A control device for the actuation of lamps in particular for internal aircraft lighting, wherein the control device (1) has an input (18) for the supply of an input signal and a plurality of outputs (21 28) for passing output signals to connected lamps (L1 L8). In the control device (1) a signal processing module (8 12) is preferably formed by a microprocessor and a preferably freely programmable electronic memory (13 17). The signal processing module (8 12) produces the output signals from the input signal in accordance with a conversion instruction deposited in the memory (13 17), wherein different conversion instructions can be stored in the memory (13 17) for output signals belonging to different outputs (21 28).