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DC-MP3....continued from 2011


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Posted

Ok, I'm Backkkkkk. Because the problem is back. I've searched and reread all post again pertaining to Showtime Director DC-MP3. Halloween shows ran with no problem this year. Christmas shows were running without any problem - ie. 3-4 days. Appreciate all the feedback from last year. Shows are starting up again after midnight - unpredictably. Needless to say I've had to run downstairs about 1:30-2:00 am and unplug the sd card a couple of times to shut it down. Does anyone know the logic of the Show Builder. Don / Dan want to chime in here??? Dennis has chimed in, as well as wbottemly with great feedback. (my previous post was http://forums.lightorama.com/index.php?/topic/18805-dc-mp3-starting-to-fail/ ) I was sitting thinking about the problem from last year. The issues of two shows being on the card that Dennis talked about, came back to mind. So I recreated the sd card last night (2gb - fat -firmware V4) by specifying 1 show as indicated by checking all days Sunday - Saturday and a start / stop time of 5:30pm till 10:30pm. thinking that the sd card would then have only one show on it. Removing all the check marks from the second line with no times specified. The SD card still had two shows created! S1xxxxx and S2xxxxxx. Does anyone know why??? So. I deleted the S2xxxxx files. And guess what. Lights did not come on after midnight last night. I would still really love to have two separate shows - one for S-T 5:30pm - 9:30pm and F-S 5:30pm - 10:30pm. But the unpridicability of having them start up after midnight is killing my desire to do so. The possibility of using an external power adapter is also being considered. HU still being considered as well. Does anyone know the logic of how the SSB is creating shows based on input to the show builder? S1 versus S2.

Thanks for feedback.

Posted

I don't use the SSB (except to check a feature, etc) so I can't comment on the logic behind it.

Any show I create for a Director I do via the Hardware Utility. Within the HWU you would have the flexibility to do the show schedule you wish. You could also configure a show to run from 12:00a-5:29p with an "All Off" sequence. If you create this as "Show 01" (see the HWU) then it will take priority over every other show on the card.

Show 02 could be S-T 5:30pm - 9:30pm and Show 03 could be F-S 5:30pm - 10:30pm.

Remember when creating your shows for the Director the Show with the lowest Number (ie, Show 01) takes priority. So if you scheduled Show04 to run 5:00-5:30p, it would only run from 5:29-5:30 (based on the times shown in this post), since Show01 would have priority.

Posted

Is it a music sequence playing or just lights flashing? Is it possible for an animation sequence to be loaded in the memory, and that is what is playing at a weird hour? If you had a power blip, the director would be on the timer still, but an animation sequence loaded in the memory would play because the computer was "reset".

Posted

TFTR bisuit, It;s a single show - 9 musical sequences. In response to your questions/suggestions, I never turned on the radio to know if it was a show playing or just lights flashing. The light pattern I saw from the bedroom window would indicate it's a sequence versus just some of the lights flashing, if that's what you were driving at. There is no memory to load into that I'm aware of. The director is not on a timer (although I've considered doing so, I could then use my x-10 network to power that up as well). The showtime director is a stand alone device and the computer does not need to be attached as a result. I don't believe power blips are the case as I'm on a very stable power line. My ups's would trip letting me know it there were power issues and it hasn't done so.

Don, tx for the response. I still need to revisit the HWU as an alternative. Dennis suggested this last year as well. I recall looking at it, but it seemed there was going to be an issue with using it, and I can't remember at the moment what it was. So will revisit that soon.

Since I posted this and after having manually deleted the S2xxxxx files from the SD, there has been no problem with shows starting up after midnight.

I would still love to know under what circumstances the SSB creates the S2 shows???

Posted

Another followup. Have made quite a few seq changes and each time I use SSB, I delete the S2xxxxx files. I have had no problems with lights coming on after scheduled stop times...... Next stop. Experiment with HWU show builder. Tx to all for the input.

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

I've proven without a shadow of the doubt that when the S2xxxxx files are deleted there are no problems with shows starting up unintentionally. I did forget to delete the S2xxxxx files one night a little over a week ago and sure enough they started up shortly after midnight. Now that the season is as good as over, I'm going to experiment with HWU. End of Topic.

Posted

Glad you put the problem to bed, I only use the HWU to build a show and have never had the same problems as you did.

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