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Author Topic: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working  (Read 3923 times)

Terry McCormack

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Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« on: July 29, 2021, 01:31:38 PM »

Hey guys,

I recently got 4 new Chinese beam 230 7r moving heads. Im having one issue. When on sound or auto they work flawlessly. When i use one as a master on sound and the other 3 connected to it they sync up with no problems at all the DMX green light comes on saying theyre working ETC.  As soon as i plug in my controller (enttec ode mk2 with luminair) they go limp the dmx light cuts off and they wont function. The same thing happens if I have only one light hooked up to the controller DMX does nothing for it. Anyone seen, heard or had these problems? The controller works great with all my slim pars and other lights if hooked just not on these. HELP!!!
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Scott Holtzman

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Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #1 on: July 29, 2021, 02:49:59 PM »

Hey guys,

I recently got 4 new Chinese beam 230 7r moving heads. Im having one issue. When on sound or auto they work flawlessly. When i use one as a master on sound and the other 3 connected to it they sync up with no problems at all the DMX green light comes on saying theyre working ETC.  As soon as i plug in my controller (enttec ode mk2 with luminair) they go limp the dmx light cuts off and they wont function. The same thing happens if I have only one light hooked up to the controller DMX does nothing for it. Anyone seen, heard or had these problems? The controller works great with all my slim pars and other lights if hooked just not on these. HELP!!!


You are welcome to use my dumpster to dispose of them and get some lights that work.


Many of us have tried to go down that path with Charpies.  They never work right, the colors are awful and don't match between batches, they move too slow, the profiles don't match.


The fact you are yelling at us for help says it all.  You just bought them, they won't help you?  Did you take them apart and see if everything is buttoned up inside, especially the ribbons?



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Scott AKA "Skyking" Holtzman

Ghost Audio Visual Solutions, LLC
Cleveland OH
www.ghostav.rocks

Terry McCormack

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Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #2 on: July 29, 2021, 04:33:22 PM »


You are welcome to use my dumpster to dispose of them and get some lights that work.


Many of us have tried to go down that path with Charpies.  They never work right, the colors are awful and don't match between batches, they move too slow, the profiles don't match.


The fact you are yelling at us for help says it all.  You just bought them, they won't help you?  Did you take them apart and see if everything is buttoned up inside, especially the ribbons?

They work great if they are dasiy chained together as 1 set on sound and 3 set on dmx.. soon as i put the 4th one on DMX and plug in the controller blah nothing. The colors and everything on auto and sound work and look great the place i got them from literally keeps telling me that i need to change the dmx in and out outlets.. ive switched them out with other lights i have to no avail...

The place i got them from is now asking me to help them resell them to someone else WTF!
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Scott Holtzman

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Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #3 on: July 29, 2021, 05:10:33 PM »

They work great if they are dasiy chained together as 1 set on sound and 3 set on dmx.. soon as i put the 4th one on DMX and plug in the controller blah nothing. The colors and everything on auto and sound work and look great the place i got them from literally keeps telling me that i need to change the dmx in and out outlets.. ive switched them out with other lights i have to no avail...

The place i got them from is now asking me to help them resell them to someone else WTF!


Should they not be on slave?  That's the kind of weirdness though?  Do you have an active DMX splitter to test and see if it is some sort of line loading issue.


I am not going to debate how well they work, I thought the same thing too, until I started to get exposed to real lights, then the light came on!



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Scott AKA "Skyking" Holtzman

Ghost Audio Visual Solutions, LLC
Cleveland OH
www.ghostav.rocks

Terry McCormack

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Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #4 on: July 29, 2021, 05:36:13 PM »


Should they not be on slave?  That's the kind of weirdness though?  Do you have an active DMX splitter to test and see if it is some sort of line loading issue.


I am not going to debate how well they work, I thought the same thing too, until I started to get exposed to real lights, then the light came on!

My buddy has literally the same lights same system and work flawlessly and here i am arguing with a company about changing parts lol. I appreciate it guys. Im going to assume its some kind of software issue that I cannot fix on my own.... thanks...
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Jeff Lelko

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Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #5 on: July 29, 2021, 08:28:06 PM »

...the place i got them from literally keeps telling me that i need to change the dmx in and out outlets...

That doesn't really make sense to me.

Not to pile on, but this is the sort of thing you deal with when buying Chinese clones.  That's not to say all name-brand lights are perfect, but at least when going that route you have a parts and service rep who can step in when you hit a wall troubleshooting or servicing fixtures yourself.  You get what you pay for...

