LOR kills home network

[BoneDaddy]

Hello, just re-installed my basic software to a new O.S. (Win 7) and updated to version 3.7. All went well after re connecting and using autoconfiguring com ports. My settup is nothing fancy just a single 16 channel controller. After testing this year's lights with console I noticed my home network went down. The home network provides TV, VOIP and Internet. All went down until I shut down my test. Auto configure favored com4 (used to be com3 with old O.S.) so I left it that way. I believe Com 4 must be used by some essential feature on my network? All attempts to manually set to other com ports fail. By fail I mean the controller is not found and a dialog box indiates the com selected is not working. Perhaps its a PC issue? Has anyone experienced this before? Any help is resolving is appreciated

[Aaron Maue]

Sorry for an obvious question, but you're not connecting the RS485 output from the USB converter to your home network are you?

[BoneDaddy]

Wow, thanks for the quick response. To answer your question: No that is what is so frustrating. Last year I was connected to the same computer running XP and all ran like clockwork. I figure its got to be related to the windows 7 upgrade but how? My network settings have not changed. In an attempt to resolve the com port problem I downloaded the latest USB/RS485 adapter software from LOR. I noticed the instructions did not cover installing to Windows 7. I am wondering if there is a Windows 7 driver out there I should be downloading.

[cenote]

Not uncommon, every time my show fires, and if the show computer is hooked to lan, it drops one of our vpn networks. But i am using 1.31 in the network.

[jstorms]

This is very odd. The virtual com ports shouldn't really be interfering with your Ethernet. How are you connected to your network (WiFi, hardwired, USB dongle)?

Maybe you have SOOO many lights that you have created a EM field (or maybe a rip in time and space) around your home and it is causing network problems. Time to take the flux capacitor out of the show.

I have my show computer connected via WiFi and have not had these issues.

[BoneDaddy]

Thanks for getting on this. I agree there shouldn't be any walking over ethernet from my virtual com port. The great news is it is running now. I pulled a ticket with the support team and they gave me a new driver and procedure to install it. Im not sure of the root cause (me probably using the wrong driver?). For your convenience and my gratefullness I copied thier solution here for others. The LOR support team Rocks!

"A Light-O-Rama help desk staff member has replied to your request, #116944 with the following response: ...

Make sure all LOR program are stopped and shows are disabled.

Unplug the USB adapter.

Use this link to get the USB driver installer. Download it and save it to your Desktop:

http://www.lightorama.com/downloads/CDM20814_Setup.exe

Once you have downloaded it and saved it to your desktop, double click the file which will run the driver installer. (make sure that the USB adapter is unplugged).

Once the installer has completed,

1. Run the LOR hardware Utility.

2. In the “Setup Comm Port” section (Top left of screen) click on the “Manual Select” dropdown.

3. Make note of which comm ports are present.

4. Stop(Exit) the Hardware Utility Program

5. Plug in the USB adapter (wait 15 seconds for it to be recognized)

6. Run the Hardware Utility Program. Check the Manual Select dropdown and a new com port should now be present. Select that new comm port as your show port.

You should be good to go."

[mhammond1]

by chance, was there any type of ICS (internet connection sharing) going on? Maybe the OS thought the other driver was a LAN and created a bridge?