Zalman HD160XT Touchscreen Software, How to make a Ver 1 Touchscreen work in

I recently purchased a used Zalman HD160XT HTPC case and had a hell of a time getting the touchscreen to work. Thought I would post some information to help others with the same problem. Hopefully this will make it to the various search engines and maybe bring some additional attention to this excellent website (shameless plug there for ya!).

When I got my case, I did not get various cables with it, software, or the remote. I had to hunt and make the needed cables and whith that issue resolved i set out to get the touch screen to work. I went to the Zalman website and downloaded the latest software package for it and it had a Digitouch driver that it installed but....I could not get the software to recognize the display. the touch function semi-worked but i could not calibrate the screen. and the mapping was way off. touching the upper right corner moved the mouse to the lower left corner etc....I tried everything....so i started searching the web and found lots of people with issues with Vista but not much information for people with XP.

I tried several downgrade software versions from the Zalman site but nothing worked.

The clue....was staring me in the face the whole time however! Right there on Zalmans site was a note that reads "Rev 1.0 Applies to Serial Numbers HD160XTS0-, HD160XTSA-, HD160XTB0-, HD160XTBA-

Checking my serial number i saw that I had a HD160XTBA case, which is a Version 1.0 case. So I downloaded what was called Ver 1.0 software from the Zalmanusa website. but this tries to install Ver 5.1.4 software which does not work! or at least didn't work in my case! Or maybe it didn't work in the order I tried it or who knows. I couldn't get it to work (my frustration was growing and by that point, pretty high)

After some googling, I found a forum where someone had posted a link to www.digitechsys website that had a much older version of the software. Ver 4.1.0

www.digitechsys webpage:
http://www.digitechsys.co.kr/board/support_en/s_10.html

and part way down the page is a link to:
http://www.digitechsys.co.kr/board/pds/Digitouch4.1.0.exe

First thing you need to do before installing this software is uninstall all the old digitouch software. You do not need to uninstall the other software like Zini, media bay etc. AND, you have to go to your device manager, look under "Mice and other pointing devices" Remove the Jastec driver if it is there. THEN install the Ver 4.1.O software! It will automatically install a driver for you.

Warning, when doing windows updates. WU wants to update the touchdriver to the Jastec driver. Don't let it. if you click the + sign next to that update, you can select "Don't show this update again" and it wont try and update it in the future. I don't know what will happen if you do allow it to update that driver. mine works right now and im not messing with it! your mileage will vary. if you try the Jastec update after getting Ver 4.1.0 software to work for you, report back please.

After you install the Ver 4.1.0 software. you have to reboot. then it runs you through a calibration proceedure. It took me a second to figure out how the calibration worked. The calibration screen will have 5 crosshair looking patterns. One will flash and there is a note there that says, "press until 100%" I didn't quite understand what that meant at first. you have to press the flashing crosshair and HOLD until a blue progress bar makes it all the way to 100% then you can release and another crosshair will flash. you have to do this 5 times until all 5 crosshairs have been calibrated. I know that sounds pretty simple but at that point my frustration level was so high i wasn't thinking well. LOL!

In anycase. My touchscreen now works! I would be curious to know if this old software would work under Vista? maybe this is the golden key Vista users have been looking for??? In any case it works under XP MCE 2005 edition for me!


Hope this helps other frustrated Zalman owners!


BTW, I found an eBay seller selling lots of 40 Dell Harddrive screws that have the special non threaded shoulder section, these fit and worked perfectly in the Zalman rubber drive isolation washers! I also found that Alienware case cables work for the front USB, 1394 and Audio ports! good luck however finding the other cables that are required for this case should you lose yours!

Other issues I have found that I was Unaware of before I bought this case. the Integrated fan controller only has TWO fan controllers. there are 4 fan connections, but only two channels. which is a bummer as i was hoping to control the speed of all 4 of the internal fans separately but no such luck. that seems kind of dumb.
Also I found that the thermal sensors are not 100% independent. the temp of one effects the reading of the other. I placed one under the heatsink of my video card and watched the reading. it fluctuated oddly. Then i noticed that if i stuck the other sensor in front of the airflow from a fan, both readings dropped by a large margin. if i placed the 2nd sensor someplace hot, both readings would go up. so they are not 100% independent. which again sucks as I was hoping to have one sensor on say the harddrive and control the fan completely separate for the drives but it doesn't seem to work this way.

All in all I am happy with the case. But i am sure glad i didn't buy it new and pay $600+ for it! then again, maybe in the new versions they have corrected these issues???


Hope some of this information helped???

Zc

Update:

I have managed to get Ver 5.1.9 Software to work on my Ver 1 case!

By accident while mucking around inside my HD160XT I accidentally disconnected the USB cable for the touch screen. I plugged the cable back in to what i thought was the same port on the MB but...nope. it reloaded the dumb Jastec driver and i never could get it to work again. then i broke it even more trying to uninstall and reinstall ver 4.1.0 software. it wouldn't even load the touchmon app....I had to do some cleanup of the registry and try again. only i couldn't ever get 4.1.0 to work and it kept trying to reload the Jastec driver...

So poking around a bit more i learned a few things about the USB to serial converter driver it is using and which virtual serial port it is using. and I found that if I did a driver update of the Jastec driver and choose not to let it do it's auto select. and choose manually select. I could find the original digitouch driver. and that worked! well sort of....

It worked but i could not calibrate my touch screen after that. My touchscreen has some odd issue where the default is to have the screen mapped upside down and backwards...once you get it calibrated, everything is fine but stock calibration is all goofy...anyway... Once i learned how to find and install the digitouch driver. i tried installing ver 5.1.9 software. then went and downgraded the driver to the digitouch driver and WALLA it works! and it works with the new software! much much better! :bravo:

This old version of the touchscreen takes some poking to make it work that's for sure. but now that i know i can use the newer software i am much happier. 5.1.9 has dual monitor capabilities that i want to explore a bit. im hoping it will be a bit more functional.....

again hope this helps.


Zc

I now have my HTPC running and with dual monitors and I can report that with the new software on the old version case as reported above. everything works great. In the new software If you select multi monitor option then you can choose which screen to use the touch screen for. Im my case I have my TV as Monitor 1 with the touch screen as monitor 2. works perfectly. even the Zalman Zini program knows to open in monitor 2. I am a very Happy Camper!


Zc