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[duane massey]

SD2 has not been updated in quite a while, and the SD3 was discontinued when Elation acquired the Hedgehog. SD2 is a unique stand-alone controller that is very powerful and far ahead of anything else in it's price range.
The M2PC is quite a bit more expensive, and is certainly approaching the realm of "big boy" consoles.
All depends upon your needs/abilities. Personally prefer the footprint of the SD2 (48 scenes active at one time x 99 pages), but I'm an old-school guy who likes that approach. I'm also not a big fan of Light Jockey software, but (again) that's a personal choice.

[Marc Paolella]

You need to change your username to your full real name per forum rules.

The Show Designer and Martin series are completely different products.  There's a learning curve to the Martin, but it's a full-featured touring-capable lighting desk, including pixel mapping.  The Show Designer does about 3% of what Martin software can do.  That may or may not be a disadvantage, depending on what you're trying to do.

On the lower-price end of things, Martin M-Touch is what you want, along with a touch-screen laptop, rather than the M2PC.

Thanks. Name changed. I didn't realize that was a rule.

Thank you for this evaluation. This sort of tells me which way to go. If I am going to spend $1,500 on SD2, and I can get the M2PC for $3,000+/- which is a)more capable, b)able to handle professional fixtures, and c)more relevant to the current standards of the profession and more updated and growing, then I will spring for the more expensive solution. I am an amateur newbie, but I always like to be working with professional products. I don't mind complexity and learning curves, as learning is most of the fun in doing anything. Heck, I chose Avid Media Composer as my first video editor, so that tells you how dysfunctional I am. And the new fixtures that keep showing up every year seem to grow in capability and complexity. So I want a lighting controller/software package that won't have a problem dealing with that in the future. Martin also seems to be solicitous of newcomers by making it relatively cheap to get started in this most interesting activity.

SD2 does look cool though. I might look for a used one for $800 or so. Can't be a bad idea to learn both of them.

[TJ (Tom) Cornish]

Thanks. Name changed. I didn't realize that was a rule.

Thank you for this evaluation. This sort of tells me which way to go. If I am going to spend $1,500 on SD2, and I can get the M2PC for $3,000+/- which is a)more capable, b)able to handle professional fixtures, and c)more relevant to the current standards of the profession and more updated and growing, then I will spring for the more expensive solution. I am an amateur newbie, but I always like to be working with professional products. I don't mind complexity and learning curves, as learning is most of the fun in doing anything. Heck, I chose Avid Media Composer as my first video editor, so that tells you how dysfunctional I am. And the new fixtures that keep showing up every year seem to grow in capability and complexity. So I want a lighting controller/software package that won't have a problem dealing with that in the future. Martin also seems to be solicitous of newcomers by making it relatively cheap to get started in this most interesting activity.

SD2 does look cool though. I might look for a used one for $800 or so. Can't be a bad idea to learn both of them.

To Duane - M-PC != Light Jockey. If you haven't taken a look recently, you should. Make sure you are using a touch screen to eval - the software was intended for touch.

Marc, according to the Martin rep I've spoken to, the M2 series is actually older and less desirable than a touch screen PC with an M-Touch. A M-Touch setup should be ~$1500 including a new touchscreen laptop.

[Marc Paolella]

To Duane - M-PC != Light Jockey. If you haven't taken a look recently, you should. Make sure you are using a touch screen to eval - the software was intended for touch.

Marc, according to the Martin rep I've spoken to, the M2 series is actually older and less desirable than a touch screen PC with an M-Touch. A M-Touch setup should be ~$1500 including a new touchscreen laptop.

Excellent info. I kind of thought the M-Touch was intended more as an extension to an M2PC or M2GO. But if it's able to effectively coordinate with the software all by itself, then that might be a heck of a way to go, and for far less money.

[Marc Paolella]

Excellent info. I kind of thought the M-Touch was intended more as an extension to an M2PC or M2GO. But if it's able to effectively coordinate with the software all by itself, then that might be a heck of a way to go, and for far less money.

Wow, just did some research. What a cool damned thing. I'm going to get one of these and see how it works. The "faders" are touch sensitive! It seems like something that you can "play" as much as something you can program. Good looking too! For $469, I'm in. I wonder how it would work with a nice high resolution Microsoft Surface 4. Or perhaps a larger Dell Inspiron 17 inch would work better.

Here are some mini-reviews that clarify some aspects of this neat piece of gear:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms9t_AVKacg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sPXtCliMjM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgWv_-Uk6sM

[TJ (Tom) Cornish]

Wow, just did some research. What a cool damned thing. I'm going to get one of these and see how it works. The "faders" are touch sensitive! It seems like something that you can "play" as much as something you can program. Good looking too! For $469, I'm in. I wonder how it would work with a nice high resolution Microsoft Surface 4. Or perhaps a larger Dell Inspiron 17 inch would work better.

Here are some mini-reviews that clarify some aspects of this neat piece of gear:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms9t_AVKacg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sPXtCliMjM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgWv_-Uk6sM

I have a Surface Pro 1 and I find it a little small. The Surface Pro 3 and 4 are slightly larger, which would help. Bigger would also be good as the software layout is customizable.  I was looking at the larger HP Spectre 360 which is 15".

[Marc Paolella]

I have a Surface Pro 1 and I find it a little small. The Surface Pro 3 and 4 are slightly larger, which would help. Bigger would also be good as the software layout is customizable.  I was looking at the larger HP Spectre 360 which is 15".

The Spectre looks pretty hot, 15.6" at 1920x1080 seems like a good balance of resolution and screen size. I would probably upgrade it to the core i7 which would bump up the price. The only other task would be removing the bloatware that HP loves to stuff on all their computers.

