Does powered Cat5 come out of the 16-port Active Hub?

[Steve Gase]

As I've interpreted things up to this point...

• the USB dongle does not supply power to lights over the cat5
• the EtherDongle does not supply power to the lights over the cat5
• if you want power over cat5 you use a passive 4-port to place power onto the outgoing cat5 connectors

What about the 16-port active hub?  It does pass power over the pixel net, but does it ALSO put 12V power to the outgoing DMX connector?  If not, could I use a jumper to pass power to the outgoing DMX cat5 pins?

Are there any problems with having power on the cat5 coming into a passive 4-port hub, such that the 4-port replaces the outgoing power with that arriving from the new supply?

I am sure that there is better terminology to describe this... does my question make sense?

Thanks!

[rrowan]

Yes the 16 port active hub supplies power to the SSCs. It does not send 12v to the output connectors (pixelnet, dmx)

The 4 port hub does not get power from the input cat5 but outputs power to the 4 output plugs from a separate 12volt connector on board

Rick R.

[Steve Gase]

It does not send 12v to the output connectors (pixelnet, dmx)

Can you think of a reason why a mod/jumper to bring power over to the DMX would be inadvisable?

The 4 port hub does not get power from the input cat5 but outputs power to the 4 output plugs from a separate 12volt connector on board

...and if power came in on the cat5, would it be discarded so that the new power on the 12v connector would be use on the outgoing?  -- just looking to see if I need to remove power from a powered DXM cat5 before using a hub.

[rrowan]

It does not send 12v to the output connectors (pixelnet, dmx)

Can you think of a reason why a mod/jumper to bring power over to the DMX would be inadvisable?

The 4 port hub does not get power from the input cat5 but outputs power to the 4 output plugs from a separate 12volt connector on board

...and if power came in on the cat5, would it be discarded so that the new power on the 12v connector would be use on the outgoing?  -- just looking to see if I need to remove power from a powered DXM cat5 before using a hub.

The power pin of the rj-45 jack are not connected to the circuit on the pcb. So if there is power there, it never sees it.
The lynx dmx devices don't use any power from the cat5 cable since there would be a chance of drawing more power than the tiny wires inside the cat5 cable could handle.

Rick R.

[wbuehler]

Let's make sure we are editing posts that do not belong to you.

Bill

[Steve Gase]

oops, sorry!
I didn't realize that I edit someone else's response!
I thought I was quoting.

I went back to email to find what else was said by tbone321. 


Quote from: rrowan on Today at 11:38 AM
It does not send 12v to the output connectors (pixelnet, dmx)

Quote from Steve Gase
Can you think of a reason why a mod/jumper to bring power over to the DMX would be inadvisable?

Quote from: tbone321
The real question is what purpose would that serve?  None of the current Lynks DMX devices use power over CAT5 and putting it their could cause damage if the wrong combination of devices are connected.

Quote from: rrowan on Today at 11:38 AM
The 4 port hub does not get power from the input cat5 but outputs power to the 4 output plugs from a separate 12volt connector on board

Quote from: Steve Gase
...and if power came in on the cat5, would it be discarded so that the new power on the 12v connector would be use on the outgoing?  -- just looking to see if I need to remove power from a powered DXM cat5 before using a hub.

Quote from: tbone321
The passive splitter only uses the first pair for splitting.  The other three pairs on the input are not connected to anything.  Since there is no connection between the remanining pairs between the input and output, any voltage coming in on those pairs goes no further than the input connector.  The other three pairs on the outputs are conneted to the 12V terminals.

[RJ]

Do not put power on the data lines, only the pixelnet outputs to the SSC's are suppost to have it, the other systems expect data on all lines and power put on them will be a very bad thing as in damaging.
 
RJ

[chrisatpsu]

I don't wish to make this a technical conversation, if I have, then please just message me instead.

If the active hub is configured for pixelnet universe #1, beside the fact that the 16 outputs also output power, do they output the same thing as the 2 pixelnet outputs.

to ask if a different way, besides the fact that 16 ports also send power, do the 18 pixelnet outputs act the same way as long as the hub is set on universe #1? (to keep the data on the same pins) [i'm not asking if the data comes out on the same pins or not, just asking if what comes out of the 16 ports as far as data is concerned, is the same that comes out of the 2 pixelnet outputs.]

