Orion 2 F18 base/stick disconnects randomly!

[Chief_Biv]

I have Orion 1 F18 HOTAS. It's only the joystick that disconnects. I get a Windows audio chime when it disconnects and then reconnects. Has anyone found a fix?

[Callsign JoNay]

I have the same problem with random disconnects/reconnects during flight, and so do several of my friends. I swapped out the USB A/B cable for my printer's USB A/B cable, and that fixed my problem for over a month. No connection drops at all but they have returned the same as before. I've tried plugging into powered USB hub and direct to the motherboard, but it makes no difference on my end.

I don't have any other flight simulators installed, only DCS. Has anyone experienced disconnection issues while flying in other simulators? It would be helpful to rule out whether or not it is a DCS specific issue with Winwing Orion stick bases.

[MustangSally]

3 hours ago, Callsign JoNay said:

I have the same problem with random disconnects/reconnects during flight, and so do several of my friends. I swapped out the USB A/B cable for my printer's USB A/B cable, and that fixed my problem for over a month. No connection drops at all but they have returned the same as before. I've tried plugging into powered USB hub and direct to the motherboard, but it makes no difference on my end.

I don't have any other flight simulators installed, only DCS. Has anyone experienced disconnection issues while flying in other simulators? It would be helpful to rule out whether or not it is a DCS specific issue with Winwing Orion stick bases.

Whats the power rating of the hub? If its low, you'll get the disconnects, esp if you have multiple devices connected. I have 2 x 48w 7 port USB 3.1 hubs and have absolutely no issues

[Callsign JoNay]

7 hours ago, MustangSally said:

Whats the power rating of the hub? If its low, you'll get the disconnects, esp if you have multiple devices connected. I have 2 x 48w 7 port USB 3.1 hubs and have absolutely no issues

I have no idea. Probably low. It's not an expensive hub. Can you confirm that you do have disconnection issues when you plug into the tower instead of the hub?

[MustangSally]

2 hours ago, Callsign JoNay said:

I have no idea. Probably low. It's not an expensive hub. Can you confirm that you do have disconnection issues when you plug into the tower instead of the hub?

A long time ago when I owned a Libra plugged into the back of my pc.

Edited April 8 by MustangSally

[PluckyUnderdog]

Having this issue myself. Completely random. Sometimes not for days. Always comes back on after 15-20 seconds. Throttle and stick, I have the Orion 2 F16EX stick and throttle.

 

I don't believe it's a connector issue. I think it's their firmware and/or the simapp pro software and how they interact with the PC. Their QA/QC can't be that bad that they have this many issues with seating cables........ can they??? A little frustrating for me at the mo but I can bear it, obviously the bloody thing should work without issue, especially as I've had it for only three months. But frankly, after the horror stories of dealing with their customer service, I think I'll grin and bear it.

 

Such a shame, as they are great to use, really responsive and precise.

 

My own fault for not doing enough due diligence though, that's on me.

Edited April 10 by PluckyUnderdog
Correction

[PluckyUnderdog]

An update to my previous post, I have decided to contact them through PayPal, as that's how I bought it. I will let them respond. If it is not resolved to my satisfaction (them paying to ship it back to China and repairing/replacing) then I will raise a dispute.

 

I am not going through the process of replacing wires etc, that isn't my job and I wouldn't know what I was doing and may completely void the warranty. I've followed the various troubleshooting steps outlined on here and other threads on here, and on Reddit etc, to no avail. So I'm being pre-emptive in not letting them waste my time talking for weeks and weeks through their terrible customer service.

 

As I say, I should've done more research. My own fault.

[PawlaczGMD]

Just to report that my problem is not fixed, I must have been lucky for a while.

On 4/7/2024 at 1:35 PM, Callsign JoNay said:

I have the same problem with random disconnects/reconnects during flight, and so do several of my friends. I swapped out the USB A/B cable for my printer's USB A/B cable, and that fixed my problem for over a month. No connection drops at all but they have returned the same as before. I've tried plugging into powered USB hub and direct to the motherboard, but it makes no difference on my end.

I don't have any other flight simulators installed, only DCS. Has anyone experienced disconnection issues while flying in other simulators? It would be helpful to rule out whether or not it is a DCS specific issue with Winwing Orion stick bases.

