SleepyHead Mac OSX CMS-50D+ problems - please help

Hello,

I am a new user of SleepyHead and the CMS-50D+ oximeter. I am not a new user of computers, and know my way around.

I have read everything that Google has had the pleasure of throwing my way on this problem. And I've tried every alternative (mentioned, or thought of)

Still, as of now, I have utter failure.

Writing this post as a last-resort, in the hopes that fresh eyes can spot a missed step, a misconfigured part, or something else)

The Configuration

• Macbook Pro 15"
• Mac OSX 10.10.5
• USB to UART Bridge Controller v1.0 (downloaded from http://www.silabs.com/products/mcu/page ... ivers.aspx)
• SleepyHead v1.0.0-beta-2 (downloaded and installed, multiple times, today)
• Parallels Desktop 10.0.2-27712
• SpO2 Assistant v2.4 (installed on the Parallels virtual machine, of course)
• Contec CMS-50D+, with original 'USB' cable

The Objective
What I really want to do is to monitor to see if I have apnea or heart arrhythmia that might be messing up my O2 levels. I have not been diagnosed with Sleep Apnea officially, but I have had atrial flutter which has been ablated surgically. My hope is that by checking my O2 levels with the pulse oximeter I might be able to spot if indeed I am going into apnea at night or not, or if something else is going on.

Specifically, from a sequence perspective, all I want is to do the following:

• (1) Wear the CMS-50D+ overnight, logging my O2 level
  (2) Every morning, download last night's data into SleepyHead
  (3) Using SH, be able to see if I have a problem
  (4) Keep the data as a record, night after night

The Problems
There are two basic problems that, as much as I tried, I have not been able to overcome. First, I cannot get SH on the Mac to download the data from the device. Second, even when using a file to upload the information, I cannot get SH to correctly log the reading on the right date.

I will address each of these problems in turn. Obviously, if I could fix the first problem, the need for fixing the second immediately disappears!

SH on the Mac does not download data
I have installed SH, the USB/Serial bridge, and logged some use on the CMS-50D+. Some of the important points to make follow:

• SleepyHead seems to be installed correctly, as it starts up, and seems to work fine. Still, just as a precaution, I checked on its permissions, and set it as "locked" (as seen when you do Get Info, or CMD-i, on the file)
• The USB/Serial bridge seem to be installed properly. I can go to SysInfo on the Mac, click on USB, and I can see it installed, showing me version number, developer (Silicon Labs), etc. I have no way to actually KNOWING that it is working, but it seems to be installed properly [Note: if anybody knows how to test if this bridge is working properly, please let me know]

The sequence I follow to attempt to download the data is the following:

• (1) No parallels running at all, tried on a fresh mac, and for kicks on my wife's mac as well (which doesn't even have parallels installed)
  (2) Start SH
  (3) Select Oximetry, the Wizard comes up
  (4) Press "Start"
  (5) Select "CMS50D+/E/F, Pulox PO-200/300" on the drop-down box
  (6) Click on "Import directly from a recording on a device", I see "Scanning for compatible oximeters" in the log window
  (7) Plug in the USB cable into the computer. When I am on my Mac, it asks whether I want to bind that connection to either the Mac side or the Parallels side (I choose Mac of course) and on my wife's mac of course it asks nothing
  (8) In any case, soon after I plug it in, the log 'detects' the oximeter and you can read: "Connecting to Oximeter. You need to tell your oximeter to begin sending data to the computer. Please connect your oximeter, enter it's [sic] menu and select upload to commence data transfer..."
  (9) Through this all, the CMS-50D+ has been in the device menu, the one you get after a long press, the one the reads "Settings. Alarm, Record, Exit".
  (10) After it gets tired trying, SH reports a dialog box that reads: "Could not get data transmission from oximeter. Please ensure you select 'upload' from the oximeter devices menu."

Some applicable comments to the sequence above, because I have tried several combinations, all with exactly the same behavior.

• With regards to steps (6) and (7), I have tried with the cable connected to begin with, disconnected, with the 50D+ off, with it on, etc. Bottom line, it is always the same. If no cable, it stays on "connecting" and when there's a cable, it goes to "press upload on device to send data" (paraphrasing, of course)
• With regards to stops (8) and (9), I have tried with the 50D+ off, and then a long press, and then moving the arrow. Nothing. I also tried with "Recording on" and "recording off" to see if that made a difference. I also tried with having recording on and then clicking it "off" while connected and with SH listening...to no avail. Always the same behavior.

