Simon Modelling CB&Q and Wabash See my slowly evolving layout on my picturetrail site http://www.picturetrail.com/simontrains and our videos at http://www.youtube.com/user/MrCrispybake?feature=mhum
My bet is that as the cost of DCC comes down, new people enter the hobby and older ones die off (to put it bluntly), that -- yes -- DC will go the way of the dodo.
Two standards is just not cost effective for the manufacturers.
Since going DCC myself, I couldn't imagine going back to DC and all the crazy block control switch flipping.
An alternative is that an "improved DCC" appears and replaces both.
Craig
DMW
It is hard to tell what the future will hold. I would guess that DC will probley fade out and be replaced with DCC but not very fast. I imagine that DCC will at some time will be replaced with some other type of control.
In my mind I can see in the future that model trains could be controled by remote control, similar to a TV set, using on board battries for the power and track voltage to charge the battries. Battries are getting better and smaller every day.
When I was a young child (probley 40 plus years ago) I ask my dad why they couldn't make a record that would not skip. He told me that they already do, by using lazers, but they were very expensive and we would not see them in our lifetime due to the expense. He was seeing DVDs and CDs before they were really in extistance yet. The only time my Dad was wrong. (Sorry Dad.) Miike
I suspect the collector's market will keep DC alive for a good long time. On top of that, some DC folks are not just content with DC, they are fanatical about staying DC and provide a very vocal market for the DC only products..
Chris
Blank VHS tapes are still readily available. Like DC locomotives will be for a long time to come.
Anynody know WHY VHS beat out Beta?
Dr. Frankendiesel aka Scott Running BearSpace Mouse for president!15 year veteran fire fighterCollector of Apple //e'sRunning Bear EnterprisesHistory Channel Club life member.beatus homo qui invenit sapientiam
loathar wrote: Blank VHS tapes are still readily available. Like DC locomotives will be for a long time to come.Anynody know WHY VHS beat out Beta?
Yes.
Although Beta was of slightly superior quality in terms of color reproduction, it was waaayy more expensive. The public voted with their wallets and it was eventually doomed. It didn't help that Sony was the only other manufacturer of the technology either.
I'm really surprised that Blue Ray won out over HD DVD. HD DVD was less expensive, but apparently some of the other big studios threw their hats towards Blue ray because of the larger storage capabilities they could see as furthering their revenue stream.
Driline wrote: loathar wrote: Blank VHS tapes are still readily available. Like DC locomotives will be for a long time to come.Anynody know WHY VHS beat out Beta?Yes.Although Beta was of slightly superior quality in terms of color reproduction, it was waaayy more expensive. The public voted with their wallets and it was eventually doomed. It didn't help that Sony was the only other manufacturer of the technology either.I'm really surprised that Blue Ray won out over HD DVD. HD DVD was less expensive, but apparently some of the other big studios threw their hats towards Blue ray because of the larger storage capabilities they could see as furthering their revenue stream.
Wrong. The adult movie industry couldn't fit a full length movie on a single Beta so they threw their support behind VHS. HD DVD is so high resolution that it shows too many blemishes on the adult "actors" so they supported the lower quality Blue Ray format. They are the largest user of these medium in the world so they dictate the standards.(now you know the seedy truth)
I've only been into model railroading since 2005 and from what I read DCC started about 10 or so years earlier.
All the manufacturers I can think of still make DC models as well as DCC. So I don't think anyone using DC should worry that there won't be power packs made still 10 years from now.
With that said, DCC has made some substantial strides since it's introduction in the 1990's and will continue to for years to come. With newer technology eventually DC will go by the wayside but that is still years from now.
Bill
I would answer the question, but first, what's VHS?
Well VHS vs. Beta is just another example of what always happens in America, someone comes out with a great quality but expensive product, and goes bankrupt when someone else comes out with a medium quality cheap version. It's true for American TV's going back to the forties, could argue Mac vs. PC was the same thing too.
The problem with Astrac was that although it worked fine, it was proprietary like Hornby's Zero-1 system. You had to either use the one company's product exclusively to use it. Thanks to the NMRA standards we have several manufacturers making compatible DCC equipment, so you can have an Atlas engine with a TCS decoder and a Soundtraxx sound decoder run by a Digitrax control system.
Anyway...I can't see young folks joining the hobby not using DCC in the future, so I suspect DC will go like outside-third-rail in O scale - you'll see people using it for a long time, (MR featured such a layout around 1990 IIRC) but each year the pct. of them around will diminish as they convert or die off. They may be a significant number for a long time, but the pct. of modellers using DC started to decline as soon as DCC came out, and it will continue to decline in the future...at least until fuel costs become so high that we go back to running trains on big DC batteries like car batteries, only now solar rechargeable.
DCC will continue to grow, and we all hope it does! DCC is nothing short of revolutionary, and a Godsend for those of frustrated with flipping block switches, among many other advantages.
