Addressing
Terra User Manual
90
020-102838-10 Rev. 1 (05-2020)
Copyright
©
2020 Christie Digital Systems USA Inc. All rights reserved.
Addressing Guidelines
All devices and the Controller must be on the same IP subnet.
Devices can have their IP address and subnet mask configured either through a DHCP server or static
values can be applied.
Using static values is strongly advised.
If a device is configured for DHCP address allocation and no DHCP server can be reached, the device
falls back to self-allocation using the Automatic Private IP Addressing (APIPA) scheme, also commonly
called auto-IP. This scheme allocates addresses in the 169.254.0.0/16 range (i.e. 169.254.x.x with a
subnet mask of 255.255.0.0). If a device is configured for manual IP address allocation, addresses are
set using the Terra software (Terra Startup Assistant and Terra Manager).
The Controller must be connected to the same broadcast domain, subnet, and gateway as the device
running the Terra Startup Assistant.
Best practices include:
•
Using the Terra Startup Assistant software to assign IP addresses to Terra devices.
•
Include the Gateway address for the Controller.
•
Apply static addressing.
DHCP address management is popular for desktop PCs because they frequently migrate, and
this eliminates configuration time for IT staff. Terra Controllers, Transmitters and Receivers
are network appliances that are similar to printers and servers which do not migrate and are
better managed using static IP addresses. Use of static IP addresses also reduces the amount
of DHCP/DNS network traffic resulting in greater efficiency. A compromise that can be used
when network policies dictate use of DHCP addressing is to reserve a block of static IP
addresses for use with Terra Transmitters and Receivers and other AV devices.
Multicast IP Addresses
Audio and video data is exchanged between Terra devices using IP multicasting. The address range for
these devices is 224.1.1.1 to 224.1.3.255. This address range is reserved and must not be used by
other network applications. The range is used as follows:
224.1.1.1-221.1.1.252
Available for audio and video
224.1.1.253
Reserved for RS232 and IR data to all TX (encoders)
224.1.1.254
Reserved for RS232 and IR data to all RX (decoders)
224.1.1.255
Available for audio and video
224.1.2.0-224.1.2.255
Available for audio and video
224.1.3.0-224.1.3.255
Available for audio and video
IP Address
Terra devices support IPV4 addresses. IPV6 addresses are not supported.
For additional information on addressing, refer to
Guidelines, page
Dynamic IP Address Assignment
By default, Terra devices are configured to use a DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) server
to have an IP address assigned automatically. For this to work, a DHCP server has to be present and
connected either directly to the 10G network switch or connected to one of the Terra devices over the
1G network port.