D40 D60 patching profiles

I have some D40 and D60 units I am patching and using the profiles "D40 Vivid Direct" and "D60 Vivid Direct." In the data sheet for these fixtures, in the "DMX Input Channel Profiles" table, the D40 shows 9 channels and the D60 shows 10 for the Direct configuration. (They match except D60 has a fan control.) However, the board only uses 8 channels to patch either of these. What happens to the other channels? Do these instruments need 8 or 9/10 channels? Why is the board only using 8 channels?

I noticed some strobing from what I think was these units. In most cases, the patch left two blank channels after these instruments, but where that isn't the case, it would seem that could be a problem. Channel 9 is the strobe. If they really have 9/10 channels, why is the board only patching 8? Is the profile incorrect? That seems unlikely. What am I missing?

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0 JTBettis over 10 years ago

Rick,

For the D40 & D60 in Direct mode, you want to use the 'D40 Direct Str' & 'D60 Direct StrFan'.

Those profiles give you control of the 7 LED colors, Intensity, Strobe, & for the D60 Fan Control. 'D40 Direct' & 'D60 Direct' only patch the 7 colors & Intensity.

BTW To use the strobe, it must be enabled in the fixture.

Hope this helps.

Jeff
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0 Rick36616 over 10 years ago in reply to JTBettis

From your response, I would guess the theater has configured these to not use the Strobe or Fan and thus used the D40 Direct patch without those, so the patch only uses 8 channels. If the Strobe On/Off setting is OFF, then it must ignore the 9th channel. Similarly Fan Mode to Auto disables the 10th channel. Thanks Jeff.
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0 Rick36616 over 10 years ago in reply to JTBettis

From your response, I would guess the theater has configured these to not use the Strobe or Fan and thus used the D40 Direct patch without those, so the patch only uses 8 channels. If the Strobe On/Off setting is OFF, then it must ignore the 9th channel. Similarly Fan Mode to Auto disables the 10th channel. Thanks Jeff.
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0 Rick36616 over 10 years ago in reply to Rick36616

I followed up at the theater today. The instruments are patched with an empty channel at the end, so even though they're patched as Direct mode, the instruments themselves are in 9-channel mode with strobe enabled. The strobe cannot be accessed from the board, however. This means inexperienced operators can't accidentally access the strobe, I suppose. It also means that a recent change to the patch that did not leave an empty channel resulted in some instruments strobing randomly, explaining the anomaly I was seeing. Some instruments also had the Fan enabled, so that explains why the fans were sometimes randomly running. Now that I understand it, it can be fixed. Thanks for your help.
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