Setting DALI Gateway to Factory Defaults Changes Ballast Addresses

Symptoms/Issue

After setting a Response DMX DALI Gateway to factory defaults in Concert, fixture addresses have changed even after re-sending the configuration.

Description/Explanation of Issue

When you connect a Response DALI Gateway to a DALI loop, it discovers ballasts and assigns them DALI “short addresses” if they do not already have them assigned. These short addresses are patched to DMX addresses based on the starting address of the gateway. This patch is then stored in Concert, along with other gateway settings such as mode, curves, and hold last look behavior. Concert does not identify the ballasts on any level deeper than the short address.

When you send a factory default command to the gateway, it also forwards this factory default command on to each ballast connected to its loop; this includes clearing the devices short address. Then, when the gateway is rebooted, it rediscovers and reassigns the short addresses to the ballasts. When you reupload the config from Concert, the DMX -> DALI patch table remains the same, but the fixtures may now have different short addresses so the control will be changed.

Fix/Solution

If the gateway has already cleared the addresses of the connected devices, all that can be done is to reidentify and reassign short addresses to devices. However, you can prevent this behavior by disconnecting the DALI loop from the gateway before setting it to defaults. This will prevent the addresses from being cleared on the fixtures, and when they are rediscovered, your patch will still be correct once you reupload the config from Concert.