This hobby still very much needs DC. There always needs to be a cheap "IN" for newcomers to the hobby. The formula that we accidentally started works well - start with an inexpensive train set, enjoy running it, build a simple layout, learn how to build and then master scenery and structures, then ADD DCC to that experience.
I just sounded too much like an old fart, didn't I??! I believe it though.
Carmine, CEO, CE, and Chief Bottle Washer - the Pacific Belt RR, in HO scale
Founded by myself, 1975!
How are we going to get new recruits, when we ourselves are being priced out of the hobby!! Take your trains out of the box and play with them! That's why they were made!
Back when I started model railroading, the standard DC voltage had just been raised from six to twelve volts, and taper-wound rheostats could control any model locomotive made.
Has anybody (other than Yours Truly) tried to control a can-motored locomotive with a 40 ohm rheostat? Zero to track speed(plus) instantly!
One bump on the path of Model Railroad progress was a radio-controlled F7 A-B set powered by on-board batteries. It didn't even need track! However, the batteries were only good for a couple of minutes, so, except for the novelty effect of an uncontrollable (from the DC panels) train on a club layout, it quickly faded from view.
Thanks to a sizeable roster of open-frame motored equipment and a disinclination to put myself at the mercy of electronics I don't understand and probably can't repair in-house, I am committed to analog DC. Which direction(s) others wish to travel is their problem. I just hope they will have as much fun as I do.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - with 1970's control technology)
The manufacturers are on top of this, from what I can tell. You can buy the same engine DC-only, or equipped with sound and a dual-mode decoder. It's really the same engine inside, with the exception of the circuit board and speaker. The dual-mode decoder allows the engine to run on a DC layout, so as more DC users discover sound, they will be able to go down that path without converting to DCC.
Even now, the biggest stumbling block to conversion is the large fleet of DC-only engines that would require decoders. As older engines are retired, and their replacements are all either DCC-ready or equipped with dual-mode decoders, that transition becomes easier and easier.
Besides, DCC is just so much more fun.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Usually at the 20-year mark is when a new technology becomes entrenched. For DCC, this will be somewhere around 2013 ... so we're still some 5 years away from that time.
I do see DCC becoming like radio control is to model airplanes ... you don't have to model airplanes that way, but it's considered the defacto standard if you want the most flexible control of your model. You can still buy low end model airplanes that don't come with radio control, for example ... but most serious model airplane hobbyists graduate to radio control pretty quickly.
I see the same thing happening with DCC. You will still be able to buy less costly locomotives that don't come with DCC decoders already installed. But most locos will be DCC-ready and allow plug-and-play DCC decoder installation.
I think we're still at least 5 years away from this "defacto" standard, however.
Joe Fugate Modeling the 1980s SP Siskiyou Line in southern Oregon
I think this response hits the nail on the head. The public will vote with their dollars whether they want to keep DC around. As long as there is sufficient demand for both platforms, DC and DCC will co-exist. However, when the day comes (and I think it will), that DCC demand far outstrips DC, manufacturers are going to ask themselves if it is cost effective to produce lines for both and in all likelihood, they are going to reach the point where they don't think it is profitable and DC will be dropped. When that tipping point will come is a guess but I have little doubt that day will come. DC proponents will continue to find ways to operate their layouts, but the manufacturers will not cater to them the way they do now. So says Carnac the Magnificent.
loathar wrote: Driline wrote:I'm really surprised that Blue Ray won out over HD DVD. HD DVD was less expensive, but apparently some of the other big studios threw their hats towards Blue ray because of the larger storage capabilities they could see as furthering their revenue stream.Wrong. The adult movie industry couldn't fit a full length movie on a single Beta so they threw their support behind VHS. HD DVD is so high resolution that it shows too many blemishes on the adult "actors" so they supported the lower quality Blue Ray format. They are the largest user of these medium in the world so they dictate the standards.(now you know the seedy truth)
Driline wrote:I'm really surprised that Blue Ray won out over HD DVD. HD DVD was less expensive, but apparently some of the other big studios threw their hats towards Blue ray because of the larger storage capabilities they could see as furthering their revenue stream.
Sorry to contradict you, Loathar, but the adult film industry was not the determining factor in the HDDVD/BluRay fight. The key players here were the major studios. As Driline wrote, BluRay has significantly more storage. From a marketing perspective, that means you can put more garbage extras on a disc, thus increasing the marketability. But the other significant issue in this fight was compatibility: HDDVD uses Microsoft-proprietary code, but Blu-Ray is Java-based, and is therefore platform-independent. Since both MS and Apple are pushing the idea of the computer as the all-in-one entertainment device, it doesn't make sense to exclude those consumers who would want to watch a disc on their Apple (or, for that matter, Linux) computers. From the outset, several studios supported both formats, and several (including my employer) refused to support HDDVD, but only one refused to support Blu-Ray. At that point HDDVD was doomed -- in our world, we knew which way this would go almost two years ago.
