Long time lerker first time buyer

[jamie_huffman@hotmail.com]

I am purchasing a system during the upcoming summer sale. I am wanting to use my computer to run the lights and I think i want to use 16 channel's. I'm just looking to make my purchase as easy as posible.

I will be using this for Halloween and i am wanting to have a singing face and a use a couple controllers for things here and there.

I also know next year i would like to expand to a 32 or 64 channel system.

Thanks in advance for the advice.

[ItsMeBobO]

Welcome Jamie ! You will find lots of advice and helpers here. Lots of threads to check out. Read read read...

[james campbell]

as far as controllers I think the best is the partially built ctb16pc. it has everything you need enclosure cords heat sink.others who are talented at soldering prefer the kits. as bobo said ask allot of questions and read allot of good info in this forum

[jimswinder]

Welcome Jamie!!!

Go for the Residential Controllers

http://www.lightorama.com/ShowtimePC.html

as opposed to the Commercial grade ones..

http://www.lightorama.com/ShowtimePro.html

they basically both do the same thing...

What kind of lights are you planning on using?

LED's or incandescent?

[TJ Hvasta]

Hi Jamie, welcome to the greatest group of just-not-right people on the planet! The possibilities for your show are endless!

The pumpkin faces are a great way to start before the Christmas season begins and get your feet wet with sequencing..

Be sure to put your town in your profile so we'll know if there are any of us local that can help if you run into trouble.

As for which controller to go with.. if you are comfortable soldering, we mostly recommend the -16PC kits as they're cheaper, giving you more $$ to spend on either lights, or more controllers. They will run by computer, instead of the MP3 Director(stand-alone unit, lots more $$).. The one thing we pretty much advise is, if you can manage it ($$-wise), go with the Advanced Level software, gives you more and better tools for sequencing (Beat Wizard, etc).

And the silly question is the one you dont ask.. We were (or still are) all beginners at one time or another..

teege

[MikeH]

TJ Hvasta wrote:

....As for which controller to go with.. if you are comfortable soldering, we mostly recommend the -16PC kits as they're cheaper, giving you more $$ to spend on either lights, or more controllers. They will run by computer, instead of the MP3 Director(stand-alone unit, lots more $$).. teege

You'll need the extra money to buy lots of extension cords.

MikeH

[jimswinder]

MikeH wrote:

TJ Hvasta wrote:

....As for which controller to go with.. if you are comfortable soldering, we mostly recommend the -16PC kits as they're cheaper, giving you more $$ to spend on either lights, or more controllers. They will run by computer, instead of the MP3 Director(stand-alone unit, lots more $$).. teege

You'll need the extra money to buy lots of extension cords.

you'll need the extra money to appease the spouse....

[Guest Don Gillespie]

jimswinder wrote:

MikeH wrote:

TJ Hvasta wrote:

....As for which controller to go with.. if you are comfortable soldering, we mostly recommend the -16PC kits as they're cheaper, giving you more $$ to spend on either lights, or more controllers. They will run by computer, instead of the MP3 Director(stand-alone unit, lots more $$).. teege

You'll need the extra money to buy lots of extension cords.

you'll need the extra money to appease the spouse....

Welcome aboard Jamie don't forget the extra money to appease the forum members LOL, contollers and extension cords lots of them keep asking we shall answer you

[zman]

Jamie, welcome aboard. On of my good buddies in FL, Darren Huffty (ClarkG) has one of the best animated pumpkins I have seen, check out his video. Good luck.

[caniac]

Don Gillespie wrote:

jimswinder wrote:

MikeH wrote:

TJ Hvasta wrote:

....As for which controller to go with.. if you are comfortable soldering, we mostly recommend the -16PC kits as they're cheaper, giving you more $$ to spend on either lights, or more controllers. They will run by computer, instead of the MP3 Director(stand-alone unit, lots more $$).. teege

You'll need the extra money to buy lots of extension cords.

you'll need the extra money to appease the spouse....

Welcome aboard Jamie don't forget the extra money to appease the forum members LOL, controllers and extension cords lots of them keep asking we shall answer you

and lots and lots of zip ties, ordering another case from monoprice.

[jamie_huffman@hotmail.com]

I will probable be starting with the incandescent bulbs. That is unless there is a reason i should look into the LED's.

[Ron Amedee]

incandescents cheap to purchase..expensive to run..LED's expensive to purchase ..Cheap to run:?

Old saying crawl , Walk then run...Guess I'm stupid want to run out the box..But keep the wife and kid's:shock:

[caniac]

Ron Amedee wrote:

incandescents cheap to purchase..expensive to run..LED's expensive to purchase ..Cheap to run:?

Old saying crawl , Walk then run...Guess I'm stupid want to run out the box..But keep the wife and kid's:shock:

Yeah, what he said. The year before I had lots of incandescent and inflatables and a four channel Mr Christmas, it cost me and additional $200 a month to my light bill for almost two months. Last year was tons more lights, mega tree, LOR, and more inflatables but all lights were LED and the bump to my light bill was only $75 a month. The electricians here will correct me if I am wrong but I think the amperage pull on incandescent is ten times LED's so if still want to go that route you will need an electrician to run several dedicated circuits (depending on your display) or else you will be rebooting your house during your show! LOL

[Surfing4Dough]

jimswinder wrote:

MikeH wrote:

TJ Hvasta wrote:

....As for which controller to go with.. if you are comfortable soldering, we mostly recommend the -16PC kits as they're cheaper, giving you more $$ to spend on either lights, or more controllers. They will run by computer, instead of the MP3 Director(stand-alone unit, lots more $$).. teege

You'll need the extra money to buy lots of extension cords.

you'll need the extra money to appease the spouse....

