Two productions in, none of these movers have died yet
We run a 320-seat black box at a community college and the lighting budget is whatever the dean didn't spend on the pep band. Department head told me last August "find me 4 movers, $1k total" which is roughly half what one entry-level branded mover costs.
Ended up with 4 small movers off a brand I'd never heard of, ~$200 each direct. I went in expecting to babysit them through tech week.
Here's what actually happened: A Doll's House (3 weeks of tech + 8 shows) and a student-directed Tartuffe revival (5 shows after 2 weeks of tech). About 30 hours of pure show time per fixture, plus another ~70 hours of tech week and student programming abuse stacked on top.
Zero dead units and no RMA tickets so far. Two full productions in, all four are still on the rig.
Things I'd flag for anyone going down this road:
- Fans are inaudible from the audience in our 320-seat house. Only audible if you walk under a hang within roughly 1m. For dialogue-heavy work in a smaller space, just don't hang directly over the front rows.
- DMX channel layout is goofy if you've spent your career on Mac Auras. Took my student programmers one rehearsal to relearn it. RDM works fine, patches without drama once you've sorted the channel map.
Anyone else running cheap movers through a real season? Curious what dies first. Fan or pan motor.