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Controller ethernet network


sethprejean

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Can I plug my light o rama controller into my home network in one room, and then in another room have my PC with USB to ethernet plugged into my home network?

My home network uses a simple router to connect the network jacks in each room. It supports DHCP.

Thanks

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No.

This is RS485, not ethernet.

You will damage something. Fate will determine if its the computer, NIC, LOR board, or something else.

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Don wrote:

You will damage something. Fate will determine if its the computer, NIC, LOR board, or something else.

It is unlikely that the LOR board would be damaged. It uses RS485, which should accept up to 12 volts.

On the other hand, it also supplies 10 volts DC power, which could potentially damage an Ethernet switch, or the NIC on a PC, which expects only 2.5 volts.

In any case, it won't work.
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Repeat after me:

Lightorama is not ethernet. None of your networking equipment will work with it. The cable is the same and the plug is the same, but that is all that is the same. What runs through the wires is totally different.

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A wireless (or wired) USB extender should work. I didn't respond favorably to your earlier suggestion about the wireless printer server because from what I have seen, most of those are specifically for printers, not for generic USB devices.

Another well-supported and tested wireless solution is the ELL.

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sethprejean wrote:

Repeat after me:



USB is USB before it converts to RS485.



so why wouldn't wireless USB connection work



PC->WirelessUSB->USBto485_adapter->ethernetLighORama

Because you said "wireless print server", not wireless USB connection. With every wireless print server I've ever worked with, the "wireless" portion involved wireless ethernet (802.11b/g) which is then connected to a wired USB port. This will not work with LOR. If you have some device that's instead just a native wireless USB hub where the wireless component is transparent to the PC's root hub, then that might work with LOR. I've never used such a device.
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A quick Google search shows that wireless USB or USB over WiFi does not practically exist. This is a reasonable conclusion, since the speed and latency requirements of USB does not mesh well with wireless or network protocols.

There are USB extenders available that will send USB over CAT5, but this does not make any sense for LOR since running the LOR network over CAT5 would be more reliably and more cost effective.

The conclusion is that if you really need to run LOR over an existing Ethernet network, the serial to TCP/IP converters I posted earlier, along with an SC485 may be your best option.

There is another option, and that is to wire your show computer locally to the LOR network, and then connect to your show computer from your desktop computer using RDP, GoToMyPC.com, or another remote desktop service.

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Steven wrote:

A wireless (or wired) USB extender should work.  I didn't respond favorably to your earlier suggestion about the wireless printer server because from what I have seen, most of those are specifically for printers, not for generic USB devices.

Another well-supported and tested wireless solution is the ELL.


Even if you could get the wireless USB/printer device to somehow work, it would probably have some major lag-time due to buffering (printing doesn't have to happen real-time...) so it would be useless for syncing lights to music...
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As for the serial over ethernet, I believe someone tried a RS-485 over ethernet solution in a year past, and reported that it caused a variable amount of delay that really messed up the show... It would not surprise me if the RS232 versions have the same problem.

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