But make sure you spend that too since you don't want any extra available for your spouse to be able to afford a divorce lawyer when they realize they became a LOR Widow.

[jamie_huffman@hotmail.com]

my father-in-law will be helping be piggy back another breaker box dedicated for my light display. I was thinking 2 outlets, 4 channels, per fuse. Does anyone have any input on this, or know if this has already been discussed?

Thanks

[caniac]

jamie_huffman@hotmail.com wrote:

my father-in-law will be helping be piggy back another breaker box dedicated for my light display. I was thinking 2 outlets, 4 channels, per fuse. Does anyone have any input on this, or know if this has already been discussed?

Thanks

depends on how many controllers and type of lights, probably more than enough for LED's but if you went all incandescent and 16+ LOR controllers it might not be. you have to look at how many channels of lights and what type. I think i read somewhere that incandescent 100 ct strand pulls 4 amps where as the same count LED pulls .4

[Steven]

jamie_huffman@hotmail.com wrote:

or know if this has already been discussed?

Yes, it has been discussed many times, mostly in the General Decorating Questions forum.

If you go 100% LED, then you can run a decent-sized show from a single 20A circuit.

[ErnieHorning]

Also relize that you dont have to turn on all of the lights at the same time. A few years ago, I ran a total of 43 amps of incandescents off of a single 15 amp outlet using some creative sequencing. When you turn a channel on, turn another one off. This also works good when doing chases with multiple elements. Also when you fade a channel up, fade another channel down.

It got me through another year but I've since added more outlets so watching the amps isn't an issue anymore.

[Surfing4Dough]

caniac wrote:

jamie_huffman@hotmail.com wrote:

my father-in-law will be helping be piggy back another breaker box dedicated for my light display. I was thinking 2 outlets, 4 channels, per fuse. Does anyone have any input on this, or know if this has already been discussed?

Thanks

depends on how many controllers and type of lights, probably more than enough for LED's but if you went all incandescent and 16+ LOR controllers it might not be. you have to look at how many channels of lights and what type. I think i read somewhere that incandescent 100 ct strand pulls 4 amps where as the same count LED pulls .4

Whoa! Not even close on this one. A standard set of 100ct mini incandescents draw approximately 0.33A (think 3 strings per 1 amp), whereas a similar LED string will be 0.03-0.04A. Here is a good summary of this topic: http://planetchristmas.com/FigurePower.htm

I don't think the OP was planning 16+ controllers, but 16 channels initially. Considering that each "half" of the controller (ch1-8, and ch9-16) can't exceed 15A at one time, then two 15A per controller are adequate (obviously these should be on separate 15-20A circuit breakers). To summarize the capacity of the controllers: you can go up to 8A per channel, but can't exceed 15A per bank (ch1-8, ch9-16). However, don't forget that only what is turned on counts. So in theory, you could have 8A on every channel but you would never be able to have more than one channel per bank on at a time, or else it would exceed the 15A capacity of the bank. Obviously if you have that many lights, you probably have moved beyond having 1 controller.

I would suggest that you lay out the basics of your display on paper, and estimate how many strings you would need for the various elements (bushes, trees, etc), and start to estimate what you power needs would be. Once you start the set up of your display, I strongly suggest getting a Kill-a-watt meter ($15) so you can actually measure the exact amount of power each channel is pulling so you don't overload your controller.

[caniac]

Surfing4Dough wrote:

caniac wrote:

jamie_huffman@hotmail.com wrote:

my father-in-law will be helping be piggy back another breaker box dedicated for my light display. I was thinking 2 outlets, 4 channels, per fuse. Does anyone have any input on this, or know if this has already been discussed?

Thanks

depends on how many controllers and type of lights, probably more than enough for LED's but if you went all incandescent and 16+ LOR controllers it might not be. you have to look at how many channels of lights and what type. I think i read somewhere that incandescent 100 ct strand pulls 4 amps where as the same count LED pulls .4

Whoa! Not even close on this one. A standard set of 100ct mini incandescents draw approximately 0.33A (think 3 strings per 1 amp), whereas a similar LED string will be 0.03-0.04A. Here is a good summary of this topic: http://planetchristmas.com/FigurePower.htm

I don't think the OP was planning 16+ controllers, but 16 channels initially. Considering that each "half" of the controller (ch1-8, and ch9-16) can't exceed 15A at one time, then two 15A per controller are adequate (obviously these should be on separate 15-20A circuit breakers). To summarize the capacity of the controllers: you can go up to 8A per channel, but can't exceed 15A per bank (ch1-8, ch9-16). However, don't forget that only what is turned on counts. So in theory, you could have 8A on every channel but you would never be able to have more than one channel per bank on at a time, or else it would exceed the 15A capacity of the bank. Obviously if you have that many lights, you probably have moved beyond having 1 controller.

I would suggest that you lay out the basics of your display on paper, and estimate how many strings you would need for the various elements (bushes, trees, etc), and start to estimate what you power needs would be. Once you start the set up of your display, I strongly suggest getting a Kill-a-watt meter ($15) so you can actually measure the exact amount of power each channel is pulling so you don't overload your controller.

It's gotta be true, I read it on a message board somewhere!!!