Some Musings About York

Thanks Ed, 

Don

Well put, Ed.

Peter

I am very impressed every time I interact with or hear anything Jon Zahornacky and Mike Reagan say.   Lionel seems to have a sound set of priorities/business strategy for its future.  That started years ago with more focus on customer response and repairs, and now seems to be guiding product development in that "creative use of electronics" by employing it to make better products, not better gadgets.

I am surprised by the control-your-loco-via-your-iPhone because it flys in the face of much of what Lionel seems to be doing (and what I both like and think makes sound business sense).  Lionel's improved conventional slow speed running in its Legacy locos, its offering of more lower-range ($500) conventional-only locos , its increasing focus on mid-range locos (Legacy - $1,000-$1,300) rather than high end (Vision $2k+), and its remote Thomas lineup, all employ electronics to simplify use and hide the complexity of the electronics: electronics is there to serve, not be the feature. 

That strategy makes tremendous sense to me.  iPhone-DCS, not so much.

I agree with Lee, in that Lionel has made great strides to make their electronics as user-friendly as possible. To my mind, many of the best designed products have their complex electronic wizardry almost transparent to the user. Even the full-blown Legacy system is very intuitive, and takes but a short time to become familiar with. I don't have any experience of MTH and DCS, but from what I have read here in this forum, I believe that Lionel have a better user interface. I would describe Lionel as being the Apple of the O-Gauge world. Their products have a quality look & feel, are intuitive to use and they have a first-class customer support organisation. The latest electronics are being used to remove a large amount of the need to understand the inner workings of our locomotives. For those of us who grew-up in the days when constant routine maintenance was required to get the best from our trains, this can take some effort to accept. But we have made that leap in many other areas of our lives, so why not with our trains?  Remember the days when you could look along your street on a weekend afternoon as see a dozen or so cars with their hoods up, and the owner busy tinkering with something underneath? Or when you would spend hours dusting your records and replacing the stylus to try and tweak the sound just that little bit more?  Nowadays we just turn a switch or press a button and just expect that it will work as advertised. A lot of this is due to the advances in electronics that are hidden from our sight.

Nicole;

I think you'll find that each system has it's own positives and negatives.  Classic Toy Trains put out a book a few years ago and re-released about a year or so ago comparing the two major command control systems (DCS and TMCC - now Legacy).  They allow the reader to make up his or her own mind but the bottom line is that the best way to go is to have both.

Thank You Nicole, you understand the goal perfectly.

It does seem that instead of playing with telephones Lionel is advancing it's electronics to be very user friendly. And you don't need to read a hard cover book to use it.

I saw the Lionel version of using your Ipad to control your layout at York and Jon from Lionel explained how it would work. After looking at the others, Lionel seems to be more user friendly. Of course time will tell. 

Dave

I just hope we always have a choice, such as the conventional alternatives offered in some some cases by Lionel or MTH or those such as Williams produces. One of the electric windows on my wife's van was repaired while under warranty and now after the warranty has expired both have failed. The roll-up windows on my twelve year old truck still work just fine, although the dealer had to go to the adjacent state when I bought it to find a base-model truck for me.  

I had the good fortune to run MTH's layout at York with my I-Pad. Very use friendly. All the offerings on the DCS remote are on the I-Pad along with a sketch of the layout and where the train is on the layout. While I will not be getting rid of my remote this feature is the future. I do not have the Lionel system. I'm sure it also will be very user friendly. Another side bar to this is that with an I-Pad you will have more memory that is not available in a remote at this time. Running trains just keeps getting better each year. My father bought my 1st train for me at **** in 1950. Sure wish he could see all that is available today.

German,

Given the quantities of trains currently being produced, it may come to the point where it does NOT make sense to offer a conventional version of a particular locomotive.

The reliability of the current generation of electronics, and how well the locomotives that have them run, means the old concerns about the " electro" tech inside your engine are much reduced. The new electronics are sturdier, use less power, run cooler and, as a result, are much more reliable compared older components and systems used by the train makers. They also do more and are more fun to run than their conventional counterparts.

A perfect example of this in the automotive world is the rarity of roll up windows in the pick up you selected to buy.

Ed Boyle

I often say I should have been born 100 years ago and my wife often says she wishes I was too.