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Wireless DMX Latency - should I dump wireless?
Bob Faulkner:
I'm not a lighting person, but I understand DMX addressing and setting up DMX fixtures.
I have some DMX wireless units (from about 7 years ago). I got these from Springtree. Never used them for a show, till recently, a band is asking for lights... For testing, I'm setting up some scenes with 8 x PAR LED (RGB) stage wash lights using a Chauvet Stage Designer 50. All PAR lights have their own addressing. For the configuration, wireless DMX was setup between the light trees (to avoid running a cable between the trees). There is a DMX cable between the controller and the first tree. Observed latency between the trees was extremely high. I'm guessing close to 100ms of latency - you couldn't miss it! I remove the wireless option between the trees and move it to the controller. Observed latency between the controller and first tree appeared well below 100ms (manageable). However, the latency between the trees (now with a DMX cable) was still there, but much less than the original 100ms. It's almost as if the controller was delaying the sending if the commands to the second tree.
I removed all wireless from the setup and went back to all DMX cabling; there is virtually no latency.
Is DMX wireless worth the expense/effort? Is the controller the problem?
It would be nice to have a wireless solution. At this point, DMX wireless does not appear to be an answer.
Should I abandon wireless DMX?
Mark Norgren:
I use the Donner DMX wireless stuff and they work great. I'm sure there is a degree of latency, but for bands I'm calling it good. If I were to be doing lights for a theater company, it would be all hard wired.
Most drummers are off by 100ms! lol
Paul G. OBrien:
--- Quote from: Bob Faulkner on June 17, 2021, 09:31:36 AM ---I remove the wireless option between the trees and move it to the controller. Observed latency between the controller and first tree appeared well below 100ms (manageable). However, the latency between the trees (now with a DMX cable) was still there, but much less than the original 100ms. It's almost as if the controller was delaying the sending if the commands to the second tree.
--- End quote ---
That's not possible unless the delay is programed in, but you also proved that the wireless link isn't the problem.. you have some other issue. All hardwired fixtures should respond at the same time... assuming they are programmed to do so, if they don't I'd suspect the fixtures first... maybe a setting or a fault with one of them.
One thing to check is that all fixtures are set to slave mode, there cannot be any masters as they will hijack control of downstream fixtures.
Bob Faulkner:
--- Quote from: Mark Norgren on June 17, 2021, 09:50:42 AM ---I use the Donner DMX wireless stuff and they work great. I'm sure there is a degree of latency, but for bands I'm calling it good. If I were to be doing lights for a theater company, it would be all hard wired.
Most drummers are off by 100ms! lol
--- End quote ---
For sure! I thought about just going with it, but the delay was too distracting.
--- Quote from: Paul G. OBrien on June 17, 2021, 10:07:36 AM --- That's not possible unless the delay is programed in, but you also proved that the wireless link isn't the problem.. you have some other issue. All hardwired fixtures should respond at the same time... assuming they are programmed to do so, if they don't I'd suspect the fixtures first... maybe a setting or a fault with one of them.
One thing to check is that all fixtures are set to slave mode, there cannot be any masters as they will hijack control of downstream fixtures.
--- End quote ---
I agree, it should not be possible! It was baffling to watching. No delays were programmed. The trees function correctly (timing) when using all cabling. Good point about the master / slave configuration; though, from the manual, that setup shows it only works when using the fixtures without a controller.
I'm assuming DMX controllers send their data in a linear manner. Makes me wonder if the wireless units are unable to process the data fast enough. Sort of like using a 10-BaseT network components on a 1G network attached to 1G devices...?
Steve Litcher:
Is there any chance that any of the fixtures have some type of delay/fade built-in to them? Some of our old Blizzard HotBoxes had a setting that made it seem like there was latency... It wasn't immediately obvious, but once we corrected the setting on the fixtures, things were more responsive.
And more power/good-on-ya to Mark for getting the Donner stuff to behave... mine always seemed to drop connectivity/fail about 3-4 minutes before showtime. I eventually moved over the the SHoWBaby stuff and it was a massive stress reducer.
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