My theater recently purchased several RDM10 splitters. They work fine when using regular DMX input, but when I try to connect them to my lighting network to manage them remotely with either a web browser or CLU, it seems like they repeat the DMX input as sACN and cause problems.
The rest of my lighting network is ETC Net3, which uses sACN mixed with other ETC protocols. My theater hosts various guest concerts throughout the season, and we often have guest LDs bring their own consoles and take control of my lighting system, either via 5-pin DMX lines, or sACN. I keep my primary console’s sACN priority set to 95, allowing guest consoles to automatically take control of the network when they plug in. I suspect what was happening with the RDM10s is that they were repeating the DMX signal back into the sACN network at priority 100, causing some kind of feedback loop.
For now, I have the RDM10s set to ArtNet, which seems to mitigate the issue. But if I’m missing something and there’s a way to either change sACN priority on the RDM10s, or disable sACN output, I’d like to do that. Any tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Welcome to the forum. Really great to hear your theatre has just purchased some RDM10s.
RDM10s will only output sACN or Art-Net themselves when using the onboard sACN/Art-Net tester, or when running cues with “Resend Ethernet” enabled. They will not repeat the incoming sACN universe back onto the network.
This software will be able to view all sACN sources on the network, and what priorities they’re currently at, so this should help track down what is happening when you encounter the issue.
I did check with sACNView, and even in the “Splitter A” preset and all inputs set to DMX, the RDM10s do show up as an sACN source at priority 100, overriding my primary console’s priority 95 sACN.
If it helps, I’m also seeing the same behavior with ArtNet. Even with my console and everything else in my system off, the RDM10s are still showing up as an ArtNet source on my lighting network. All RDM10s are in the Splitter A factory preset, and all inputs are set to DMX.
Attached is a photo of the Input configuration screen. You can that even though it’s set to DMX, it still has options to set the network protocol and universe number.
