Amie Posted August 14, 2011 Author Share Posted August 14, 2011 The show is finally over. I had more problems with LOR than I care to admit, but the most important part of the show finally worked. Over 2000 people in attendance, something I never want to do EVER again. If it is simply our christmas show and there are technical difficulties, we postpost the show for a night...no big deal.So here are the problems I encountered, I would love to know what I did wrong.Triggers: I called LOR and had Mary overnight 3 of the CTB16 Input Connectors. I tested one on a box connected to my laptop, just at my house. It worked great. But the triggers that I was using were only about one foot long. I then had to solder a 75' cable onto 4 of the triggers and a 4' cable onto 2 of them in order to reach where I was going to be sitting. The cable I used came from CAT5 line. Not CAT5e.I didn't have time to test an individual box again because my husband had already taken the boxes and daisy changed them into the final system while I was still soldering the triggers.When I got to the location, and plugged the triggers in and turned the Control Panel on, the triggers started turning on and rotating through in sequence, nonstop. This was without hitting the triggers at all. If I hit the triggers, nothing happened. I reprogrammed them in the LOR Show Editor, to make sure they were correct, but it continued doing the same thing. So, the triggers had to be side-lined.Next option, was to run the show via the Sequence Editor. I had one musical sequence and 5 animation sequences. About 1 hour before the show started, I finally figured out that the animation sequences were the culprit as to why I couldn't keep the channels from changing. Every time I opened up an animation sequence to run it, when I opened the musical sequence, all of the channels would be zero'd out or wrong. I'd have to reassign all of the channels again. Over and Over again. I bet I did that 4-5 times within a 3 hour period yesterday. When I finally realized it was the animations causing the problem, I rebuilt them as musical sequences using 'silence'. That fixed the problem....just 15 minutes before the show started.So...I get up to stretch my legs since I hadn't moved for hours from the chair I was sitting in. I had 10 minutes before the show started. I come back to my computer, and LOR has lost it's connection to the boxes. I close the sequence editor, and it hangs. I reboot, open the sequence editor, no connection. Reboot again...same thing. The play starts, I miss the first 5 animations sequences. I unplug everything to the computer and the box I have sitting next to me, and plug it all back in, then reboot again. Finally, the 3rd reboot is a charm, I get connected about 2 minutes before the final musical number, and it works. Everyone loves the lights and I feel like curling up in a fetal position and sleeping for a week.After the play is over, they ask to the see the light show again. I start it up, it plays for about 10 seconds and then it stops. It was a 1-time show.Any ideas why I had so many problems? Is there any issue with having a 75' ethernet cable between boxes? If the computer goes to sleep, is that what causes the issue with locking up the Sequence Editor? I couldn't even kill it from the task manager.btw, thank you for helping me. If you guys hadn't told me how to run a show through the sequence editor, I wouldn't have been able to do anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimswinder Posted August 14, 2011 Share Posted August 14, 2011 Hey Aimee...Sorry you had so many problems...wish I knew the why of your problems too...but I don't...hopefully someone smarter than me will though!!and don't give up on triggers!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amie Posted August 14, 2011 Author Share Posted August 14, 2011 Thanks Jim, I won't give up. I still want to figure out the why's, with respect to the triggers. I am going to test the boxes individually with the CAT5 lines on them, and see if they will work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimswinder Posted August 14, 2011 Share Posted August 14, 2011 Amie wrote: Thanks Jim, I won't give up. I still want to figure out the why's, with respect to the triggers. I am going to test the boxes individually with the CAT5 lines on them, and see if they will work.I myself just used SPT-2 wire...but my 6 triggers were less than 15' from the controllers... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cmoore60 Posted August 14, 2011 Share Posted August 14, 2011 Amie,I am guessing that using the Cat5 wire for your triggers @ 75 feet distance caused to much voltage drop and therefore the system was seeing things as being triggered. This is only a guess.My experience with triggers has been a short distance.Another thing that comes to mind. did you use the exact same switch as you did in your test? Might have been possible to have trigggers configured in the software to be one condition (normally open, or normally closed) but yet you had them wired the opposite.Chuck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CKSedg Posted August 14, 2011 Share Posted August 14, 2011 Amie,Sorry about all your troubles. I have been by your house several times in the past few years and you have a GREAT display. Keep it up. I can't wait to come again this season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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