Instruction Manual

Page 14

5. APPENDIX

A Quick Lesson On DMX

DMX (aka DMX-512) was created in 1986 by the United States

Institute for Theatre Technology (USITT) as a standardized

method for connecting lighting consoles to lighting dimmer

modules. It was revised in 1990 and again in 2000 to allow





standard. It has also been approved and recognized for ANSI



DMX covers (and is an abbreviation for) Digital MultipleXed

signals. It is the most common communications standard used





of these channels was originally intended to control lamp

dimmer levels. You can think of it as 512 faders on a lighting



is sent over the data link as an 8-bit number having a value

between 0 and 255. The value 0 corresponds to the light bulb

being completely off while 255 corresponds to the light bulb

being fully on.

DMX data is transmitted at 250,000 bits per second using

the RS-485 transmission standard over two wires. As with

microphone cables, a grounded cable shield is used to prevent

interference with other signals.



(cable shield), two wires for “Primary” communication which

goes from a DMX source to a DMX receiver, and two wires for

a “Secondary” communication which goes from a DMX receiver

back to a DMX source. Generally, the “Secondary” channel is



most of us are most familiar with DMX-512 as being employer

over typical 3-pin “mic cables,” although this does not conform

