Is there a way to convert a Renard 24 to work with DMX?

OptykMuse

OptykMuse

Supporting Member
I came across a used Renard 24 last year and thought I would try to make use of it this year... I've never used Renard controllers before and see that there is a renard selection in the 'display setup' (Vixen 3.9u5 currently), so I selected that and it appears it needs a separate comm port from the one used for my other controllers (all LOR and a few generic DMX) which are on the 'open dmx' controller.
It would greatly simplify things if I could just daisy chain this Renard24 in with the other DMX controllers. Actually I don't have available copper to run another comm line out to my display area for this anyway, so really need to run the Renard board on open DMX. I read somewhere in the forum of someone who had a converted RenardSS working on DMX so hoping this is possible with my board as well.
I run the show from a windoze computer inside the house and have underground cabling going out to a stanchion near my lights (about 150 - 200 ft.). Just no room in the conduit to run another CAT5 cable out there.
So is there a way to convert the Renard24 to DMX?
 
I use Renard Plus controllers with DMX on them running off my BB16's. It just takes a few minutes to
make the changes to the code and save it. I have some 16's and 1-24ct controllers. Basically uncomment
a line for DMX and then set a start address and save. At least for what I use. I not sure on your board
if you have a SS24.
 
My board is not the SS24 its just the 'Renard 24' V. 3.3

Rayhjr, I'm looking at the code for the DMX version and see that there is a place to enter the start address...
Would this be the 'actual' start address number, or do I need to use the start address formula that is used in the "start address configuration guide" for the "start address firmware"?
 
The author of the code is P. Short, who is one of the admins of this board. You can always contact Phil -- he's normally quite responsive although he wrote that code a long time ago and all the details may be a little fuzzy.

The "start address firmware" section of the Wiki was designed for Renard without respect to DMX. Phil could certainly address that, too.
 
Yeah, I was looking again at the address range shown in the comments and it seems to be referring to normal DMX channels so I think I'll just try that and see how it works.
I've had a number of props that are just 'T'd off already used channels to get them lit up so it would be nice to use this Renard controller to get those on their own channel. I used to have a small front yard and never used all of my props, but now I've had a large slope the last few years to populate and have plenty of room for all my props and any new ones I collect. It's nice to finally have a large area to play with:)
 
OptykMuse said:
Yeah, I was looking again at the address range shown in the comments and it seems to be referring to normal DMX channels so I think I'll just try that and see how it works.
I've had a number of props that are just 'T'd off already used channels to get them lit up so it would be nice to use this Renard controller to get those on their own channel. I used to have a small front yard and never used all of my props, but now I've had a large slope the last few years to populate and have plenty of room for all my props and any new ones I collect. It's nice to finally have a large area to play with:)
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One of the reasons why all of the props in my show are wireless is because of the ease of changing the active channels with the ESPixelStick firmware. Therefore, I set the firmware in all the PICs to be start channel 1, universe 1, and then use the ESPixelStick firmware to actually set the desired start channels and universe settings, which can be done remotely from a PC without having to recompile or reflash any firmware. So in a sense, I use ESPixelSticks as a sort of "front-end" for the controllers and eliminate the issue of reflashing them.
 
That's an interesting thought, but for this year I would like to give changing the PIC code a shot.

I see there are 3 PIC chips in this unit... Do all three need to have the DMX code flashed to them or just one of them?
 
A Renard 24 is really three 8 channel controllers looped together. So, PIC 1 outputs to PIC 2 and that outputs to PIC3. I don't recall 100% but I think the DMX program outputs dmx. And each chip will take its own program with its own set of channels. Could be wrong about that but I think that is correct.
 
MikeKrebs said:
A Renard 24 is really three 8 channel controllers looped together. So, PIC 1 outputs to PIC 2 and that outputs to PIC3. I don't recall 100% but I think the DMX program outputs dmx. And each chip will take its own program with its own set of channels. Could be wrong about that but I think that is correct.
Click to expand...
They way I had tested with the DMX firmware (several years ago), I was using RJ's USB DMX dongle which outputs all 510/512 channels and "tapped" off the main data line for each SS24. I had the start channel for each SS24 hard coded in the firmware of the 1st PIC (1,17,33,49,etc...). If I remember correctly, I only had to hard card the start channel for the first pic, and then leave the start channel as 1 for the other 2 PICs. Without hard coding the start address, it was hard to guarantee that the SS24 would react to the channels that you intended it to if it was not exactly where is was supposed to be in the chain since the firmware would strip/shift out the channel info before sending the data to the next PIC in line.

I was trying to read the pics tonight to verify, but I am having trouble getting the PICkit3 to read the pic.
 
I decided to order some new PIC chips instead of re-flashing the ones currently installed on the board, just in case I mess something up in the process of flashing the DMX firmware. This way I can try swapping out the first one, then test, then if needed swap out the other two and test... until I get a working configuration. If I can't get it to work then I can swap the original chips back into their respective positions and regroup. Should be a fun experiment / learning experience. This will be the first time I've done anything with PIC chips so keeping my fingers crossed... If I don't succeed, I can still get by without the extra channels this year so no real pressure. I have the necessary tools, just need to finally put them to use. I've learned quite a bit in the past 3 or 4 years because of this holiday decoration hobby (obsession!) and still alot to continue to learn.
 
Martin, is the assembler part of MPLAB? I've not yet installed and used it but was looking on the Microchip website and only saw MPLAB. They sure have a bunch of stuff to read on the website, could take some time! I'll probably get more specific questions answered by folks such as you and others here who have used the chips in various controllers.
 
I just tested with the default settings in MPASMWIN v5.51 that comes with MPLAB v8.82, it seems to write the hex file correctly. I converted one of the DMX flashed ones back to stock Renard .
 
Thanks everyone for all the comments, I'm just now installing MPLAB on a laptop, jumping in over the next few days to try to get the Renard24 to speak DMX. I'll post here with my experiences later.
 
OptykMuse said:
Martin, is the assembler part of MPLAB? I've not yet installed and used it but was looking on the Microchip website and only saw MPLAB. They sure have a bunch of stuff to read on the website, could take some time! I'll probably get more specific questions answered by folks such as you and others here who have used the chips in various controllers.
Click to expand...
Yes and it has plug-ins for C and other languages.
 
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