jpbaily1 Posted December 15, 2009 Share Posted December 15, 2009 I have 2 16ch controllers. One is newer than the other & the older one has a hard time keeping up when I run the leaping arches fast. There are three arches w/ 4 ch on ea. (I will change them to 5 ch ea next year) so the 1st arch has a hard time keeping up with the other two which are on the new controller.I wll presume that since the controllers are the same "blue" boad & have the same chipset that it is a firmware issue?The newer controller has the new firmware while the older one does not.Thoughts?Thanks in advance.John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dstevens Posted December 15, 2009 Share Posted December 15, 2009 Have you ruled out a communication issue (i.e. re-routed and/or changed cables)? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-klb- Posted December 15, 2009 Share Posted December 15, 2009 Which firmware releases? If the old one is not 4.32, I would upgrade it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbaily1 Posted December 15, 2009 Author Share Posted December 15, 2009 The old one is not 4.32.I will have to see how to install it.I downlaoded it & it loosk like a text/data file.Thanks for the reply. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbaily1 Posted December 15, 2009 Author Share Posted December 15, 2009 The communication passes through fine to the 2 nd controller.I could read how to move my channels to the 2nd controller which would solve the issue i suppose.Thanks for the reply. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-klb- Posted December 15, 2009 Share Posted December 15, 2009 You probably have a later firmware in your LOR install than on the web site. Firmware upgrades are done through the hardware utility. Refresh your controller list, then click on the firmware tab.. It is pretty self explanatory from there, or there are instructions in the on line controller manuals as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chuckd Posted December 15, 2009 Share Posted December 15, 2009 Is it ONLY two controllers with 16 channels on each? Or are they part of a much larger display?If only the two, then I agree, you've got yourself a network or hardware/firmware issue. Unless you're trying to go faster than physics allows, those should keep up just fine with anything you want to do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbaily1 Posted December 16, 2009 Author Share Posted December 16, 2009 Yes, only two controllers for a total of 23 ch.I'll try the firmware tomorrow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbaily1 Posted December 27, 2009 Author Share Posted December 27, 2009 Well I finally uploaded the CTB16D_Blue_4-32.lhx into my [glow=red]CTB16DV5_Blue[/glow] 16ch controller.All went well with a "ststus" successfull at the end.I refreshed my units & it had changed the firmware as promissed, but it now no longer controlls the lights on any channel.It has a solid red on the LED on the board. & passes the network connection to the 2nd box (which is a CTB16DV5_Blue controller using CTB16DV5_Blue_v4.01.lhx firmware & works fine).So I re-installed my CTB16DV5_Blue_v4.01.lhx and it controlls the lights.I'll try to get 2 more 16ch boxes next year to handle the arches & small trees. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eldoradoboy Posted December 30, 2009 Share Posted December 30, 2009 im not sure how fast you are running your arches but 4 channels per arch surely shouldnt be an issue if your comms cables are solidly connected and your PC is clean and running efficiently..I run 176 channels and was really buzzing around a lot in some of my sequences and didnt have network issues....if the one controller is not working now, make sure you didnt lose its address when you reloaded firmware (unless it is one with the wheel switches).. if it is the type that requires addressing, unplug your other controller, and use the hardware utility to make sure it is still set to its programmed address and if not, reset it...-Christopher Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-klb- Posted December 30, 2009 Share Posted December 30, 2009 I missed this the first time. The only thing I have heard about not working after an upgrade, is an occasional need to power cycle the controller after upgrading the firmware. I never seem to bump in to this, as I generally upgrade them before carrying them out to where they go, or they get upgraded on the house far enough in advance that they naturally get a power outage before we plan to use them..I think the house has around 250 channels, all on one network, with some pretty speedy stuff in the lawn grid, and everything looks fine. Though a 4 channel arch may not look that good no matter how good the timings are... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbaily1 Posted December 30, 2009 Author Share Posted December 30, 2009 Christopher:Yep, did all the above but still no change (mine has the dial/rotary switches to assign controllers).I'll try again before puting it up for the year.Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbaily1 Posted December 30, 2009 Author Share Posted December 30, 2009 KLB;I am actually supprised how well the little arches work.I need to add mor colors than just white which teay all are now but I'll need more controllers.And so it goes... John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chuckd Posted December 30, 2009 Share Posted December 30, 2009 Is there a V5 version of 4.32 or 4.30? Seems to me that the standard 4.32 for pre-V5 boards probably wouldn't work, but I'm just guessing at why there is a separate firmware version. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chuckd Posted December 30, 2009 Share Posted December 30, 2009 Just to add a bit more, this year I'm running four separate networks. On one network, I have 16 yard strands and 128 channels for a LED matrix display. The LED matrix display at times lags behind a tiny bit. I'm probably the only one that notices it, but it's there.Don't get me wrong, this is INFINITELY better than last year trying to run one network. The slowdowns were horrible.So I'm not sure you're ever going to be perfectly on-time, if you have any busy activity at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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