DMX Questions, and hopefully answers

[Guest guest]

wbottomley wrote:

ydeardorff wrote:

Easy, I havent purchase anything yet, Im still testing the waters on both sides of the pond. Either way I need to know this info.

So if it comes down to I have to buy a LOR system to talk to people here, and ask questions well then, yes I suppose I am in the wrong place.

I would have thought this was about the displays, and making people happy.

I thought it was a Light-O-Rama Support Forums. I guess I've been fooled for 7 years now.

Only been here for almost 2 years now and I thought the same thing as William when I started reading this particular thread. So guess William wasn't the only one being fooled by the header "Light-O-Rama Support Forums"!!!

And I'm not gonna swear to this, but I thought I read somewhere in the TOS of the LOR forums use about these types of posts were a no-no here.

Or did I miss the memo that changed that?

[friskybri]

Orville wrote:

wbottomley wrote:

ydeardorff wrote:

Easy, I havent purchase anything yet, Im still testing the waters on both sides of the pond. Either way I need to know this info.

So if it comes down to I have to buy a LOR system to talk to people here, and ask questions well then, yes I suppose I am in the wrong place.

I would have thought this was about the displays, and making people happy.

I thought it was a Light-O-Rama Support Forums. I guess I've been fooled for 7 years now.

Only been here for almost 2 years now and I thought the same thing as William when I started reading this particular thread.   So guess William wasn't the only one being fooled by the header "Light-O-Rama Support Forums"!!!

And I'm not gonna swear to this, but I thought I read somewhere in the TOS of the LOR forums use about these types of posts were a no-no here. 

Or did I miss the memo that changed that?

 

You never got the new memo Orville. If you are new to the hobby, less then 100 posts. You can swear, demand everybody give them info and make sure they get their display up 2 days before Christmas. Now if you are over 600 posts you get blocked for a few days. Told not to be such a bully. SO be nice Orville.

[JBullard]

ydeardorff wrote:

Easy, I havent purchase anything yet, Im still testing the waters on both sides of the pond. Either way I need to know this info.

So if it comes down to I have to buy a LOR system to talk to people here, and ask questions well then, yes I suppose I am in the wrong place.

I would have thought this was about the displays, and making people happy.

Well, guess when you said you would be using a competitor's software product in post 10 and every hardware link was for a non-LOR product, I thought I would ask, since this is not a general decorating forum like Planet Christmas is.

[Greg Young]

ydeardorff wrote:

Easy, I havent purchase anything yet, Im still testing the waters on both sides of the pond. Either way I need to know this info.

So if it comes down to I have to buy a LOR system to talk to people here, and ask questions well then, yes I suppose I am in the wrong place.

I would have thought this was about the displays, and making people happy.

Given the fact that we see trolls here from time time, when the discussion in a post from a new poster seems to focus on other vendors' products primarily, in a forum that is known by all to be vendor specific, and additionally the poster has no real name/location identified, folks tend think the worst and become concerned that they might be dealing with another troll, trying to stir up business for a competing product.

You would get the same concerns expressed from LSP users over on the LSP forum, if your posts focused primarily on LOR software.

You may very well be sincere in your desire to learn about both systems, but when you posted that "Im thinking of going light show pro V2", and then 3 posts later say: "Possible, but Im going to be using Light show pro.." that certainly raises more concern to many reading your posts.

If you are sincere, a better way to gather the information you seek is to ask about the LOR software/hardware here, and the other software/hardware on forums that focus on those.

Often how we are perceived is how we present ourselves.

Take my suggestions as just that, suggestions, from one who has been around all of the forums a while.

Have a Merry Christmas!

Greg

[George Simmons]

friskybri wrote:

You never got the new memo Orville.

And speaking of Orville and memos, did everyone see that they found the glitch in the forum software and we won't all be getting Orville's PMs anymore? Darn... some of those suckers were pretty juicy...

