My sACN Keeps Shutting Off: Thanks, Windows

Recently, I’ve been using a Windows 11 laptop for a Hog 4 setup and I kept having my console and the vis computer lose connection.  This would happen about every 30 minutes.  Most frustrating.  I remembered a setting in Device Manager that would power down the network adaptor (I’m using a USB C hub) if Windows decided it wasn’t doing very much.  When I got to the ethernet adapter and right clicked on it, I found a whole new horror- EEE is implemented in Windows.

EEE is short for Energy Efficient Ethernet and it became part of the internet protocol a few years back.  For lighting network people, it’s the devil.  (Check out my article The Case of the Missing Universes for how this problem shows on a network-wide basis.) It’s supposed to save power by turning off IP addresses and/or ports that aren’t doing very much.  Since sACN is efficient, EEE sees it as something to turn off.  So here’s yet another thing to add to your list of things you need to do to Windows to make it work for lighting.

Go to Device Manager.  Find your Ethernet adapter under Ethernet.  Right click on your adapter, and choose EEE. From the pull down menu, select Disabled.  Choose Green Ethernet, and do the same thing. 

I’m unsure if this is new to Windows 11 or not as I don’t have a windows 10 computer any more.  (If you do and can confirm or not- I’d love that info- please post in the comments.) If it is, I suspect it might be a new name, since there were power settings previously.  

While we’re talking about it, maybe it’s time to make a crowd-sourced list of all the things you have to change and alter to make entertainment protocols work on Windows.  Please comment below and I’ll write something up for us all to have. I can then update it whenever we find a new thing.

3 comments

    • Terry - Reply

      Not in my experience. I’ve never lost connection on a Apple product for this reason.

  1. Ueli Riegg - Reply

    I have Win10 Pro 22H2 (19035.4651). There’s Advanced EEE (Disabled), Energy-Efficient Ethernet (Enabled), Green-Eyhernet (Enabled). I have never changed any of the settings so I assume those are the defaults, or maybe previous defaults that persisted through updates.
    On this PC this NIC is also running internet traffic, that’s probably why I’ve never seen any power saving deactivating.

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