Kiwi's XPS test results are up.

[adjonym]

	Quote: Originally Posted by jonkoppisch
	& the results are (after the responses are all deleted).... Quote: We are not concerned about this, as we know how the system works. We are not ablidged to share exactly how it works as it falls under technology trade secrets, but we certainly can demonstrate it. The very reason for our extreme range is how this works.

JD has one thing correct. He doesn't have to share exactly how it works. What he(or in this case Graupner) HAS to prove is THAT it works.
The Swedish consumers law is written in a way that no "we didn't write it exactly like that, so we are home free" scenario will NOT work for a company. If a consumer gets the impression that the system, or whatever, should work in a way, that's enough for a legal case.

Let me explain more about how this works in Sweden(hopefully JD is reading this, since the original thread is closed).
Any person can file a case against a company that makes false claims for their goods. In this case, a technical product.
The authoritys HAVE to respond to the claim filed. In the Graupner case, the authoritys will contact Graupner, asking for proof that the system works as adertised. If they aren't happy with the proof provided, they will ask for a system, to be taken to an independent 3:d party for testing. And, no JD's "we know it works" is not concidered evidence in a court of law in Sweden. Neither is "we know how it works".

If that testing facility finds that the product isn't doing what it's said to do, and order to stop the current marketing is issued. Failing to comply will lead to further actions taken. Normally a fine, or in extreme cases prison follows.

Now, with JD's refusal to give any information on the parameters required to "hop", the 3:d party testers would probably do the same tests KIWI did, and of course fail to make the system jump.

Quote:
"but we certainly can demonstrate it"
end quote.
Hmm, then why haven't they?

I can't see in any way that the range of the XPS system has anything what so ever to do with the frequency jumping. That might be me, and my lack of understanding of the technology though.

Quote
"We are not concerned about this"
end quote
Hmm, i'd be quite concerned. Graupner, being one of the most well known companys in the RC world, at least in Europe, being involved in a legal case should, at least if I was in JD's shoes, be quite embarrasing. All that because JD doesn't want to reveal the conditions he's system needs to "jump". I mean, come on, if it works as he says, how hard could it be to just say "this is what's needed to complete this test".
I guess Graupner will have to fight he's battle in court.

[XJet]

	Quote: Originally Posted by adjonym
	I can't see in any way that the range of the XPS system has anything what so ever to do with the frequency jumping. That might be me, and my lack of understanding of the technology though.

Surprisingly enough, there may be *some* truth in this.

I'm sure JD has designed frequency agility into XPS, the problem is that it's like being given a raincoat on a sunny day -- it only works when it's not needed.

So long as the transmitter and receiver can still talk to each other, they may well be able to negotiate a new frequency and coordinate a switch. *IF* that's the case, then it could be that when reaching the limits of range (and packet-loss gradually starts to increase), the system will rescan and find the quietest channel available -- which will then be switched to.

Unfortunately, although such a mechanism will work (when the sun is shining) it fails completely when strong interference occurs, even at close range -- the problem being that if the transmitter and receiver can't communicate, they can't negotiate a new frequency so the link fails.

Now given the receiver sensitivity of the XBeePro modules and the effective radiated power of 100mW, I would expect the system to have at least 2-3 miles of range even without re-optimizing its operating frequency for minimum noise. So in effect, the agility that may exist simply solves a problem that doesn't exist (lack of range) and completely ignores the more important problem of avoiding typical 2.4GHz interference.

This also ties in with JD's repeated assertion that XPS *does* hop and may even explain how the guys at Boeing got it to hop (if they did).

When I get some time I'll try a *very* gradual rise in the noise floor on the XPS operating channel and I would not be surprised if XPS changed channels.

Unfortunately, JD thinks that simply by claiming that this very gradual rise in the noise floor is how interference works on 2.4GHz that his system is therefore able to dodge it. This is not the first time he's simply "redesigned reality" to suit his claims.

I'm sorry, but that's where it all falls apart. After considerable "real world" monitoring of the 2.4GHz band *from a moving aerial platform* (ie: UAV/model) I can categorically say that you will almost *never* see a gradual rise in the noise level.

Due to the line-of-sight nature of 2.4GHz signals and the fact that they usually "appear" suddenly when the interfering device is turned on, the noise-source becomes "visible" from behind a shadowing object/terrain, or the noise source has changed frequencies to avoid interference *it* has detected.

As Kiwi's tests have shown, XPS is totally incapable of dealing with such a situation. I suspect the "ramp-up" time for a hop-inducing increase in the on-channel noise level for XPS is *far* slower than anything that could be considered acceptable as a method of avoiding *typical* interference.

As I've always said: XPS has no *useful*, robust frequency agility.

