Hello everyone, I am curious as to what software everybody uses to run their jackpot board. I got mine hooked up to my mpcnc router months ago and I am just now getting around to messing with it. I was trying the web page based software on the board and I find it a bit clumsy to work with. I tried it with an apple macbook and now a windows 10 machine. Both work about the same. The board seems to lag as far as response to data input such as setting x and y. I am wondering if it would be faster to hardwire the board direct to a usb port on the computer. Also, I would like to use a standalone frontend program to control it, either via wifi or wired. Any thoughts? thanks for any input.
Not entirely answering your question, but wanted to mention that the default gui auto-refresh is quite slow. If you switch the radio button from poll to auto and set it to 300ms it becomes much snappier.
I am just using the onboard software, fwiw, and Estlcam to generate the gcode which I send wirelessly. Tend to alternate between my laptop for uploading files and just using my phone while a run is going on (btw make sure you don’t have multiple screens open at once or you’ll run into memory issues).
It also helps to set up station mode on the jackpot so you don’t have to reconnect every time (ie have it permanently on your WiFi instead of acting as its own ap).
Hello and thanks for the help. Can u tell me where to set radio from poll to auto? Also how to set up station mode on the board. Im a complete newbe when it comes to the under the hood stuff. Mark
For the refresh, find this section on the updates - looks like mine is defaulting to “Poll” every 10 seconds. Just change that to 1 second or what I usually do is click “Auto” and make it 300ms (which thinking about it may be way too fast, 1000ms is probably fine).
The WiFi is a bit trickier, and some people have had problems with connectivity, but mine is not that close to my router and has been rock solid. Click on “FluidNC” on the tabs at the top of the screen (between Dashboard and Tablet), then switch the WiFi mode to “Sta>AP”, which means that if it can’t connect to your network it will still fall back to AP mode so you can connect directly and try again. Then enter your network name in STA/SSID (if you have spaces I think you need to replace them with %20), and password below it. Once it reboots if all goes well you’ll be able to access it at fluidnc.local.
After you change any settings in the config, you need to go back to the dashboard and trigger the save macro, otherwise they won’t persist past a reboot.
Full instructions here : Wifi and Bluetooth | Wiki.js
The “config items” page under FluidNC is also pretty important, that’s where you can set the dimensions of your rig, max speeds, individual motor settings and homing details (like how much to back off once the switch clicks), and soft/hard limits (because you’ll only home to one side).
Lots of good info at wiki.fluidnc.com, the v1e docs, and searching these forums.
Have fun!
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Thanks very much again for your help. All these things really make the web based app work great! Now I can get something done. thanks much!
This some good info but i have one more little problem. After making the changes, i hit the save button which i think is the second one down on the dashboard left side. When i reboot, the grbl reports setting still says poll 10 sec instead of auto 500ms. What exactly is the save peoceedure? I’m sure it’s simple I just don’t see it. And btw i do reboot everything each time. Thanks again! Mark
I actually don’t know where to save the refresh setting, I wind up changing it every time. The web ui is separate from the backend. The save button should be working to save the rest of the config changes though.
There’s a new web ui (v3) and a dedicated v1e skin (there’s a whole thread about it somewhere). I briefly switched over to it, got stuck on something and switched back to what I knew but it’s improving rapidly.
Btw I do recommend updating to firmware 3.7.16 from the releases page, it seemed to resolve problems I had uploading gcode over WiFi. You can do the upload wirelessly - follow the OTA instructions here : FluidNC Installation | Wiki.js
Firmware downloads at : Releases · bdring/FluidNC · GitHub
(You just need the win64 one, even if you aren’t running windows, you’re just gonna grab one file from inside it).
You can set the change on the settings screen as well, and scroll all the way down and save (at least you can in V3).
This setting is a balance, you refresh too often you are pushing the esp harder than needed. Things like raster laser images you will notice a difference. 10 is a lot, but we were testing other issues when that was set. I think 3sec is a great balance.
I do plan on updating the configs for V3 pretty soon, so keep an eye out.
thanks for the reply. I did try the save button on the bottom of the settings screen. However, after a restart, the grbl report goes back to poll every 10 seconds… 
My save macro did not work and the save at the bottom of the screen did not work?? One of them has to, if not you might want to re-flash it.
Ok Ryan, yes I would like to reflash the firmware but I do not know how to do that either. Is there a procedure to do it wirelessly? Do I have to remove the esp microcontroller from the main board? I really dont want to do that since the socket on the main board id wider than the esp32 board and I might wreck it by removing it. The main board is clearly made for a wider esp32. My pin sockets are severely bent inward to accommodate the smaller board so wireless approach will be the best. I noticed a button on the config page of the web gui to update with. This is as far as I got. Thanks for all your help. Mark
We were just talking about this in another thread. Make your change, save using the button at the bottom, save using my macro button, then power down completely wait a couple of minutes and power back up to see if the save stuck, reboot does not do it all the time.
As for updating, use a USB cable and a Chrome browser and follow step 1. Jackpot CNC Controller - V1 Engineering Documentation
The bend is fine the board comes in and out pretty easily. If you have to, otherwise just leave it in and flash it as is.
Can you do it wirelessly, yes, but it seems to currently be a better option to do a full erase and wipe, upload all new files and start fresh especially if yours is not saving such a small change. If everything was working fine wireless is an option.
Ok, first off thanks for all your help. I did the firmware flash by cable direct. I used the automated flasher on the website. All is back up and running but I still can not save the GRBL setting so it refreshes Auto 500ms. It always comes back at Poll 10 sec. I tried the save button again. So I will just resign myself to setting it every time I start up. I was wanting to get the tablet page to default to INCH too. Thats ok though, I will run the way it is. This is a WAY better board setup than what I was using before “RAMPS” so all is well here. Thanks again and have a nice day. Mark
I am not sure how your board can flash fine but not save a setting.
You can actually directly edit that in the config file and re-upload it if you want, I might be able to edit it today myself. It is fairly human-readable and a easy edit.
I want to make some changes to the V3 files and get those going so maybe not a big deal anyway.
Good to know, thanks Ryan! There is a still image on the webui wiki page where it shows 50ms so I had no idea what was a safe range.
Here : http://wiki.fluidnc.com/en/features/web
The only time it really bothers me is when I put a new board on and tend to do multiple z-probes to make sure it’s level and find the max board thickness.
If I’m reading the docs right Auto should use fewer resources than poll (presumably it keeps the http channel open and just writes to it when it has something to say, avoiding the poll request completely). Not sure how to test it but if that is correct it might make sense to switch the default to Auto 3000ms vs the poll default.
That wiki is not mine. I can’t edit it.
I probe with gcode and not manually, so I never notice it at any time delay. I promise editing the text file is simple, if it bothers you ever just change the number and re-upload the config file.