[harrison0550]

Ok I will take partial blame for the OP's confusion about dmx as he sent me a pm asking about it and I have been busy with the family. I said partial blame however because all of the incorrect info below and questions you may have were answered in the videos and threads you said in your pm you had already read and watched. So my advice is to watch them and read them again. I will link each answer to your questions below. On a side note I recommend you stick with LOR software and hardware with of course the exceptions of certain dmx products you may need that they don't offer.
ydeardorff wrote:

There is an abundant level of information on how to sequence christmas lights in the sequencer. However there seems to be a serious tech black hole when it comes to DMX. Lots of terms, like lynx, and dongles, dip switches etc. Yet no definitive information about setting up the DMX system in ones Christmas display.

How to set up and sequence rgb in LOR can be found here.

and here....

My hope in this post is that knowledgeable ppl with chime in, and help decode this bit of information.

I personally have gone this into this train of thought due to making the setup on the roof a lot easier. One RGB LED rope light can represent, up to four individual light string strands. This helps in simplifying the setup of lights on the house.

I know the 512 controllers have the Ethernet through point connections making them chain-able, whereas the little white 3 channel controllers that can be found for 3 bucks don't. So they would have to be on the end of said chain as the last element.

The white controllers have been argued as not being addressable. Well I have found this making the claim it can make them addressable.
http://www.holidaycoro.com/docs/DMXProgrammer.pdf
They are in fact addressable, there are 2 different ways to assign the address. Either with a hand held programmer for field use or software and a cable to program with your pc. Both can be purchased at almost every store that sales the controllers.
This of course does not make the white controllers chain-able. However, this could make them like I had mentioned the last item in your daisy chain of DMX controllers, like a flood lamp, or last RGB LED string.

The 3 buck controllers can be daisy chained and the thread explaining this is here..... read the last 3 posts and click on the PDF link for pictures.
http://forums.lightorama.com/forum75/28615-2.html

How does the DMX system get setup? I know the sequencer has to know what items is what to properly issue commands to them. Im sure there are things that must be taken into consideration when using DMX and LOR boards.
Refer to the YouTube video above for step by step walk through of this.
Here is a video on setting up a simple RGB flood lamp that helped me a lot. Perhaps it might help others too.

What are the dip switches for? How are they configured? What do they do?
Dip switches are simply dials on the board that let you physically set the controllers address. Think of your garage door remote and opener. If you pop the back off it you will see little numbered switches that let you set the "address" of your garage door. Same principle. LOR DC boards have these switches were as the 3 buck controllers do not creating the need for a hand held programmer or pc software to set there address's like I mentioned above.

It would be nice if the LOR boards were able to communicate natively to the DMX system, and you didn't need a dongle (whatever that is) to control them.
This way we could just continue the daisy chain from the controller boards, directly into the DMX stuff. It would make life a lot easier.
A dongle is just a device that converts the signal from your pc to whatever you are trying to control. You don't need the enttec or anything other than the LOR USB to RS485 adapter. $30

What does the DMX control look like in the sequencer?
How do you sequence the RGB effects in it?
How do you address the controller?
What is a DMX universe, and how does that work in the sequencer?
YouTube video above for all these questions.
My personal hope is to be able to use DMX, and RGB LED light strips to outline my roof on the house and detached garage, as well as outline the 7 windows across the front of my home. While still using normal controller boards to control all the rest of the 80 to 96 channels in my yard.
That is the dream! LOL You got this.

Here is a picture I have of the daisy chain on the 512 controllers. Again these are only for the RGB LED strips, not the 24 million color ones with a thousand effects.

I would suggest you go to my account, click on my recent post and read each thread from start to finish that has anything to do with rgb or dmx and make sure you watch all the videos and read the pdf's. It will take a little time but if you do it then you will know exactly what you need to at least start getting your hands dirty. Good luck, Merry Christmas, and get off the forums and spend some time with your family! Talk to you guys after the new year.

