smartstring help

[grumpy2076]

Ok im new to smart strings, so with that said, i have the dongle, do i have to get the eather dongle to do smart strings and is there anything i should know on how to use them in vixen?

[mykroft]

you dont need the etherdongle if you have a usb dongle already - usb dongle lets you do 1 universe of pixelnet (4096 channels) and etherdongle lets you do 4 universes.

After which ever dongle you choose, you will need either a 16 port active or passive hub.  If you need to output DMX also, active is the way to go, passive is straight pixelnet.  you will also need a SINGLE RAIL pc power supple with enough watts/amps to power what you are going to run thru the hub.

Then, you need pixelnet smart controllers (SSC) - one controller will run 1 light string - number of nodes depends on what type of light string you pick (128 max).  The approved ones are listed in the wiki along with a link as to where to get them.

There is also diagrams in the wiki explaining how the pc > dongle > hub > controller setup can be done in several ways - suggest taking a look there as well.

Hope that guides you in the right diection.... 

Myk

[Steve Gase]

you dont need the etherdongle if you have a usb dongle already - usb dongle lets you do 1 universe of pixelnet (4096 channels) and etherdongle lets you do 4 universes.

don't forget to load the pixelnet firmware into that usb dongle, otherwise you won't have pixelnet for the smart strings.