# Slot Race Manager 2.50 RELEASED!



## Cenobyte (Mar 15, 2009)

*SRM v2.50 is finally here!*
Here are the new features:

*Sync Cars & Drivers on different computers*
If you have more than one track with a timing PC or you want to have another computer that has all your car data on it, you can now sync this data with more computers! Using a diskette, it only takes a minute to add new cars from another computer or correct edited data. Only car and driver data is affected, no time data.

*New Search routine*
For a long time, I wanted to improve the awkward search routine that helps you find cars, drivers and tracks. First you must enter a filter, remember the code and then search the code. Strange how I could ever think of something so clumsy... But, now it's replaced by an all new search routine that works much better!

*Fixed "take laps with you" bugs in Single Race, lap collection*
If you rotated lanes in a single race and you took the amount of laps with you, your timing screen got scrambled up. This only happened on tracks with more than 2 lanes, so only a few people reported it.
Also, when you rotate your cars on the track, maintaining the position on your track, your car will not make a full lap when the next heat starts. This will result in a (faulty) fastest lap. It can also result in a missed lap, when your car is very close to the finish when rotating: the Minimum Laptime will prevent it from registering. This is now fixed.

*New timing screen appearance*
Some people asked for a timing screen with a colored background instead of a black screen with colored characters. As of version 2.50 you can choose between these settings:
- Text colored, background black (original setting)
- Text white, background colored
- Text black, background colored (Laptimer 2000 setting)
- Text colored, background colored (very nice, subtle setting)

*New "Single Race setup" screen*
The single race screen had rudimentary possibilities to collect points or laps when racing a couple of heats, and take these with you to keep a simple ranking when you rotated your racers. However this was not very useable because of the way this was implemented... In the new version, the Single Race screen is completely rewritten, offering you a very useable Ranking list so you can race multiple heats, keep track of the ranking and rotate on your lanes as you please. You can rank on points or laps, reviewing your ranking between every heat.

*Lap or Time (seconds) correction*
After racing a heat, you can correct the amount of laps or the amount of time (seconds) a driver accumulated to correct errors or to apply a penalty or bonus. Corrections can be plus or minus. This will work in Single Race and in Championship.

*Race Alone option*
Sometimes, when you're just racing alone trying to improve your best laps for a couple of cars, you get tired of changing the car on every lane of your track each time. If you select the "Race Alone" option in the Single Race Setup screen, SRM will now do that for you and change the driver and car on all lanes when you select a driver and car on one lane.

*New "Store Times" screen & lap/time penalties and corrections*
The screen after a race, allowing you to store your best times, is completely changed. It now shows your "end of race" information more clearly and also allows to make corrections to the amount of laps you have accumulated or the time you needed to complete a number of laps (thus allowing you to give penalties or correct for -partly- completed laps). You can now also enter all best times with one press of a button.

*Press a key before the race starts*
Many people asked me to remove that extra keystroke before you start a race or a practise session. After removing it in v2.41, others asked if it could return. So now you can choose in the Overall Settings screen if you want to press a key or not ;-)

*Restart timing button*
When you interrupt a race by pressing the ESC key, you can restart the timing by pressing '2'. This could sometimes cause you to press '2' by accident, losing your running heat. I moved the option to restart the heat to the '*' (asterix) button, so it's not so close to the '1' and you need to press SHIFT, preventing an accidental restart of your heat or practise session.

*More flexibility with erasing data*
In the old version, you could erase all data. I'm not shure when you would need this, but in the new version you can erase more selectively. You can erase only the time data and keep drivers, tracks and cars. You can also erase all Championship data and keep everything else.

*Speed and distance conversion*
There were some bugs reported in the conversion of speed and distance between European and USA notations. These are now hopefully fixed.

*Minimum laptime*
This is changed, so you can now enter a minimum laptime as low as 0,1 seconds.

*Championship improvements*
The Championship is improved in many ways.
First, the overall screen has changed so you can clearly see who's next and on which lanes. This was always a hassle and some of you complained about it (and you were right).
You can also swap between 25 or 50 lines (like in the Times screen) to show everybody if you're running a large group of racers.
The Template feature is also implemented. You can now create a template file of a Championship, saving the setup and all driver & car data. This way you van start up a new Championship and just load the template file, allowing you to use the same drivers, cars and setup as before. The Template files are readable textfiles, so you can manually edit them to create new templates. Ideal if you regularly run Championships with the same group of people!
All in all the useability of a Championship has been improved a lot!

