Also…irrelevant, but was a slightly more interesting tag line than “Post-PLASA 2010”.
The show was very good this year – we had a prime spot thanks to Polar Audio, right at the entrance on their natty stand where we commandeered a disproportionate number of meeting tables and general space due to our very enthusiastic staff presence (or should that be due to our very extensive staff presence)…
The DP548 went down a storm – more so than I expected – the view that it was more than a sum of its parts was neatly highlighted by one customer who explained how he would use one when they were available – his plan was to use inputs A&B feeding outputs 1&2 as insert processing on his master vocal channels, leaving him with the equivalent of a super-powered DP226 on inputs C&D feeding outputs 3-8.
There were a few good suggestions about alternative uses for the unit as well, which mainly focussed on the idea that it needn’t be thought of as a 448 with dynamics, but more as the main parts of a channel of SiDD, so maybe we should look into doing a 4 in – 4 out version for people to use it like that…any comments would be appreciated.
The other star of the show was the new version of iCore which now includes full 4 Series support, so presets can be pulled in from any unit and reused in the DC1048. The ability to design custom panels has now also been implemented, and for anyone who didn’t see our demo at the show, we had a little 10″ resistive touch screen monitor (a snip at £160 from amazon!) wired up to a laptop with a nifty panel set up to control various devices on a system on the stand – channels of amplifiers, Ti1048, Breakout box gains etc, all neatly combined on a single panel.
iCore version 2.0 will be released later this month – we are just giving it one last check over and getting some documentation finished explaining the new features, including wireless support using the “Walkabout Kit” hardware.
I met up with Andi Zeh, the man responsible for the iPod apps for the 4 Series (the new 4 Series mini one is now in the app store – see previous posts for more info) and he showed me his prototype iPad 4 Series app – it looks good so far and it’s only just been started so keep up the good work Andi – sorry I couldn’t make it out for a drink 🙁
On a different topic entirely, I unearthed this video from Frankfurt a few years ago (before MC2 merged with us) of Carol opening Ian’s wallet at a restaurant – enjoy!
The desirability of a product is inversely proportional to its availability. As often happens, once something goes out of production, people are desperate to get hold of one. More often than not, this is just to put on a shelf and admire as a great example of its genre, or maybe as the first ever version of something. They’ll never use it again properly, except to occasionally show it to a fellow admirer.
I am guilty of this type of behaviour, especially with technology. Not so much of the clamouring for something because it has become rare, more because it holds a certain nostalgia, or is a piece of great design and worked really well. Without going too much further into this I would just mention the XO Laptop – designed as the ”$100 laptop”, whilst it has yet to achieve this price, it’s good to know that to date nearly a million and a half of these little machines have been given away to developing nations’ kids to help them educate themselves.
XO Laptop – Yes, I have one, and yes those are aerials for the WiFi.I bought one of these as part of the ”Give One Get One” program a couple of years ago (thanks again to Kevin Markowitz at Group One for helping with this – cheers mate!) and it’s a masterpiece of practical design that has been so carefully thought out as to extend to things like spare screws inside the case so kids can fix it themselves if anything ever needs replacing. This would be my example of good design that also does its job extremely well. It was criticised in some quarters as not actually being a very good computer, but that wasn’t its design remit – it was supposed to be a leaning tool for collaboration in classrooms in developing countries and so not only was the software important, the hardware and of course cost were crucial if it was to be a success. But enough of that – read more about it here if you are interested: https://laptop.org/en/
My geeky, retro nostalgic example would have to be my Vectrex. I am not a gamer by any standard or definition, but this console still can entertain me for hours with its incredibly smooth and fast vector graphics and crap sound chip blurting and squirting effects though its (really very loud) little speaker. I can’t remember exactly when this was released (early 80s?), and I’d be lying if I said it was a beautiful piece of design, but it does work very well, and I love mine dearly. Sad. Sad. SAD. More on the Vectrex here : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vectrex
Vectrex – MineSweeper anyone? You will lose.So maybe now I should get to the point. First we had SiDD – xta’s first foray into digital dynamics came about as an extension to the work we had done in perfecting the limiters that went into the DP224 and DP226. One of reasons for the success of these units was not just how good they sounded under normal circumstances, but how good they sounded when they were being really THRAPED (for non UK residents, that means driven hard :)). This was all down to the limiter algorithms being so transparent. Other companies limiters had a far from linear response, despite the assumption that a digital limiter would be a perfect model, and this non-linearity manifests itself as distortion, not all that measurable on a steady state signal in a test environment, but definitely audible with music. As we don’t tend to go to a concert to listen to sine waves (unless it’s Pendulum, but why bother?!), the musicality of the limiters set the units apart, and continue to do so to this day.