[Guest guest]

friskybri wrote:

Orville wrote:

wbottomley wrote:

ydeardorff wrote:

Easy, I havent purchase anything yet, Im still testing the waters on both sides of the pond. Either way I need to know this info.

So if it comes down to I have to buy a LOR system to talk to people here, and ask questions well then, yes I suppose I am in the wrong place.

I would have thought this was about the displays, and making people happy.

I thought it was a Light-O-Rama Support Forums. I guess I've been fooled for 7 years now.

Only been here for almost 2 years now and I thought the same thing as William when I started reading this particular thread. So guess William wasn't the only one being fooled by the header "Light-O-Rama Support Forums"!!!

And I'm not gonna swear to this, but I thought I read somewhere in the TOS of the LOR forums use about these types of posts were a no-no here.

Or did I miss the memo that changed that?

You never got the new memo Orville. If you are new to the hobby, less then 100 posts. You can swear, demand everybody give them info and make sure they get their display up 2 days before Christmas. Now if you are over 600 posts you get blocked for a few days. Told not to be such a bully. SO be nice Orville.

Well Friskybri, seems you're in the same boat as I am, you have by your post count 752 posts as I post this, although I know I'm twice that. Guess I'll just have to go and sit in the bad guys corner with William for now!

[bretk]

Ok, so I watched the videos (excellent by the way) and set about trying to duplicate yor process. I am running 3.1.4 on windows 7 computer. Have an extra USB 485 lor dongle and a cat 5 crossover with pin 4 to 1 and 5 to 2 made, then it goes thru a 12 v power injector a la coro mega ball and into 2 mega balls. The dmx adapters are set to 110 and 140 via a coro dmx programmer dongle. And are cycling thru the preset pattern and respond to programming commands thru the coro programmer dongle control panel. When I start the com listener it says 30 listener listening on port 8837, 32 listener connection accepted 336, a700eqyA: adapter opened, 32 listener connection accepted 356 and the cycling turns off. then it wont work. if i unplug the dongle to the conventional controller then it sorta works, if i do a smooth fade white then i get a white fade with occ yellow flashes, if i do a green fade then i get a green fade with occasional red flashes. arrrgh! would using an enntec pro fix this!

[heystew]

bretk wrote:

Ok, so I watched the videos (excellent by the way) and set about trying to duplicate yor process. I am running 3.1.4 on windows 7 computer. Have an extra USB 485 lor dongle and a cat 5 crossover with pin 4 to 1 and 5 to 2 made, then it goes thru a 12 v power injector a la coro mega ball and into 2 mega balls. The dmx adapters are set to 110 and 140 via a coro dmx programmer dongle. And are cycling thru the preset pattern and respond to programming commands thru the coro programmer dongle control panel. When I start the com listener it says 30 listener listening on port 8837, 32 listener connection accepted 336, a700eqyA: adapter opened, 32 listener connection accepted 356 and the cycling turns off. then it wont work. if i unplug the dongle to the conventional controller then it sorta works, if i do a smooth fade white then i get a white fade with occ yellow flashes, if i do a green fade then i get a green fade with occasional red flashes. arrrgh! would using an enntec pro fix this!

I witnessed this behavior (flashing during fades) once and it turned out to be a bad dmx adapter (not the coro dmx adapter but one with all 512 dmx channels).. switched it out and the problem went away. this was using a USB 485 as my LOR to DMX converter.

[bretk]

I am using the $6.00 3 channel devices, and i have tried 3 different ones and they all do the same, now when i use the holiday coro programmer as an adapter they work fine as long as i add one to the channel count (ie megaball 110 which shpould be channels 110, 111, and 112 works fine if i make red 111, green 112, and blue 113 instead)



I ordered an enttec pro anyhow to reduce the burden on my cpu as i plan on adding lots of rgb to the show 2 pixel strips, 6 rgb strips, 10 coro balls, rgb spots, a bunch of rgb nodes, and a partrige in a pear tree!

[geronc]

I had to change the pins in my holiday coro programmer. Every time I would set the DMX #, it would set it to 0. Changed the pins and it works like a champ.

If you set the DMX # to 110, red should be on 110, not 111. Something is wrong.

[bdeditch]

geronc wrote:

I had to change the pins in my holiday coro programmer. Every time I would set the DMX #, it would set it to 0. Changed the pins and it works like a champ.

If you set the DMX # to 110, red should be on 110, not 111. Something is wrong.

I also have been told that the Holiday Coro Program uses pins 4 & 5 on the Cat5 and LOR used 1 & 2

[geronc]

bdeditch wrote:

I also have been told that the Holiday Coro Program uses pins 4 & 5 on the Cat5 and LOR used 1 & 2

You have that backwards. LOR uses 4 & 5, Coro and everyone else uses 1 & 2 for DMX.

http://www.lightorama.com/Documents/DMX-DOC.pdf Page 2

[bdeditch]

geronc wrote:

bdeditch wrote:

I also have been told that the Holiday Coro Program uses pins 4 & 5 on the Cat5 and LOR used 1 & 2

You have that backwards. LOR uses 4 & 5, Coro and everyone else uses 1 & 2 for DMX.

http://www.lightorama.com/Documents/DMX-DOC.pdf Page 2

I stand corrected

[JBullard]

geronc wrote:

If you set the DMX # to 110, red should be on 110, not 111. Something is wrong.

This is a well reported problem since last October. The Holiday Coro adapter will do that when used with LOR software. The adapter is NOT on the LOR tested and approved list.

It was tested, but not approved because of its behavior

[Dave H1]

JBullard wrote:

This is a well reported problem since last October. The Holiday Coro adapter will do that when used with LOR software. The adapter is NOT on the LOR tested and approved list.

It was tested, but not approved because of its behavior

John,

Is there an alternative programer that is recommended with the 3 channel DMX units or is the one on Ray Wu's site the preferred one, which I believe is around $45

[geronc]

Dave H1 wrote:

John,

Is there an alternative programer that is recommended with the 3 channel DMX units or is the one on Ray Wu's site the preferred one, which I believe is around $45

Holiday coro has one for $20.http://www.holidaycoro.com/Hardware.asp

[JBullard]

Dave H1 wrote:

JBullard wrote:

This is a well reported problem since last October. The Holiday Coro adapter will do that when used with LOR software. The adapter is NOT on the LOR tested and approved list.

It was tested, but not approved because of its behavior

John,

Is there an alternative programer that is recommended with the 3 channel DMX units or is the one on Ray Wu's site the preferred one, which I believe is around $45

The Holiday Coro DMX dongle will program the units. You have to use a LOR tested and approved dongle to control the units with LOR software

[geronc]

JBullard wrote:

The Holiday Coro DMX dongle will program the units. You have to use a LOR tested and approved dongle to control the units with LOR software

Correct. Any of these will work to actually make the lights work in a sequence.

http://forums.lightorama.com/forum75/28546.html

[bdeditch]

OK So I am going to go thru how I THINK I would set up to do RGB with what I have. I would use the cord that I got from Holiday Coro with the AT5 straight through female-female coupler for easy connection to CAT5 devices.I would then have to make the X/O for to change the pins config to LOR. From that I would plug into my Enttec Pro, out to the first 3 channel DMX controller (From Holidaycoro as well) then I would hook into my RGB Strip. I would have to make sure that I go to the configuration and have the Enttec Pro on there. Now that would just help me program the first DMX Controller, I would have to do each one separately and note the number.

Would I have to config this all off of the last Controller, #6, that I am using as well?

Now if I was to use the CMB16D-QC and USB-RJ45 ( Do I need the Booster Type), would I be saving myself a lot of time. Or does it really matter which way I go