Losing control of lights, possible dmx signal loss

[kyleparks77]

I'm running the sunlite suite software with 4 Martin moving head fixture, 8 Selecon fresnels with color changers and a few other lights on dimmer boxes.

Towards the end of the set tonight, it seemed like all of the lights decided to go into sort of a stand alone mode. The fresnels and other lights came on at full power, the color changers started to constantly scroll through colors, and the moving heads went to their center positions. The software itself didn't freeze up because i wash able to click around and stuff but that did nothing. I ended up having to run back and kill the power to all the lights.
I had signs that something was wrong earlier when I would but fading the moving heads with the dimmer button and they would suddenly flash to the original dimmer setting (ex: i had a scene set to where the moving heads were in a certain position but the dimmer was at zero. I would then manually fade them in as needed. But they would suddenly flash back to 0%. This had never happened through multiple rehearsals.)
I'm thinking that the issue is in the dmx signal or the interface box. Either way, the only thing that would stop the scrolling and get the lights off is completely killing all power to the lights. When it happened afterwards (I ran through my scenes again to see where the issue might be. the same thing happened, but at a completely different time in the show.), I tried unplugging the usb cable, turning off the interface, exiting out of the software, or going to my preprogrammed "blackout" scene on the interface. None of that helped.

Whatever you can do to help would be greatly appreciated! I need to have the issue fixed very soon. There are three presentations tomorrow night and then ten more over the next week.

[simonB]

It could be anything.

1. Faulty DMX cable
2. Faulty fixture
3. Software bug
4. Interface bug
5. USB cable
6. Windows
7. USB hub

If it happens again you need to look at the interface to see if the DMX LED is still flicking. If not then the interface has been disconnected. This can happen due to power interference such as a smoke machine or a surge of power coming from a dimmer pack in a bright scene. This can be fixed by changing the USB cable, adding power to a USB hub, running your computer off a different ring main than high power devices.

You need to figure out if the lights are going crazy because the interface is sending out crazy DMX signals or if they are just going into Stand Alone mode.

I suggest you make a stand alone show (if your interface has stand alone compatibility) and copy some simple scenes to the stand alone memory. This way you can flick to stand alone mode whilst you restart the computer without the lights going into stand alone mode and going crazy.