I love the concept of the Surface, but if you look online, there are so many complaints about stability, it gives one serious pause.

[Scott Holtzman]

The Spectre looks pretty hot, 15.6" at 1920x1080 seems like a good balance of resolution and screen size. I would probably upgrade it to the core i7 which would bump up the price. The only other task would be removing the bloatware that HP loves to stuff on all their computers.

I love the concept of the Surface, but if you look online, there are so many complaints about stability, it gives one serious pause.

I have a Lenovo Yoga with an i7.  It is a touchscreen laptop with an articulating hinge that allows you to fold the keyboard back and use it as a tablet.

At first I was excited, it's small enough to replace the Samsung tablet I keep on my table in the media room.  However after awhile the shine came off.  Windows 10 is slick but the tablet only mode just isn't an Android or an Apple.  It's also as pointed out not quite as stable as I would hope though that has improved with every weekly update.  The Windows store apps are really lagging behind their Android and Apple counterparts, especially Tapatalk so I still have the Yoga and the table.

The Yoga is the nicest small laptop I have ever owned, but the touchscreen is just a curiosity.  Occasionally using touch screen instead of touchpad gets me where I need (like zooming and panning on a picture).

The one device dream is still a long way away.  You need a lot of tools to get the job done still.  I have a desktop with a 4k display and a bunch of other screens at the office and home, a Macbook for recording and other audio apps, the Yoga, an iPad mini, three Android tablets and an old Core 2 Duo running XP for some legacy apps on older equipment.  That's a lot of gear for one guy.

My guys are all over the board.  I think your computing devices are as personal a choice as your socks.

[Marc Paolella]

I have a Lenovo Yoga with an i7.  It is a touchscreen laptop with an articulating hinge that allows you to fold the keyboard back and use it as a tablet.

At first I was excited, it's small enough to replace the Samsung tablet I keep on my table in the media room.  However after awhile the shine came off.  Windows 10 is slick but the tablet only mode just isn't an Android or an Apple.  It's also as pointed out not quite as stable as I would hope though that has improved with every weekly update.  The Windows store apps are really lagging behind their Android and Apple counterparts, especially Tapatalk so I still have the Yoga and the table.

The Yoga is the nicest small laptop I have ever owned, but the touchscreen is just a curiosity.  Occasionally using touch screen instead of touchpad gets me where I need (like zooming and panning on a picture).

The one device dream is still a long way away.  You need a lot of tools to get the job done still.  I have a desktop with a 4k display and a bunch of other screens at the office and home, a Macbook for recording and other audio apps, the Yoga, an iPad mini, three Android tablets and an old Core 2 Duo running XP for some legacy apps on older equipment.  That's a lot of gear for one guy.

My guys are all over the board.  I think your computing devices are as personal a choice as your socks.

All very true. I am running a 3 display system with a 4K LG31MU97 at 4096x2160 in the middle and 30 inch 2560x1600 displays on either side. MIDI keyboards all over the place, DMXIS hanging out of a USB port, Maschine Studio and S61 controller, Presonus 24AI mixer, MBox Pro, you name it. Stability is very so-so. As of tonight, my hard disk has some corrupt files that cannot be removed or repaired. Fortunately the damned thing runs, but it does crash periodically. My latest experiment has been trying to get the Maschine Studio to trigger songs and associated programmed light cues by hitting a pad. I think it can be done but it will involve some creative improvisation.

For this lighting laptop I am thinking of installing only lighting-specific software, nothing else. No Creative Cloud, no MS Office, no ProTools, no Avid, no Internet Explorer, no nothing. I want the thing to run as stable as humanly possible and I'm not sure any Windows 10 system with a plethora of audio and video drivers is capable of being crash proof at this point. I already have a laptop for computing, I envision that this laptop is basically going to be a Martin M-PC lighting server and not much of anything else. I want stability, but I fear it is an impossible dream, a fool's errand. But I never stop trying though, do I? No, I don't.

[Scott Holtzman]

All very true. I am running a 3 display system with a 4K LG31MU97 at 4096x2160 in the middle and 30 inch 2560x1600 displays on either side. MIDI keyboards all over the place, DMXIS hanging out of a USB port, Maschine Studio and S61 controller, Presonus 24AI mixer, MBox Pro, you name it. Stability is very so-so. As of tonight, my hard disk has some corrupt files that cannot be removed or repaired. Fortunately the damned thing runs, but it does crash periodically. My latest experiment has been trying to get the Maschine Studio to trigger songs and associated programmed light cues by hitting a pad. I think it can be done but it will involve some creative improvisation.

For this lighting laptop I am thinking of installing only lighting-specific software, nothing else. No Creative Cloud, no MS Office, no ProTools, no Avid, no Internet Explorer, no nothing. I want the thing to run as stable as humanly possible and I'm not sure any Windows 10 system with a plethora of audio and video drivers is capable of being crash proof at this point. I already have a laptop for computing, I envision that this laptop is basically going to be a Martin M-PC lighting server and not much of anything else. I want stability, but I fear it is an impossible dream, a fool's errand. But I never stop trying though, do I? No, I don't.

For the lighting server have you considered running Windows SBS?  It's expensive but light.  You can turn off all the services you don't need and not have to deal with the auto update crap (I prefer to decide when to apply my updates thank you).

While we are on the subject, I love my 4k display as I am sure you do to but Windows is really dumb about the scaling and doesn't provide good tools for tweaking it.  If I open one more terminal session and am greeted with sub micron fonts I think I will empty my Browning Gold Cup into the damn thing.

[ProSoundWeb Community]