Interesting, I also bought new cables, and IT SEEMED to fix the issue for a while, but it has returned. It might just be placebo, and we simply did not encounter the random event after the cable swap.

It also make no difference where you plug it, hub or not. I am strongly considering asking for a charge back from my CC and just not bothering to deal with this issue. I've tried a 100 different things.

[MustangSally]

look back through the thread, had a similar issue with my libra. Good high powered hubs resolved the issue

[PluckyUnderdog]

7 minutes ago, MustangSally said:

look back through the thread, had a similar issue with my libra. Good high powered hubs resolved the issue

Well, I mean you shouldn't need a high wattage USB hub for this to not happen, imo. I had the Warthog hotas for three years and didn't encounter this issue once. I've never heard of it happening with Virpil, for example. This is on Winwing to sort out and them passing the buck on to paying customers is unacceptable.

[MustangSally]

2 minutes ago, PluckyUnderdog said:

Well, I mean you shouldn't need a high wattage USB hub for this to not happen, imo. I had the Warthog hotas for three years and didn't encounter this issue once. I've never heard of it happening with Virpil, for example. This is on Winwing to sort out and them passing the buck on to paying customers is unacceptable.

Fixed it for me. See my sig, all my gear is WW with no issues. All plugged in to 2 x powered 48w usb hubs

[PluckyUnderdog]

2 minutes ago, MustangSally said:

Fixed it for me. See my sig, all my gear is WW with no issues. All plugged in to 2 x powered 48w usb hubs

Yes that's good that you solved it and that works for you. I have a powered USB hub that I think is 20W and it still happens with that. I like their stuff aesthetically but I will be pursuing a refund and staying away from their stuff, personally. It's happened about 7 or 8 times in the 3 months I've had the hotas. Unacceptable for something that cost me around £600.

[PawlaczGMD]

11 minutes ago, MustangSally said:

Fixed it for me. See my sig, all my gear is WW with no issues. All plugged in to 2 x powered 48w usb hubs

Sorry, not sure where your "sig" is.

 

Do you mean that you have 2 individual powered usb hubs, one for joystick and one for throttle? Or you use just one hub?

I have tried using my Pimax powered hub and it didn't help, although the headset is also using it, so it might be maxed out on power.

Honestly, I would just buy the hub to try it at this point. 

[MustangSally]

Just now, PawlaczGMD said:

Sorry, not sure where your "sig" is.

 

Do you mean that you have 2 individual powered usb hubs, one for joystick and one for throttle? Or you use just one hub?

I have tried using my Pimax powered hub and it didn't help, although the headset is also using it, so it might be maxed out on power.

Honestly, I would just buy the hub to try it at this point. 

Turn Signatures on in your forum profile. I have 2x 7 port 48w USB 3.0 hubs. All my WW devices use the hubs

12 minutes ago, PluckyUnderdog said:

Yes that's good that you solved it and that works for you. I have a powered USB hub that I think is 20W and it still happens with that. I like their stuff aesthetically but I will be pursuing a refund and staying away from their stuff, personally. It's happened about 7 or 8 times in the 3 months I've had the hotas. Unacceptable for something that cost me around £600.

20w is pretty low imho

[PawlaczGMD]

4 minutes ago, MustangSally said:

Turn Signatures on in your forum profile. I have 2x 7 port 48w USB 3.0 hubs. All my WW devices use the hubs

Thanks, I will try this, although I think It's BS that I need to spend $40-80 dollars on hubs to maybe fix it. I will start with a single hub and see if it fixes anything.

Should have bought VKB and saved myself all the headache. 

Edited April 12 by PawlaczGMD

[PawlaczGMD]

PS, WW support just replied to me with a possible fix. @PluckyUnderdog you can try it as a last resort before you chargeback  . It seems that buying a powered hub could be circumventing this, so I will see if it helps before I buy the hub.

54.Procedure for troubleshooting intermittent lagging issues.docx

[PluckyUnderdog]

4 minutes ago, PawlaczGMD said:

Thanks, I will try this, although I think It's BS that I need to spend $40-80 dollars on hubs to maybe fix it. I will start with a single hub and see if it fixes anything.

Should have bought VKB and saved myself all the headache. 

 

This is my bugbear too. I've spent £600 on a hotas, I expect it to work. Why should I spend another £50 on a high powered USB hub? No. I do not think that's acceptable, so it's going back. And I'll buy a Virpil hotas. They actually work properly.

