need advice on changes

[kfxi]

For the past three seasons I have running my show with Vixen 2.1.1.0 and a usb dongle and 15 lynx express boxes.  I had about 210 channels.  Now it is time to expand.  I want to add three mega trees using 72 strands of dumb strings.  I have built a ether dongle  and smart string hub and I have three more smart string hubs to build.  Now the questions

!. I know I need to upgrade Vixen but to what version and do I need to add any addons.  Where do I find the up grade for Vixen

2.  I assume I will need to use E1.31 for all channels in vixen and then convert the first 512 channels to dmx at the smart string hub.

3.  What if any are the wiring differences between smart strings and dumb strings. I have all my dumb string controllers built.

4. I envision the process to be Vixen to ether dongle then to a smart string hub,  then split with first 512 channels going to the lynx express boxes and the pixels going to the dumb string controllers, is this correct.

Please give me any comments on my proposed layout and any corrections I need to make.

thanks for any comments you have including "you don't have a clue what to do"

Ken

[tbone321]

For the past three seasons I have running my show with Vixen 2.1.1.0 and a usb dongle and 15 lynx express boxes.  I had about 210 channels.  Now it is time to expand.  I want to add three mega trees using 72 strands of dumb strings.  I have built a ether dongle  and smart string hub and I have three more smart string hubs to build.  Now the questions

!. I know I need to upgrade Vixen but to what version and do I need to add any addons.  Where do I find the up grade for Vixen

If you are using dumb strings, then you probably don't need to upgrade Vixen or if you decide to perhaps Vixen+ may d it for you.

3.  What if any are the wiring differences between smart strings and dumb strings. I have all my dumb string controllers built.

Smart and dumb strings are completely different devices so the wiring is also completely different.  Dumb strings use 4 wires with a +12V and a seperate ground for each of the colors.  Smart strings use three wires with a +12V, a ground, and the data wire.  You can't use smart strings with a dumb string controller or dumb strings with a smart string controller.

4. I envision the process to be Vixen to ether dongle then to a smart string hub,  then split with first 512 channels going to the lynx express boxes and the pixels going to the dumb string controllers, is this correct.

The order is correct but the channels that you use for DMX is up to you.  You can set the active hub to provide DMX on any one of eight segments of the Pixelnet Universe.  The hub willl also send those same channels on the Pixelnet outputs so make sure that you address the DSC's properly, startig at channel 513 if you are using the first 512 for DMX.

[jnealand]

I did a little of what you are speaking of the last two years.  I am still running vixen 2.1.4? with a bunch of LEs and a couple thousand smart strings and one dumb string that I put on a star.  Vixen works fine, it just doesn't have some of the features of newer software.  I started my smart strings by just converting my old sequences and using hybrid mode I just did color changes, but I only had one string of lights on my gutters and windows and just one cat 5 cable going to each instead of having 3 or 4 strings of lights (different colors) and 3 or 4 extension cords going to each element. After that was working I started playing with individual pixels and did some chases around my windows.  Last year I added a 7ft pixel tree and used nutcracker to generate some functionality.  This year I will be looking at expanding my use of nutcracker and will be taking a look at Vixen 3 and vixen plus as well as giving lsp another shot since I already own that.  Lots of choice, but my recommendation is to go slow and don't try to be to fancy to fast.