As for Graupner's alliance with JD.

Well they're a commercial enterprise faced with a difficult situation.

They saw an opportunity to gazzump competitors by selling a product for which wonderful claims were being made.

They asked questions, JD (who is apparently very charismatic and has the ability to make BS sound like gospel) answered those questions in his own inimitable way. It should be realized at this point that *many* people (particularly those charged with "technical" jobs) don't like to appear ignorant.

If JD rolled out a line of BS that sounded credible, who's going to question it?

It's also worth noting that JD is now the US agent for a range of Graupner products -- which means there was a double-plus in this relationship for Graupner.

Right now I bet there are a lot of anxious people at Graupner and some really hard questions being asked. They're in a very difficult position.

If they admit that they have no actual proof of JD's claims, or if their own testing has proven that it lacks the robustness claimed, they'll probably just try to withdraw the product from the market very quietly, probably by simply not restocking when existing units are sold.

If they still believe JD's claims and they are disproven by independent tests then they'll potentially suffer an enormous blow to their bottom-line and their credibility.

[jonkoppisch]

Graupner got the worst end of the exchange..... ie, graupner got xps products, jd got graupner turbines etc...

[easytiger]

"We are not ablidged to share exactly how it works"

I'm not normally one to bust on someone's spelling, after all, this here is them thar internets, but for a guy who claims to have gotten three college degrees at once at age 17, you would think he would know how to spell "obliged". That's not exactly an SAT word.

Look, guys...Jim Drew is lying. He's a proven liar. A pathological liar? I cannot say, I don't have the clinical definition of "pathological", only the street definition, which, in common useage, seems to mean "lies all the time". In which case, yes, Jim Drew is a pathological liar. He lies all the time. Rather continuously. Go ahead, sue me for libel, Jim. Go for it. You can't win, because what I'm saying is TRUE.

Jim Drew never graduated college at all, as far as anyone can see. He certainly did not graduate with three degrees at age 17 from U. Oregon, Klamath Falls. A simple phone call to the registrar put paid to that big whopper of a lie. He's just a snake-oil salesman with just enough self-taught knowledge of electronics to be dangerous.

I said this really early on, and I got pilloried for it. Now it's rather obvious. There is no point in continuing to refute each of his new claims, point by point, or his old ones...pretty much nothing he says is true.

Don't risk your planes, even your foamies, to XPS. Sooner or later, someone is going to lose an eye. It's been a very near thing so far, that giant twin turbine airliner crashing into the autobahn in Germany was a wake-up call.

[BZFrank]

	Quote:
	It's been a very near thing so far, that giant twin turbine airliner crashing into the autobahn in Germany was a wake-up call.

Allow the small correction: It was a giant three engine turbine airliner (model of a MD-11) and AFAIK it crashed near a federal road (fortunately not into it).

Here a flight video of the model (when it was flying still on 35 Mhz a few months before):

YouTube - rc airliner MD-11 ~Peter Michel~

[jonkoppisch]

Now he says...

	Quote:
	Now that we have clearance from the FCC, we will post a video of the current hopping vs. the new code that will be released as a firmware upgrade. We are keeping the original method as it allows the range to be better than any other system. The addition uses multiple channels when necessary. We will also have a full time frequency hopping version required for Europe in August that will also be just a firmware upgrade.

[KrisW]

	Quote: Originally Posted by XJet
	But I think JD said just a while ago that he's still in the paintball business. And it's not anyone's job to put anyone out of business -- just redress the balance of hype and deception versus reality. If it weren't for the FBs, this would be a simple task -- JD would say one thing, others (and Kiwi's tests) would say another. People could review both and make their own minds up. Unfortunately, the FBs continue to praise Lord JD and keep alleging that the naysayers are simply on the payroll of Futaba or JR and have some kind of personal agenda against their exalted one. Whenever anyone asks a legitimate question and an objective response, that response usually gets deleted by JD or shouted down by the FBs (chances are that the response I linked to, which simply read " No, they're about the best independent testing we've got at the moment" will have already been deleted by the time you read this). That's why the "naysayers" maintain a presence -- to establish the balance necessary to keep otherwise uninformed people aware of the facts.

Yup, they've been deleted.

Absolutely amazing how touchy this guys trigger finger is.

[spoiler]

	Quote: Originally Posted by jonkoppisch
	& the results are (after the responses are all deleted)....

That response may be totally expected, but it is also totally disengenuous. The question relates not to the technology behind/inside the system, but whether that technology actually does what the manufacturer says it does. This is obvious to all except XPS it would appear and the kind of response that should ring alarm bells with any customer even vaguey concerned with safety and getting what he paid for...

