Okay, I don’t know what is wrong with me, but I can’t seem to find an affordable USB DMX sollution, that is fast enough.
In Ricos we had an ARTNET -> DMX device, very cool 8 universes, very fast, but also very expensive.
I have an Enttec Dongle, connected to another computer it reads out VVVV artnet, and is also very fast.
I wanted a solution that can work with vvvv direct. So I read, and looked, and I found DMX4All StageProfi dongle, and I saw there was a native vvvv patch, so I bought one. But it is slowwwww when I want to change more than 10 channels. :(
I realy would like some advise on what to get next, I just want to spit in 256 channels, like I can do with Artnet.
Working with RGB LED’s, and would realy like to use only 1 computer.
Please Help, sugest, what ever, I started vvvv cozz off DMX, and now I am realy stuck…
PS Sorry for the angry tone, it is late, and I am frustrated…
i didnt do any performance measurements, but my impression was that the DMX4all interface isnt prohibitely slow - did you try @MSBERGERs Blockmode patch or the patch on the DMX4ALL page? iirc the serial format itself was quite compact…
we used that cinectix dmx controller http://cinetix.de/interface/usdmxbox.htm for that fahrplan led installation and were able to change 196 channels with a good frame rate (dont remember the exact fps anymore but as far as i remember there was no difference if we changed 1 led or all 196 at the same time). first we tried also with dmx to all but it was really slow!
back then we tried both modules for dmx4all. yours and the blockmode patch. with blockmode it was sigificantly faster around 4 times as far as i remember but still to slow to change more than 20 channels simultanously. but since then the dmx4all hardware has changed, maybe its faster now. nothing against dmx4all, its ok and inexpensive but it was not so fast, at least the old version we used.
Thnx for the replys people. Offcours I used MSberger BlockMode patch. I even patched my own ASCII sender, wich to my own suprise worked (but even slower).
Seems like I have a weird problem. I was testing the dongle in a single screen, and it was slow. Weird thing is that when I clicked on an different windwosscreen (like the explorer) the whole speeded up again to normal speed!! (I was testing it with a 20 blinks/sec LED patch, changing 150 spreads).
Okay, so now I wonder… could it be my slow computer (PIII, 800Mhz) low memery (128 mb) or a driver error off some kind… need to retest some more now, with more up to date machines before I draw any conclusions…
i have no understanding of anything, but just reading your last comment: “when I clicked on an different windwosscreen (like the explorer) the whole speeded up again to normal speed!!” i’d suggest playing with the mainloops ‘foreground fps’. particularly setting it to a low figure…
could be related to a funny behaviour I’ve noticed today: when in foreground, vvvv runs with 60fps and when vvvv looses focus and runs in the background the timing node tells me, that vvvv runs with 110fps. mainloop is set to 120fps for fore-and background.
There was another thread saying that ampop, initially put down to dual cores, but It happens on a single core I run as well. I’ve not noticed the speed up with loosing focus, I’ll check that, something for the bugs thread?
Think I can fix the trouble with the Mainloop node, need to test it proper, will post here. Weird thing is, that I just tested only the DMXnode from MSberger, and than the speed dropped, but than I opened that patch inside the patch I am working on, with a Renderer (EX9) and now it speeds up again…
It is a clean WinXP SP2 instalation, no updates yet, is there some thing in some off those updates, wich I don’t have yet, that might cause this behaviour? (I didn’t want to hook this machine up to internet)
@ Oschatz, Yep, that is the one, a bit too much for my little application ;) (actualy, also too much for Rico’s…)
Hmzz… seems like mainloop doesn’t do anything, unless I set it to a lower value than I am currently running, but I want speed… not slower. (I use the Timing node top check that).
Also try the Boost node, still wonder if that does anything though.
I am stuck at 14 fps or lower :(
I only use some Quads with 128x128 .png files.
Without the DMX node I run 20 fps, can’t imagine sending a 120 value spread to a comport costs me 6 fps…
Sigh… other idea, if I make the DMX node a different thread and send the info via UDP, is that an option worth try-ing??
I am currently in the process off rebuilding the GUI, so I switch quads off when not used, now I just grouped every GUI page and switched between them with a Switch (node), see if that helps. (or at leats gain a few frames)
The whole thing with the slow framerate happenes when I simple build a Linearspread, with an LFO, to get constant changing, 120 slices, connected directly to the DMX blocksend node from mr. Berger.
It seems it also drops speed on my ‘big’ computer, that went from 30 to 20 rames, just by turning on or off the DMX send node. Just have a feeling the RS232 node isn’t working optimal (or not)
@west - the rs232 usb driver of your machine might be a suspect. is it a real rs232 port or an usb dongle? latest drivers etc?
&@west&kalle - yes its about 18000 real dmx channels, so we really need a lot of universes. the manual says that one ENTTEC Datagate deals only with four artnet dmx universes as outputs (and with another 4 as ins) - i´d love to have just 8 outs. do you have any informations if this will work?
