Back in 2009, I was introduced, hooked, and purchased my first Vista lighting desk. At the time, it was under the Australian company, Jands, who designed, built, and sold it, which at the time, and some would argue today, was a rather unconventional lighting control desk, which did the job but in a different way.
Fast forward to today, and Vista is now part of the Canadian lighting manufacturer and distributor, ChromaQ. I have to say that as a user, for all those years, I have seen it come on in leaps and bounds, and since ChromaQ took Vista on, it has become an even better piece of lighting hardware & software. I have to admit though that I have, fraternised with other systems, but in the end, I stayed with Vista by ChromaQ.
Why Vista...?
I'm a simple man, and I always require simple solutions. I also need portability and the Vista system fits neatly into a Peli case that I have dragged around the globe since 2011, it's my own desk, I keep it in good order, the software is always up to date as well as my fixture library. I am responsible for it, and only me.
The system, more importantly, is easy to use. It can do what any other lighting desk can do, some things better, some maybe not so good (I've not really found ant TBH). That can be said, however, about all hardware/software devices; lighting desks are no exception. I don't do the lighting desk wars. I've turned up to many a festival or gig, and received sniggers from local lighting crews. It's satisfying to watch; later, their expression changes when I've rocked up, plugged in, and done a great show. They all nod their approval and truly marvel at the speed and agility of the system; they are genuinely impressed. I'e turned up to afew places and people have said."Oh, I've not see none of these before". (Where have they been?)
The dreaded dongle?
I have to admit. I wasn’t keen on it way back when I bought it, and I'm still not keen on it now, and that’s the dongle model. What a pain in the ass that really can be...?
The idea, I guess, is that if you have a small budget, you can start with 512 channels with a small surface and, bang! you have a good cheap lighting desk. The more money you have, the more channels you can buy. I have 4096 channels or 8 universes (8U). The issue is, fixtures that are coming out, almost daily have so many modes that they swallow so many channels. An Ayrton Perseo, for example, in extended mode is 61 channels; some fixtures have considerably more, especially the flashy "program each pixel" type fixtures, battens, tubes, and LED bricks.
In the past five years, I have been doing some rather large corporate gigs. The last one was back in January 2026, I needed 32 universes! We had dozens of LED tubes each in 121+ channel mode, Perseos in full mode, washes all with individual pixel control, it just went on and on and on...
To get it all working, I had to use a mains powered 6-port hub, as well as the socket inside the EX itself. Now, that’s no big deal in its self really, is it? Inside any lighting desk, it's just a motherboard, an OS, and some USB ports, but everything is hidden under a nice piece of hardware.
So I turn up with a fistful of dongles and a USB hub, which makes the whole set-up look like a home lab computer set-up. In the end, I just made sure it was all nicely labelled up and thrown around the back out of view... What the eye doesn’t see, etc...!
I'm not really moaning? Am I? The Vista system, since its conception, was to allow for folk on tight budgets, folk, that in the future will grow, and folk, who want to go all in, to be able to afford a lighting desk, no matter what the budget or discipline they were in. But is it time to get away from the physical plug in dongle now? These pesky little things that you can lose, and or break. (I should know, I've done it twice since 2012! Careless).
Vista is the only lighting desk using a physical mechanical device to add DMX channels to a lighting desk, if there are others then what I'm saying applies to those desks as well. For most lighting consoles the amount of DMX universes are baked into the desk. Most compact consoles now come with a minimum of 24U all included in the price. Take for example the latest desk from AVO, the D3 with 24U straight out of the box. How about the Chamsys MQ70, again 24U.
Here's the thing though. If I had an AVO D3 on my 32U gig, how would I have done that gig? So maybe the stacking dongle thing is not so bad after all...?
It's all about cost?
If you were to buy a Vista EX, add an 8U dongle, get it all working with a good computer, then you'll have an 8U lighting desk, for what? £6000.00? Spend just under £10,000 for an AVO D3 or an Chamsys MQ70 and you'll have a 24U lighting desk. So it's almost double the cost, but you are getting 8U extra!!! What's not to like there...? However, if you are a small church, say, and there are many that use the Vista, you can get an MV and a 512 dongle, super cheap. By the way. Why is the Vista so popular with churches. Is it that different dongle cost thing?
I'm staying with Vista by ChromaQ, I am, all in. I know it well, it has done me a great service on every gig. I have contacts that I can hire extra dongles from if I need more that the 8U I already own. I'd just like to not bother I think with the whole mechanical USB thing. It's another physical point of failure.
Another way?
If ChromaQ want to carry on with the "pay as you grow" model of console selling, is it not time to change to a software based licencing key, similar to the licencing used by say Capture, the visualisation software? How about just 'hard-wireing' your selected universes into the console like everyone else is doing?
These are just my ramblings on the issue. I'm sure it's not as straight forward as it all sounds be it technically, or more important, financially.
Thoughts...?