Issues; Getting Xlights to send data correctly to Pixelsticks when a Model uses Shadow models

G

Gmick

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Jan 8, 2021
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Wow, I have spent time on this and not sure where to turn. I am running a show with 15000 pixels. My controllers are all Dig Octa controllers. I will say I am truly enjoying this but this issue has me stumped. This year I wante to switch all the Dig-octa from WLED to PPixelsticks and use a Raspberry Pi running FPP. The Raspberry PI will also be the bridge to the controllers allowing them to run in a seperate network. From what I know of FPP, it sens a lot less data around. This is all to try and stop lag, computer hicups etc. So, all controllers (11 so far) are switched to Pixelsticks, Raspberry Pi is running FPP, all is good.

Now for the fun part, Uploading the data from Xlights to the controllers. not working . I have to back up here, I have two Matrixes and 1 Megtree. The large Matrix has 4 controllers attached, the smaller Matrix has 2 controllers attached and the Mega tree has 2 controllers attached. To allow me to make the connections to multiple controllers for a model, I created shadow models for each of the matrixes and the Mega tree. This worked great when running WLED. But now when I try to upload to Pixelsticks, the file sizes are 305 bytes. According to what I looked up, this is basically a header data and that is it.

I am stuck, I have tried a lot of things and cannot get it to load the data correctly. any help out there?
How have you set up the Matrixes when you have 4400 pixels in a matrix? and one controller is not large enough?

At this point I am thinking to go back to WLED and pass a lot of data around but I really did not want to. As a note, I am using LAN wiring to connect the controllers together.
 
MikeKrebs said:
Can you manually upload to to controllers? Does everything work?
Click to expand...
3 controllers are connectd to props like snow flakes, candy canes and those load correctly. It is only the props that I am using shadow models that are loading files of 305 bytes. So I started everything up this morning ... I went to do a FPP COnnect
Out of 11 controllers it only displayed 9. where did the other 2 go?
I ran with what I had and did the upload.
Yard1A - Candy canes and mini trees - loaded file size 3,167,120
Yard 1B - 2 vertical matrixs with 576 pixels each, (no shadow) - 4,063,686
Matrix 1A - shadow - 27,123 (seems a little low)
Matrix 1B - Shadow - 303 bytes
Matrix 2a - Shadow - 303 bytes
Matrix 2b - Shadow - 31,734
Matrix 2c - Shadow - 0 (did not show in the FPP Connect)
Matrix 2d - Shadow - 22,961
MegaTree1A - Shadow - 28,903
MegaTree1B - SHadow - 1,235,126
Yard2A - Arches - 0 (Did not show in the FPP Connect)

SO looking at this, it is all over the board. The FSEQ on the Raspberry pi is 21.98 MB

I ran FPP Connect a second time and all 11 controllers showed up.
Running the upload.
Yard1A - Candy canes and mini trees - now 303
Yard 1B - 2 vertical matrixs with 576 pixels each, (no shadow) - now 303
Matrix 1A - shadow - 303 bytes
Matrix 1B - Shadow - 303 bytes
Matrix 2a - Shadow - 303 bytes
Matrix 2b - Shadow - 303
Matrix 2c - Shadow - 303
Matrix 2d - Shadow - 303
MegaTree1A - Shadow - 303
MegaTree1B - SHadow - 303
Yard2A - Arches - 0 (Did not show in the FPP Connect) - 1,084,063
So now all was wiped ouyt except for Yard2A which was not selected the first time.

So currently nothing is playing, even when I run from Xlights.
This really is disheartning. I do not know if this is me or the software but I do not understand. I have looked at as many videos as I can to try and understand if I am doing something wrong. not sure.

At this point I feel I have to get everything back to WLED and forget about trying to get FPP working.
 
I would suggest jumping in the zoom room where you can share your screen and chat realtime with someone who is able to assist, there are loads of variables (network architecture, and others) that come into play that is difficult to explain and comprehend in a text-based environment.
 
So frustration hit the max this weekend. As I am going to be away for most of August and all of September need/needed the controllers to be working correctly so they can be setup in October before the snow flies. I have now moved 9 of the DIG-OCTA controlers back to WLED and tested and they are working just fine. I have also setup a seperate wired network using a spare ASUS router I had and changed the LAN setup to be able to run the show on the seperate (second) network. The last controller boards I will give one last chance today to get them working and if not then they also will be convered back to WLED software. I will say the WLED software is very stable and has always worked. The only complaint is that we cant reduce the network traffic with them.

Basically All I was trying to do was be efficient and try and reduce traffic for a better show. I dont know if others are having the same issues with the Pixelstick on the dig-octa or just me.

There is a lot of information out there and I think I looked at it all. I guess the last regret I have is not going the FPP route from the beginning.

Lastl;y, I have no idea where the Zoom room is but. I have tried to join some other conversations but really, being not that tech savy have not figured how to join. Thank you eveyone for suggestions and help, I will get through this as I know the backup plan.

Just a note though, this has been the second year I have tried to get Pixelstick working, so it does have one more strike before it is out totally.
 
I do apologize. My daughter is have a rough pregnacy and we are on 'grand baby watch'. but that said. My props work fine with WLED software so I think I willl stick with that this year. Get everything ready now for the October setup. We need to setup early because we can have snow on the ground beginning of October and I really do not realish the thought of setup in the snow. The Props are working with WLED and the two I am converting back now to wled, are working if I just use Pixelstick with no FPP and running from the XLIGHTs so not sure what was going wrong. But like Merryonscherry said, the best one is the one that is working. Just for fun, I may look at FPP and Pixelstick on the esp next spring when I have more time to figure what is going on.

For now, seperate wired network for the show, using WLED on Dig-Octa, and XScheduler running on a PC within that network.

Thankyou all for your help and merry pixeling.
 
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