Prop and Lighting Issue

B

BigRedNole

Apprentice elf
Joined
Dec 6, 2016
Messages
58
Location
USA
First off, I am not sure if this is the correct place to post this issue. I am hoping it is. I am just starting to design my layout in Xlights. The first prop I am testing is a 480 pixel mini tree from Pixel Paradise. I am using a Falcon F16v3 to run the project. Below are the things I have done to test things out and points to the Tree setup in Xlights.

Potential Issues:
  1. My laptop took a spill from a 32oz drink. Everything appears fine, but you never know.
  2. The Falcon F16v3 has Port 1 completely dead. 2-16 function fine at least from the Falcon test and Xlights test.
Issue with Mini Tree:
  1. From Falcon test and Xlights test, all 480 pixels light up as the should in all testing
  2. Pixel 479 will sometime light up a solid wrong color and stay that way. Pixel 480 will not turn on at all.
Xlights Tree Setup
  1. Tree: Degrees 220; Rotation 3; Spiral Wrap 0; Bottom/Top Ratio 6; Perspective 2; Strand Direction Vertical; # Strings 2; Node/String 240; Strands/String 12; Location Bottom Left
  2. Setup is from the instructions from Pixel Paradise
  3. I have power injection on the last strand to be sure there is more than enough power going to all pixels (12v). In just the tests, there is no power issue so there shouldn't be with Xlights tree model.
  4. If I increase the number of pixels in Xlights to say 242 nodes per string, all pixels light up (484 pixels instead of 480). This does not solve the problem because those extra pixels in the nodes will run into the star on top.
Any ideas or things to look at in Xlights to get the last 2 pixels to work properly?
 
Last edited:
Start with the easy stuff.
First, make sure the first 2 pixels are actually working. All too often, people have it shifted and think the last ones aren't working when it's the first ones, which comes from testing with solid colors, chases, and other things where the pixels all do pretty much the same thing... (Probably you already confirmed this, but never hurts to check.)
Make sure you rerendered etc. Sometimes a complete refresh fixes things, never hurts to try if you are doing everything with as much automation as possible.
Do a "Check Sequence" in xLights, even if you don't have a sequence open. This will validate whether there's any weird stuff in your layout, such as overlapping channels, or other things that cause weird things to happen without being obviously wrong.
 
Go into Tools>Test>Models in Xlights and test things progressively to see if your wiring actually matches Xlights.
Test Node1, Node 480, Node 20, 21, 40,41 etc to see if there is an issue there.
If you don't see an issue there then can you post screenshots of the prop setup in xlights, the controller page, the visualiser and also the prop in FPP.
1755732237860.png
 
@merryoncherry Thank you for the information. I went through this test as described. I spot checked and narrowed down to where there was a node failure. It occurs at Node 171 on all of my strings. I have 12 strings of 240 pixels each. In all cases, Node 1-170 is perfectly fine. Once I hit Node 171 on all, the behavior is the same. Node 171 lights up only with Red channel and the following node lights up with the other 2. This is the same behavior on all strings. It would be completely and probably statisctically impossible for the same Node 171 to be damaged across 12 sets of lights.

I will run the test again using a different channel on the controller. Too early in the morning and lack of focus to tackle that right now. I will try when I am home from work this afternoon.
 
Aha. This is a great clue! A DMX universe holds 512 channels, which is 170 and two thirds of a pixel, so usually 510 channels are put in a packet. Is it possible that you have 510 in some places and 512 in others?
 
merryoncherry said:
Aha. This is a great clue! A DMX universe holds 512 channels, which is 170 and two thirds of a pixel, so usually 510 channels are put in a packet. Is it possible that you have 510 in some places and 512 in others?
Click to expand...
I set the F16v3 up long ago and went through that old setup video again. Setting up the Universes, there are 96 in total starting at Channel 1 to Channel 510 (170 pixels). This is most definitely the reason for the issue, but I haven't tracked down how to resolve it yet. When I went to test node by node, then channel by channel, everything is fine at Node 170 (Channels 508, 509, and 510). When I test Node 171, that pixel is 1 color and Node 172 is lit up with 2 color. In my mind, Node 171 is getting channels 511 and 512 and node 172 is getting channel 513 or something on those line. Just need to get the software side figured out. I will be doing more on Saturday and Sunday to get through it.

@AAH thank you. That test information is what pinpointed it to Pixel 170 and leading me to the universe set to 510. Need to do some more digging.
 
  • Like
Reactions: AAH
I wanted to give a thanks to @AAH, @Kent, and @merryoncherry. All of this helped solve the issue. It took resetting the F16v3 to factory defaults and starting the board from scratch. Port 1 is finally working again. Using DDP made it much easier to create the props in Xlights. Still a few little awkwards kinks to work out, but all is good. The only kink is getting the Mini Tree to populate correctly in Xlights. If I set it up as 2 strings of 240 pixels, it will put String 1 on one port and String 2 on the next port without allowing me to change. If I set it up as 1 string of 480 pixels, it works fine. I can look into that in more detail, but 99% of my issues resolved with this solution.
 
BigRedNole said:
The only kink is getting the Mini Tree to populate correctly in Xlights. If I set it up as 2 strings of 240 pixels, it will put String 1 on one port and String 2 on the next port without allowing me to change. If I set it up as 1 string of 480 pixels, it works fine. I can look into that in more detail, but 99% of my issues resolved with this solution.
Click to expand...
Assuming that the prop is only connected to 1 port, even though you are using multiple strings (2nd string connected to the end of the first and so on) then this makes sense to me as for xlights it is just 1 string. If you enter it as 2 strings, you are essentially telling xlights that you are using 2 ports on the controller for the prop.

Looking at the instruction on the Pixel Paradise site (excerpt below, emphasis mine), the image they give you with #string set at 2 is if not using injection, you mentioned in your post you are power injecting, so no need to enter as 2 strings.
7. Optionally, you may also want to secure your pigtails to the crossbars of the base ring. Our suggestion is to use 2 separate controller ports, one for each string of 240 if not power injecting.
Click to expand...

I treat #strings in xlights as the number of ports I am using for that prop.

For example, 1 of my props is 252 nodes, which I while have physically used 3 strings for it, I am running it from 1 port so I enter it as 1 string with 252 nodes.
 
christmasdave said:
I treat #strings in xlights as the number of ports I am using for that prop.

For example, 1 of my props is 252 nodes, which I while have physically used 3 strings for it, I am running it from 1 port so I enter it as 1 string with 252 nodes.
Click to expand...
Thank you. I am back into my learning curve in Xlights now. I set the F16v3 and sequences about 5 years ago and never did anything else. I am basically starting over again this year. I am glad that the issues on the F16v3 went away on the factory reset. Now learning about DDP and trying plan out Props-to-Ports again.

I will be using the F16v3 for testing and putting props together. I ordered a Genius Pro 32 which I will be using for my actual display this year.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top