Chauvet Xpress 512

Jsmoovey · Fri Oct 10, 2014 5:00 pm

Please, oh please.... tell me there is a way to use the Express 512 dongle with Qlight? Tired of Chauvet and taking forever for the simplest updates.

Massimo Callegari · Fri Oct 10, 2014 11:05 pm

Hello. It is difficult to say.
It seems there are no hardware specifications on the internet.
If you have the chance to connect it to a Linux PC it would be nice to see what is says so I can get an idea.

Jsmoovey · Sun Oct 12, 2014 6:51 pm

I know Chauvet keeps it private. But it's super silly. I should be able to use it with whatever software I'd like. Linux? I've never needed it. So, I wouldn't even know where to being with that. Is there some information in windows I can get to give to you?

Massimo Callegari · Sun Oct 12, 2014 7:08 pm

And how on earth should we be able to support a hardware without knowing how it works ?
The only clue that we could hope on is if the adapter is based on a FTDI chip.
See if Windows recognizes it as a USB-to-serial converter. Or see if the drivers say "VCP" anywhere

Jsmoovey · Sun Oct 12, 2014 7:36 pm

It comes up as Universal Serial Bus Controller in Device manager but nothing about VCP that I can see.

TazteTheLightz · Wed Aug 05, 2015 8:24 pm

Bump...

I am so frustrated with ShowXpress. It has so many issues, and just isn't reliable. This post is the only hope I have found in the search for better software.

Jsmoovey, have you been able to use any other software with your Xpress 512?

Massimo, I looked through the program files, and from what I have gathered it seems as though the adapter is based on an FTDI chip. I found ft* dll files, and even an ftdibus.sys file. I am not great with reverse engineering system files... but I have decompiled a couple of the files I found. I didn't notice anything useful. I am going to see what sort of things I find on my Mac, and when I get the chance, hook up the Xpress 512 to a computer running a linux distro, and see what I can extract from that.

Any ideas, or things I should be trying/looking for?

TazteTheLightz · Wed Aug 05, 2015 8:27 pm

You know, I might actually open up the hardware and see exactly what ICs are in there. I don't know how useful that will be, but it may be worth a shot.

mcallegari · Wed Aug 05, 2015 11:18 pm

Hey, if the device is FTDI, and the manufacturer haven't changed the USB IDs, it sould be at least listed in the IO panel.

Otherwise, the vendor ID and product ID can be found with Windows. Right click on the device in the system devices tree and find this window:
http://thewindowsclub.thewindowsclubco. ... blem-2.png

TazteTheLightz · Thu Aug 06, 2015 1:48 am

Hmm, that is true. Unfortunately, I do not actually own one. I just got started with lighting design, and I am working with another guy who has all of the equipment. I think the earliest I will have physical access to the interface will be this Sunday. I'll see what I find out then, and go from there.

boxy · Thu Aug 06, 2015 8:59 am

Hi Taz,

Can you open up the box and take a good close up photo of the PCB? Should tell me straight away if they're using a micro (PIC probably), or something similar. If you only have a crappy phone for a camera please write down ALL the info on the big chip(s) and post it as it appears on them. ie:

A2C0006121500
TMS470 980
MSA......

etc. etc. in the attached photo. The large chip on the right is a Texas Instruments TMS470 type ARM processor customised for the application pictured, hence the weird logo instead of the TI one.

Cheers,

Boxy

TazteTheLightz · Fri Aug 07, 2015 2:59 pm

boxy,

I will definitely be sure to submit pictures of the PCB(s). I will be using a phone camera (albeit, a decent camera), but I will type out all of the chip S/N's and model numbers, etc.

By the way - and I might make a new post for this question - but I would really love to build some custom hardware controllers and interfaces. Do you have any pointers for someone like myself for doing this? I know this is a vague question, and I could post more specifics in a new post, but basically I'm thinking Arduino controllers and using an Altera FPGA I've got as an ArtNet (i.e. ethernet) to DMX gateway.

boxy · Sat Aug 08, 2015 10:15 am

Hi,

What is wrong with existing available kit? I have little experience with FPGAs and am not sure what you want to do with one.

TazteTheLightz · Sun Aug 09, 2015 1:01 pm

boxy,

What do you mean "what is wrong with existing available kit?" If you are asking what is wrong with the interface I am currently using, it is simple. As far as I've found, I HAVE to use Chauvet's terrible software with it.

