Replacement for zero88 illusion 500

[dannyp2001]

My theatre group has an illusion 500 which is showing signs of age, and although I have replaced the battery, floppy disk with USB stick and repaired/ replaced faders (and had the main board after an unfortunate red wine incident)it won't go on forever.

I would like a replacement that does not have a fixture limit, (which to my mind seems a strange way to make a desk as it's really easy to exceed 24 fixtures) is no larger than the 500, but has better control for LED fixtures with pallette option and does not cost over £2-3k.

What would your suggestions be please?

[kgallen]

FLX S24 (48 fixtures, where a "fixture" can be as complex as it needs to be - from a single dimmer to a mover with lots of DMX channels)

or the "full" FLX if you can stretch the budget a bit. "Unlimited" fixtures, but of course all consoles are limited by the number of DMX channels/universes supported.

As you're used to syntax with the Illusion, then the "full" FLX would be the natural console for you.

https://www.vari-lite.com/global/products/flx-console

https://www.vari-lite.com/global/products/flx-s24

https://www.zero88.com/forum/forum/92-product-support/

No, I don't work for Zero88/Vari-lite but I do own an FLX.

 

ETA: FLX S24 doesn't have an external monitor port if you're used to that. It does have the internal touch screen and an external monitor can be "emulated" on an iPad or similar with the ZerOS Monitor app. FLX S24 and FLX have DVI-D monitor ports.

Edited May 15, 2023 by kgallen

[jonhole]

1 hour ago, dannyp2001 said:

...not have a fixture limit, (which to my mind seems a strange way to make a desk...

On the FLX range, a fixture limit is in place where the console is primarily fader based (e.g., FLX S) and not where the console is primarily syntax based (e.g., FLX).

On FLX S, the fixture limit is based on twice the number of faders (so 48 on FLX S24, and 96 on FLX S48) and are controlled by a "Page" button. We deliberately chose two pages so a fixture is always only a single button press away... more than two pages would mean scrolling through multiple pages.

Edited May 15, 2023 by jonhole

[dannyp2001]

Thank you for your thoughts, Zero88 FLX would be my first choice, except for the cost. The FLX S48 is too long to fit the space we have, and the S24 only does 48 fixtures, when you have 32 conventional dimmers it does not leave much room for the LED fixtures. I really do not need lots of faders.

There must be other options without going down the PC/wing route

[Tomo]

The ETC ColorSource family should fit your requirements and budget.

All versions have 80 'desk channels' (independent fixtures, regardless of DMX slot count).
The difference is whether there's 20 or 40 physical faders and so how much paging you need to do.

Standard edition lists around the lower end of your budget, AV edition around the top end of your budget and adds Ethernet, a second physical DMX port and monitor.

There's a free offline editor of course, look under the "Software" link of the above page.

[Don Allen]

The Coloursource AV has a lot of extra features such as included sound effects and video slides including animated videos such as falling rain, but has 20 or 40 faders. It is a good choice for small schools but has poor support for fixture file requests. There is a monitor output which can be used for lighting OR video effects output, you have to choose your priority. There are no encoder wheels unfortunately. You can use a network setup for a second monitor.

The FLX S24 has the same size internal touch screen as the Colousurce, so I use a laptop as an external monitor. If you have the bench space for a laptop of screen for a desktop pc it makes a big difference. Edward from Varilite now,  FLX S Forum has shown me how to make a multicell fixture profile for me for my FLX S48, so I can hade a 12 channel dimmer rack under one channel fader. I need to do a lot of preprogramming before doing a one day dance concert in a venue that has 204 channels of Jands HPX dimmers. I will record my basic conventional washes as groups for ease of access. I will also be using two LED fixtures under one fader as multicells.

Both desks have offline monitors.

[sleah]

6 hours ago, Don Allen said:

The Coloursource AV has a lot of extra features such as included sound effects and video slides including animated videos such as falling rain, but has 20 or 40 faders. It is a good choice for small schools but has poor support for fixture file requests.

If you are feeling brave there is fixture creator software, or 'personality editor' as ETC call it. Not too hard for pars'n'bars, but can be quite challenging to create a personality for a mover - probably take a couple of tries to get it spot on!

[jonhole]

40 minutes ago, sleah said:

If you are feeling brave there is fixture creator software, or 'personality editor' as ETC call it. Not too hard for pars'n'bars, but can be quite challenging to create a personality for a mover - probably take a couple of tries to get it spot on!

If only there was a better way...

[alistermorton]

There's still the problem of "no name" (for want of a better expression) fixtures which are nearly but not quite copies of better known fixtures. You still end up having to create a profile for them, don't you?

[timsabre]

You can nearly always find one that someone else has made, that works with your device.

2 useful websites for finding matching fixtures are:
Avolites fixture finder (https://www.avolites.de/downloads/d4find/)
Onyx fixture finder (https://onyxfixturefinder.com/)

Basically you tell it what parameters are on each DMX slot and it shows you all the other fixtures that match your one. They both show links to libraries for the particular console (Avolites / Obsidian) but it's not too hard to use the info to find a matching fixture in other libraries.

[Don Allen]

In the current ZerOS 7.13 software, you can create fixtures when you are patching if you cannot find a suitable one, but there are limitations on mode channels. ZerOS Fixture Creator.  I have noticed a lot more activity on the ColourSource Forums where people are helping each other out.

[jonhole]

1 hour ago, alistermorton said:

There's still the problem of "no name" (for want of a better expression) fixtures which are nearly but not quite copies of better known fixtures.

33 minutes ago, timsabre said:

Basically you tell it what parameters are on each DMX slot and it shows you all the other fixtures that match your one.

Yes, ZerOS (the software on FLX & FLX S) has this feature built in to the console. You can say (for example) "I want a 9 channel fixture, where channels 3 & 4 are Pan and Tilt and channel 6, 7 & 8 are RGB", and ZerOS will return all the fixtures in ZerOS Library that match this. If you find a fixture that's close but not quite right, you can then edit this fixture before patching it. More info on dealing with "missing" fixtures in ZerOS here: https://www.zero88.com/manuals/zeros/patching/add-fixtures/missing-fixtures

Edited May 17, 2023 by jonhole