RefSmart Timer Re-program

[JSam21]

Just passing along for the D3, NAIA, and JUCO umpires out there that are using the RefSmart Timer. You can send it in to be re-programed again.

 

https://refsmart.com/products/ncaa-baseball-softball-timer-reprogram-for-2025?utm_campaign=website&utm_medium=email&utm_source=sendgrid.com

[Richvee]

Thanks for the info. I think I’ll be holding off on this update. For $25, they’ll change the 10 second warning alarm to 8 seconds. I think I can deal with a buzz and then wait two seconds before acting on it. 
We will still need to deal with that pesky 30 extra seconds for a relief pitcher( he gets 150 seconds compared to 120), and the new 30 second timer for offensive conferences. 

[JSam21]

2 hours ago, Richvee said:

Thanks for the info. I think I’ll be holding off on this update. For $25, they’ll change the 10 second warning alarm to 8 seconds. I think I can deal with a buzz and then wait two seconds before acting on it. 
We will still need to deal with that pesky 30 extra seconds for a relief pitcher( he gets 150 seconds compared to 120), and the new 30 second timer for offensive conferences. 

I will be using a stop watch for the 150. The 30 seconds for defensive or offensive conference is by conference adoption. 

[Richvee]

Or, don't reprogram the RefSmart. Run your 120 in between innings timer. If it's a new pitcher, give the 30 second warning when the 120 runs out, run a 20 second action clock, then again to the ten second warning. There's your 150. I just can't see 25 bucks for a 2 second adjustment. Or, I may just go back to the stop watch for everything.  

[JSam21]

29 minutes ago, Richvee said:

Or, don't reprogram the RefSmart. Run your 120 in between innings timer. If it's a new pitcher, give the 30 second warning when the 120 runs out, run a 20 second action clock, then again to the ten second warning. There's your 150. I just can't see 25 bucks for a 2 second adjustment. Or, I may just go back to the stop watch for everything.  

1/6th of one game check isn't a big deal. Now... how about holding everyone playing under a rule set to the same standard instead of pushing the cost onto the umpires... that would be an actual discussion.

D3 football and basketball have play/shot clocks... 

 

[Richvee]

It is ironic that all this timing will fall on the shoulders of the one guy on the bases in a JuCo or D3 game, when the guys doing 4 man will have a time keeper in the booth. 

[MadMax]

I’ll still be sporting my stopwatch, TYVM. 

S#!t, I’d be willing to forgo having a booth/stands clock operator, and run everything on the field… if that meant or brought us 3-man umpiring crews (once again)! 

[grayhawk]

If I didn't know better, I would say the NCAA is in kahoots with RefSmart.

I did get mine reprogrammed last time, but won't do so again. I already use a stopwatch for between innings, mainly do to the buzz on the RefSmart being the same for 30 and 15 seconds left. Sometimes I lose track and don't know where we are on the timer. Having the stopwatch and its display makes it much easier. Now that we MAY have to do 30 seconds between batters, as well as for offensive and defensive conferences, using the stopwatch is a no brainer.

One of my JC conferences is mandating visible clocks, and D2 is mandating them as well. I would be surprised if any of the schools will have a clock operator, so we'll likely have to use the "brick" remote that they'll have. Seriously, why does the remote have to be so large? Not sure what my D3 or NAIA conferences will be doing, but I would be surprised if they will be required.

[Richvee]

53 minutes ago, MadMax said:

… if that meant or brought us 3-man umpiring crews (once again)! 

Don’t get me wrong. I’d take a 3 man crew over 2 and a timekeeper every day. Just a comment that there’s a whole hell of lot of time keeping for that one base guy. 

[johnnyg08]

Probably the most annoying part of college baseball now. Not only the on field timing, but the fact that they keep changing the times. Those end up being some very expensive timing devices. And yes, I understand that umpiring is an 'opt-in' operation. 

[DerekGDS]

I'm surprised these devices can't be easily self updated via firmware. Are there no competing products?

[BLWizzRanger]

Quite frankly, as an engineering major a long long time ago, my digital lab had a project very similar to this. I've lost the skills to make this, but, its not that hard.

[JSam21]

On 11/16/2024 at 5:19 PM, DerekGDS said:

I'm surprised these devices can't be easily self updated via firmware. Are there no competing products?

There is no software on them. The are set by dipswitches. If the dipswitch configuration can't get the proper timing, the board needs to be replaced. 

[kylehutson]

7 hours ago, JSam21 said:

There is no software on them. The are set by dipswitches. If the dipswitch configuration can't get the proper timing, the board needs to be replaced. 

There is software on them - on an EEPROM chip most likely. The dipswitches just tell the EEPROM what mode it's in. There SHOULD be an updatable firmware.

On 11/16/2024 at 9:49 PM, BLWizzRanger said:

Quite frankly, as an engineering major a long long time ago, my digital lab had a project very similar to this. I've lost the skills to make this, but, its not that hard.

I still have the skills to do this. What I lack is the time and gumption. If those two things ever coincide, there will be an open-source refsmart-like device available.

[MadMax]

15 hours ago, JSam21 said:

There is no software on them. The are set by dipswitches.

 

7 hours ago, kylehutson said:

There is software on them - on an EEPROM chip most likely. The dipswitches just tell the EEPROM what mode it's in. There SHOULD be an updatable firmware.

