The keypad system to be used is set when you install the software, and can be changed at any time in the Preferences dialog. When starting the software, you may be asked to specify a COM port for the base station if the system has not been used before. If you have a keypad system with base station, select the port you are using. If you do not have the base station connected, clicking Cancel will set the system into demonstration mode. Demonstration mode is useful for showing people how the software operates before they have to use the system themselves (and you can select demo mode at any time using the Keypads menu).
Once Impact Explorer™ is searching for keypads, each participant should be asked to press the 1 (one) key on their keypad. In fact, users can press any key on the keypad except the Clear key, but giving a clear instruction to press the 1 (one) key, removes any doubt as to which key users should press. When a key has been pressed the system will then detect which keypads are active (in use) for the session. A red number will appear in a small window display on the keypad. After a few seconds the red number will disappear and the keypad number will be shown on the list.
The Keypad activation dialog shows which keypads are active. If the "show inactive keypads" box is checked in the keypad activation dialog then a list of all possible keypads, from 1 to 250, will appear. The active keypads will be shown in bold black type, while the inactive keypads will be greyed out. Once the keypads have been detected and the elements entered in to Impact Explorer™ the system is ready for use. (The master keypad option is covered in Master keypads).
If no keypads are shown as active in the keypad activation dialog, please see Troubleshooting.
You can quickly use the same set of keypads as were last used if you select the Use last set button. This is handy for pre-preparing keypads, or for continuing after a break or software restart
The software will automatically optimise the speed of data gathering during the keypad detection phase. The maximum time that gathering inputs takes is 5 seconds. If there are less than the full 250 keypads, this can be reduced to as low as 1 second (if the keypads are all numbered in the range 1 through 50).
Note: The keypad activation dialog allows you to select the demonstration mode (also available from the Keypads menu) which simulates 49 keypads and one on-screen keypad. This can be useful for demonstrating the software to a client group without having to set up the keypads.