which is considered by many as THE MOST readable among all. This is absolutely false in my case! So, what I suppose is that it is NOT the color, but the "transparency" level that makes the difference! Maybe different fascias are produced with different level of transparency, and that's the whole point! If my empeg had been readable as it is now with the red fascia, I would have never started this thread! :)
So, I hope this helps to understand why some people like me found the empeg not readable in the sunlight.
Finally, I am waiting for my AR fascia that I requested from empeg in the hope to solve the readability problem. I'll let you know whether it is as transparent as the red I have now on my empeg, or as the blue that I have just removed.
Also, emepg guys, could you post a comment on this? I hope this helped you too to find out why some empegs are considered not easily readable in the sun.
Let me know, and of course thanks to everybody for your help.

Taym
______________________________
MK II BLUE 12GB 090000923

Errata Corridge: the RED fascia is NON-AR

Taym
______________________________
MK II BLUE 12GB 090000923

The red fascia is more transparent because it filters out much more light than the blue or green versions (the VFD itself generates a blue/green hue). Even so, the red display is still less bright than either blue or green.

It is interesting to hear that you find the red display readable - as far as I can remember you're the only person who has ever reported it that way around.

There were some very early blue displays that were very dark and unreadable, but those were only fitted to the first few Mk.2 players and replacements were offered.

Rob

Ok, than that must be my case. For some reason I got one of those, because the difference is really noticeable. As you said, I am the only one reporting this, that's why until I actually tried the red fascia I did not expect that that could be the problem. But now I can definitely tell you that the BLUE I have is much much less readable than the red. No comparison whatsoever.

Now, I already requested at carsupport a AR blue replacement fascia. If the regular non AR blue (not the "dark" one I got) is even more readable that the non AR RED I have, than I'll get it, I don't really mind if it is not AR. Do you think I can have one, or are you totally out of stock, including the non AR ones?
Thank you!

Taym
___________________________
MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

I don't see how a player with serial number 923 could have one of those fascias - only the first 50 units had them. They were deep blue, verging on purple, compared with the current screens which are closer to cyan.

We have no screens in stock right now. When we do get some in they will be AR coated. This has a negligable effect on the brightness, but greatly improves readability in sunlight.

Rob

As you can immagine I don't have an answer to that :), but your description really matches the fascia I have. It IS deep blue, not at all close to cyan... When mounted it does not look purple, but if taken off the player it does have some almost purple reflections, I have to say. Also, I noticed that the inner side of the fascia has a layer on it that looks almost silver when observed under the sunlight. Don't know if that is normal...

Anyway, again, the difference between the red one and the blue I have is way too big to be subjective.

As to the AR Blue, ok, there's no problem, I'll wait to receive that, which I have already ordered.

Thank you,

Taym
___________________________
MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

Ok, here is an example:
In this post, you see a blue MKII:

http://empeg.comms.net/php/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=install&Number=33036&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=14&part=1#Post33980

You can see the components behind the blue fascia. THAT never happens on mine, not even when the sun is right on it...


Taym
___________________________
MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

Also, I noticed that the inner side of the fascia has a layer on it that looks almost silver when observed under the sunlight. Don't know if that is normal...

That's the EMF filter coating. All faceplates need this in order for the unit to meet FCC emission requirements.

___________
Tony Fabris

Ok, I see. Just by curiosity, does the EMF coating reduce visibility? Not that it matters regards to my problem with the blue fascia, since also the red fascia has it, obviously...

Taym
___________________________
MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

It causes a slight reduction in brightness, but it's not greatly significant. This coating isn't optional - without it the player cannot be legally sold or used in many countries.

Rob