Just now, PawlaczGMD said:

PS, WW support just replied to me with a possible fix. @PluckyUnderdog you can try it as a last resort before you chargeback  . It seems that buying a powered hub could be circumventing this, so I will see if it helps before I buy the hub.

54.Procedure for troubleshooting intermittent lagging issues.docx 210.86 kB · 0 downloads

Yeah I already tried this, was sent it yesterday. It didn't work, and the disconnect still happened, unfortunately.  But thanks for the notification. 

[PawlaczGMD]

3 minutes ago, PluckyUnderdog said:

This is my bugbear too. I've spent £600 on a hotas, I expect it to work. Why should I spend another £50 on a high powered USB hub? No. I do not think that's acceptable, so it's going back. And I'll buy a Virpil hotas. They actually work properly.

Yeah I already tried this, was sent it yesterday. It didn't work, and the disconnect still happened, unfortunately.  But thanks for the notification. 

This sucks to hear. I agree with you completely, but simply at this point it is more worth it to try the hub than waste time dealing with them and a chargeback/return, then buying another more expensive set. 

[PluckyUnderdog]

15 minutes ago, MustangSally said:

Turn Signatures on in your forum profile. I have 2x 7 port 48w USB 3.0 hubs. All my WW devices use the hubs

20w is pretty low imho

Thanks. Yeah as I say, I don't think it's acceptable. It should work, it shouldn't have these random disconnects. That's on them as a company, it's clearly a firmware issue, or maybe poor optimisation in regards to how much power they draw. But in any case, it's not our job as customers to solve that. 

[MustangSally]

Just now, PluckyUnderdog said:

This is my bugbear too. I've spent £600 on a hotas, I expect it to work. Why should I spend another £50 on a high powered USB hub? No. I do not think that's acceptable, so it's going back. And I'll buy a Virpil hotas. They actually work properly.

Yeah I already tried this, was sent it yesterday. It didn't work, and the disconnect still happened, unfortunately.  But thanks for the notification. 

Mate, I've spent over $4000 on my WW gear. Decent power is a small price to pay imho

[PluckyUnderdog]

1 minute ago, PawlaczGMD said:

This sucks to hear. I agree with you completely, but simply at this point it is more worth it to try the hub than waste time dealing with them and a chargeback/return, then buying another more expensive set. 

I hope it works for you dude. Myself, I'm not satisfied with doing that and think it should work properly, so if nothing else on principle, I'll be escalating the case through PayPal (I bought it through that) and initiating a refund.

[PawlaczGMD]

I like the gear too, but it is clearly an issue that is unique to them. They were also unable to suggest a fix for 5 months! If I need a hub, then tell me clearly before I buy the product. I have wasted so much time and frustration on WW that I am unhappy with them either way at this point.

[PluckyUnderdog]

Just now, PawlaczGMD said:

I like the gear too, but it is clearly an issue that is unique to them. They were also unable to suggest a fix for 5 months! If I need a hub, then tell me clearly before I buy the product. I have wasted so much time and frustration on WW that I am unhappy with them either way at this point.

Likewise. I'm not buying their stuff again. I'll pay Virpil prices and understand that the higher premium is going to mean far less headaches about stuff that doesn't work as advertised, imo.

[PluckyUnderdog]

15 minutes ago, PawlaczGMD said:

I like the gear too, but it is clearly an issue that is unique to them. They were also unable to suggest a fix for 5 months! If I need a hub, then tell me clearly before I buy the product. I have wasted so much time and frustration on WW that I am unhappy with them either way at this point.

Their customer service is dreadful, imo. Unfortunately this is something I realised after buying.

 

As I've said, it's on me that I bought it without doing enough due diligence, so I have to suck it up and deal with it.

[PluckyUnderdog]

31 minutes ago, MustangSally said:

Mate, I've spent over $4000 on my WW gear. Decent power is a small price to pay imho

I just don't agree mate that a hotas malfunctions and solving it by spending an extra sum of money to get the thing to work is a good thing. Genuinely glad you have solved your own issues with it, really. But it's the principle, as far as I'm concerned. I shouldn't need a hub. It should work fine plugged directly into the motherboard, like all other hotas brands. That's my point.

Edited April 12 by PluckyUnderdog
Spelling mistake