Control/Dimming Legacy ETC Unison controller and presets

[Barry]

i have been tasked with reprogramming all the presets used in this theatre space. No one has any of the original paperwork that would describe the installed hardware, what house lights, work lights and lobby lights are on each of DMX addresses. I will start with what I know of the installation.
2 rooms - lobby and main theatre.
Lobby has one 5 button legacy preset panel
Theatre has two 5 button preset panels and one LCD preset panels.
One 96 dimmer sensor dimming rack
One 24 channel legacy unison contoller
One ion lighting desk with fader wing.
The LCD preset panel can see both rooms but the 5 button presets only affect the lights in there respective rooms
The ion can address all the house and work lights including the lobby
This is all riding on a single ETCNet 2 network.


What is the best way to reprogram each of the 5 button preset panels?
Does light manager run on windows 7?
Do I need to reprogram all the presets from the legacy led panel?

 

[BillConnerFASTC]

If this was bought from a dealer, ETC probably has the records and can tell you all this. Call their 800 support number and find out at least, and probably get original config emailed to you. (Does require a 3 1/2" floppy IIRC.) Too easy,

 

[Barry]

Bill thank you for your reply. This will get the config file from the beginning of time. What I am afraid of is that physically people have changed the configuration and programming has changed also and none of this has been documented.
The questions that remain are on how to change the the programming for the 5 button preset panels. They don't have a record button on them and the LCD panel will let you select the the presets for them but not record them.
What options do I have?
Does light manager run on windows 7?

 

[SteveB]

Possibly the best solution would be to find the company that initialized the system, they are likely to be authorized users of Light Manager and can help you make desired changes.

As part of the system there should be a Unison ER4 processor/main control unit. On the right side of that unit is a 3.5 floppy drive and hopefully a disk in the drive. If so, that disk might contain either the original .cfg file or a current version and you would be wanting to save whatever is in the processor to a current disk. I'd be contacting ETC to have them talk you thru the save to disk process, it's pretty easy.

Light Manager, as BTW, was not software given to end users, usage generally required some training from ETC, though it's easy to use, thus approaching a trained user is a good idea for your situation.

 

[BillConnerFASTC]

Early, ETC did more often than today provide light manager. I use to have a copy, and we included a copy be provided in our specs. I believe that in the users hands it appeared to cause more problems than it solved, so not so much distributed today.

Sorry, but I don't recall what version of Windows it ran on but try it on 7. Harder part will be finding a way to write to a 3.5 floppy.

I'm sure there are techs with the software and a machine that has the drive, and hopefully that drive still works, and can help you. Ask ETC. You probably are not going to be able to get this done for free, but not impossible.

Do seriously consider pushing for an upgrade - replacement of wall stations and processor - to Paradigm. Nothing lasts forever.

 

[BobHealey]

Having dealt with Light Manager, the last copy ETC provided us after the Emphasis server it was installed on was wiped, was still a Win16 app. So it may run on Windows 7, but only on the 32 bit editions. If its ETCnet2, Light Manager can talk to Unision over the net, but I can't remember if its upload only, or if it can download the config too.