All that aside, keep troubleshooting to see if you can isolate a faulty unit, a faulty cable, etc.  It sounds to me that at least one unit is corrupting the DMX signal, which could be due to an incorrect unit setting or possibly a bad PCB in the fixture itself.  If that doesn't work I'd consider the route that Scott suggests and split the lights up to see if that helps (using a proper DMX splitter - never a Y-cable).  Good luck!
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Scott Holtzman

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Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #6 on: July 30, 2021, 01:36:38 AM »

That doesn't really make sense to me.

Not to pile on, but this is the sort of thing you deal with when buying Chinese clones.  That's not to say all name-brand lights are perfect, but at least when going that route you have a parts and service rep who can step in when you hit a wall troubleshooting or servicing fixtures yourself.  You get what you pay for...

All that aside, keep troubleshooting to see if you can isolate a faulty unit, a faulty cable, etc.  It sounds to me that at least one unit is corrupting the DMX signal, which could be due to an incorrect unit setting or possibly a bad PCB in the fixture itself.  If that doesn't work I'd consider the route that Scott suggests and split the lights up to see if that helps (using a proper DMX splitter - never a Y-cable).  Good luck!


Yeah really, I actually buried a useful statement inside that snark and I still get the hand.


I liken the Chinese lights to compulsive gamblers.  Everyone you know has gone up to the table and lost but that one guy has the formula, he is buying spares, found a "great" seller, knows how to fix them.  I know them well because I tried myself and lost.  Just sharing my pain.  I get it though, guy trunk slams on the weekend, saves his cheese, buys $1200 worth of 7R's and maybe some equally shitty Chinese cases, he knows in his heart nobody pays him more to bring lights, oh and his "buddy" has a set and they work great, then you hook them up and you get weird behavior.  How about this one?  You spend hours using some crap PC to program a few scenes, you have them all lined up however one moves slower than the rest, or the govo wheel is different, the LED colors don't line up, then the fans die, If they are not LED you have to keep bulbs and ballasts around.  Been there, got the Polaroids.  The recovery program is easy, start getting a few gigs that you have to hire an LD and real lights.  In 30 minutes they program a show that looks better than anything I ever did on Showxpress and the lights haul ass, they have awesome effects, you get shown how cool moving pars are that you can actually frame your artists as they move around.  I do have some Chinese blinders that don't suck but I am sure one will break on a gig and embarrass me.   
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Scott AKA "Skyking" Holtzman

Ghost Audio Visual Solutions, LLC
Cleveland OH
www.ghostav.rocks

Mark Norgren

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Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #7 on: July 30, 2021, 08:14:16 AM »

I too fell into the Chinese trap.  When they worked, it was fine.  But every time I plugged them in, I never knew what was going to happen or in half the cases, not happen.  I now have gone to name brand stuff and guess what, they work every time!   NO shit, go figure!
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Paul G. OBrien

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Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #8 on: July 30, 2021, 10:05:39 AM »

As soon as i plug in my controller (enttec ode mk2 with luminair) they go limp the dmx light cuts off and they wont function. The same thing happens if I have only one light hooked up to the controller DMX does nothing for it. Anyone seen, heard or had these problems? The controller works great with all my slim pars and other lights if hooked just not on these. HELP!!!

What does the "fine owners manual" have to say about DMX operation...  :o Does it suggest a certain mode needs to be set on the fixture? That's a bit of a sarcastic retorical question because I know first hand how useless the included documentation can be with these direct from china fixtures, and I don't know how technically savvy you are so the most likely issue is that you just don't have the fixtures setup correctly for DMX operation, for older style fixtures it may not be a simple plug and play thing.
Unfortunatly for you I have never seen that issue, all the gear I purchased over there works exactly as expected, but I'll suggest something you can try.. invert polarity on the DMX output, that will be done in the software.
The only communications issue I have seen with any fixture was with a set of led bars that refused to work with a wireless dongle, they worked just fine hard wired to software or hardware controllers and even worked with the wireless dongle if it is buffered via a dmx splitter, but not when it is directly connected to the wireless unit.
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Jonathan Goodall

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Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #9 on: August 03, 2021, 03:02:38 AM »

Have had the pleasure of using 4 of a version of these and found that, unless they were set to 20ch dmx  mode (not 16), they would not work in a chain past the first fixture.
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ProSoundWeb Community

Re: Beam 7r 230 DMX not working
« Reply #9 on: August 03, 2021, 03:02:38 AM »


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