What computer?

[Klayfish]

I want to take advantage of the Summer Sale when it rolls around. But I'm completely new to the world of controllers, transmitters and all that stuff. Trying to digest as much info as I can as fast as I can. From what I'm understanding, the LOR controller will need to be hooked up to a computer. The computer will have the software that tells the controller what to do. I'm assuming the music will be loaded on the computer too and play at the same time as the light sequence?

Anyhow, I'm assuming I need a dedicated computer for just the lights. I'm not a computer tech guy, but can understand some basics. What are the minimum requirement specs I'd need for a computer? Processor speed? Memory? Hard drive? I want to know what to look for so I can find a good deal. Thanks!

[Max-Paul]

Klayfish,

There is another method of controlling the controllers, but it has limitations. I do not use it but others can tell you about the Mini Director. It is a device that takes a SD card and communicates with the controllers. I am going to stop here about that due to my limited knowledge of this device. But in a nutshell, it mounts at the first controller and does not require a dedicated computer to run the show.

PC method is what I use. Haven't looked at the 3.5 requirements, but anything that has been produced in the past few years will do the trick. It takes more computer power to work with the sequence editor and run the visualizer to get an idea how your sequence looks.

[Guest wbottomley]

I want to take advantage of the Summer Sale when it rolls around. But I'm completely new to the world of controllers, transmitters and all that stuff. Trying to digest as much info as I can as fast as I can. From what I'm understanding, the LOR controller will need to be hooked up to a computer. The computer will have the software that tells the controller what to do. I'm assuming the music will be loaded on the computer too and play at the same time as the light sequence?

Anyhow, I'm assuming I need a dedicated computer for just the lights. I'm not a computer tech guy, but can understand some basics. What are the minimum requirement specs I'd need for a computer? Processor speed? Memory? Hard drive? I want to know what to look for so I can find a good deal. Thanks!

This page has the info you need.

[LOR Staff]

The software page linked has the specs. However to make it easier I'll say this:

Any computer of recent vintage will most likely work.

I've personally run routines with 1,500 channels driving a decent sized visualizer and not seen any hickups. All that on a 12 year old Dell 8200 2.2 Ghz 400 mhz bus P4 (that's a single core thank you) with 512MB ram (most video cards have more than that now a days). Anything you can today (with maybe the exception of a Netbook) is going to be much faster than my old test machine.

[Orville]

I use the DC-MP3 Showtime Director, no computer needed, no external or extra timers needed as it has a built in real time clock and battery backed up. Had it unplugged for almost a month, reconnected it and still had the correct time on it. It costs a little more than the Mini Director, which doesn't have the real time clock, so an external timer would be required for it, but I needed the outlet for a controller, not an extra timer, so the extra cost was worth it to me.

But any cheapo laptop with around 1Meg ram, 40GB Hard Drive and VGA LCD monitor will work fine with it. Matter of fact I bought and used an old laptop for some testing purposes that I bought specifically for that.

It only has Win XP, 512MB RAM, 20GB HD and VGA LCD monitor, it works just fine for running tests, but it could run a full show without any problems, as I have ran a few during tests or changes I was making to be sure.

The biggest files will be your MP3 or WAV music files used for the show.

If using the Director units, ONLY MP3 can be used, it can't and won't read WAV or any other music format. And they will use up to a 2GB SD card in the Director units, at least my DC-MP3 Showtime Director can. Oh, and the MP3 Directors can get their power from a controller via the cat5 cable, at least the DC-MP3 Showtime Director can, not sure about the Mini Director, but I'd think it should be the same in this respect.

Edited August 3, 2012 by Slipstream

[scubado]

You don't need much for a show computer, garage sales are a great source. I got mine for $5 had to install a hard drive I already had. Your sequencing computer is just the opposite. A beefy HD graphics card really helps, dual monitor is highly recommended as well.