These RefSmart timers, with dipswitches, are the NFHS of the timer/time-keeping world, ie. they are the lowest, crudest denominator of complexity. A party-favor digital watch I get for 50 tokens at Chuck E Cheese has more complexity... How? The party favor has a fricken' screen! (Crude that it may be). In another comparison, even a simple television remote – with no screen, per se – can be connected to a computer via USB and reprogrammed, often thru a simple web portal. Why wasn't this employed? Why use an abacus when a calculator is available??

7 hours ago, kylehutson said:

If those two things ever coincide, there will be an open-source refsmart-like device available.

Oo! Instead of something mounted on the hip, how about something that ... I don't know... is worn on the wrist, or the back of the hand, or nestled in the palm of the left hand? It wouldn't necessarily have to have a screen – sure, it'd be nice – but it strums / thumps / vibrates in different ways... and is easily reprogrammable... 

... using something more intuitive than flipping teeny tiny switches up and down.

[grayhawk]

When my son graduated from KU with his EE degree, I was going to ask him to create a timer that actually made sense, but his focus was more on radar and remote sensing than on component electronics.

The RefSmart is so poorly designed that it's a miracle it ever made it to market. Pretty much ANY other purpose-made device could easily surpass it in every way. Their re-program of it costs more than a whole new device should cost.

Once visible clocks are being used at every level, the need for these will vanish quickly.

[Richvee]

56 minutes ago, grayhawk said:

Once visible clocks are being used at every level, the need for these will vanish quickly.

This is also why there’s no new advances in any timing device. 
Now all they need to do is get those bricks that run the scoreboard clock down to a manageable size. 

[kylehutson]

20 hours ago, MadMax said:

These RefSmart timers, with dipswitches, are the NFHS of the timer/time-keeping world, ie. they are the lowest, crudest denominator of complexity. A party-favor digital watch I get for 50 tokens at Chuck E Cheese has more complexity... How? The party favor has a fricken' screen! (Crude that it may be). In another comparison, even a simple television remote – with no screen, per se – can be connected to a computer via USB and reprogrammed, often thru a simple web portal. Why wasn't this employed? Why use an abacus when a calculator is available??

But here's the difference. How many of those "party favors" did they make in that batch? 100,000? 1,000,000?

What's RefSmart's total possible market? 20k?

Certainly not enough to get any real economy of scale. 

[JSam21]

13 hours ago, Richvee said:

This is also why there’s no new advances in any timing device. 
Now all they need to do is get those bricks that run the scoreboard clock down to a manageable size. 

They are already available... just not the cheapest opiton.

 

[grayhawk]

Those prices are absurd. No wonder there was pushback from D3 schools on the requirement to implement this season.

[JSam21]

52 minutes ago, grayhawk said:

Those prices are absurd. No wonder there was pushback from D3 schools on the requirement to implement this season.

That is just for a system with the small controllers. There are much cheaper solutions out there.... But it isn't like they didn't have 5 years to prepare for this.

 

[DerekGDS]

That is honestly hilarious. Is this pricing in response to a government RFP… 

 

[BLWizzRanger]

While sitting on the Seat of Ideas, this is a money making opportunity for a do-it-yourselfer in figuring out the dip switch setting and selling it for $3.99 to all who wants it.  I mean, on a 8-bit toggle, there is only 256 possible combinations.  That would take, guesstamating, 4 hours to go through all of them?  Heck, if someone took 00000000 through 01111111 while someone else took 10000000 through 11111111, I am sure that time would be cut down in half!

Whos game? 

[concertman1971]

See below for most HS/JUCO

Football- Clock operator.....CHECK. Locker Room............CHECK

Basketball- Clock operator.......CHECK. (sometimes 2!!) Locker Room.....CHECK

Baseball- Clock operator.......Ummmmmm, hey guys, here is this brick sized box you will need to hold and there is no way to attach it to your belt. Also, we think the batteries are charged. Locker room.................... IYKYK

[Biscuit]

On 11/18/2024 at 10:52 PM, MadMax said:

 

These RefSmart timers, with dipswitches, are the NFHS of the timer/time-keeping world, ie. they are the lowest, crudest denominator of complexity. A party-favor digital watch I get for 50 tokens at Chuck E Cheese has more complexity... How? The party favor has a fricken' screen! (Crude that it may be). In another comparison, even a simple television remote – with no screen, per se – can be connected to a computer via USB and reprogrammed, often thru a simple web portal. Why wasn't this employed? Why use an abacus when a calculator is available??

Oo! Instead of something mounted on the hip, how about something that ... I don't know... is worn on the wrist, or the back of the hand, or nestled in the palm of the left hand? It wouldn't necessarily have to have a screen – sure, it'd be nice – but it strums / thumps / vibrates in different ways... and is easily reprogrammable... 

... using something more intuitive than flipping teeny tiny switches up and down.

I've done games with the stopwatch, and I really, really don't like it. Why? Because when I go to run and make a call it's just awkward. I'm sure I could get used to it, but I've spent so many hours refining my mechanics, and you have to change it with the stopwatch. Being hip mounted made the ref smart worth it for me. 

That being said, I just got off a high school basketball court where they're employing a second clock operator to do the shot clock... It was a Sophmore game. Colleges really can't out ine more person in the press box to run the pitch clock? Really?