So SiDD – the ”Seriously Intelligent Digital Dynamics” unit was born. Two channels of Dyamic EQ (only one band though), a compressor with sidechain EQ, a noise gate or expander with sidechain EQ, and a limiter with look ahead delay and again, sidechain EQ. Harmonics generation, a delay line and a pile of parametric EQ made this a formidable box of tricks, forming a pretty comprehensive engineer’s toolbox, capable of sorting out all manner of problems and also being used creatively in a studio environment.
The only real criticism SiDD faced was that with all that power, it was hard to access everything, even though menus were kept to a minimum and there was a powerful Windows package to run with it. So along came the Series 2 processors: the best bits of SiDD but with knobs on. In particular the C2, dual channel compressor, and D2, dual channel 3 band dynamic EQ proved to be what people had been waiting for – analogue sounding perfect dynamics but with the advantages of digital – repeatability, AES inputs and outputs, pristine sound quality. And of course lots of knobs and lights which every engineer likes 😉
Eventually when we were forced to discontinue the Series 2 units, of course everyone suddenly realises how good they are, and how much they rely on them and wants to order more! The only option was to either build them again with new guts (expensive development and eventual probably expensive units) or take advantage of what we had learned over the course of the SiDD and Series 2 development and use this to enhance something we already had.
So the new flagship is the DP548 – everything you love about the DP448 plus the equivalent of a pile of Series 2 processing for little more than the cost of a single C2. You get the equivalent of 4 D2s thrown in (one across each input), and 8* C2s (one on each output). Add to that the fact that we have also opened up the routing to allow matrix mixing from any input to output (you can still do traditional routing if you want) AND you get the ability to store and recall dynamics settings (can’t do that with knobs!). Of course, being a DP product means it’s also integrated into AudioCore for an amazing level of control and detailed monitoring if you want it.
Like I said – there’s not much it doesn’t do (you’ve still got all the power of the high slope crossovers, the PEQs which you can swap to a multitude of different behaviours including esoteric ones like elliptical and resonant, the two stage limiters, the Graphic EQs etc. etc.), so come to Plasa and see it in action.
*OK so technically it’s only the power of 4 C2 compressors, but as all 8 channels are linkable in any combination it’s as useful as 8 individual units…I think so anyway.
So, moving on from that, our good friend Andi Zeh in Germany has been working away (in his spare time it should be mentioned) on the iPhone app and has added a curve draw feature showing an equivalent of the “Global View” in AudioCore.
Curve view shows frequency and phase reponse for each output.
Falling out of the work he’s done on the full iPhone app, he’s also developed a cut down version of the app called “DP4 Mini” which shows a single screen with control of gains, and mutes, and display config, names and metering. The good news is it’s only a few Euro, so if you just need a quick tweak then this is the one to try…
Gains, mutes and mentering...
He’s also been beavering away with an iPad so watch this space for future info on what develops there…
Slipping in just above the iPod and just behind the 360, the DP226 makes it into Pro Sound News’ (unscientific) poll of the bits of kit that just keep on working. I can testify to that, as we still get plenty of units back for service. That’s not to say they all are turning up broken, it’s generally for basic things like dead back-up batteries, squashed encoders where the rack’s been dropped on its face, bent fronts – general wear and tear. It would be worse if we didn’t get any back, as that would imply that they were no longer in regular service, but that certainly can’t be the case.
What’s even more heartening is the conversations with customers concerned about how long they’ll be without their equipment – it’s generally only a couple of days – as they depend on the units so much. That’s good to know. What’s also good to know is that above and byeond the 5 year guarantee with all our units, we can still service and repair everything we have ever manufactured so don’t be put off buying second hand. Ideally buy new gear of course (!) but the reason the second hand prices remain so high is partly down to the fact that you aren’t buying out of date gear – just used.
This relates to the last post as well, as the main reason for the update is to include new DC1048 firmware that’ll work with both the original and the new DSP platform as mentioned in the said post.
What do you mean you didn’t read it?
There is also new firmware included for all MC2 Ti-Series components – the new firmware for the amps and breakouts uses a different comms ID generation algorithm so be aware that when you update any Ti-Series components you’ll have to rescan the system to find everything again. This only needs to be done once.
My advice would be to make sure before you update firmware in the Ti-Series components, that you go on-line and name each amp/breakout with an identifiable description, rather than the default “No Network Name Has Been Set!” string. This way, when you rescan, you’ll be able to work out what’s connected where if you’ve used the zones to group devices in physical locations.
Yes, I had a lovely holiday – thanks for asking. Anyway – I came back to a several hundred emails offering me the usual courses in “Graphic Design” (which I take as a personal affront) and member enlargement (which I do not) . Amongst the detritus were several genuine mails from customers enquiring why some of their brand new DP448 units had firmware version 2.10 and there was no sign of it on the website. Things like this happen when you go away for a week.
