Possibly not; coming back after a few years out and it seems everyone is on Zwift.
I pulled out my Computrainer for the first time in 2-3 years ready to dust off the old Ergvideos and get some fitness back. As a legacy user (the DVDs) I had about 20 videos to choose from. Unfortunately I was getting some strange error message loading the program and had to run the CT in plain (and manual) erg mode.
I figured perhaps a Windows update over the last 2-3 years may have made it incompatible so went to the website to see if there was a newer version. To my dismay I saw a message indicating the streaming service the company piggy backs off did an update the broke the playing of videos in the software. Now I donāt know if this was my particular issue but the developers message inferred that nothing would work and that come May, the entire website will disappear for good.
I canāt remember how the program ran originally, before v6, but thought that I could run it in standalone rather than connect to the server. Unfortunately I canāt roll it back to the original either as the developer needed to unlock codes and they were pretty clear last time that they were all in on the subscription service and would not support legacy users beyond the current authorisation.
I will miss my Ergvideos. Lots of memories riding those videos and enjoying the automation that allowed limitless customisation of rides, chopping bits out of the full video etc.
Thank you Paul for being one of the first to build on Racermateās original offerings. There was a lot of vision there. Itās unfortunate the business model did not see sufficient growth to keep it going.
Paul was both a genius, and an insufferable jerk. He literally deep-sixed a 10-year lead to hop into bed with one coach syndicate, at the expense of all others, and then basically failed to innovate as time slipped away.
I hope he found happiness; he made others happy, but his gruffness and haughtiness cost him in the end.
A year or two ago, the automatic sync of Trainingpeaks workouts of the day stopped working, I emailed and advised of this and asked if it would be fixed. His response was, he would only fix the issue if I would pay for it. So not surprised with such an attitude.
A few years ago after a long hiatus, I pulled out the Computrainer and my erg videos. I had problems connecting, like you, and found out that Computrainer had gone out of business. I hopped onto Zwift with a new smart trainer and have been there since. I miss the old times and Erg Videos riding with the boys up the climbs and TT intervals.
try Perfpro, Drew has a fix so that the Computrainer works via ANT+ also Perfpro will run the Computrainer
option B is that trainer road legacy might still work with Computrainer via direct USB.
However PerfPro ant bridge will allow the Computrainer to communicate with pretty much any program out there via ant+. I have not tried this recently I mothballed my Computrainer a while back due to the fear of no spare parts.
I did see perfpro mentioned in previous searches and sounds like best bet. Would be good to copy the power profile from the vids to then try and recreate on another platform so it matches the vids, but ChatGPT struggled to read the little image shown on website.
Why mothball the CT though, if it breaks it breaks?
Wish Iād stayed on v3.0; donāt think you needed to log into server after dvds were unlocked.
I had to replace the multi pin cable and well things were not getting easier to make it work reliably since most platforms are better using bluetooth so in the end I got a great deal on a new trainer and jumped ship. I only wish when the guys behind Wahoo approached Cmputrainer to set it up with ANT+ they had understood where the future was and that they could still be aroundā¦ They were married to their system and did not evolve.
Ah yes I have experienced a few issues with the DIN cable - results in no resistance and wonāt spin down - but read somewhere to spray with wd40 and that seemed to work.
I thought you meant mothballed to save it for later (worried you couldnāt use it later) rather than replaced. Now makes sense.
If anyone is still trying to get this running, I was able to on Windows 11 with version 4.08. That was the last version prior to the streaming and login requirements.
I am still trying - we bought scads of the videos back in the day for our multirider studio - so I have tons of DVDs. I uninstalled V6 and did go back and reinstalled V4. It starts up. but didnāt recognize any of our videos (ānot an evr fileā error). If I try to reinstall a video I need to download a validation code which of course is impossible. Any tips on how you got yours to work would be much appreciated. Thanks.