I might just buy a cheap USB to DMX interface that is compatible with QLC+, but I've got an FPGA, and I am studying Computer Engineering, so I thought this would be a cool way to have a project related to what I am learning in school. Basically, I just was thinking about using the FPGA as a buffer that is constantly sending out DMX packets at 250k baud, and allows the buffer to be updated with a computer or other hardware (so, in other words, when you want a channel's value to change, you submit the change to the FPGA which just acts as every interface does, and controls/updates the DMX traffic).

mcallegari · Sun Aug 09, 2015 1:05 pm

But why reinventing the wheel when the FTDI chip does that for you ?
http://stevenbreuls.com/2013/05/diy-usb ... -under-10/

Anyway I don't suggest to use it if not for amateur usages. For production usages I suggest buffered devices like Enttec Pro or DMXKing pro.

TazteTheLightz · Sun Aug 09, 2015 11:34 pm

Massimo,

That is definitely a great DIY option. I have looked at that before, but I guess I just like to make things difficult for myself

With the FPGA, I intend for it to be buffered. With 144 GPIO pins, I could theoretically control almost 70 different universes at once (TX/RX).

Anyways, I did have a chance to take a look at the Xpress 512, and I did get a picture of the PCB.
It is using a Texas Instruments SN75176BP RS485 transceiver. Where it gets complicated is with the microcontroller. It is using a MCF52211 Coldfire microcontroller: http://cache.freescale.com/files/32bit/ ... F52211.pdf, and I guess it has special firmware which is causing the problem of having to use Chauvet's software to communicate with it. I did manage to analyze the USB traffic as the interface initialized, and I have that data saved. I could upload it if anyone wants to look at it. I am going to sift through it and see if I can't just emulate what the ShowXpress software is sending to it.

I've never made a custom driver before, but I might have to for this I suppose. I'm sure it could help out others as well!

Link to the image of the PCB:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B887sp ... sp=sharing

boxy · Mon Aug 10, 2015 10:46 am

The FTDI chips are fine with a fast PC but start running stuff like VirtualDJ on the same machine, with an older model, and things start getting dodgy.

Does the FPGA have USB support built in? If not, you have a very long road ahead implementing that. Best of luck.

mcallegari · Mon Aug 10, 2015 10:46 am

boxy wrote:The FTDI chips are fine with a fast PC but start running stuff like VirtualDJ on the same machine, with an older model, and things start getting dodgy.

Well, even PRO adapters use FTDI chips, but probably they place a PIC or Atmel micro afterward, to handle bufferization and a bit of intelligence.
Maybe the same thing can be done with FTDI + FPGA, so Tazte can have a USB interface for very few bucks.

TazteTheLightz · Tue Aug 11, 2015 4:17 pm

Massimo,

I'll probably start another thread for the FPGA project, but as far as the Xpress 512:

From what I've gathered, all the initialization of the interface is done on the host computer (i.e. the software gathers a few packets from the interface, but does not send anything to the interface). After it is initialized, the computer just has to send the 512 bytes of data continuously to the interface. It does look like there is a driver for the interface, and I haven't really looked at that yet.

So, how could I emulate what Chauvet's software is doing with QLC+? I assume a plugin would have to be made to work with the interface. How would I go about doing that?

Thanks

mcallegari · Tue Aug 11, 2015 4:17 pm

TazteTheLightz wrote:From what I've gathered, all the initialization of the interface is done on the host computer (i.e. the software gathers a few packets from the interface, but does not send anything to the interface). After it is initialized, the computer just has to send the 512 bytes of data continuously to the interface. It does look like there is a driver for the interface, and I haven't really looked at that yet.

Let's assume there is not really an initializations sequence.
You can re-use the code of the Enttec Open, which sends the plain universe data (512 bytes)

So, as Jano suggested, you probably need to add the USB vendor/product IDs to the DMX USB plugin and recompile.
If there's a FTDI chip and plain data is fine, it would be a miracle.
...but I doubt that...

Some nasty vendors even use an encryption key to allow only their prorietary (close source) software to communicate with the device.

janosvitok · Tue Aug 11, 2015 4:55 pm

From QLC+ side, check plugins folder (this may be good start: https://github.com/mcallegari/qlcplus/t ... dmxusb/src)
you have to:

- discover the device (find according to USB ID or name)
- find a way how to transfer data to the device and back (with some luck the device appears as serial port, which makes things easier)
- find the protocol (data that you have to send to the device)
- write plugin for all that

Since you say you have windows: can you attach msinfo32 report here?

ShowXPress installation contains libFTDI so with some luck you may be able to reuse much of the code... How did you sniff the communication?