But back to important things: DCC vs. DC. One factor to keep in mind in this discussion is the lifespan of the technology. The longer the technology keeps working, the longer it will be supported by the manufacturers. It's not uncommon for a DC layout to exist for twenty or thirty years (or more), and if the owners remain satisfied with them, they will continue to be a customer base for DC. I don't think we're deep enough into the "DCC age" to know what the real lifspan of DCC layouts might be. Until a couple of years ago, those who went DCC would have been considered "early adopters" -- and they're more likely to embrace change, so their layouts are more likely to have a shorter lifespan (without significant change).
Mind you, I'm not saying DC won't go away, I just think it might take a lot longer than some on this thread might think.
My ,
Peter
Hopefully, DC will be around as long as I am, but since I'm 68, who knows? But for me, converting my huge brass steam fleet to DCC would just be too big a financial outlay at this time in my life (and no, don't tell me 'just do it one locomotive at a time', I never know which of my 50-odd brass steamers I'm going to want to run at any given time). However, if I were some twenty years younger, I'd probably jump on the DCC bandwagon. But I'll leave the conversion to whoever gets my brass collection after I'm gone. Let it be THEIR problem.
Tom
Tom View my layout photos! http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/mm310/TWhite-014/Rio%20Grande%20Yuba%20River%20Sub One can NEVER have too many Articulateds!
I asked the owner of the LHS I go to mostly and asked him what he thought and he said the vast majority of his customers were into DC. Most had small layouts and not the large MR Mag type layouts that would support DCC. He does have a lot of customers that use DCC but DC is still dominate in his shop. I'd like to hear what other LHS owners are experiencing in this.
Bruce
BurbankAV,
Re-read Loathar's answer, he is correct. His reference on the adult film industry was for VHS vs Beta and is true. For HD/Blue Ray, he does mention major studios. I hadn't heard about HD being too high a resolution.
What really bothers me is both loathar and I knew about the...uh...Graffic Adult Art tie-in with Beta/VHS. Humm....must have been a TV program on it....right loathar?
Glad to know Wally's has VHS tapes. Now, who is carring Beta tapes?
Tilden
alcofanschdy wrote: I asked the owner of the LHS I go to mostly and asked him what he thought and he said the vast majority of his customers were into DC. Most had small layouts and not the large MR Mag type layouts that would support DCC. He does have a lot of customers that use DCC but DC is still dominate in his shop. I'd like to hear what other LHS owners are experiencing in this.Bruce
I have little doubt that DC is still in the majority but the question is what will be the dominant platform down the road. When DCC first came out, there was just a trickle of modelers who went to it. Then it become a steady stream. At some point, I think the dam will burst and DCC will push DC aside. As DCC becomes more prevalent, there will probably be little if any difference in the cost so builders of new layouts will have little reason to stick with the old technology. I don't think the holdouts can keep DC viable indefinitely. Maybe for another decade. Perhaps a little longer. Eventually DC will get swept away and something else might come along that makes even DCC seem antiquated.
loathar wrote:Blank VHS tapes are still readily available. Like DC locomotives will be for a long time to come.Anynody know WHY VHS beat out Beta?
Beta wasn't slightly technologically superior, it was VASTLY superior. It used a single-arm spindle mechanism that pulled the tape 3/4 around the tape head for better contact and a vastly improved image. The VHS mechanisms used two spindle arms that only gave 1/2 diameter contact with the tape heads.
VHS beat Beta, as others have said, on price and storage capacity. But the unseen factor was that it was a proprietary system made only by Sony while Matsushita opened the VHS specifications up to other manufacturers, just as IBM opened up their vastly inferior PC architecture and had contracts that allowed MS to sell the OS to other PC manufacturers, while Apple kept the vastly superior Macintosh architecture proptietary. As with the Mac, A variant of Beta did survive, Betacam was a popular commercial format and is still around.
However, the DC standard in model railroading has a history dating back well over half a century, while these electronic products barely reach back two decades. DC will be around in some form. But it will be interesting to watch and see how much of the market DCC takes, and what forms it evolves into.
Best!
Hopefully. Once DC is gone there won't be as many issues with having to install decoders, they'll already be there...in all models not just some. Why use a vastly inferior technology?
I have some concern though over people that think that DCC only benefits those with large layouts. In my opinion, there are far more advantages provided to small and mid-size layouts (provided they want to run more than one engine) by DCC then there are to large layouts.
