Answers and walkthroughs.

Routing system audio on macOS

macOS blocks apps from hearing the audio your computer is playing. This is the one-time setup to fix that; takes about 3 minutes and it's completely free.

Why this is needed

On Linux, audio apps can tap into the system's output via pulseaudio monitor. On Windows, it's WASAPI loopback. macOS has no equivalent built in; Apple keeps the output stream sealed off from recording. To get system audio (Spotify, YouTube, Rekordbox, anything playing on your Mac) into Conductør, we route it through a free virtual audio driver called BlackHole and a Multi-Output Device that plays to your speakers and BlackHole at the same time.

Set it up once and Conductør remembers it forever. If you're using a mic, an audio interface, or MIDI input instead of Mac playback, you can skip this entirely; you're already set.

01Install BlackHole

Head to existential.audio/blackhole. The site uses a donation-first flow that can throw people off if you don't know what to expect: there's no direct download button. You'll see two options, "Donate $10" and "I can't afford to donate." Both get you the same software; the second one is free and skips payment entirely.

Click "I can't afford to donate," fill in your email and name, and hit "Send Link to Download." The download link arrives by email within a minute or two. It'll come from noreply@existential.audio (check spam if it doesn't show up).

When the email arrives, grab the BlackHole 2ch version specifically. The 16ch build exists but is overkill for this; 2ch is what every guide assumes. Run the .pkg; it's a standard Mac installer, asks for your password, finishes in a few seconds. No Mac restart needed. If Spotify, Music, or your browser was already open, you may need to quit and reopen it so they refresh their list of audio outputs.

02Create a Multi-Output Device

A Multi-Output Device sends audio to two destinations at once: your speakers or headphones (so you can hear the music) and BlackHole (so Conductør can react to it).

Open Audio MIDI Setup (Spotlight it, or find it in /Applications/Utilities/). Click the + button in the bottom-left corner and pick Create Multi-Output Device.

Your new Multi-Output Device will appear in the left sidebar. Double-click its name to rename it to something you'll recognize; Speakers + Blackhole works well. Hit Return to commit the rename; if you just click away, the new name won't stick. Then set it up like this:

• Set your speakers (e.g. MacBook Air Speakers) as the Primary Device.
• Check the "Use" box for both your speakers and BlackHole 2ch.
• Set the speaker volume where you like it; BlackHole's volume should stay at max (that's the signal Conductør listens to).
• Check "Drift Correction" for BlackHole only. This is the step everyone misses, and leaving it off causes audio to slowly drift out of sync during long sessions.

03Make it your system output

Your new Multi-Output Device exists but isn't the active output yet. To switch to it, open System Settings → Sound → Output and select the Multi-Output Device you just created.

04Pick BlackHole in Conductør

Last step, and it's the easy one. In Conductør, go to Settings → Audio and pick BlackHole 2ch as the input device, then click Save.

Conductør will auto-detect BlackHole in the background, so the onboarding modal goes away within 30 seconds of BlackHole being set up; no need to restart the app.

Troubleshooting

• No sound coming out of my speakers. You probably still have the built-in speakers selected as output. Double-check System Settings → Sound → Output is set to your Multi-Output Device, not "MacBook Air Speakers" alone.
• Conductør says "no signal" even with music playing. Usually one of three things: (a) BlackHole 2ch isn't checked in your Multi-Output Device, (b) the Multi-Output Device isn't the active system output, or (c) Conductør's input device is set to your mic instead of BlackHole. Walk back through steps 2–4.
• Audio sounds delayed or out of sync over a long session. Drift Correction is probably off on BlackHole. Open Audio MIDI Setup, select your Multi- Output Device, and check the Drift Correction box on the BlackHole row.
• I'd rather pay for a nicer UI. Loopback by Rogue Amoeba ($109) does the same job with a prettier interface. BlackHole is free and works identically; pick based on taste.

Setting up Govee lights

Conductør drives Govee Wi-Fi lights directly over your LAN — no cloud roundtrip, no Govee API key. There's a one-time toggle you have to flip in the Govee Home app per light. While you're in the same screen, you can also grab the BT MAC and Product Model that Find my lights uses to keep identical lights straight.

Why this is needed

Govee's LAN API is opt-in per device. Until you flip LAN Control on, the light only listens for cloud commands and Conductør can't see it. Once it's on, the light advertises itself on multicast and Conductør can autodiscover it from the dashboard with one click.

Enabling LAN Control

The toggle lives three taps deep in the Govee Home app. The path is the same on iOS and Android.

1. Open Govee Home and pick the light. Tap the first device tab at the bottom of the screen (A in the screenshot below), then tap a blank area of the light's card (B) — not the power button. That opens the light's main control screen.
2. Tap the settings cog. Top-right corner of the light's control screen.
3. Toggle LAN Control on. Scroll down on the settings screen until you see LAN Control. Flip the switch. If it's already on, toggle it off and back on — that re-arms the LAN listener on flaky firmware. We've seen lights silently stop responding after a Govee Home update; the off/on cycle clears it.

