Hi, guys. It's VJ here from ENTTEC. Just doing a quick video today about DMX Pixel strip,
which is what we have down in front of us here. So ENTTEC does make a range of pixel strips,
which is using pixel data. So also called SPI. Advantages of that is
that you can do multiple universes, so you can do nice, long, long runs.
But we do get questions about DMX controlled Pixel strip, essentially the same, except instead of
pixel data, we're sending DMX data as well as the DC power to run the pixel strip. So what we've got
here is an example of DMX pixel strip in a neon flex that was provided to us by a customer and
it is being controlled currently by our ELM Software through Ethernet to DMX Node here.
So now we're just going to go through the details about the wiring to make this happen. Okay. So if
we look at this example of DMX Pixel Strip, we can see this is a five core lead and looking closer at
the leads that have been helpfully labeled for us, we have DMX Plus, DMX minus and Ground. Now that's
what we'd expect to see for DMX data and that's why we'll see on any DMX controller, including our
DIN Ehtergate here, the DMX output terminal will have DMX Plus or data plus data minus and ground.
So that fulfills our need for the DMX data. We also have two additional terminals here,
so we have this thicker cable, which is 24 volts positive. So that's how we're
getting power to the strip. So essentially we're providing 24 volt DC power and then
we're providing DMX data and that's sufficient to run this strip. There
is another terminal here which we're not using in this case, which is an addressing terminal.
That's for, I guess, setting start addresses, but it's not needed for controlling via DMX. Now that
we know what each of these does, the next step is for us to wire this up to our DIN Ethergate. So
we have DMX flowing into the strip and then wiring the DC power supply and then power everything up.
Looking at our DIN ethergate here we can see the terminals labeled as for the front label here.
So we have a zero volts, which is the, data ground. We have our data minus and our data
plus. We're not going to be using the termination terminal here, which is going to be sending data
via DMX. So the first thing we need to do is connect our DMX Plus and DMX minus to the DMX
plus so data plus and data minus respectively, so that we've got that data connection established.
So now that we've got our data minus and data plus wired into our terminal block,
the next thing for us to do is to introduce our 24 volts power. So for that,
I've just got a 24 volt power supply here. It's not plugged in yet because
we want to make sure our connections are good first before we power anything up.
And I've got a ground terminal and a VCC or 24 volts positive terminal here. Now,
the trick here is I need to splice the 24 volt ground
into the ground terminal of my DIN Ethergate as well as my data ground. So that's why I'm
introducing a couple of these splicing connectors here so I can make that two way connection.
I'm just going to make my ground connection first. So because I've
got a thick cable coming from my power supply, I'll just put that in its own section of the
splicing connector and then I'll put common my data ground and a bit of spare cable here
so that I can jump that into my terminal block.
Okay.
So now that that's locked down, I can take my resulting ground terminal and connect that into
the ground terminal of my screw connector, which I can double check on my labeling.
Okay, so
now that my ground connection is made, I can make my 24 volt connection as well. So
I've got my 24 volt line from my power supply and I got my 24 volt line going to the strip,
and I can just connect them both together using another splicing connector.
This one's a bit easier to do because there's no connection from this power
supply back to our DIN Ethergate, because I'm powering that separately.
Now that all of my connections have been made, so I've got my data plus and data minus. I've got
my ground connected. I have everything wired into this terminal block simply so I can plug that in.
I can also plug in my power supply to the DIN Ethergate.
And now that’s booting up, I will then be able to power on my 24 volt power supply
and there we go. So a 24 volt power supply is on it. The DIN Ethergate is still
getting its show from the software and that is now playing on the DMX strip.
So again, the DIN Ethergate is just receiving Art-Net from our ELM software converting to DMX,
which is then flowing through the strip. The strip is receiving 24 volt power from
the power supply and it is rendering these patterns. Just a quick summary of controlling
DMX control pixel strip with ENTTEC gear. So the ELM software through an Ethernet to DMX node.