Jay Czerwinski Posted September 2, 2011 Share Posted September 2, 2011 I get weird little flickers of some other color when turning the lights on/off or in fades - I am testing in White right now. I've seen other posts where there was concern it was the iDMX unit or some other hardware defect.But I am thinking that because the 160 RGB LEDs (480 channels) are getting iDMX updates at 44 times per a second that sometimes the different command comes in to the unit half way through the commands to an individual pixel.For instance, if a white pixel is to come on, then the red, green, and blue elements should come on at the same time. But if DMX is passing by and doesn't start to send the ON command until after it has passed the red element, then only the green and blue turn on for the first 1/44th of a second with a teal color. And when turning off, if the command arrives after the red element, then only the green and blue are off and I get a little flash of red. A fraction of a second later if the off command came after the green, then only the blue would turn off and I get a quick flash of yellow beacuse the red and green did not get the OFF command on time....Does this logic make sense or is there potentially another setting I should look to tweak? Tonight when I get home from work (yes I need to be working! Ha!) I will try the test only using Red, Green, or Blue and see if the glitch still shows up.... I'll post the results here... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zman Posted September 2, 2011 Share Posted September 2, 2011 Do you have a terminator on the end of the DMX branch? That might be the first thing I check.The other is the 128 Ichan limit that LOR has for doing ramps/fades, twinkle/shimmer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zman Posted September 2, 2011 Share Posted September 2, 2011 You might want to check the other post about the DMX256 mode that your iDMX E0 is forcing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay Czerwinski Posted September 3, 2011 Author Share Posted September 3, 2011 I do not have a teminator on the end. Not sure how to do that. The wire configuration is converted for these tubes to a little 4-pin connector with screw-together sleeves holding them together. All of their diagrams do not mention a terminator ( http://www.showvisionled.com/snowvision.pdf ) -- but I'll take suggestions.For my tests, When I converted the sequence to only one of the prime colors, the random color flicker disappeared, but there was a pausing jittery mini-delay when doing a leaping arch type of light flow at high speeds. I think consistent with my first theory, that the on/off commands are not coming in perfect timing.A REAL IMPROVEMENT was made when I changed the address to a non-zero ending address!! I set the device to 51 instead of E0. (I also lowered the number so the hardware manager doesnt need to look so high up. - I might bring it lower without worries of crowding addresses for future LOR boxes since I found it easy to change this address in Notepad as a txt file.) (on a side note - interesting that E0 shows up as -32 in the .lcc file, but 51 is 51.)Then I went back to White to test again and the flow is much smoother. But the flickers still appear at very high animation speeds - cycling through 480 channels in less than a second.It is not as obvious now and may be acceptable. I will push my CCR to the same limits to compare performance in the future. This might just be an unavoidable anomoly of having so many channels. (and like most posts suggest, a defect that only I would notice and my audience will never see)I'll keep posting here to give feedback on your suggestions, as well as share any new findings on my own.Thank you again!Jay Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zman Posted September 3, 2011 Share Posted September 3, 2011 The CCR may not be an issue since it has it's own controller. I think you are running into the 128 Ichan limit now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay Czerwinski Posted September 3, 2011 Author Share Posted September 3, 2011 I have confirmed that the 128 limit is the issue. Not sure what the Ichan name means, but that is it.If I try to change more than 128 things at the same time, then there are glitches (or what I like to think of them is missed commands)If I turn on all 480 channels and leave them on solid, then at the 128 mark of diming the glitches appear. Strange since I thought DMX was sending the code to every channel 44 times a second. It makes me think that if there is no change, then a command is not sent.So, I either need to live with the glitches, or be concious not to change more than 128 things at the same time, or get an iDMX box for every 128 channels, or use the MADRIX software to support these lights, or hope that the newer DMX dongles solve this problem, or that new firmware is available to fix this....I'll keep plugging away and see which route seems the most acceptable/enjoyable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JBullard Posted September 4, 2011 Share Posted September 4, 2011 You need to keep in mind that the iDMX supports LOR effects that regular DMX does not. Therefore the iDMX converts these "special" commands to Ichan or "intelligent channels".128 of these special LOR effects can be supported at a time.You could use regular DMX but perhaps not have these effects available or change your sequence to not use more then 128 special effects at a time Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay Czerwinski Posted September 4, 2011 Author Share Posted September 4, 2011 JBullard wrote:You need to keep in mind that the iDMX supports LOR effects that regular DMX does not. Therefore the iDMX converts these "special" commands to Ichan or "intelligent channels".128 of these special LOR effects can be supported at a time.You could use regular DMX but perhaps not have these effects available or change your sequence to not use more then 128 special effects at a timeI am assuming any one of the buttons are an LOR effect in reference. It would be nice to confirm which things in LOR sequencing are effects.Let me know if I am on the right track though --- If I use a LOR fade button, then that is an effect. But if I were to have several cells with a fixed level value ramping up in value from one cell to another, then that is not an effect and i could essentially do a fade, but with a lot of little manual steps...?Hmmmm... you have opened another door of thinking for me! Thank you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zman Posted September 5, 2011 Share Posted September 5, 2011 On/Off/Intensity are no problem. Anything that is a ramp/fade, shimmer/twinkle require one of the intelligent channels. The Ichan is "checked out" as soon as the effect starts, and is released when the effect ends. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay Czerwinski Posted September 28, 2011 Author Share Posted September 28, 2011 I eventually solved (?) this problem by purchasing MADRIX. It seems to be what will be needed if a large amount of DMX channels are going to need fades and other special effects.A bit of an expensive option, requiring the software and two additional usb DMX boxes. LOR outputs basic animation bank numbers out through the iDMX. The iDMX outputs to a USB DMX box that is INput to MADRIX. MADRIX sees that command to change to a different preprogrammed animation number and then sends out hundreds of DMX commands through a second usb OUTput DMX box.It's a bit messy, but I am getting to the results I wanted. (except for the bank account status) Ha!Thank you everyone for the education along the way that will be useful in years to come! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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