The dangers of an all Ethernet setup

[totoxraymond]

1. I gotta check my dante routing
2. I gotta check my Dadman routing
3. I gotta check pro tools I/o setup

I hate that Dadman thing. In EVERY studio with Dante i've worked in, the Dadman setup is wrong.

One of them had the routing wrong between film and EBU standards (L C R Ls Rs LFE or L R C LFE Ls Rs)

Another one has it's input set to mic level even though they use an external preamp. When i arrived, the PAD was ON, the preamp gain was around 10dB, then the interface was adding another gain stage with wrong input impedance.

I spent a full hour understanding why it was so noisy...

Another studio, all the line out had a 20dB gain. The talent was complaining that the sound was bad in their headphones, i went and check and it was awfully distorted... Put the output level at unity and everything was nice.

Dante is cool by the way!

 

[Brian Roth]

As a sound engineer and sometimes amateur musician, i appreciate that someone else will take care of audio so i can focus on my guitar.
Hopefully, the collegue will do his job well...


I set up my control room so i can monitor any cue mixes with the same headphone / amp as the musician without leaving my chair.

How do you control the actual "cue pod" unit with controls the musician can adjust out in the studio? And, do you have individual return lines from the output of each "pod" in order to hear the actual mixed audio from each pod into the headphones??

I've never worked with the relatively expensive Aviom cue system...perhaps it offers the ability for the engineer to remotely override the settings made by the musician remotely while listening to the exact audio feeding the headset?

Bri

 

[pucho812]

I hate that Dadman thing. In EVERY studio with Dante i've worked in, the Dadman setup is wrong.

One of them had the routing wrong between film and EBU standards (L C R Ls Rs LFE or L R C LFE Ls Rs)

Another one has it's input set to mic level even though they use an external preamp. When i arrived, the PAD was ON, the preamp gain was around 10dB, then the interface was adding another gain stage with wrong input impedance.

I spent a full hour understanding why it was so noisy...

Another studio, all the line out had a 20dB gain. The talent was complaining that the sound was bad in their headphones, i went and check and it was awfully distorted... Put the output level at unity and everything was nice.

Dante is cool by the way!

Dante is cool. It offers so many things that streamline audio. But yeah dadman is usually wrong.

How do you control the actual "cue pod" unit with controls the musician can adjust out in the studio? And, do you have individual return lines from the output of each "pod" in order to hear the actual mixed audio from each pod into the headphones??

I've never worked with the relatively expensive Aviom cue system...perhaps it offers the ability for the engineer to remotely override the settings made by the musician remotely while listening to the exact audio feeding the headset?

Bri

There is zero override in any of these systems other then unpatch it.

 

[totoxraymond]

How do you control the actual "cue pod" unit with controls the musician can adjust out in the studio? And, do you have individual return lines from the output of each "pod" in order to hear the actual mixed audio from each pod into the headphones??

I've never worked with the relatively expensive Aviom cue system...perhaps it offers the ability for the engineer to remotely override the settings made by the musician remotely while listening to the exact audio feeding the headset?

Bri

I don't use aviom or personal monitor system. I set the mix for the musicians, and am always monitoring their cue while doing so.

 

[pucho812]

Last place I set up a private cue system we used pm-16 by elite core audio.
It’s audio over ip with an input box and poe(power over Ethernet) mixers. The system is sound and the best part is the mixers look and feel analog. Volume and pan per channel only, 16 channels, main volume out, main out to line level and headphones. Main has 3 band eq, one knob compressor. So easy a child could use it.
Every so often we get the occasional huh but other wise, user friendly.

 

[Brian Roth]

I don't use aviom or personal monitor system. I set the mix for the musicians, and am always monitoring their cue while doing so.

Same here. I was commenting to an earlier post in this thread that was praising the usage of systems that allowed each musician to set their own mix.

Bri

 

[Spiritworks]

Last place I set up a private cue system we used pm-16 by elite core audio.
It’s audio over ip with an input box and poe(power over Ethernet) mixers. The system is sound and the best part is the mixers look and feel analog. Volume and pan per channel only, 16 channels, main volume out, main out to line level and headphones. Main has 3 band eq, one knob compressor. So easy a child could use it.
Every so often we get the occasional huh but other wise, user friendly.

We have five of the little Behringer units in our studio, which are fed over Cat5 from their main rack-mount distribution hub. The distro hub accepts 16 inputs which we can send from our console via the matrix, auxes or group outputs. Relatively inexpensive, and decent quality. Haven't had any problems or complaints. We make sure to tape a legend underneath each channel on the headphone mixer/s, show the talent what to do and things usually go pretty smoothly. We always make channel 1 & 2 the stereo mix we are listening to in the control room.

 

[fazer]

My comment about using iPhone/droids is based on looking at reaper and using the phone as an interface over Wi-Fi to control the daw aux cue sends so the tracking EE can still override the daw. Also use separate cue amps and run dual outputs. One sends to performer and other to a multi switch for EE to check performers cue without having to get out of main chair. Reaper has tremendous scripting abilities. Most daw software has abilities to hookup phones and tablets. The Wi-Fi interface controlling locked in aux/ cues means they can’t run the main mix. Now the IT thing is the battle for me. I have a weekly jam at the studio with a three piece and EE as well as play. It’s a fun thing but getting everyone’s cue right takes a little while.

 

[Brian Roth]

@fazer It seems you have a good system set up. As long as the session engineer has the ability to hear the actual signal driving into the cans and the ability to override any boneheaded settings out in the tracking room.... that will work.

The Furman/Hearback/Aviom/etc. systems lack the ability to hear what is driving the cans AND the ability to override settings made at the "pods".

Bri

 

[fazer]

The Furman/Hearback/Aviom/etc. systems lack the ability to hear what is driving the cans AND the ability to override settings made at the "pods".

Agreed . I have not used Aviom but the others I’m familiar with and don’t care for the sound of the hearback amps or the dig converters.

You need the same phones also if your going to judge a players mix balance and efficiently level.

 

[fazer]

@Brian Roth This is the idea with reaper. Even if you don’t use reaper you can follow the concept with the explanation. Pretty cool