Cumulus Support

Oh woe and thrice times woe

A few weeks ago I purchased another of Maplin's finest NGY whatever they are. My last one gave up after 3+ years of withstanding everything our exposed location can throw at it. I've even renewed those little bearings in the anemometer.

The replacement and set up went like a breeze, no issues and I was up and running in a couple of hours, which included the sensor installation. Job done or so I thought.
Sometime in the last 48 hours I noticed the data on the web page had hung. You have to appreciate that the weather read out and attached computer are in a shed in the field, so I'm not privy to real time info. Sure enough........... Please Wait - Downloading Data. The display was fine and on unplugging the USB, Cumulus loaded OK

So my first port of call was these pages. Lo & behold. Well in order to be methodical I read everything up including the sticky thread. So this is how I proceeded.

Firstly USB power management. Sure enough on examining the properties they were all set to let Windows power down. So I switched them all off power management. Without a reboot I tried starting Cumulus again - no joy. Then I did a reboot - no joy. Conclusion - on the face of it, it would appear that it makes no difference, however clearing that alone may be only part of the process.

Unplugged USB and re-plugged - no joy.

Unplugged USB and then removed batteries from display unit. Re-installed, everything working fine.
So the next thing is to see how long it goes before the next hang. If it does I'll let you know.

Peter.

nearly forgot, other data
Cumulus v 1.9.2 (1032)
Windows XP SP3
AVG Free.
AOpen Cube 2gig RAM.

toadstone wrote:Firstly USB power management. Sure enough on examining the properties they were all set to let Windows power down. So I switched them all off power management. Without a reboot I tried starting Cumulus again - no joy. Then I did a reboot - no joy. Conclusion - on the face of it, it would appear that it makes no difference, however clearing that alone may be only part of the process.

It's possible that the USB power down puts the station into the state where it doesn't respond, so a reset is required. It'll be interesting to see if you get the problem again; as Mark Crossley has commented, it does seem to be more common amongst newer stations.

I'm quite sure you may well be right, Steve. So far so good. I'll post either way if I get beyond the last set up time.

Peter.

steve wrote:Your station may have stopped responding to requests for data; a number of people are finding this happens with Fine Offset stations. You may need to reset it to get it going again. If you zip up the diags folder and attach it, I'll take a look.

Steve, first your program is great and that you offer it for free is very kind. I have made a donation via paypal hope you have received it.

I am having the same problem as others with the "downloading data please wait" I have tried many solutions, but the only one, and it is truly not a convenient solution, is a remove batteries and re start my weather station, Ambient Weather WS-2080.

I have applied the work around, for time and location, as I run WIN7

I do not agtree that the problem is a weather station one. Why.
1.I have other programs that can read the weather station data perfectly while Cumulus continues to open the "download" window and then freeze.
2. I removed Cumulus and re installed, with Cumulus still resulting with the same results, "downloading data please wait". Obvious to me there is a file that remains in the Cumulas folder with is not in Program files or Program files (86)

I am attaching several of my diags files.
It would seem to me that there is a file in Cumulas that one can edit to allow Cumulas to start normally when this error occurs. I am not a smart person, but a logical one.

Thanks in any case for an excellent program albiet with one small problem.

Cisco
Mexico

solyluna wrote:I do not agtree that the problem is a weather station one. Why.
1.I have other programs that can read the weather station data perfectly while Cumulus continues to open the "download" window and then freeze.

Cumulus is asking the station for the first block of its memory and not getting any response:

6/16/2012 20:01:00.424 : Request EW data block, addr = 000000

That's the last line in the file, no data comes back. The fact that you reset the station and it starts working again indicates to me that it is a problem with the station. The fact that it is known that this problem does occur with other software indicates to me that it is a problem with the station. The fact that this problem only seems to occur with newer versions of the Fine Offset stations, while those of us with older stations never see the problem at all indicates to me that it is a problem with the station.

2. I removed Cumulus and re installed, with Cumulus still resulting with the same results, "downloading data please wait". Obvious to me there is a file that remains in the Cumulas folder with is not in Program files or Program files (86)

Uninstalling and reinstalling Cumulus has no effect. There are no files in Cumulus and no settings in Cumulus which can affect the way that it reads the first block of data from the station (which is the first thing it does).

It would seem to me that there is a file in Cumulas that one can edit to allow Cumulas to start normally when this error occurs.

No, there isn't. The only thing that will get the station working again when it stops responding to requests for data is to reset the station. I haven't changed the code which reads data from the station for a very long time, and this problem only started happening recently. If this is somehow a problem with Cumulus, then I'm afraid it will continue to be a problem with Cumulus, because I can't write the code any other way. If you really do have software which can read the data from the station when this specific problem occurs, then what would be useful would be a USB trace of what that software does to read the data, and one from Cumulus to compare it with.