The answer is easy – the units with version 2.10 have a new DSP platform in them. This was first used in the DP426 (hence it being at firmware version 1.83 whilst all other 4 Series are still 1.82) and then the DC1048. We are methodically moving over to this newer platform and so all new units apart from the DP424 and the DP444 will be version 2.10.
This new firmware will be released when it is finalised for the entire 4 Series.
There is no need to worry about upgrading current units – the firmware is operationally identical to 1.82 (or 1.83 for the DP426).
After 5 weeks of gruelling training, the “XTA Hardcore” Works Fours rowing team were pumped and ready for the 25th anniversary regatta here in sunny Stourport on Severn. Each week since mid May, we met at the boat club by the river Severn for a mentally and physically exhausting training session of up to 45 minutes. On one occasion this was twice in a single week. The punishment. Yours truly was in the “Stroke” position (more on that later), supposedly setting the pace for our now streamlined rowing machine.
What happened on the day was closer to a streamlined washing machine. Our first race was at 9:45 am. We duly turned up resplendent in our iCore team shirts, looking altogether like a team that meant business.
N-n-n-n-losersSomeone's nicked the bally boat - hilarious.
Just before the race we scope out the competition and I give a highly motivational team talk, being the self-appointed captain and all that. I think what I was probably saying was more along the lines of “Do you think there’s time for a slash before we go?”, or “Someone wake Lewis – we’re up next.”
Must have been important - look at the gesticulation.
So we row to the starting line, and get into position. Steward shouts “Attention…go!” and we’re off – in a ferociously fought battle to the
OK so we lost.
And discovered later that the team we raced against had entered the past 3 years so we didn’t feel quite so rubbish then, this having been our first go.
Cheating swines. Losers of the first race got one more opportunity to get back into the running (or rowing), and things were looking good initially in this race, until a seating malfunction which resulted in my seat breaking, and falling off the back into the footwell behind me. Remember I mentioned I was the “Stroke”? Well, during that race it just looked like I’d had one. We eventually limped back across the finish, but did get a good cheer and some friendly abuse from the commentator so not all was lost.
If you want to watch some carefully edited highlights, which show us not losing, here’s your chance.
Obviously by “Victorious” I mean “Not submerged”. All good fun none the less and we’ll be back next year to whip them. Maybe 🙂
Here, actually. Well, not exactly here, as I’m not going to explain them all again, but there is an updated guide to help you choose the best one for your application. It covers all the interfaces we stock, with part numbers and shows what you get with each kit. You can download a copy from the Tech Support section of the site, under the “Remote and Interfaces” section or directly from here: https://audiocore.wpengine.com/tech-support-docs/Remote_Interfaces.pdf
Now, onto more important things like our sea-faring activities of late… 🙂
Just a quick note – I had a phone call from a customer in America (who was kind enough to be up at 3:15am this morning to receive his call back – thanks John) who’d downloaded AudioCore and had an error message about a corrupt “.cab” file. Turned out the file on the server was damaged, so it’s been replaced and all’s well.
If you’ve had a recent issue trying to upgrade and seen this, apologies, and it’s now fixed 🙂
Bet you’re all gagging to hear about our conquests on the high seas…well, it wasn’t quite the Atlantic, and you’ll have to wait a little longer… 😉
Not being part of the Las Vegas posse has never really bothered me. Until now. Until lucky Laurel and Hardy here get to go up in a private plane at the end of InfoComm for a zip about near the Grand Canyon. I say “near” as I’ve been told you aren’t allowed to just fly over it as there’s a bit of a monopoly on just who gets access, I guess to limit the number of tourist flights. I say “so I’ve been told” as Richard might have made it up when the actual truth was they wouldn’t let someone into the airspace who looks this deranged.
Luckily he's still on the runway.
…and much more scarily, mid-flight.
"Satnav schmatnav!" they scoffed. Then drove into a bollard.
End of show madness overtook the airfield staff and they allowed them to go for a flight. I gather the fumes in the cockpit were being recycled in flight to provide fuel. Make of that what you will. Here they are pre-flight:
Be grateful, America, they only let them up one at a time.
So moving on, maybe some comment from the show itself. Well, interesting news was that Danté has been taken up by more manufacturers, one of the notables being Midas. This is all good, and as we’re starting to ship the our Danté breakouts, everyone wins. At a recent seminar recently I was asked why we had gone with Danté as the option for our “Live” Breakouts (the DC range of breakouts are available with Cobranet and Ethersound as well as Danté). The simple answer to that is that it sounds the best by quite a margin, and as sound quality is as important as it’s even been to us, we wouldn’t have felt happy with our box being a weak link in a potentially top class chain of gear. Coupled with the flexibility and ease of use of the Danté system, and other details such as their virtual soundcard driver (with multiple AISO pairs available) and their commitment to AVB future-proofing, it makes sound sense, so to speak 😉
Coming up soon – not content with ruling the skies, XTA takes to the water with spectacular results…
