Announcing : Raspberry Pi RDM Controller with USB, fully compatible with the Enttec USB Pro protocol.

135 views

Skip to first unread message

Arjan van Vught

unread,

Sep 20, 2015, 6:14:15 AM9/20/15

to open-lighting

After some good times debugging and testing the DMX, RDM, OLA protocols, I am happy to announce the first release.

The open source software for the Raspberry Pi RDM Controller with USB is fully compatible with the Enttec USB Pro protocol.

The firmware is running on bare-metal Raspberry Pi for high precision DMX12 timing. It uses the FIQ for receiving the DMX data, and the IRQ for sending the DMX data.

When using a Raspberry Pi A+ (running the firmware) and for example a Raspberry 2 Model B as the host with a 5V2 2A power supply, then there is no need for a powered USB hub. The Widget can directly powered from the host.

The Widget is ANSI E1.11-2008 compliant (DMX512-A) and E1.20-2010 compliant (RDM).

The FT245RL USB to parallel interface is used for fast communication with the host.

The Widget configuration is stored on the sdcard. Hence the configuration is not lost when the Widget loses power.

You can also set the main RDM device parameters ; Manufacturer name, Manufacturer id and Device label.

In the Widget mode 3, there is support for the OLA Enttec Sniffer software (https://youtu.be/TStTcbK9v5g)

Additional to the Enttec USB Pro protocol, there is a parameter in the Widget configuration which controls the DMX receive throttling to ensure receiving software is not overloaded with too many RDM512 packets per second.

The Widget utilizes the HDMI output for displaying the real-time statistics and process information (https://youtu.be/wQEgB16U2jw).

The Widget is extensively tested with the OLA RDM Test Server and with different devices.

The main Widget source is written in ANSI-C, and it is hardware independent :

The Enttec USB Pro protocol is implemented in widget.c and in widget_usb.c
The support for the OLA Enttec Sniffer software is implemented in widget_sniffer.c
The output for the external HDMI monitor is implemented in widget_monitor.c
The support for saving the Widget configuration to the sdcard is implemented in widget_params.c

More information can be found here http://www.raspberrypi-dmx.com/raspberry-pi-rdm-controller

The complete open source can be found here https://github.com/vanvught/rpidmx512/tree/master/rpi_dmx_usb_pro

The hardware is available from here http://www.bitwizard.nl/shop/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=154