ESU, TCS, Zimo sound decoders — Thoughts & Advice

[davefoxx]

I converted to exclusively ESU LokSound decoders, ESU CabControl DCC system, and LokProgrammer several years ago and have never regretted the move.  I’m presently upgrading my fleet to V5.0 decoders, so I can take advantage of a few features not available on V4.0 and earlier decoders, e.g., certain brake settings and bass/treble settings.  Those brake settings are key when using the ProtoThrottle.  This conversion to V5.0 was made easier to do when I sold off about a third of my motive power fleet recently.

DFF

[GGNInNScale]

I converted to exclusively ESU LokSound decoders after installing about 35 TCS, NCE, DigiTraxx, and a couple other non-sound decoders.  I use ESU V5 sound decoders exclusively now.  I run the layout with an NCE PowerCab, and an SB5 booster.  I bought a LokProgrammer also.  I use it to install the initial sound file and CV settings, then the NCE takes over for any adjustments to the CV set.  I have 48 diesels with ESU decoders so far.  I have a new Kato 4-8-4 that needs an ESU decoder- installing soon.  Some installs into the old Atlas, and Atlas/Kato and Arnold can be challenging, but a bit of machining, Dremel work and a good set of small files helps a lot.  I have read about ZIMO, but no further interest.  TCS- I might have gone with them but once I started with ESU I stuck with one company. 

[Ed Kapuscinski]

We're an ESU household too for the reasons mentioned above: availability, features, quality and their fantastic service.

This goes so far as to get "stealth" versions of models that don't have them or swapping out lesser (cough, BLI, cough) decoders for them when I can.

The ONLY non-ESU sound decoder I have intentionally bought was for my O Scale 2-8-0. I got the TCS one because I didn't want to have to figure out how to connect my programmer to an O scale programming track and the onboard programming stuff was really handy in that case.