We had a fun final dress rehearsal tonight. About an hour and a half before curtain I was off at Subway grabbing some dinner when I got a call... "Where are you? The light board won't turn on!" Got back to the theater 5 minutes later and the year old Strand Classic Palette is just dead. Fortunately, thanks to the cool way Strand has granted their system rights. All I had to do was open the hood of the console, pull the USB Key, and my USB backup Drive, plug them in another computer on the network and in about 5 minutes I was running the show from another computer. So we were able to run the show normally using the backup computer. The PC backup system is fully functional but awkward. I believe you can't do that on an ETC with the way their Dongle works... +1 Strand.
On the other hand my year old console is dead. It shut down last night like normal. It runs through a UPS which appears to be working fine. I flip the switch... nothing. I'm guessing it's just the internal power supply gone bad. Having talked with him in the past about other issues, I immediately called and e-mailed Strand's Field Service Manager but he was out of the office for the night. I also put in a call and e-mail to our local authorized service guy but again he was gone. +1 ETC for that 24 hour customer service number!
While this sounds like something for the punching booth or what went wrong, I thought it belonged here as it will be a good oportunity to see, in real time, what Strand's customer service is like these days. I've been telling you for a while that I think things are improving significantly at Strand. This is a great chance to see if I'm right.
As for what caused it...
Around 2 am yesterday, while doing some final painting, one of the students said the name of the Scottish Play. He then declared he was not superstitious and refused to follow the proper cleansing ritual. I think we all know what caused this and who needs to be sacrificed for the good of the community. Get your pitchfork and torch!
On the other hand my year old console is dead. It shut down last night like normal. It runs through a UPS which appears to be working fine. I flip the switch... nothing. I'm guessing it's just the internal power supply gone bad. Having talked with him in the past about other issues, I immediately called and e-mailed Strand's Field Service Manager but he was out of the office for the night. I also put in a call and e-mail to our local authorized service guy but again he was gone. +1 ETC for that 24 hour customer service number!
While this sounds like something for the punching booth or what went wrong, I thought it belonged here as it will be a good oportunity to see, in real time, what Strand's customer service is like these days. I've been telling you for a while that I think things are improving significantly at Strand. This is a great chance to see if I'm right.
As for what caused it...
Around 2 am yesterday, while doing some final painting, one of the students said the name of the Scottish Play. He then declared he was not superstitious and refused to follow the proper cleansing ritual. I think we all know what caused this and who needs to be sacrificed for the good of the community. Get your pitchfork and torch!