Before you ask, the 50D+ and data downloading work just fine on the Windows/Parallels side of things. I go into SpO2Assistant with the 50D+ connected, click on the serial icon, it recognizes the device on COM3 (of all places), I can connect to it "live" and see the readings on the laptop or I can choose to download the data file. All of it works, every time. Same cable, same data file on the 50D+, same computer.

After hours trying to get the connectivity to SH/Mac to work, I gave up and attempted the second approach. Namely, I would use SpO2Assistant to download the data file, and will use SH on the Mac to read it. Here, too, I faced insurmountable problems

Importing of .spo2 files on same date every time
In the second approach, I use the Windows/Parallels side of the Mac to download the file, and the Mac side to run SleepyHead and process/store it. Or at least, that was the idea. Specifically, I would follow these steps:

• (1) On the Parallels side, run SpO2Assistant, connect the 50D+, and download the .spo2 file into a directory that is shared with the Mac side
  (2) Run SleepyHead on the Mac, select Oximetry, select "Import from a datafile saved by another program, like SpO2Review"
  (3) Select the file I just produced in step (1)
  (4) SH would ask me to enter date/time manually

It is in step (4) above where I found the issues. First, while asking for a date and time, I would try to select June 2016 on the calendar, and it would say "June" and "2016", but no days of the month would show up. I must have tried dozens of months and year combinations, and everytime it would not show up. This is problem (A).

Problem (B) has to do with what happens once you DO download.... Not sure exactly why, but irrespective of the date (more like month/year) and time you set, the program always downloads your data as Jan 01, 2000 (I think). Always the same. This sort of defeats the purpose of using SH as a nightly logger/tracker/monitor for me, doesn't it?

In short, if you can help it would be much appreciated. Best if I can connect the 50D+ directly to the SH software on the Mac Side, but short of that if I can sort out how to import an .spo2 file correctly (while overwriting date/time) that would work too.

Failing both, maybe I need to replace my sensor for another one that works "out of the box" with SH on a Mac? If so, any recommendations? I went with the 50D+ because of low price and because I do not need much fancy stuff (example, I do not have a CPAP machine)

Thanks in advance for reading this far.

--Luis

you might want to try the 0.98-1 version of SH, I think the programmer broke oximeter input in the current beta.

tl;dr

You need to put the Oximeter into Setup mode before SH will read the data.

@ChillAtGVC - how do I put the 50D+ in "setup mode". Apologies if this is an idiotic question

lblando wrote:@ChillAtGVC - how do I put the 50D+ in "setup mode". Apologies if this is an idiotic question

that would be what you did in:
(9) Through this all, the CMS-50D+ has been in the device menu, the one you get after a long press, the one the reads "Settings. Alarm, Record, Exit".

palerider wrote:

lblando wrote:@ChillAtGVC - how do I put the 50D+ in "setup mode". Apologies if this is an idiotic question

that would be what you did in:
(9) Through this all, the CMS-50D+ has been in the device menu, the one you get after a long press, the one the reads "Settings. Alarm, Record, Exit".

But, then, I don't understand your advice. I clearly had it in "setup" mode all the times... and still did not work.

What am I missing?

lblando wrote:

palerider wrote:

lblando wrote:@ChillAtGVC - how do I put the 50D+ in "setup mode". Apologies if this is an idiotic question

that would be what you did in:
(9) Through this all, the CMS-50D+ has been in the device menu, the one you get after a long press, the one the reads "Settings. Alarm, Record, Exit".

But, then, I don't understand your advice. I clearly had it in "setup" mode all the times... and still did not work.

What am I missing?

my advice was to use an older version of sheepyhead.

chillAtGVC's advice was to do what you already said you were doing.

palerider wrote:

lblando wrote:

palerider wrote:

lblando wrote:@ChillAtGVC - how do I put the 50D+ in "setup mode". Apologies if this is an idiotic question

that would be what you did in:
(9) Through this all, the CMS-50D+ has been in the device menu, the one you get after a long press, the one the reads "Settings. Alarm, Record, Exit".

But, then, I don't understand your advice. I clearly had it in "setup" mode all the times... and still did not work.

What am I missing?

my advice was to use an older version of sheepyhead.

chillAtGVC's advice was to do what you already said you were doing.