Steve,

Thanks. OK I would like to try the suggestion below, BUT alas how would I achieve the information that would be useful for you?

The software that read the data without any problem are
Weather Exchange
Easy Weather
They both give me current data from the Ambient Weather WS-2080
Cisco
Mexico
If you really do have software which can read the data from the station when this specific problem occurs, then what would be useful would be a USB trace of what that software does to read the data, and one from Cumulus to compare it with.[/quote]

solyluna wrote:The software that read the data without any problem are
Weather Exchange
Easy Weather

To be absolutely clear about this: You are saying that when the station locks up with Cumulus, and the last line in the diags file looks like this:

6/16/2012 20:01:00.424 : Request EW data block, addr = 000000

then Easy Weather can read the data from the station without requiring it to be reset? If so, that's not what others have found. When their station locks up, EW is not able to read data either.

If you can run a 'USB sniffer' to get a trace of Cumulus and Easyweather (separately) while the problem exists, then it may prove useful. If you are running 64-bit Windows 7, I don't think you will be able to find a free USB sniffer. http://www.usblyzer.com/ offers a free 33 day trial. But if you have no experience of this sort of thing you may find it a challenge.

steve wrote:

solyluna wrote:The software that read the data without any problem are
Weather Exchange
Easy Weather

To be absolutely clear about this: You are saying that when the station locks up with Cumulus, and the last line in the diags file looks like this:

6/16/2012 20:01:00.424 : Request EW data block, addr = 000000

###as i cannot read the file, i do not know. here again attached is the very last file in the diag folder, 009.

then Easy Weather can read the data from the station without requiring it to be reset? If so, that's not what others have found. When their station locks up, EW is not able to read data either.

###yes that is true,, easy weather and weather exchange can read the stream from the aw WS-2080.

If you can run a 'USB sniffer' to get a trace of Cumulus and Easyweather (separately) while the problem exists, then it may prove useful. If you are running 64-bit Windows 7, I don't think you will be able to find a free USB sniffer. http://www.usblyzer.com/ offers a free 33 day trial. But if you have no experience of this sort of thing you may find it a challenge.

### i am running 64 bit win7 i will try to USB sniff. if i cannot work the program i will ask for advise from a friend here in San Cristobal, Chiapas.

thanks for the communication.
PAZ Cisco

solyluna wrote:###as i cannot read the file, i do not know.

They are plain text files.

steve wrote:

solyluna wrote:###as i cannot read the file, i do not know.

They are plain text files.

ok as there was not a file ext. now i know.

So the only solution for the issue is to reset station so far what will result in loosing data from the time when connection to the station was lost?

I add that I have WH 2080 (Conrad 0101, german version) and I encountered the problem when station was on-line and Cumulus was opened earlier. What was strange before that in athe afternoon in a few record it was uploaded absolute pressure though normally it is relative pressure. Besides, it was today situation when in a tray I had 3 icons of Cumulus. Eventually memory of the station was full - whole cirle was black - it could be any relation with that or it is only a coincidance?
Once the problem with downloading data by Cumulus appeared the Easy Weather software also wasn't able to upload data.
Maybe there are any ways to avoid it? Simply I don't want to have some gaps in my data.

Mark14 wrote:So the only solution for the issue is to reset station so far what will result in loosing data from the time when connection to the station was lost?

I would imagine that doing a full reset would delete the contents of the logger, yes. But I could be wrong.

Eventually memory of the station was full - whole cirle was black - it could be any relation with that or it is only a coincidance?

It should just start again at the beginning of the memory. But others have also theorised that this may be something to do with the problem; I'm not sure anyone has proven it.

Mark14 wrote:in a tray I had 3 icons of Cumulus.

Just wondered if you mean the Windows system tray is showing that 3 versions of Cumulus are running at same time?

If so, then I'm sure there would be confusion while trying to 'download data'.
Try:
Configuration - station settings - program settings - stop 2nd instance

sfws wrote:the Windows system tray is showing that 3 versions of Cumulus are running at same time?

Yes, there were such situations, not once. Thanks for an advice. The option "stop 2nd instance" was unselected. Maybe it will help. I hope so

On the other hand, the station is plugged in to my laptop which was a few times per day turned to "Sleep mode" (in Windows 7) and in the case Cumulus automatically is closing. Maybe it has something also to do with this.

Mark14 wrote:On the other hand, the station is plugged in to my laptop which was a few times per day turned to "Sleep mode" (in Windows 7) and in the case Cumulus automatically is closing. Maybe it has something also to do with this.

It could well be; with that setting, Cumulus attempts to close itself down when the PC goes to sleep. It may not be successful. It's much better not to let your PC sleep while Cumulus is running.