[easytiger]

	Quote: Originally Posted by KrisW
	Yup, they've been deleted. Absolutely amazing how touchy this guys trigger finger is.

Except...I made a post HERE last night and it sure looks like it was deleted by Flying Giants.
Which is now, as I understand it, just another subsidiary of RCgroups, which is in the pay of XPS...

[Kiwi]

Easy,

I just sent you a pager but in case you miss it where was the post that was deleted?? I was on here last night and I see no deleted posts.

If we delete a posts it leaves a yellow bar to show where it was pulled from. I see nothing here that was yanked.

[XJet]

	Quote: Originally Posted by spoiler
	That response may be totally expected, but it is also totally disengenuous.

I see now that JD is claiming (in light of threatened investigation by European authorities) that he never said the frequency agility of XPS was designed to avoid interfering signals -- no, it was only ever designed to improve the range of the system.

Well he's been caught out on that one too. Here are quotes from postings he made on RCU back in 2006:

We are the ONLY 2.4GHz system that has the ability to monitor the available frequencies in the 2.4GHz range and change as necessary, in real time. This means that the plane as well as the transmitter can make the change occur. If you flew your plane over a school with a huge 14dbi external 802.xx antenna, that would likely be cause for switching to a new frequency (away from whatever channel that 802.xx was on)

In the same post he also claimed:
"Even 2.4GHz cameras are not a problem as we can move around their frequency, even with huge drift that occurs in the cheap overseas versions. Our system is extremely well thought out for safety reasons"

And perhaps the most damning claim, also on RCU in 2006:
"If there was a burst at a particular frequency or range, we would just hop to something that wasn't an issue. Now, if you had some other competing 2.4GHz radio... you would be in trouble. "

The guy is BSing and he's been show so many times to have lied that I really wonder if his FBs are the kind of stuff that would interest a university specializing in human psychology. Some PhD student could write a wonderful thesis on this -- it's absolutely unbelievable that so many people can ignore the facts even when they're presented to them on a plate.

[tadawson]

I dunno - seems to me that avoiding interfering signals is a pretty damn fine way to increase range . . . . so I think the statements overlap, if folks can just take the "attitude blinders" off and look at the statement clearly . . . .

- Tim

[Pale Rider]

	Quote: Originally Posted by tadawson
	I dunno - seems to me that avoiding interfering signals is a pretty damn fine way to increase range . . . . so I think the statements overlap, if folks can just take the "attitude blinders" off and look at the statement clearly . . . . - Tim

Your kidding right ?

[ricoalonso]

It looks like XPS has released or at least stated the parameters/conditions to make their unit perform the illusive hop. Here's what JD mention in his RCG post at http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=869306 post #15

	Quote:
	Kiwi's test will never be able to reproduce it. The existing hopping requires the noise floor within +/-15MHz of the frequency to slowly rise inside of 512 frames (about 11 seconds). Remember, this is a predicitive hop designed to increase range. It was never designed to fix a saturation issue as that does not occur in the real world without all of the band being wiped out. People have already reported using the XDP to monitor their flight, taking off and one channel and landing on another. This is how it is possible. Incidentally, the AirHorn devices being used in Kiwi's test are not FCC certified. I contacted the supplier and they could not provide a FCC ID either. The noise (band to band splatter, increasing the noise floor) is pretty severe. However, just moving our receiver a few feet away foils that bench test. The bench test failure requires the receiver's front-end to be swamped, which is why it stops working. The additional hop code is going to just foil the bench test by moving to another frequency. This will likely never be used ever in the real world, but it should silence the nay-sayers. This is a FIRMWARE only upgrade. The XBEE Pro hardware and our existing firmware we program on the XBEE module is quite capable of frequency hopping full time, and according to the FCC is allowed as a DSS device (much like what Futaba does with the FASST system). I am not a fan of full time frequency hopping as it typically reduces the overall range, since you are hopping through congestion. Fortunately the XBEE hardware is very sensitive, so that will help make up for it in Europe, where full time hopping will be required August 1st. This upgrade is certainly not required, but it does add some real features like the telemetry package, multiple servo outputs modes, voltage monitor, etc.

One thing I am confused is the statement above regarding the additional code. If the original version of XPS already does the hopping... why need the additional code to move to another frequency? Isn't hopping the same as moving to another frequency?

^R^

[XJet]

I'm pretty sure that XPS will hop under those parameters -- but that's kind of like having a raincoat on a sunny day -- absolutely useless.

Interference doesn't slowly increase over an 11-second period in the "real world" so it's useless as a method of avoiding the kind of interference you're *actually* going to encounter when flying a model.

As I've always said -- XPS has no useful frequency agility and JD has just confirmed that with those parameters.