Repeat for every light you want Conductør to drive. There's no global toggle — each light needs its own flip.

Finding the BT MAC and Product Model

When you have two identical lights (say, two of the same RGB strip), the Product Model alone isn't unique. The BT MAC is — and Conductør keys on it so commands land on the right strip. Both fields live on the same screen, right at the bottom.

1. Get to the same settings screen as Step 2 above (Govee Home → device tab → tap the light's card → settings cog).
2. Scroll all the way down. Past the Wi-Fi Settings, past the User Guide, past LAN Control — keep going until you see the Device section.
3. Read off Mac Address (formatted like D0:C9:07:35:FE:3E) and Product Model (formatted like H610A). Both are right above the Delete Device button.

Autodiscovering DMX fixtures with RDM

When it works, the Autodiscover button finds every fixture on your DMX line in a few seconds and pre-fills their addresses, channel counts, and profiles. When it doesn't, this page covers the three usual reasons and how to fix each one.

What RDM is, briefly

RDM (Remote Device Management) is the bidirectional layer that rides alongside DMX. Plain DMX is a one-way firehose — the controller sends 512 channels, the fixtures listen. RDM adds a request/response protocol on the same cable, so the controller can ask a fixture "what's your manufacturer? model? channel count? current DMX address?" and the fixture answers. That's the magic that makes autodiscover work: we ask, your fixtures answer, Conductør pre-fills the rig for you.

Not every fixture supports it. Sub-$150 LED pars and dimmer packs from before about 2015 often don't. Modern moving heads, mid/pro LED bars, and most professionally- marketed fixtures almost always do. If the scan doesn't see your fixture, that doesn't necessarily mean RDM is broken — it might mean that specific fixture genuinely doesn't implement it.

Why a scan might come up empty

Three buckets, in order of how often they're the cause:

01Node-side: Discovery Period set wrong

Most common cause for users with a working DMX setup. The Art-Net node (the box that converts your laptop's network signal into DMX on a 5-pin XLR cable) has its own RDM settings. Some nodes ship with autonomous RDM discovery disabled, which means the node never asks fixtures who they are unless something else triggers it.

DMXking nodes (eDMX1 PRO, eDMX2 PRO, eDMX MAX) are the most common example. They ship with Discovery Period = 0s, which translates to "never auto-discover." Conductør now sends an explicit discovery trigger before every scan, so this no longer breaks autodiscover for you out of the box. But if you want faster, lower-latency scans (or you want the node to keep a fresh table cached for other software), bump Discovery Period to 30 seconds in the eDMX MAX configuration tool:

1. Open eDMX MAX Configuration.
2. Click your node in the left panel.
3. Open the PortA tab.
4. Find DMX-OUT RDM Settings, drag Discovery Period to 30s.
5. Click Apply.

Other node-side reasons a scan can fail: RDM disabled entirely in the node config, the node living on a different IP subnet from your laptop, or the node's network mode being wrong (Static IP set to a value that doesn't match your network).

02Fixture-side: doesn't implement RDM

Some fixtures don't have it. Period. This is most common with budget-tier LED pars, inexpensive dimmer packs, and older moving heads. There's nothing to fix on those — they'll never respond to RDM no matter what the controller does.

Less obvious fixture-side causes when a fixture should support RDM:

• Fixture is powered off — it has to be on to answer RDM messages.
• Fixture is in a non-standard mode — some fixtures only respond to RDM in their full operating mode, not in standby/test patterns.
• Daisy-chain cable issue — RDM is more sensitive to cable quality than plain DMX. If the chain is long or uses non-DMX-rated cable, RDM responses can drop while DMX output still looks fine. Try testing with the fixture connected directly to the node.
• Termination missing — DMX needs a 120Ω terminator on the last fixture in the chain. Plain DMX often works without it; RDM is less forgiving.

03Network-side: Conductør can't reach the node

Less common but real. RDM autodiscover sends Art-Net packets on UDP port 6454. If something between Conductør and the node blocks that, the scan times out with no responders.

• Wrong subnet — your laptop and the node need to be on the same network. Check the node's IP in its config tool against your laptop's adapter IP.
• Firewall blocking UDP 6454 — corporate or aggressive personal firewalls sometimes block uncommon ports. A scan that returns nothing while plain DMX-OUT still works points here.
• VPN active — most VPNs route Art-Net traffic somewhere it can't return from. Disconnect for setup.

What to do if RDM truly isn't supported

You don't lose anything functional — RDM only helps with setup. Once a fixture is configured (manufacturer, model, channel count, DMX address, role), it works exactly the same whether it was added via autodiscover or by hand. So:

1. Close the Autodiscover modal.
2. Click + Add fixture on the Fixtures tab.
3. Pick the fixture from the bundled catalog (we ship 2,500+ profiles), or pick Custom / Blank if it's not in there.
4. Set the start address to match what the fixture's hardware menu says.
5. Save. Done.

If you have a few of the same fixture, use Count: N in the Add Fixture modal — it stamps N copies sequentially, addresses pre-allocated.