aidancar Posted December 5, 2018 Share Posted December 5, 2018 (edited) About two weeks ago I left for vacation the same day my show began. Shortly after arriving at my destination a neighbor reached out to me telling me some of the lights in my display were behaving erratically. I pulled up my camera feeds to find that channels 4.1, 4.3, 4.5, and 4.7 which control green led lights on my second floor siding looked as though they were shimmering. Luckily I have it setup that I could unplug all of the controllers remotely and reset them. After I had done this the problem would go away. It seemed to keep coming back roughly every other night and still continues doing this. I typically see it on unit 4’s odd channels. I have also seen it recently on 2.1 (snowman video attached) as well as some of the bush channels I have in unit 2. Im sure there were some other channels that have done this that I am unaware of. When I saw the snowman doing this(being back from vacation) I disconnected both Cat 5 cables from unit 2 and reconnected them. The issue continued. After power cycling the unit the issue stopped. I have the latest firmware on the controllers which are all CTB16 gen 3. I am running 5.2.2 software with a 500k enhanced network through the high speed USB adapter. Any ideas what could be the issue here? This becomes very distracting throughout the show. Unit 4.9 4.11 4.13 4.15 with the issue: https://youtu.be/nvwbHoga0TI Unit 2.1 with the issue: https://youtu.be/dCGOh3mOMeE Edited December 5, 2018 by aidancar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Orville Posted December 5, 2018 Share Posted December 5, 2018 Does it do that in every sequence or just specific ones? Thinking maybe you entered a shimmer command somehow, somewhere. I've never seen a glitch like that one without something being awry in a sequence. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k6ccc Posted December 5, 2018 Share Posted December 5, 2018 (edited) By chance, do you have two sequences playing? for example, a sequence in "Background" or "Animation" and another one in "Musical". That is allowed, but the sequences involved CAN NOT have any of the same channels. Not just not used, they can not exist in both sequences (on in the same Preview since you're running S5). Edited December 5, 2018 by k6ccc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LightshowNoober Posted December 5, 2018 Share Posted December 5, 2018 Aidan, I've had this same issue. I'm using a Pixie16 to control my mega tree. It does have a "glitchy" and almost strobe effect at times during every sequence. I hope someone can give us an answer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DocBrown86 Posted December 5, 2018 Share Posted December 5, 2018 I just posted a topic, possibly too simirlar to be its own, however my issue isn’t with rgb stuff. I also hope there is a simple answer for all of us... Haven’t experienced this in my 8 or 9 years with this software. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DocBrown86 Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 Hey guys, I just updated my PC software from 4.3.4 to 4.4.2 and that solved every issue I was having!! Might be worth a shot. Never thought that would have been the problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aidancar Posted December 6, 2018 Author Share Posted December 6, 2018 5 hours ago, Orville said: Does it do that in every sequence or just specific ones? Thinking maybe you entered a shimmer command somehow, somewhere. I've never seen a glitch like that one without something being awry in a sequence. It seems to happen randomly and when it happens it continues on the same channels reguardless of what sequence is playing until power cycled. I thought the same thing when I first saw it. Also k6ccc, the musical sequence is the only one that is playing. A part of me wants to think it’s something involving a firmware issue but I’m not sure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DocBrown86 Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 I spoke too soon on the update fixing mine. It got me through half the night, then it was back to what you're describing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LightshowNoober Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 14 hours ago, DocBrown86 said: Hey guys, I just updated my PC software from 4.3.4 to 4.4.2 and that solved every issue I was having!! Might be worth a shot. Never thought that would have been the problem. Hey Doc, I've updated mine too and i'm using 4.4.2 now but still have the same problem. It could be that my Pixie 16 firmware is not up to the latest due to my Pixie16's being two years old and LOR has to have them shipped in for them to manually update the firmware as it cannot be done through the HU w/ those particular boards. Either way, i'm hoping someone can answer the glitchy cause it only happens in Superstar. Pixel editor effects still come out nice and smooth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Orville Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 (edited) 1 hour ago, LightshowNoober said: Hey Doc, I've updated mine too and i'm using 4.4.2 now but still have the same problem. It could be that my Pixie 16 firmware is not up to the latest due to my Pixie16's being two years old and LOR has to have them shipped in for them to manually update the firmware as it cannot be done through the HU w/ those particular boards. Either way, i'm hoping someone can answer the glitchy cause it only happens in Superstar. Pixel editor effects still come out nice and smooth. If it's only happening in SS, maybe you better contact Brian{the guy that created the SS program} and explain the issue to him, could be a glitch in the SuperStar software that has shown up in the one you're using. So you may have found a bug in the SS software. Edited December 6, 2018 by Orville Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LightshowNoober Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 2 hours ago, Orville said: If it's only happening in SS, maybe you better contact Brian{the guy that created the SS program} and explain the issue to him, could be a glitch in the SuperStar software that has shown up in the one you're using. So you may have found a bug in the SS software. Good idea! i'll do that and maybe Brian may have some insight. Thx Orville! