Skip to main content

VR-Arena troubleshooting

Work through the troubleshooting method first. With only three projectors and two machines, the "one channel or all channels" question resolves very quickly here.

TODO verify with senior technician

Symptoms are derived from the equipment documentation and the structure of the signal chain. Causes and step sequences are informed reconstructions — review against real fault history before treating as authoritative.

Quick triage​

ObservationJump to
One of three projectors darkOne projector is dark
All three dark, projectors poweredAll three channels dark
Stereo doubled, ghosted or uncomfortableActive stereo not syncing
Source will not switchMatrix routing
No soundAudio silent
Seams visible between projectorsBlend problems

One of the three projectors is dark​

  1. Check the projector's own web interface on port 9999 — vr-proj1.c.itn.liu.se:9999, vr-proj2, vr-proj3. Addresses on Projectors. Check power state, shutter, input and alarms.
  2. If unreachable, check the PDU outlet on PDUs.
  3. If reachable and healthy but dark, suspect the signal into it — the DisplayPort feed or the matrix routing.
  4. Only then consider entering G111b, and only when the room is free.

Remember the mapping: projector 1 is closest to the door and covers the left of the screen, projector 3 is furthest from the door and covers the right.

Access to G111b

Via alarmed server room G112, with the C-tech key. Never leave the key in the lock — the door locks from both sides and self-closes.

All three channels are dark​

Not a projector problem. Go upwards.

  1. Is the playback application still running on WALL-E?
  2. Is the correct source selected on the control panel?
  3. Are the RTX 6000 Ada outputs still active — did a display topology change occur?
  4. Do the projectors show their own on-screen menus? If yes, the fault is upstream of them.

Active stereo is not syncing​

The arena runs active stereo with separate left-eye and right-eye pipelines on separate computers. That split is the usual source of stereo faults.

  1. Confirm both eye machines are running and playing the same content at the same point. One machine paused or crashed produces a "stuck eye" that reads as ghosting.
  2. Confirm the stereo sync signal is present on both pipelines.
  3. Confirm the glasses are active-stereo glasses and are charged. Flat glasses look exactly like a sync fault to an audience.
  4. Confirm the playback mode is stereo and the eyes are not swapped.
  5. Check that neither machine has had a GPU driver or display configuration change — stereo and genlock settings do not survive one.

If you cannot resolve it before a session, run the session in 2D. That is a legitimate fallback and better than an audience with headaches.

DisplayPort matrix routing problems​

The arena uses DisplayPort matrices between the compute and the projectors — see Matrixes.

  1. Confirm the intended input-to-output routing.
  2. Re-apply the routing rather than power-cycling the matrix as a first step.
  3. If an output is dead on every input, suspect the output card or the cable to the projector rather than the routing.

The VR-Arena uses three matrices (addresses on Matrixes):

  • Kramer VS-88UT (HDMI) — back HDMI connections to the projectors
  • LightWare MX2-8x8-DH-8DPio-A (DisplayPort 1) — left eye signal from WALL-E and BURN-E
  • LightWare MX2-8x8-DH-8DPio-A (DisplayPort 2) — right eye signal from WALL-E and BURN-E

The standard routing for a normal session: each eye's LightWare matrix routes the active machine (WALL-E for 2D, BURN-E for 3D) to the three projector fiber encoders; the Kramer carries the back HDMI connections.

BOSE 5.1 audio is silent​

  1. Is the correct audio source selected? A source switch that changes video but not audio is a common cause.
  2. Check mute and level at the mixer and on the playback machine.
  3. Check amplifier power.
  4. Determine whether all channels are silent (source/amp) or some channels (routing/speaker/cabling).

Visible seams or misalignment​

  1. One seam or all seams? One seam means one projector moved or is being fed the wrong region; all seams means a global calibration or content-resolution problem.
  2. Confirm the output resolution matches what the blend was calibrated for.
  3. Remember the projectors are rear-projected via individual mirrors — a bumped mirror shifts the image in the opposite direction from what intuition suggests.
Do not re-warp

Warp and blend are Barco Pulse calibration tasks, not troubleshooting steps. Escalate.

The control panel is unresponsive​

The VR-Arena control panel runs on the Showmaster 2 unit in the VR-Arena. See Showmaster.

  1. Reboot from the control panel — vr-panel.citn.liu.se, Reboot section, press Showmaster. Under a minute.
  2. Reboot via Medialon Showmaster Editor from VMIX-02 — the VR-Arena is on 172.19.66.0/24 and the editor only finds Showmasters on its own network, so it must be VMIX-02 and not VMIX-01. Connect with Ctrl+Alt+K, select the unit, then Reboot.
  3. Power cycle from the ePDU — the tech panel's Power Cycle section is not yet implemented, so this must be done at the PDU. Roughly two minutes.

Restart order for the VR-Arena​

  1. Playback application
  2. WALL-E, both eye machines if stereo
  3. Matrix routing re-apply
  4. Showmaster 2
  5. Projectors, respecting cooldown
  6. PDU outlets — last resort

When to swap hardware​

DeviceSwappable?
PDUYes — see spare units
DisplayPort cable to a projectorYes, but only with the room free
Playback machineOnly with a prepared spare; stereo and genlock settings must be reapplied
ProjectorNo — per-position warp and blend. Escalate.