Regarding your own rollback attempt, did you have a V4 on one of your earlier discs? I havenāt checked, but thought all mine came with a V3 variant. Though I had a mix of the early discs and some later HD ones, so might need to go back and check what version came with those.
As you said though, I donāt see how it would not ask for the code again. Ideally when you unlock them it wrote the unique code on the hard drive somewhere, which could be read and reused (being the same computer).
I still had V4 installers in my downloads folder from way back. I was surprised they actually installed and started up. I am still using the same old computer. Seems to me the version 6 changed the evr files so that ver 4 doesnāt recognize them anymore, hence the ānot an evr fileā error when trying to add these to my library in V4. I am not quite out of ideas yet but getting close. The video files are on my computer (all installed properly with legal access codes) but the ergvideo library app refuses to add them. The authentication thing only pops up for a few videos I never installed apparently, so it asks for the code and since I canāt get one it gives me access to 5 minutes of the video. I am going to look behind the scenes at the library files when it adds one of these non-authorized videos and see what it does. It did not work when I copied the contents of an old library file into the library file for this v4 install. It just ignores the contents.
FIXED - I got it to work. The secret was to look in the right directory for the DefaultLibrary file. For the old versions (I am using a version 4 from an old installer I still had in my downloads folder but the discs do have the software on them as well - you just have to find one with an old enough version I think but I didnāt try this since I had the old installers) look in Users/Public/Public Videos/Ergvideo (version 6 put these elsewhere which isnāt recognized by old versions). In that directory was a backup folder probably from when we were switched to the subscription model. In the backup folder are .evr3 files. These are not recognized by the app, but if you rename them to .evr the app recognizes them and can add these videos to your library as long as the actual video file is in the same folder. Then I discovered there were also several defaultLibrary files saved in this backup folder (they have numbers in the name as well that I guess are dates). You can simply copy one of these and paste it in the above ergvideo directory in place of the empty one that was installed there when you installed V4 (take the numbers out of the name), and you will have all of your custom built rides too. If you go through the process of manually adding evr files to the library (which I started doing because I didnāt realize these backup libraries would work) you will not get any of the custom rides, so you would have to recreate them. Anyway, the darn thing works. No more taking Paulās name in vain.
Iām really looking forward to giving this a try and to being able to use my DVDs again. Just in time for summer (here).
Thank you so much for solving this. I donāt think I would have known where to look. Love my old Ergvideos and what Paul created. Paired with my 2004 Computrainer, this old dinosaur lives on in prehistoric times.
I found the folder and renamed the files from evr3 to evr, but realised the videos were saved on an external hard drive. Note I have v6 installed, but also installed v3. The HD discs I bought have 2007-2010 stamped on them, but only v3 on them (or at least the one I checked).
my lap topās HDD is close to full so havenāt tried copying a vid into that folder. But I noted the external drive folder had both the media plus evr file (not ā¦3 variant). When I tried to add the evr file from there I got the ānot an evr fileā error then the software shut down. So not sure if it all has to be in the Users directory.
It also wasnāt clear if you suggested the files with the date should be the first port of call.
Edit- I copied over the old 4 man TT as itās a smaller vid. I didnāt get the error message but the āprogram stopped workingā then shut down.
Thanks ā your solution worked for me and will allow me to keep training on my old ergvideos.
I was only able to find version 3 on an old CD-rom that came with one of the first videos I bought. So now I canāt use my ANT+ heart rate monitor and dongle since only version 4 and up supported those. I canāt find a full version of CTANT+ either (I have the āfreeā version downloaded that lasts only 5 minutes). Any suggestions on how else I can get my ANT+ heart rate monitor to work with version 3? My old wired Polar sensor from Computrainer broke a long time ago.
Yes, all the old discs will still show in the loaded library. For me they only ran properly after I copied the .evr3 files from the backup folder to the Ergvideo folder, renamed the existing .evr files in the Ergvideo folder (I think I added āOLDā to the filename), and changed the extensions of the copied files to .evr