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DocBrown86 Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 Adding to this... Today during non-operational hours, items on my controllers randomly came on. Stayed on. And a couple of hours later shut off. Variations of this have been happening all day... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aidancar Posted December 6, 2018 Author Share Posted December 6, 2018 59 minutes ago, DocBrown86 said: Adding to this... Today during non-operational hours, items on my controllers randomly came on. Stayed on. And a couple of hours later shut off. Variations of this have been happening all day... That’s interesting, I wonder if mine would do the same if I left them on during the day? Were they on steady or shimmering? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DocBrown86 Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 14 minutes ago, aidancar said: That’s interesting, I wonder if mine would do the same if I left them on during the day? Were they on steady or shimmering? It’s different every time. Which makes it tough to trace. Different lights, some shimmer and some stay solid. I started switching to an ambient show at midnight this year, and at 6am one controller stopped working until 7am when it entered shutdown scene. The other random issues popped on at 1:15pm today. This is beyond frustrating. Never had these issues before! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aidancar Posted December 6, 2018 Author Share Posted December 6, 2018 Just happened again to me 20 minutes ago. Worse case yet, channels 8-16 on Unit 4 affected, Multiple lights channels on unit 2 affected, and Unit 1 channel 1 affected. Here is a video of the issue tonight showing me walking out and resetting all the controllers, temporarily fixing the issue. https://youtu.be/6XQcvs2HMaE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aidancar Posted December 6, 2018 Author Share Posted December 6, 2018 48 minutes ago, DocBrown86 said: It’s different every time. Which makes it tough to trace. Different lights, some shimmer and some stay solid. I started switching to an ambient show at midnight this year, and at 6am one controller stopped working until 7am when it entered shutdown scene. The other random issues popped on at 1:15pm today. This is beyond frustrating. Never had these issues before! I put a help desk ticket in around two weeks ago. So far I have only gotten one response saying to keep an eye on it and record what channels it happens on that it’s hard to tell what is going on. Haven’t heard back since so I would assume that they are still overwhelmed. Major distraction for the visitors each night. Really wish they could find a fix. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dibblejr Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 What everyone in this thread is failing to post.... What is your current firmware version on the "pixie controller"? You can find this in the HU. Also another common denominator. You are all on some of the newest versions of LOR S4 and S5. In order for you to have complete control of your pixie controllers you need the firmware update 1.04. I imagine you are all on 1.03 If you read the "firmware update guide" I will tell you that there is no need to update if things are working good but when you see problems perhaps an update is required. There is no telling if you have the pixie controller set up correctly. There is a step by step guide posted at top of the General Hardware section of the forums. For those of you on S4 it will take you from box to lights. For those of you on S5 you need to have a little knowledge about adding a device in S5. I would recommend checking your config by going back over the step by step. Test and if you have problems complete the upgrade. Happy Lighting JR Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dibblejr Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 (edited) 8 hours ago, LightshowNoober said: due to my Pixie16's being two years old and LOR has to have them shipped in for them to manually update the firmware as it cannot be done through the HU w/ those particular boards. Who told you this? How would I have been able to Beta test if I couldn't update the firmware from home is beyond me. I only have 2 new pixies the rest of mine are originals. Feel free to PM me. I think my friend Jim provided you with my contact info. If you call, all I ask is text first, to ensure I am available. . I do not answer unknown calls without advance warning and you will probably get my robokiller fun messages. JR Edited December 6, 2018 by dibblejr Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k6ccc Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 One more. For S4 users: Are you exporting from SuperStar in Legacy format or as Intensity files? For S5 users. Did you create the SuperStar effects entirely in SuperStar and export them to Sequence Editor (as you would have done in S4), or did you create them using the "Insert SuperStar Effects" from the S5 Sequencer? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aidancar Posted December 7, 2018 Author Share Posted December 7, 2018 16 minutes ago, dibblejr said: What everyone in this thread is failing to post.... What is your current firmware version on the "pixie controller"? You can find this in the HU. Also another common denominator. You are all on some of the newest versions of LOR S4 and S5. In order for you to have complete control of your pixie controllers you need the firmware update 1.04. I imagine you are all on 1.03 If you read the "firmware update guide" I will tell you that there is no need to update if things are working good but when you see problems perhaps an update is required. There is no telling if you have the pixie controller set up correctly. There is a step by step guide posted at top of the General Hardware section of the forums. For those of you on S4 it will take you from box to lights. For those of you on S5 you need to have a little knowledge about adding a device in S5. I would recommend checking your config by going back over the step by step. Test and if you have problems complete the upgrade. Happy Lighting JR Just to clarify I am having this issue on generaion 3 CTB16’s. I do have a pixcon in my display but that is working fine. Not sure if this is the same problem others are having on the pixie controllers or something different. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts