LED Leuchten Shop

DMX is a worldwide standart for effect lighting. To make you own LED applications run on DMX you formaly had to accept a lot of circumstances because LEDs have secial technical parameters.

This was the reason to create a new cascadable 9 channel DMX Interface that allows you to control up to 288 channels. The common power input for interface and LEDs increases to possible number of illuminants to a maximum. We knowingly choosed a 9 channel layout to provide upcomming RGB applications and their developers as well as their users.

Further technical data:

- NEW: Combined interface- and LED power inputs
- NEW. Switchable polarity for max. flexibility

- Max. capacitance per channel: 10A
- Max. LED forward voltage: 35V DC
- Max. total capacitance of illuminants: 20A over soldering pads or 16A over clamps

- Power supply of interface: 7-30V DC
- Power consumption of interface: <100mA
- Short circuit protection: Yes
- Protokol: DMX512 (/1990)
- Connection: Common anode
- Dimensions (LxWxH): 110x111x35mm

Further features in short form:

- Integrated jumperable 120 Ohm terminator for longer connection ways
- DMX IN and DMX OUT for looping through further DMX interfaces
- Maximum number of interfaces: 32
- PWM frequency at all outputs 125Hz (flicker free)
- Number of channels: 9 (up to 32 interfaces cascadable). That means up to 288 channels adjustable over one DMX controller
- Adjustable starting adress 1-512 by DIP switch. Please note the above linked help tutorial for setting start adresses
- 3pole DMX (male and female) can be connected over soldering pins, too
- Dedicated IP65 housing (optional part) made from plastic with transparent cap (120x120x55mm)

What is DMX?

DMX512, often shortened to DMX (Digital MultipleX), is a communications protocol used mainly to control stage lighting. It is a form of the RS-485 architecture.

Developed by the Engineering Commission of USITT, the standard started in 1986, with subsequent revisions in 1990 leading to USITT DMX512/1990. ESTA took control of the standard in 1998 and began a revision process. The new standard, known officially as "Entertainment Technology — USITT DMX512–A — Asynchronous Serial Digital Data Transmission Standard for Controlling Lighting Equipment and Accessories", was approved by ANSI in November, 2004. This current standard is also known as "E1.11, USITT DMX512–A", or just "DMX512-A", and is maintained by ESTA.

DMX512 was originally intended as a 'lowest common denominator' protocol for use between interfaces supporting proprietary protocols. However, it soon became the primary method for not only linking controllers and dimmers, but also linking more advanced fixtures and special effects devices such as fog machines and moving lights. As DMX512 is unidirectional and does not allow for a response it must not be used for any type of use involving life safety, such as controlling pyrotechnics. MIDI is sometimes used for this task.

About DMX:

DMX512's popularity is partly due to its sturdiness. The cable can be abused in ways that would render Ethernet or other high speed data cables useless without any loss in function. Many people do not use the terminating plugs since without them a break in the Data Plus (Pin 3) or Data Minus (Pin2) cable may not affect the operation of the fixtures. Strange behaviour on the parts of the fixtures is usually due to incorrect addressing, cable faults, or the wrong data from the controller. Cable faults can occasionally give very surreal intermittent problems such as fixtures twitching.

The two Secondary Data Link pins on the five-pin connectors were originally intended for sending a second Universe of data, however this has never been implemented, and some manufacturers did some improvements and made units with 3 pin connectors. DMX512-A specifies that the connector is to be a 5-pin XLR connector, however many foreign companies do not follow this American standard. Some companies used the extra pins to carry other data or power. However DMX512-A forbids using the extra pins to send power, as this could damage devices expecting other types of signals on these pins. Thus many lighting rigs need a number of small adaptors which can be frequent points of failure. Some companies prefer five-pin connectors as it makes it harder to confuse sound and lighting cables.

If a single DMX512 channel is used to control pan on a Martin Mac 500, which has 440° of pan, then an increase of 1 would result in a movement of 1.7°. Over a long throw (distance between the fixture and the projection surface) this amount of movement can result in a significant movement of the beam. To control position more accurately Macs and other fixtures use 2 channels each for pan and tilt. This gives a 16-bit value between 0 and 65535 for each movement axis.

Using these type of devices on older lighting controllers would result in two adjacent channel controls being used to adjust a single movement axis. One would be referred to as the coarse and the other as fine, reflecting the relative amount of movement control each channel had. The coarse channel would allow values in multiples of 256, such as 0, 256, 512, 1024, all the way up to 65280. The fine channel allows the addressing of all in between values, by adding between 1 and 255 to the value obtained by the coarse channel.

Recently, wireless DMX adapters have become popular, especially in architectural lighting installations, where cable lengths would be prohibitively long (Over approximately 1024 feet). Wireless DMX generally uses WLAN technology to transfer the DMX data, with strategically placed converters bridging the signal back to wired links.