[rrowan]

Simple answer

Pixelnet inputs and outputs have all the channels sent out by the dongle. The jumpers for the universe selects the the dmx (512 channels) range and the 16 ports pixelnet range (4k channels) only. As per the channel chart in the wiki You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login

Rick R.

[chrisatpsu]

what i meant though, is the actual data sent out of the 16 ports, the same as the data sent over the two pixelnet outputs for whatever universe the hub is set for?

i was referring to just the data, the 1's and 0's,

is what i'm getting from one of the 2 pixelnet outputs, the same as what i'm getting from the 16 active ports (minus the power)?

[rrowan]

depends on the dongle being used.

If usb dongle (pixelnet) than its sending out 4k of channels. The 16 ports only send out 4k of channels

If using the etherdongle then its send out of 16k of channels. the 16 ports only send out the 4k of channels selected range by the jumper

Rick R.

[chrisatpsu]

so...  could i attach a passive hub to either port? (if i was using pixel uni #1)

[Steve Gase]

Yes the 16 port active hub supplies power to the SSCs. It does not send 12v to the output connectors (pixelnet, dmx)

The 4 port hub does not get power from the input cat5 but outputs power to the 4 output plugs from a separate 12volt connector on board

Rick R.

ok... 

as I understand it, you can cascade multiple 4-port passive hubs.

--dmx--->[   ]-----(1x dmx connection WITH 12v added)-------------------->[   ]-----(1x dmx connection WITH 12v added)-------------------->[   ]
--12v--->[hub]-----(3x dmx connections WITH 12v added)--->       --12v--->[hub]-----(3x dmx connections WITH 12v added)--->       --12v--->[hub]

so, the hubs know enough to discard incoming 12v power, and there is an assumption that the dmx w/12v is something that can be handed off to a bunch of powerless dmx devices (for example a lawn filled with corostars or illuminaries).

if that is true, then is there miscommunication? 

i see from RJ:

Do not put power on the data lines, only the pixelnet outputs to the SSC's are suppost to have it, the other systems expect data on all lines and power put on them will be a very bad thing as in damaging.

I am not interested in adding power to the data lines, but instead using "unused" wires in the cat5 to carry 12v to the devices. 

if that is permissible, then wouldn't my original question be valid...  could I connect the 12v to unused pins of the DMX connector on the Active Port Hub so that it could supply power to my powerless DMX devices?

Sorry that I'm reasking an answered question, but I've been seeing others talk about supplying 12v over cat5, with other devices, and I'm wondering if that could be (or already is) the way that Lynx might work -- or could be extended to work.

Thanks, 
Steve

[tbone321]

what i meant though, is the actual data sent out of the 16 ports, the same as the data sent over the two pixelnet outputs for whatever universe the hub is set for?

i was referring to just the data, the 1's and 0's,

is what i'm getting from one of the 2 pixelnet outputs, the same as what i'm getting from the 16 active ports (minus the power)?

Maybe I'm reading your question incorrectly but the PixelNet outputs will put out what is going into the PixelNet input regardless of the jumper settings.  The jumpers settings only control what universe the active hub(s) are putting out to the 16 SSC ports and / or what Pixelnet universe the DMX converter is working with.  There should be no 12V on any of the pins on the Pixelnet outputs. 

[mykroft]

Correct me if I am wrong, but the way I understand it...

1st pair - univ 1
2nd pair - univ 2
3rd pair - univ 3
4th pair - univ 4

the input expects this, and this exact same is sent to the output pixelnet ports with no power.

So - you could have 1st active hub and univ 1 > 2nd hub - univ 2 > 3rd hub - univ 1 (dups what is output from 1st hub) > 4th hub univ 3 > 5th hub univ 4 etc.....

so if you used the pixelnet output to go to a passive 4 port hub - you could never get univ 2 3 or 4 data, as it is expecting its data coming from the 1st pair ....?

and i assume the univ jumpers on the active hub just send pair x's (universe) data to pair 1's spot on the 16 rj45 connectors since the 1st pair is used by the SSCs for data?

Thanks
Myk