Problem Daisy Chaining controllers

[Bpmarmstrong]

I have 4 controllers this year and im having a problem daisy chaining the contollers they all work great on there own. When I hook them together with cat5 cable only the first contoller works. The Led is solid on the first one blinking on the second. I have tested the cat 5 cable. What else could it be.

[oilmoney]

try moving the first controller to the last spot in line if it's not too difficult, you could have one bad cable jack but that won't matter if the controller is the last one in the network

[Joe Polenchar]

Did you assign different unit id's to the controllers?

If not and they are all set to the default unit 1 that may be your problem.

[Anthony in Houston]

Try different cables too the cable off the first one going to the secone may be bad.

 

Anthony

[Ron Boyd]

One other thing, if these are Gen 3 controllers, you should be fine checking the above things. But, if you have mixed, Gen 2 and Gen 3 controllers and running on the HS (red) RS485, that will be your problem.

 

I found the older boxes won't run on the HS adapter. All of the Gen 3 controllers I had last year ran just fine on the HS network.

[Denny]

Ditto on replacing the cat5e from the first to second controller.  This year, I also had a cat 5e that checked good with a tester, however, it turns out the cable was still bad.  When I replaced it, everything has worked fine.  According to LOR support, the inexpensive testers that we use only check continuity and there are other things that can go wrong with the cable that our testers will not find.  In order to thoroughly check the cat 5e for everything that can be wrong, a very expensive tester is required.

[Bpmarmstrong]

try moving the first controller to the last spot in line if it's not too difficult, you could have one bad cable jack but that won't matter if the controller is the last one in the network

I tried that i ended up unhooking all the controllers to test the jacks and rj45 cables. Both Jacks on all the controllers work when plugging one controller into the rs485 but when I Plug any of the other 3 in the lights never stop blinking and they dont show up in the HWU.

 

Did you assign different unit id's to the controllers?

If not and they are all set to the default unit 1 that may be your problem.

Yes I changed the Unit IDs

 

Try different cables too the cable off the first one going to the secone may be bad.

 

Anthony

I tested the cables

 

One other thing, if these are Gen 3 controllers, you should be fine checking the above things. But, if you have mixed, Gen 2 and Gen 3 controllers and running on the HS (red) RS485, that will be your problem.

 

I found the older boxes won't run on the HS adapter. All of the Gen 3 controllers I had last year ran just fine on the HS network.

I have the Black adapter but I do have a mix of Gen 2 and 3.

[k6ccc]

Make sure the cables are not crossover cables.

 

This sure sounds like a cable or RJ-45 jack problem.

[Bpmarmstrong]

Make sure the cables are not crossover cables.

 

This sure sounds like a cable or RJ-45 jack problem.

How do i know if they are crossover cables and if they are what am i supposed to be using.

[wbaker4]

Test each cable you are planning on using by connecting one end of the cable to the 485 adapter and the other end to the controller.

 

Run a test to make sure you can detect the controller using the hardware utility and can turn the channels on and off.  Unplug the network cable from one connector on the controller and plug it in the other connector.  Repeat the test.

 

Do that for all of your cables.  Get rid of any cable that does not work.

[Caleb Linburg]

One other thing, if these are Gen 3 controllers, you should be fine checking the above things. But, if you have mixed, Gen 2 and Gen 3 controllers and running on the HS (red) RS485, that will be your problem.

 

I found the older boxes won't run on the HS adapter. All of the Gen 3 controllers I had last year ran just fine on the HS network.

What do you mean by the "HS adapter" I have had a few issues this year with a mix of gen 2 and 3 controllers.

[Bpmarmstrong]

Test each cable you are planning on using by connecting one end of the cable to the 485 adapter and the other end to the controller.

 

Run a test to make sure you can detect the controller using the hardware utility and can turn the channels on and off.  Unplug the network cable from one connector on the controller and plug it in the other connector.  Repeat the test.

 

Do that for all of your cables.  Get rid of any cable that does not work.

Thanks That seems to have solved it.

[Ron Boyd]

USB RS485 HS is the High speed adapter.

http://store.lightorama.com/usbrs485hs.html

They came out last year to run the 500K network speed. If you have a Gen 1 or 2, If memory serves, they will not run at this speed. Gen3 will and you can take advantage of the faster network speeds.

[k6ccc]

Just a note about the high speed USB adapters.  There is no requirement to run them at 500K speed.  So the issue is the speed set to 500K, not that you are using the high speed USB adapters.  Of course only the high speed adapters will run at 500K speed...

 

Also answer the question about how to identify a crossover cable.  Hold the cable with the two ends next to each other and the the wires showing through the top of the connector.  If it's a straight cable, the order of wire colors will be the same on both connectors.  f it's a crossover cable, the order will be different.