I've heard it rumored that
Express consoles are quirky in that
cell phone interference can cause them to reboot. Anyone know if
cell phone interference can cause a
cue stack to
clear though?
Not sure if interference can cause a
cue stack to
clear. I can tell you that several older
ETC consoles may be susceptible to interference from wireless devices such as
cell phones and 2-way radios. Blinking subs, cues running themselves, rebooting, indeed are what we have seen. This is all very rare and is almost always due to the wireless device being placed on the
console and it either receiving or sending audio/data.
Think about the
power these devices have and decide for yourself if they should be placed on or near your
console, computer, laptop,
etc. Not me, but then I've, of course, seen what they can do.
In order to sort out what may have happened, more information is needed. I suggest a brief chat with the
ETC folks may be the fastest way to deal with this. I'm afraid we might all be jumping to answers without fully looking at the evidence.
The DR rack holds
DMX input
level for quite a while as mentioned, so it's not as if the
console stopped outputting data, UNLESS perhaps they had been sitting in a
cue for a long time before the outage. If the lights went down in less time, the
console told the rack to do it. You said it's two racks? Well, if a
processor had a problem, it wouldn't affect both racks - only one. No amount of static or interference would stop the two processors from receiving data, or more importantly, receiving data they think is all zeros or missing. If for some reason this happens again, and I am not hoping or thinking it will, then a quick look at the DR rack LCDs will tell you if data has been lost.
When you reboot an
Express console, it will begin to output all levels at zero unless a sub is up. It's always good to have a sub recorded with a look for just such occasions. How/why did they
clear the stack? Knowing what was done step-by-step helps understand what occurred as well.
I know this doesn't answer the question of what happpened but maybe this will narrow it down.
David