What Basic Skills are Required?

[mrpackethead]

Having done a lot of this stuff and worked with a lot of people doing a lot of this stuff, i'll share my experience of what you need to know at a bare minimum

(a) you need to be able to configure the controller device with what ever universe/channel information it needs. To do this, you probably need to be able to use a web browser, though some devices have other config methods
(b) you need to be able to plug controllers into a switch; and your media server into a switch.

Thats about it... If something goes wrong then you might need to know some more, but thats the bare minimum.

[angus40]

What Basic Skills are Required?

This may be one skill needed .

http://www.techrepublic.com/photos/w...l-panel/354396

or this might be another

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEUAAiAIKbw

[klyneshouse]

You also need a good understanding of voltage drop, power injection and distance the pixel data can travel, but that can be said about pixels in general

By far understanding and overcoming voltage drop, and understanding placement/length restrictions from controller was my biggest learning curve.
I just finished wiring up / testing the last of my ~3000 new channels for 2012.

As everyone else is also saying, an understanding of basic networking is also a must, which most here already have.
Being your channel count/sequence size will grow, another faster/more memory computer may be needed.
The patience and dedication knowing that your channel count will multiply by a 100 fold, so sequencing is a time killer, nutcracker will be a huge plus for pixel newbies this year.
If you were renard only like me, getting your arms around universes/groups etc (the new dmx lingo) was not that bad, the E681 documentation and fasteddy's schematics were very helpful in that regard.

And lastly, the blending in with your existing non rgb elements may be somewhat difficult, even the fact you might have to retire some old stuff prematurely, or more probable,, add the missing red green or blue strands to it so it matches up.

[fasteddy]

Thats a very good point as well klyneshouse, the way you sequence and the software you use is also an important factor to consider. Sequencing and controlling pixels takes on a whole new way of thought when sequencing and puts a lot more demand on lower end computers which has been touched on before in another thread.
Other things that do cause some confusion is the type of pixel to use, be it the 6803, 2801, 3001, GE and the countless others that keep appearing and the voltage used, mainly either 5vdc or 12vdc

There is definetly a lot more to consider when dealing with pixels in general, E1.31 is just the main way that the computer communicates to the controllers due to the potentially large amount of data that can be required when using pixels and as such a good understanding of basic computer networking is required. You can still use pixels with DMX but you are limited by the 512 channel universe per dongle which only equates to 170 pixels. So in the end the obvious choice is to use e1.31 and learn how to connect, configure and control pixels.

But there are lots of good material starting to appear around the forums that are trying to help people understand and due to the amount of choices it can make it hard for someone new getting into pixels and E1.31 to actually decide which system and which pixels would best suit them, everyone seems to have their own thoughts and opinions.