Right, my bad. I got the two posts mixed up. Apologies.

Been trying to find 0.98 Mac OS X binaries and have come up empty-handed. Any ideas/advice where to download them from?

Thanks in advance
Luis

lblando wrote:Been trying to find 0.98 Mac OS X binaries and have come up empty-handed. Any ideas/advice where to download them from?

Thanks in advance
Luis

give this a shot: http://sleepfiles.com/SH/files/testing/

@palerider,

First, thanks for your quick and useful replies.

I was able to download 0.9.8.1 from the link you provided.

Tried it on my laptop... Exact same behavior.

To make certain that it was not my laptop, I moved to the house iMac, which up to this point was absolutely virgin territory...

• First downloaded SH 0.9.8.1 and installed
• Downloaded the USB/Serial bridge as before, and installed

Ran it all again, multiple times, with the same behavior, to wit:

• If the cable is not hooked up, SH waits on "Scanning for compatible oximeters"
• The moment the cable is connected, it waits on "Please connect your oximeter, enter it's menu and select upload to commence data transfer..." (even though that through it all the 50D+ has always been in its setup menu, which is the way you tell it to be in upload mode, from what I've learned)
• SH eventually times out, and puts up the dialog box telling me to instruct the device to go into upload mode

Extremely frustrating. Three different Macs. Two versions of the software. An entire day spent trying...

lblando wrote:@palerider,

First, thanks for your quick and useful replies.

I was able to download 0.9.8.1 from the link you provided.

Tried it on my laptop... Exact same behavior.

To make certain that it was not my laptop, I moved to the house iMac, which up to this point was absolutely virgin territory...

• First downloaded SH 0.9.8.1 and installed
• Downloaded the USB/Serial bridge as before, and installed

Ran it all again, multiple times, with the same behavior, to wit:

• If the cable is not hooked up, SH waits on "Scanning for compatible oximeters"
• The moment the cable is connected, it waits on "Please connect your oximeter, enter it's menu and select upload to commence data transfer..." (even though that through it all the 50D+ has always been in its setup menu, which is the way you tell it to be in upload mode, from what I've learned)
• SH eventually times out, and puts up the dialog box telling me to instruct the device to go into upload mode

Extremely frustrating. Three different Macs. Two versions of the software. An entire day spent trying...

well, bummer. one thing with the thing you have, it has to use the cable that came with it, it looks like a usb cable, but it's not, it's a serial to usb interface... you should see something come up in the logs when you plug the cable in, even without the 50d+ attached to it.

the fact that SH is saying it sees it makes me think you are using the right cable, but, just I mention it just in case.

I'm not a mac person, so my ideas kinda run out... you already are putting the 50d+ in setting mode, that and the cable are the two usual gotchas.

http://www.pulseoximeter.org/50d-plus.html

read the manual at the bottom

It sounds like you are able to use SpO2Assistant to download the file if I understand you correctly. You must have the today data from the CPAP already downloaded on SleepyHead. You use the daily tab and select the day with the CPAP data and then you can import the SpO2 file into Sleepyhead adjusting for the start time with the CPAP file. The CMS-50D+ does not have a clock or date stored on it.

In my case since I am using windows the days that have O2 data is shown in red on SleepyHead daily tab.

@lblando
Did you ever get your 50D+ to work? I'm having exactly the same problem you had with downloading recordings directly into my Mac. I'm running SH 1.0.0-beta-2 and my brand new 50D+ appears to have version 4.6 firmware. There are several other threads on the same subject, and noone ever seems to post a definitive solution. The pointer to the English language manual "supplement" is interesting with its nonintuitive sequence of steps, but nevertheless, following them while chewing bubblegum and walking backwards still did not convince my SH software to capture the recording.

If anyone else has a step-by-step process of how to use and upload from a CMS-50D+, I'd love to see it.
1) Start a recording
2) Stop recording so that it is saved and uploadable
3) Know that a recording is actually on the device and available for uploading
4) Properly hit each SH UI menu item and each 50D+ button/menu item in the right order so that the uploading happens

Conversely, if @jedimark or anyone else knows that the Mac version of the software definitely does not support 50D+'s, it would be great if someone would speak up and unambiguously put this quest to rest.

Thanks all! I'm looking forward learning from all those who have struggled with this diagnosis before me.

Macs were never compatible with that model (as Kevin the owner explained) but you can still get results from the device without the full download.