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    Jason Lord
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USB Extender possible for Ion Fader Wing?

The DP on my show wants to control several channels of lights from a remote position from the Ion console I'm running. He is insisting on mechanical faders, not something like the iPad app. 

One idea I had was to see if anything exists to extend a USB cable and slap a fader wing in front of him.  I can assign channels to the faders on the fly and he can be happy.

http://www.cablestogo.com/product.asp?cat_id=1521&sku=53880#

Would this work with the Ion's fader wing?  Why not, right?

Parents

  • Ok, I went through my cable bin and found an old 16-foot USB extender cable that is self-powered that I got from Fry's for $16 a long time ago.

    I plugged it in, put a 10 x 2 Fader wing on it, popped up instantly in the Desk Settings and it works great..  Now if the Cat5 extender idea works then I'll be good to go.   But it is working on this little test..

    The net3 solution, while would work to a degree, seems like a complicated way for me to do.  This is so much nicer with the glowing LCD display in the dark camera tent.  I'll keep you posted on what happens..

Reply

  • Ok, I went through my cable bin and found an old 16-foot USB extender cable that is self-powered that I got from Fry's for $16 a long time ago.

    I plugged it in, put a 10 x 2 Fader wing on it, popped up instantly in the Desk Settings and it works great..  Now if the Cat5 extender idea works then I'll be good to go.   But it is working on this little test..

    The net3 solution, while would work to a degree, seems like a complicated way for me to do.  This is so much nicer with the glowing LCD display in the dark camera tent.  I'll keep you posted on what happens..

Children
  • in reply to Jason Lord

    I have used the Cat 5 extenders with mixed results.  One thing that has helped is to put a self powered USB 1.1 hub on the console side of the connection.  This prevents the console from trying to communicate using full speed USB 2.0 that the extenders don't support.  With the hub, I haven't had any problem using a fader wing about 50' from the board.

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