Encore Pro alternative?

canuck88 · Post by **canuck88** » Fri Jan 26, 2007 1:56 pm

Is anyone aware of any freeware software that will do the same job as Encore Pro? Or a way to get the data and interpret it yourself? I cannot justify $150 CDN on a piece of software that I will be using pretty infrequently.

Wulfman · Post by **Wulfman** » Fri Jan 26, 2007 2:06 pm

NOPE! You're stuck with Encore Pro.

Why infrequently? Use it more often to justify the outlay. It's cheaper (in the U.S.) than going back to the doctor and/or having additional sleep studies.

I'm sure most of us have pi$$ed away more money than that on less important stuff. How much is your therapy (and your health) worth?

Den

canuck88 · Post by **canuck88** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 7:38 am

I guess it's different up here in Canada, since we don't pay for sleep studies... my DME even offered to pull the data off the smart card in my Pro2 for me (obviously I'd rather have the data available at home though)...

I'm just surprised considering the number of programmers that seem to be on here that none have come up with a freeware version to extract the data...

blarg · Post by **blarg** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 8:31 am

Give me a year or so.

In the mean time, get Encore. It's a good (albeit slow) program.

Bones · Post by **Bones** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 8:44 am

I've only been using Encore Pro for a week and a half now, but I can honestly say, that for my money, it's the best software investment I've made in a long time. The ability to track what's happening and see the results of any changes I might make are worth way more than the $115 CDN the program cost me.

Brian

blctech · Post by **blctech** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 1:40 pm

I have RemstarAuto M series APAP with a card and recorder and I have the software.

My wife has a Remstar CPAP without a recorder. I would like to record here data also. Her equipment provider does not have recorder machines.

I opened up the recorder compartment her CPAP and see that the contacts are there. I see on the CPAP website that you can buy a recorder for a Remstar. Could I add it to my wife's machine or is there a machine software limitation that might keep it from working?

Wulfman · Post by **Wulfman** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 1:46 pm

blctech wrote:I have RemstarAuto M series APAP with a card and recorder and I have the software.

My wife has a Remstar CPAP without a recorder. I would like to record here data also. Her equipment provider does not have recorder machines.

I opened up the recorder compartment her CPAP and see that the contacts are there. I see on the CPAP website that you can buy a recorder for a Remstar. Could I add it to my wife's machine or is there a machine software limitation that might keep it from working?

Which specific model is your wife's machine?

Den

blarg · Post by **blarg** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 11:18 pm

The reason Den is asking that is that just because a RemStar machine has a smart card slot does NOT mean that it records useful data. If we know the actual model number (Pro 2, Plus, M-Series Pro, Auto, etc) then we can tell you whether or not it'd be worth the investment.

jskinner · Post by **jskinner** » Sun Jan 28, 2007 3:19 pm

canuck88 wrote: I'm just surprised considering the number of programmers that seem to be on here that none have come up with a freeware version to extract the data...

Given enough time and energy I suspect it could be done. Currently we are missing a driver interface to talk directly to the card. There is also a rumor that the data on the smart card is encrypted which could complicate things more.

Its non trivial and would probably require a lot of work.

blarg · Post by **blarg** » Sun Jan 28, 2007 3:27 pm

We're on it. (At least two of us are.)

The Airflow Project.

Current project is writing a driver for the reader based on USB bus snoops captured using debugfs on Linux.

If you don't care about platform independence, then Air found a utility included with Encore that dumps the smart card out in binary format. Have a blast.

blctech · Post by **blctech** » Sun Jan 28, 2007 3:55 pm

My wife's machine is a Remstar Plus M Series CPAP with CFLEX model 1022334.

Goofproof · Post by **Goofproof** » Sun Jan 28, 2007 4:15 pm

[quote="blctech"]My wife's machine is a Remstar Plus M Series CPAP with CFLEX model 1022334.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sun Jan 28, 2007 6:37 pm

Thanks Jim. When the DME for a recording machine, he did't even know what I was talking about. They don't even carry an APAP machine!

greyhound · Post by **greyhound** » Mon Jan 29, 2007 7:06 am

blarg wrote:We're on it. (At least two of us are.)

The Airflow Project.

Current project is writing a driver for the reader based on USB bus snoops captured using debugfs on Linux.

blarg, if the purpose of the airflow project is to bypass Encore pro and, ultimately, provide input into Encore Pro Analyzer, why not use windows, rather than linux. I'm asking this only because EPA is a Windows-based program.

yardbird · Post by **yardbird** » Mon Jan 29, 2007 6:01 pm

The idea is to get a solution that is not OS dependant. In other words, get something that can be used on a mac or on windows or on linux.

If I could get something working in linux I'd be a happy camper 'cause I don't use windows.