Tilden wrote: BurbankAV, Re-read Loathar's answer, he is correct. His reference on the adult film industry was for VHS vs Beta and is true. For HD/Blue Ray, he does mention major studios. I hadn't heard about HD being too high a resolution. What really bothers me is both loathar and I knew about the...uh...Graffic Adult Art tie-in with Beta/VHS. Humm....must have been a TV program on it....right loathar? Glad to know Wally's has VHS tapes. Now, who is carring Beta tapes?Tilden
Yes. And it was on PBS, believe it or not.(seriously) And another one on Spike TV recently.
Tilden wrote:BurbankAV, Re-read Loathar's answer, he is correct. His reference on the adult film industry was for VHS vs Beta and is true. For HD/Blue Ray, he does mention major studios. I hadn't heard about HD being too high a resolution. What really bothers me is both loathar and I knew about the...uh...Graffic Adult Art tie-in with Beta/VHS. Humm....must have been a TV program on it....right loathar? Glad to know Wally's has VHS tapes. Now, who is carring Beta tapes?Tilden
It's so far off-topic that it's not worth fighting about, but if you'll check my post, you'll see that I was referring to Loathar's comments about HDDVD/Blu-Ray.
As an additional note, there's no resolution difference between the two formats: the acceptable resolutions are determined by the Advanced Television Standards Committee (ATSC), and both are limited to a maximum resolution of 1920x1080 (aka 1080p). Both types of discs use the same set of codecs -- AVC, VC-1 or MPEG-2. The only significant differences are (1) the storage space [BluRay having roughly double that of HDDVD], (2) the underlying programming language [which I touched on in my previous post], and (3) regional coding [allowable in Blu-Ray, not allowed in HDDVD].
But as for the Beta/VHS discussion, Loathar's answer is basically correct -- although there were a number of factors that played into that contest.
And for anyone looking for Beta tapes: if you can scrape up old Beta shells (I used to haunt pawn shops looking for them...) you can swap in the tape from a new VHS shell to no ill effect. I ran my 1982 Beta recorder until 2004 this way...
The simple answer is "no" DC will not go away. Simply because DCC technology is built on DC basics. The decoder still feeds plain DC to the motor, so DCC is simply a "middle man" in the control circuit, which is DC, varied in voltage and polarity, to control the motor.
Back converting a DCC locomotive to straight DC would be easy if all new ones would come in DCC only.
jfugate wrote: Usually at the 20-year mark is when a new technology becomes entrenched. For DCC, this will be somewhere around 2013 ... so we're still some 5 years away from that time.I do see DCC becoming like radio control is to model airplanes ... you don't have to model airplanes that way, but it's considered the defacto standard if you want the most flexible control of your model. You can still buy low end model airplanes that don't come with radio control, for example ... but most serious model airplane hobbyists graduate to radio control pretty quickly.I see the same thing happening with DCC. You will still be able to buy less costly locomotives that don't come with DCC decoders already installed. But most locos will be DCC-ready and allow plug-and-play DCC decoder installation.I think we're still at least 5 years away from this "defacto" standard, however.
Joe, I think the biggest stride forward in the acceptance of DCC was the NMRA setting up a standard for the basic control signal. Before this, most DCC equipment was not cross compatable, ie. the decoders made by one company had to be controlled by a system from the same company. It was the VHS/Beta comparison several times over. Of course this might make it more difficult to determine when the "20-year mark" starts.
Occams Razor wrote:Hopefully. Once DC is gone there won't be as many issues with having to install decoders, they'll already be there...in all models not just some. Why use a vastly inferior technology?
It depends on your point of view whether or not DC is "inferior technology" - I run DC which means that (so far) I don't have to lay out extra cash for a decoder that offers me nothing. My trains run fine, double headed, triple headed, with pushers, etc., etc. I have no complicated wiring, no need for a bus wire, and no need to clean track either. New technology, no matter how "impressive", is extraneous when the old is still doing the job.
Occams Razor wrote:I have some concern though over people that think that DCC only benefits those with large layouts. In my opinion, there are far more advantages provided to small and mid-size layouts (provided they want to run more than one engine) by DCC then there are to large layouts.
I keep hearing how DCC lets you control the trains, not the layout, but I've yet to understand how one operator can control two trains - one train with another (or others) running, perhaps, but certainly not control multiple trains. To me, control implies that you can simultaneously have two locos switching a yard, for instance, with each stopping starting, reversing, etc. as required - great with an operator for each (and a real positive aspect of DCC), but as unlikely for a single operator as having a single person drive two cars at the same time. For those who want sound, it's certainly more practical with DCC, although not everybody wants sound. Ditto for lights - DCC offers impressive capabilities, but the first time the headlight flickers due to a speck of dirt or whatever, you're back to the toy train era.
I'm sure that DCC will continue to grow, and that DC will shrink as us old timers die out, but I don't think you'll see DC disappearing completely. The "next big thing" could be just around the corner, too, and there's probably just as much chance that DCC too will fade away, perhaps before DC does.