Click here to go to the website!


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## Cenobyte (Mar 15, 2009)

Hi there!

For you SRM users out there: there are some nice new features being implemented as we speak. I'm currently working on version 2.52, solving some small bugs, but also introducing some nice new features.

Check out the NEWS section on my website to stay updated. You can also subscribe to new SRM developments there, so you hear firsthand when the new updates are coming out. :thumbsup:


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## demether (Aug 26, 2008)

Bravo ! 


I'm already using SRM (2.4x ) on my h0 track, and stills believe it's the best laptiming software available.

People has to not be afraid of the DOS graphics style : important thing is the accuracy, the ergonomy and the timing readability. And for that SRM is excellent, better than a lot of software I tried before 


I hope one day you'll make a special drag racing version of your software !


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## Joe65SkylarkGS (Feb 15, 2010)

I am just about to try to run a PC for a lap timer system. Is your software hard to use? I am still not sure which software I should use? Is yours user friendly? I mean can an ediot like me get it going??

Thanks Joe.


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## Cenobyte (Mar 15, 2009)

@Demether:

Thanks! I'm still trying to improve SRM and to do that, I entered myself in the club slot racing scene this year (yep: I have been slot racing for 15 years now and never raced at a club before!). This helps me understanding what clubracers need & want, so I can improve that in SRM. The new Championship section of SRM will be greatly improved to realise that and you will also be able to race & store times without having to enter cars. This way all best achievements of a driver in a club wil be kept on file without the hassle of having to enter cars.

@Joe:
If you're able to join this forum and enter a reply you will certainly be able to use SRM :thumbsup:

But serious: I try to make SRM as easy as possible and I think the new version 2.52 will be much more easy to use, especially the new Championship system. The only hurdle you will have to take is that you need a computer that will run true DOS (MS-DOS or FreeDOS).

Nice to hear from you guys, I'm gonna test the new Championship system now


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## Joe65SkylarkGS (Feb 15, 2010)

Cenobyte said:


> @Joe:
> If you're able to join this forum and enter a reply you will certainly be able to use SRM :thumbsup:
> 
> But serious: I try to make SRM as easy as possible and I think the new version 2.52 will be much more easy to use, especially the new Championship system. The only hurdle you will have to take is that you need a computer that will run true DOS (MS-DOS or FreeDOS).
> ...


Ok sounds good so far. What does it take to get it??

And I have an older Emachine sitting aroung and wonder if I can use it?

How can I see if it has dos? I'm real bad with computers.


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## Cenobyte (Mar 15, 2009)

Joe65SkylarkGS said:


> Ok sounds good so far. What does it take to get it??
> And I have an older Emachine sitting aroung and wonder if I can use it?
> How can I see if it has dos? I'm real bad with computers.


If it is a IBM compatible PC with a clock speed of over 100MHz than it should work, no problem. It's best to install MS-DOS or FreeDOS on the machine, removing Windows if that's on it. You can find FreeDOS here:
http://www.freedos.org/

For timing hardware you can check out my website with all the info on it:
http://www.cenobyte.nl/slotracemanager/


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## demether (Aug 26, 2008)

You should make an install tutorial, to show people how it's easy to do ! Personaly, I simply installed windows 98, then copy SRM in C: ,than configured the PC to start on DOS and launch automatically SRM ! Quite easy as far as I remember....Even if I don't know exactly how I did (I searched for tutorials on google, I'm not a specialist of DOS it's why I started with a windows 98 installation).


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## Joe65SkylarkGS (Feb 15, 2010)

I got my driver stations up but my freaking local hobby shop told me that my power supply is not ready. I bought it 2 months ago and brought it back to the guy and he tells me something shorted out and he needs to order parts.

Morons. He's had it for 2 weeks allready.

I'm almost ready to try to run a lap counting program. I can put it on a disc them bring it upstairs to my other desktop to install it on there? This PC is on line and on the 1st floor. The other PC is in my attic and not on line.
Thanks.


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## Cenobyte (Mar 15, 2009)

*SRM v2.52 is finished, all that remains is testing it!*

I'm thrilled about the new features, which are a result of all the feedback I got from you guys and also by e-mail.

Check out the News section on my website to see all new features and keep an eye open for the release of this new version!

Thanks!!


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