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[Mike Pyle]

I am easing into using some lighting at my dance events, and have aquired a small assortment of used pars and controllers. I have 2 Lightronics AS40 dimmers, a Lightronics footswitch controller and a NSI 7008 controller. The AS40 dimmers seem to function just fine with either controller. Am I safe in assuming that the LMX and MPX are just different names for the same protocol, or might I be creating future problems by mixing the components from the two companies?

Also, I have ordered the optional DMX kit to install in the 7008 controller. I think that the NSI stuff uses a 5 pin XLR for DMX. Can this be adapted to a 3 pin XLR (which some DMX dimmers use) and still function? I am wondering what the pinout would be.

Thanks!

[Craig Leerman]

Yes, the 2 protocols will work together. There are two basic variants. NSI's version normally supports 64 dimmers, but in certain cases does 96; the Leprecon and Lightronics versions support 128 dimmers. They all use 3-pin XLRs wired as follows: common on pin 1, console power on pin 2, and signal on pin 3.

As for the DMX 5 pin to 3 pin conversion, simply wire pin 1 to pin 1, pin 2 to pin 2, and pin 3 to pin 3. Pins 4 and 5 on the 5 wire are not used to transmit data in most DMX setups. They are considered "spare" data circuits and have been used by some companies for "feedback data" like dimmer tempature, or other control info. Although Pulsar & Clay Paky run  DMX512 & Power on a XLR 5 pin, its not the norm.

Craig

[Mike Pyle]

Thank you, Mr. Leerman!

[Ray Abbitt]

Mike Pyle wrote on Tue, 01 June 2004 23:37

I am easing into using some lighting at my dance events, and have aquired a small assortment of used pars and controllers. I have 2 Lightronics AS40 dimmers, a Lightronics footswitch controller and a NSI 7008 controller. The AS40 dimmers seem to function just fine with either controller. Am I safe in assuming that the LMX and MPX are just different names for the same protocol, or might I be creating future problems by mixing the components from the two companies? Also, I have ordered the optional DMX kit to install in the 7008 controller. I think that the NSI stuff uses a 5 pin XLR for DMX. Can this be adapted to a 3 pin XLR (which some DMX dimmers use) and still function? I am wondering what the pinout would be. Thanks!

See your email! I don't know what NSI charges for the DMX kit, but when I was faced with the same situation I went with the dmx-tools (http://www.dmx-tools.com) DMX-Lator II rather than add DMX kits to multiple controllers.

-ray