In the last post, I wrote about the common power connectors and plugs the stage lighting. Â If you haven’t already read that post, I invite you to now.
In this post, we’re going to go over the basic data connectors in stage lighting, and end all of the confusion between whether DMX is 3 pin, or 5 pin! Â If you don’t know what I’m talking about, just keep reading, I promise it won’t be over your head.
Lighting Today Has Many Forms of Data
DMX, Art-Net, Kling-Net, Hog-Net, MA-Net and more!
Thankfully, there are only a few that we really need to pay attention to, and these basic types of data will give us the knowledge to cable up 90% of lighting rigs out there.
So, walking into an average light rig, you’re going to see:
- DMX 3 Pin Cables
- DMX 5 Pin Cables
- 4 Pin Scroller and ColorBlast Cable
- Ethernet and EtherCon Network Cables
Data is thankfully much more simple than the world of power!
DMX – Is it 3 Pin or 5 Pin?
There seems to be a ton of confusion in the world whether or not DMX is transmitted via a 3 Pin or a 5 Pin XLR cable.  Some people say that true DMX is 5 Pin.  Meanwhile, others say that it only uses 3 of the Pins anyways.
So who’s right?
They are both right. Â While the DMX512 specification calls for 5 pin DMX cable, it only uses 3 of the Pins for data transmission. Â The original standard did this to leave room for future expansion and also to differentiate DMX cable from microphone cable, which also uses the 3 Pin XLR.
Nevertheless, most 5 Pin cables out on the market today only have 3 pins of wire inside them, and many lighting fixtures have 3 pin and 5 pin connectors. Â I talk about this more in depth here.
4 Pin Scroller and ColorBlast Cable
While 3 Pin and 5 Pin DMX cable is very common, another XLR you might see out there is the 4 pin cable used for scrollers and LED ColorBlasts.
These 4 Pin cables take the output of a power supply and send a proprietary signal to the LED lights or color scrollers. Â If you don’t know what a scroller is, don’t worry…they’re not all that common anymore!
4 Pin cables connect together just like 3 and 5 Pin XLR’s, so it’s easy to confuse them in the field. And every time these cables seem to become obsolete, another manufacturer comes in and builds a new light that uses them!
Ethernet and EtherCon ArtNet & Other Nets
The last type of data cable you may see “out in the wild” is the good ‘ole Ethernet cable. Â This is the common cable that delivers internet to your computer, and has non-internet uses in the entertainment business.
The most common non-internet data you’ll see running down Ethernet is Art-Net or sACN.  This allows you to send large amounts of DMX universes of data shooting down 1 cable, and gets very useful when you are working with large lighting rigs!