Rockville ROCKFORCE 192-Channel Light/Fog DMX Lighting Controller

For the most part gets the job done for the money
Paired this up with four par LED floods. The first time out takes a little bit to understand what is needed to make this work the lights. Once the addresses were assigned all worked fairly well. Then when it was show time, addresses at the lights had dropped. Reset those and all was good. Setting up chases takes a little planning. But that was entered and all went well. Then, the other shoe dropped when the next week it refused to play the set chase in order and eventually jumped to another bank that was not even set up and would not go back to the original. The system has now been removed and will undergo some additional testing to determine the issue. At time, it will not fire the lights, other times a light will strobe. Addresses are basically being ignored. 1, 17, 33 and 49 should be the workable addresses for the lights. At this moment cannot get all 4 lights to respond at the same time. The most we can get to work is 3. Will post a follow up review after the additional testing is completed.

Makes a good static disply controller
The Rockforce 192 DMX lighting controller is an interesting mix of capabilities. It is minimalist in terms of layout, hardware, price, and programming. In terms of functionality it is just about the least expensive DMX controller out there that provides controlled step timing and cue fading. Like most ‘smaller’ DMX controllers it is squarely aimed at the ‘DJ/Music’ user. Yes it would be possible to run theatrical shows with it, but that is not really its forte. FInally, the documentation that comes with it is minimalist, but straight forward and easy for someone with a good working knowledge of DMX to grasp.That last point is important. This lighting controller will not ‘do the hard work’ for you… At all. You will need to know how DMX works, how your fixtures and effects respond to DMX commands, and how you want your various scenes to look ahead of time. You will need to coordinate the DMX addressing of each fixture/effect with the Rockforce controller’s ‘pre-patched’ layout. You will need to write these things down as there are no ‘planning’ tools built in (It’s all too easy to forget whether you put that set of waltze tempo scenes in bank 4 or bank 5 once you’re a few hours into a setup. And God help you if you find yourself ‘manual patching’ more than one instrument into a given ‘scanner’ address range.). Writing it down is also the only way to put programming back in later if needed. Same goes for chase design. You will need a working knowledge of common music tempos and musical timing if coordinating cues to music. Personally I’d leave at least a week’s worth of spare time to experiment and program with it before you go live. You’ll want the fixtures you are goiong to be using ‘on hand’ when you do this programming.The hardware is… inexpensive. This is not necessarily ‘bad’ but does limit the usage cases a bit. For something like a fixed display or secondary ‘house’ controller that just cycles through a few standard looks and will only ever be expected to do that with minimal future reprogramming this thing is ideal. It would also make a nice inexpensive classroom aid for anyone out there teaching the very very basics of digital light control. If you have to reprogram it every night for a living? Not so fun. Nor would it do well in constant load-in, load-out, daily use with lots of ‘on-the-fly’ button mashing by an over-excited DJ. It is not designed to suffer the insults of frequent drops, confetti, spilled drinks, and cheese dust lightly. The only saving grace in these later cases is that the unit is inexpensive enough to keep a second unit on hand all programmed up and ready to go as a spare. This is a viable option, but potentially time comsuming in the programming department.About that: The one feature that I personally really wish this thing had is a way to transfer its setups to another unit or to and from some form of off-unit storage. Blue tooth and an app, or better yet, a USB port and a memory stick, or an SD card slot. (I personally don’t like the idea of some script kiddie out there hijacking a blue tooth signal and ruining my show with no real chance for detection just by dinking on their cell phone. Nor do I relish the thought of all the training and third party apps I’d need to truly make such a blue tooth connection ‘secure’.) Such a feature would make restoration of programming much faster and easier. It would also make switching to an on-hand spare unit a relatively fast and painles no-brainer that could be performed by minimally trained help or even just with some phone support (Remember those first two ideal usage cases…).My own experience is using these as ‘static controllers’ for a set of simple pre-programmed cues involving just two lights. For that specific use it is almost ideal in terms of functionality and price point and thus my 4 star rating. Had it had the ability to save and transfer programming it would have got 5 stars. But an important note: One would not have to stray too far from my usage to encounter a lesser rating.

Solid Product for intro to DMX
I bought this controller as an into to DMX lighting control for mobile DJing. The controller is built solidly and the instruction manual is informative and easy to read. The only downside is with the sound activation mode. The microphone is not very sensitive, which would be very good for a loud club environement but makes the feature not so usable for quieter background music. A way to adjust the sensitivity of the microphone would be much appreciated.

Below Par Performance
I use this as a replacement for a Chauvet. My Chauvet craped out so i figured on this. I have a pair of 4 bars. these controllers dont just plug and play into the 4 bar lighting.. it takes time to program a light, save it copy it put it in a bank and add it 10 times. bank 1. ok now for bank 2. same thing. all set for a chase: it chased from bank to bank but the timer counter was erratic. then it would freeze up and my lights would not chase. I packed it up and sent it back.

Excelente