A: If you are unfamiliar with lotto strategy and wheeling, there can be a lot of information to process, and it may be overwhelming the first time you try to use the programs. Take your time to go through the help documents available for the programs and tackle one chart or section at a time.

Quick Start Guides

We have explained in as much detail as possible the steps involved in installing, running, and using the programs in the manuals (download these free from Smart Luck Downloads Page) or built in help files in the programs, but we have also written basic overviews to get you started. These are NOT meant to be thorough instruction guides, but they should make it easier for you to get an overview of using the programs.

DOS Programs

If using Advantage Plus or the old wheel programs, it does take a few minutes to get familiar with using DOS programs and can be confusing the first time, but really the only thing you need to remember is to use the keyboard and not the mouse. The programs are very simple to use after you spend a few minutes getting familiar.

The new Windows wheel programs are more user friendly and simple to understand. If you are having trouble with the DOS Wheel 4, 5, 6 Plus, Keno Wheel, or Full Wheel Generator, we recommend purchasing an Upgrade to the new Wheel Gold or FFWG programs. You can also try these programs out in free Demo mode to see how they work before you buy.

Basics We Wrote Before the Quick Start Guides

Below is the basic information we had developed previously. We are leaving it here in case it will still be helpful to someone, but we recommend checking out the Quick Start Guides linked to above for more information.

Install the Programs(s)

First, install the program(s) from your CD or download by using the instructions provided in the manual, email, or download page. If you purchased both Advantage Gold and one or more wheeling programs, install Advantage Gold first.

Install Lotto History Files (for Advantage Gold)

After installing Advantage Gold, the first thing you want to do is install the history files for the games you play (do this with Advantage Gold CLOSED).

Complete lotto history files (updated every Monday and Thursday) for the games we track are available for free download a few ways:

Accessing an Advantage Gold Chart

Once the lotto history is installed, go to "Option 1. Select/Add/Delete/List Game Histories" in the program (just type the number 1), and you will see the list of lottery game files you chose to install. Select one (use the arrow keys until the correct game name is highlighted and press enter), and the program will use that game's history to create all the lotto strategy charts to help you win more prizes in the game.

To view any chart, just type the letter or number that the menu lists for that chart. Don't forget there is also a second page to the menu (press enter from the main menu to view those options).

Most lottery charts cannot fit all of the information on the screen at once, so you may need to use the Page Down, Page Up, and/or arrow keys to see the rest of the numbers. For some charts you can also change the sort method by changing which column heading is selected at the top. For example, in Chart 3, you can use the right/left arrow keys to change the results from sorting by lotto number to sorting by games out value, median skips, etc by highlighting the heading you want.

If a number has a * next to it, the program has chosen that number as a Smart Pick, based only on this chart.

View the manual to see which trends to look for in each chart if you want to strategize on your own.

Within any chart, press ESC to go back to the main menu.

See FAQ125 for more about which charts to use.

Using Advantage Gold Smart Picks

To get Smart Picks, you first have to run the other charts (Smart Picks calculates based on charts 3,4,5,6,7,C, and/or D). Just press the letter/number of the chart, then press the escape key (ESC in the top left corner of most keyboards) to get back to the main menu. When you've done that for any or all of the charts listed above, then press W to access Smart Picks. Choose the number of numbers you want it to give you and make sure the overrides chart on the right is not excluding numbers you want (if so, press F9 to clear those). Then if you have a wheeling program, you can press F7 from the Smart Picks chart to take the Smart Pick numbers and put them directly in a wheel. Doing this will show you all the available wheels that will fit the numbers you chose, so just highlight the one you want and press enter.

Launching Balanced Wheel Programs from Within Advantage Gold

Or to access a wheel program directly, look at the bottom f-key menu of Advantage Gold and type the fkey that corresponds with the program. It will say something like "wFive" for Wheel Five Plus/Wheel Five Gold for example with an fkey number before it. If you don't see this, then no wheel programs were installed to the same folder as Advantage Gold.

Using DOS Wheel Plus Programs

The main menu of the old balanced wheel Plus programs show the no power number wheels available (See FAQ422 for how to view other pick sizes or power number wheels). The left column shows how many numbers you input into the wheel, the top row shows the minimum win guarantee for that column, and the number in each cell is the combinations the corresponding wheel will create. Just use the arrow keys to tab over to the wheel you want to play (the combinations of the wheel - like for a 12 number 5/6 guarantee wheel, you'd move the highlight bar over the number 132 that matches that row and column), press enter, type your numbers, press F10-done, etc following the prompts or typing the key that matches the option you want to access. It only takes a few seconds to create a wheel.

Using Wheel Gold Programs

See our FAQ442 for a Quick Start Guide to Using Wheel Gold

For the new Wheel Gold programs, the layout of the main menu is similar to the old Plus programs. It shows how many numbers you input into the lottery wheel, the minimum guarantee of winning lotto prizes, and the combinations that wheel produces. You can also view the wheels by Numbers Used or Cost to Play by clicking the buttons at the top. The pick-size row will show you which pick-size options you have available and the power-number setting. You can change both of these. Any wheels that are not available (requiring purchase of a different Wheel Gold program) will be greyed out.

If you have installed history files (using Lottery Updater) and also have either Advantage Gold or the free SLHEdit program installed (see Install History section below), you will see the list of available history files in the top right drop down box. You can choose your game before wheeling.

To choose a wheel, double click on the combinations cell (or click the combinations and then click the "Make Wheel" button at the bottom) to open the Enter Your Numbers screen. Then type or click the number pad buttons with the mouse until you've entered the numbers you want to wheel (or use one of the "Fill With" button options) and press the "View Wheel" button. Your combinations are then displayed on the next screen. You can Save, Print, Edit, View the Win Info, Test Drive the Wheel, or Optimize it from this screen.

Install Lotto History Files (for Wheel Gold Programs without using Advantage Gold)

You can use limited history options with Wheel Four, Five, Six, or Ten Gold on 64-bit windows versions, without Advantage Gold. Just install the two free programs from our web site. Note both files on our web site are installers which must be RUN in order to install. If your browser only allows you to save them, find them after downloading and then run them to install.

Lottery Updater FIRST: Install free Lottery Updater. After installing Lottery Updater, run it and choose the history files you want, and download the files. You will need to run this whenever you'd like to update the history files.


SlhEdit Program SECOND: Install Free Smart Luck History Editor. Run SLHEdit to work with your favorite history files that you downloaded with Lottery Updater. The program allows you to update the winning numbers, view statistics about the drawings and the numbers, set ranges that will be honored by Wheel Five Gold, change properties of the lottery file in case the lottery makes changes to the structure of the lottery, and more.

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