USB to DMX adapters usually ok?

[junkrigsailor]

Hi, y'all. I'm new here & new to DMX.

I've got QLC+ installed & appearing to work on Debian Linux / elderly Toshiba Satellite. Haven't made provision for actual output yet.
Are USB to DMX adapters pretty much interchangeable? I'm looking at a cheapie from China on Ebay for starters, just kind of a dongle. Says it runs on Windows this & that, blah blah.
The plan here is to run lights for my band, from the stage, as a seated lap steel guitar player. I've got a Chauvet Obey 10 working but would prefer more flexibility. More chasers.

Thanks for any pointers.

Jeff

[fooschnickens]

Most will work ok, but the lemon rate can be pretty high since there's usually no QC on the cheapie clone units. You can get an Enttec DMX USB for around $70 from most major suppliers, or get the USB Pro for about $150. To me it's money well spent because I've seen my fair share of complaints and witnessed first hand the issues that the chinese copies can have.

I'm also firmly in the "buy once cry once" crowd, so I'm also biased towards proven, but slightly more expensive options. Also note that the Enttec units adhere to the actual DMX protocol, so they're going to have 5-pin connections. 3-pin adapters are cheap and plentiful, however.

[tommakesmusic]

I got one of these: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00Z ... ge_o01_s00 and it works great with QLC+ on my mac. I don't know how robust it is, but at the minute I'm not really putting it to a stern test. I imagine it would need to be treated well to last for a long time... but it has worked well for me. If you're gigging a lot maybe go for the Entec.

A work colleague who has an Avolites Titan Mobile was very impressed. I use mine to run our shows from Q-Lab - triggering a midi file with the light show at the same time as the audio.

[volmar]

How is the Lixada with the lag?

Have you tried for istance to strobe manually? Does it lag?

[blekenbleu]

That dongle uses uDMX. An LED PAR attached to my uDMX dongle responds with about 1 second delay after value changes in QLC+.
By the way, despite disclaimer that QLC+ does not support uDMX control in Windows, that is actually working for me
using signed LibUSB-Win32 driver 1.2.6.0 installed by Zadig http://zadig.akeo.ie/
It also works fine with Mac OS Yosemite and El Capitan without drivers.

[tommakesmusic]

I'm honestly not noticing much lag, but I've only tested it with a minimal rig of LED par cans (12). What I did notice is that it does work better with proper DMX cables and correct termination. Without these it didn't seem as snappy or reliable.

[muxlux]

having tried both, i strongly recommend NOT buy a usb to rs485 converter based on the PL2303HX or ch340 chips. i'd spend the extra $1 & get one based on the FT232RL chip.