4 ‐ Installing X‐Dream on a Different PC
- Install the X-Dream Software
- Connect the X-Dream Bike
- Install the PostgreSQL software
- (optionally) Restore the user database
- Check in-application video playback and potentially apply workaround
On the new system, unzip the zip file with the Trixter software. If "C:\Program Files (x86)" exists, put it there. Otherwise, put it in "C:\Program Files". You should end up with the Trixter folder under Program Files (or Program Files (x86))
Navigate into the "Trixter Additional Apps" folder. Right click and drag the "XDream Test" executable onto the desktop, and when you release the right mouse button, select "Create Shortcuts Here". Do the same for these executables:
- Live\TrixterAppRelease.exe
- Trixter Additional Apps\Diagnostics\TrixterDiagnostics.exe
The X-Dream Bike is connected to the computer by means of a USB cable, but it communicates with the computer using a serial to USB converter, a “Prolific(TM) PL-2303” to be more precise.
In the Trixter\Live folder there is an executable called:
PL-2303 Driver Installer.exe
Double click file to run it and install the driver. Once it’s done, navigate to the Device Manager:
Under Ports (COM and LPT) there should now be “Prolific USB-to-Serial Comm Port (COM-x)” where x is a number. This number needs to be 2, but it possibly isn’t.
If it does not say COM2, right click the device and select Properties.
Then configure the port as follows:
- Select the Port Settings tab
- Click the Advanced button
- Set the COM port number to COM2
- Click OK
- Set the Bits Per Second to 115200 (the software that uses the port should override this at runtime).
- Switch to the Power Management tab:
- Disable "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power"
- Click OK on the properties dialog.
It may warn you that another application has already opened the port or some other error. Ignore this. Do check that other COM ports in under "Ports (COM & LPT)" are not configured to COM2 though – change them to something else or disable them if they are. Restart the machine and return to the device manager.
A problem you might encounter here is an update of the driver, either automatically by Windows, a person doing it manually, or any driver update utility. This will likely make it stop working. It can look like this:
To fix this, you need to restore the version of the driver that was supplied with the X-Dream software. To do this, right click the device and select Update driver:
Then "Browse my computer for drivers":
Then "Let me pick from a list of available drivers on my computer"
Select version 3.3.17.203 from the list and click Next.
Hopefully this will be successful. Click the close button.
If it does not indicate that it is using COM2
you will need to configure it as before.
At this point, maybe after a restart, you should be able to turn on the X-Bike and use the “XDream Test” console application to show that the X-bike and computer are communicating.
Unfortunately, Windows 10, before very long, will restore the newer driver. For a more permanent solution, see Section “PL2303HXA Driver Support”.
PostgreSQL is database server software that X-Dream uses to manage user data. Install it from “Live\postgresql-9.1.3-1-windows.exe”
If you want you can also download later versions (and 64-bit if you're using 64-bit Windows), but version 10 and beyond are much bigger than version 9. When prompted for a password for the service account, use “postgres”.
If asked, don’t run Stack Builder. Locate the PostgreSQL config file in the Trixter installation folder: Trixter\Live\pg_hba.conf Locate the corresponding file in the PostgreSQL installation, e.g. C:\Program Files\PostgreSQL\9.1\data\pg_hba.conf Make a backup copy of this file, and replace it with Trixter\Live\pg_hba.conf Restart the PC (or just the postgresql service, if you know how to use the Services applet under administrative tools) so that it picks up the configuration changes.
This is not necessary if you don’t want to transfer user data from another computer.
- Double click the shortcut for the TrixterAppRelease executable that you created on the desktop. This should start the X-dream software. At some point between doing this and telling you to press the green button to start, the application creates a new database named trixter" in the PostgreSQL server.
- Exit from the application using Alt-F4.
- Find the "pgAdmin III" application:
- Click down to the trixter database using the password "postgres", right click and select "Restore…"
- Enter the path to your backup of the database and set the format and rolename options.
- On the "Restore Options #1" tab, enable "Clean before restore"
- Click "Restore". Look for an exit code of 0.
There are 2 diagnostic applications supplied.
- The X-Dream Test console application
- The Trixter Diagnostics application.
This is a console application that reads the COM2 port and interprets the signal coming from the bike, displaying the numbers in a simple text display:
Aside from installing the PL-2303 driver, this console application has no special requirements for installation.
This application can be found in the "Trixter Additional Apps\Diagnostics" folder. The executable is TrixterDiagnostics.exe. This application requires a registry key in the current user's hive (local machine hive doesn't work). Create a text file called trixter.reg with the following content:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Trixter]
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Trixter\X Dream Biking]
"Trixter Install Path"="C:\\Program Files\\Trixter"
Replace the "C:\Program Files\Trixter" with the actual path to the Trixter folder, being careful to use double-backslashes. Save the file. Right click the file and select "Merge" and click yes to the dialog boxes asking you to confirm. Windows is typically cautious about letting users do this, because editing the registry can be dangerous. The above script is not dangerous.
If you're using a common CPU-integrated GPU, e.g. Intel UHD series, you may find that some videos don't display.
For what to check, and how to fix it, see the workaround.