DR4 that talks LOR protocol?

[ɟɐsʇǝppʎ]

LOR is going to support art-net natively?  thats pretty cool.

I'm not sure I saw the quote that said they would support artnet.  I think I saw a response that said they would be looking to use Ethernet as a distribution medium or an Ethernet->LOR type device.  But I don't frequent the LOR forums as much as this one....

Im the same here, never heard anything about art-net but instead about an ethernet device which sounds similar to the ECG

[mrpackethead]

trying to drag things back on track,

could something like a DR4 listen to LOR protocol traffic and convert it to E1.31 or similar?

[ɟɐsʇǝppʎ]

Quote from Dan

To support displays with the 1000s of channels required for individually addressable RGB bulbs, we will be making major improvements to our network capabilities and providing high speed Ethernet interfaces that will provide multiple LOR/DMX networks and universes.  For those who want to run their show from the PC a lower cost DMX dongle will be available.

The LOR software will be enhanced to support easier sequencing when many 1000s of channels are involved.

reference: http://lightorama.mywowbb.com/forum81/25276-2.html

So im wondering if there would be a benifit by spending the time and effort doing this if LOR are going to do this
In the end as you know it is a protocol bridge so it would require some good firmware to make it work, im sure this would be within your capabilaties MPH if you chose to take on that challenge

[mrpackethead]

Not somethign i'm going to do..  Too much other work to do.. More a question in theory.. and Eds smarter than me, i was hoping he might be able to do it.

[dmoore]

LOR is going to support art-net natively?  thats pretty cool.

I'm not sure I saw the quote that said they would support artnet.  I think I saw a response that said they would be looking to use Ethernet as a distribution medium or an Ethernet->LOR type device.  But I don't frequent the LOR forums as much as this one....

Im the same here, never heard anything about art-net but instead about an ethernet device which sounds similar to the ECG

I'll confess I don't recall who I heard it from so I looked back over at the posts on LOR's forum and I could only find a vailed reference to something lke it:

http://lightorama.mywowbb.com/view_topic.php?id=22966&forum_id=75&highlight=artnet+

[mschell]

Hmmmm.   Ed (j1sys) has been awfully quiet lately.  IF LOR is going to offer an ECG like device, would it make sense for him to work a deal with Dan to support LOR protocol coming out of an ECG natively?

Curious minds would want to know...

[dmoore]

Hmmmm.   Ed (j1sys) has been awfully quiet lately.  IF LOR is going to offer an ECG like device, would it make sense for him to work a deal with Dan to support LOR protocol coming out of an ECG natively?

Curious minds would want to know...

The problem is with the LOR protocol itself.  The LOR protocol was designed for a world of bad wiring and efficient use of bandwidth at really slow speeds.  That's completely different from the need of pixels, which is the whole reason you'd even need a device that supports thousands of channels.  Bad things happen when you load up pixels onto the LOR protocol...and that's not even including the issues with intellegent channels.  Maybe Fabian that used something like 6 iDMX's could provide a little insight into the "real world" limits.

Another whole issue is - LOR S2 is nearly impossible to use when you start talking 3,4,5,6k channels without something like SuperStar to do your sequencing. 

[ɟɐsʇǝppʎ]

Hmmmm.   Ed (j1sys) has been awfully quiet lately.  IF LOR is going to offer an ECG like device, would it make sense for him to work a deal with Dan to support LOR protocol coming out of an ECG natively?

Curious minds would want to know...

I know Ed was very keen to talk to Dan about LOR and the ECG, who knows he maybe quietly working on this for LOR and that may be the reason he has been so quiet.

Only my thoughts and nothing else

[j1sys]

sorry for the silence. busy working on hardware prototypes for new products that are critical path to get first test pass done ASAP and then proceed on production and software development.

i've had no direct interaction with dan since a brief introductory email back and forth late last fall. i plan on contacting him again and seeing if there is any possibility of cooperative projects. so no secret back room development going on at this time ...

i'm not sure what the future/need of LOR/E1.31 could/would be. i'm not an LOR savvy person, let alone an expert. i understand its protocol includes some shimmer and other features that may need to be taken into consideration. what software would talk E1.31+LOR or how the different pieces would interact is fuzzy (or not even visible) in my crystal ball.

-Ed

quick revision: i went and searched my email box for dan interaction to follow-up. no soap. it was PMs on LOR forums so i'll have to start there again.

[mschell]

To be honest, I have little exposure to the LOR protocol as well.  I was not trying to start any wild rumors, just throwing some thots out there...

Perhaps LOR is going to go down the DMX route, and choose to use DMX as the main protocol, who knows?

LOR is a very transactional protocol, so it is somewhat different from streaming DMX.  However, isn't Renard transactional as well?   In any case, making this work over Ethernet or E1.31 or whatever could be interesting.

[dmoore]

In any case, making this work over Ethernet or E1.31 or whatever could be interesting.

I guess  I would ask - what problem and for how many users, does having a DR4 that outputs the LOR protocol solve or help?  I really doubt that it's not possible but why?

[JonB256]

A slight wrinkle in the discussion. As noted in another thread about Renard protocols, it was noted that Renard and LOR both use Pins 4 and 5, but that their polarities are opposite. This involves the EthconGateway because of the jumpers on the ECG-DR4. There is a row of 4 jumpers per RJ45 jacks. Their purpose is to switch from DMX out on pins 1 and 2 to Renard out on pins 4 and 5. There is a pair for signal and a pair for ground wires.

Because of the polarity difference, you can't do the simple thing and switch to Renard jumpers (4 and 5) and output DMX to an LOR board (or D-Light).

But, if you can make an "X" using wire jumpers, you can output proper polarity DMX on 4 and 5 for LOR boards. Since I have a mix of D-Light (DMX), LOR and Lynx Express boards, I can reduce the number of polarity converters I'll need in my layout.

[mschell]

Here's how I handled the cable issue.   I made a short adapter that took the "standard" DMX connections (pins 1 and 2) and converted it to the LOR pinout and put these on my LOR DC controllers that I had in one box.   That way, no matter what was connected to that box, it just worked, as the external connection to the box was always the same.

Now, if you were daisy chaining to another LOR controller in another box, you'd have to watch which cable connected to where...

I wanted to keep it mostly simple, since I was already running other Cat-5 connections for some older "legacy" AL controllers that were also in my display.   As these get retired over time, I'll be running more and more DMX, especially with the move to more intelligent pixels and more E1.31 out in the yard.

[joeengler]

To be honest, I have little exposure to the LOR protocol as well.  I was not trying to start any wild rumors, just throwing some thots out there...

Perhaps LOR is going to go down the DMX route, and choose to use DMX as the main protocol, who knows?

LOR is a very transactional protocol, so it is somewhat different from streaming DMX.  However, isn't Renard transactional as well?   In any case, making this work over Ethernet or E1.31 or whatever could be interesting.

The lastest update from Dan is that S3 will be released in about 30days, however that release will NOT have E1.31 support that will come a little while later.