Assigning Drivers to Areas and Channels

Driver assignment

If you have located a driver by flashing, you need to assign it to an area and channel to complete the commissioning process. Alternatively, you can assign a driver to an area with the localize by search procedure.

Assign driver to area/channel:

  1. In Areas view, select the Unassigned Devices editor.

  2. Either:

    • Click and drag each DALI driver from the Unassigned Devices editor to an area. The driver is assigned its own channel.

    Or:

    • Click and drag each DALI driver from the Unassigned Devices editor to an existing channel in an area. The driver is added to the channel together with other previously assigned drivers.

  3. If not already renamed, the DALI driver takes the name of its assigned area and channel.
    You can also right-click an assigned driver and select sb icon rename Rename.

  4. Repeat this process for all remaining DALI drivers on the controller.

  5. Click sb icon save to device Save to Device (F12).

    sb areas view unassigned devices ddbc320 dali

  • When saving to the DALI controller, data is saved in two stages. The DyNet data is first saved to the DALI controller, then the DALI data is automatically saved to the drivers by the DALI controller.

  • DALI group data can be saved manually using the sb icon update dali scenes Update DALI Scenes command in the System > Outputs editor. A DALI universe can have more DyNet areas than DALI groups.

    The controller gives the same DALI group address to each driver in an area, until it reaches the 16 DALI group address limit per universe. However, DyNet allows more areas to be created in a universe and across universes. Areas with the most drivers get priority when DALI groups are allocated. The DALI Controller manages the translation between DALI group addressing and Dynalite areas and channels.
Confirm group driver assignments by flashing an area or channel:

  1. Select the required area or channel.

  2. Click sb icon flash Flash and sb icon flash stop Stop Flash (F7) to confirm correct assignment.

  3. All DALI drivers assigned to the area or channel will flash.

  4. Reassign any incorrectly assigned drivers as required.

Setting the master driver

To make addressable drivers work together, more than one DALI driver can be assigned to the same channel, however only the first one will act as the master for control purposes. This means that on a channel only one driver will respond to channel level requests.

Setting the master circuit is optional, as System Builder automatically selects a master circuit for each channel.

  • sb icon circuit master Master DALI driver

  • sb icon circuit duplicate Duplicate DALI driver

To change the master driver, right-click the required driver and select sb icon set master channel Set Master Channel.

Other drivers assigned to the same channel will automatically have a sb icon checkbox tick tick in the Outputs editor Duplicate column.