Enttec DMX USB pro crash

AlrIk · Post by **AlrIk** » Sun Nov 06, 2011 9:55 pm

Hi,
I was working this summer and during the show, my enttec stop to be connected, and a black in stage came! All the programme (Lx and Qlab) was working perfectly. I needed to connect the DMX cable to my back up computer, who has another enttec. The result is 20 second of black in stage.
After the show i looked for the problem, i reconnected the DMX cable and i needed to go in preference, DMX info in lx and refresh and select the enttec, and it run perfectly again.

I was thinking it could be a problem with the driver, so i upgrade it, because i had an old version.

But this day i was working for a light creation, and this problem came back. I need to disconnect the enttec and do the same manipulation to reconnect the enttec. It's quite scaring. Maybe you know some thing about that? The two crash was with different enttec, different lx version, but the same computer...

By

Post by **admin** » Mon Nov 07, 2011 6:42 pm

There are a couple of possibilities that explain what happened to you.

First, sometimes the USB connector (especially on a laptop) gets stuff in it and when you insert a flash drive or the cable from the DMX USB Pro, it doesn't make a good connection and you have to pull it out and re-insert it to get it to connect. So, an intermittent USB connection could have caused this problem.

Second, USB ports are protected against shorts and will shut down if too much current is drawn from them. Sometimes they will not work again until the computer is restarted. A short in the DMX USB Pro could cause the particular USB port to shut down. It is possible that a short in the DMX output from the DMX USB Pro could cause the USB port to shut down but the DMX USB Pro may have current limiting that rules this out (Does anyone know?)

LXConsole does not tolerate having the DMX USB Pro get unplugged while it is active very well. In contrast, using ENTTEC's Open DMX Ethernet to connect to LXConsole via ArtNet works very well and is fault tolerant. The Open DMX Ethernet has its own power supply and will keep sending DMX even when the Ethernet cable is temporarily unplugged. The DMX USB Pro is great for its low cost. But for not much more, (especially compared to other solutions) the Open DMX Ethernet is more reliable for actual performance use.

AlrIk · Post by **AlrIk** » Mon Nov 07, 2011 10:08 pm

Thanks for answer, i think if it's one of this two solutions, it's the second, because i use an Imac and the laptop is my back up.
Well any case i'll check out quickely for the open DMX ethernet.

Post by **admin** » Tue Nov 08, 2011 1:42 pm

Someone asked about using a LanBox with LXConsole via ArtNet. Accoeding to the website lanbox.com, it supports ArtNet. But, has anyone done this?