New Product Audio Performance – A Big “Thumbs Up”

Last month we took final prototypes of our new Model 5512 Audio Interface and Model 5518 Mic/Line Interface units for a “real-world test drive” at a well-regarded music recording studio in Chicago. The ‘5512 and ‘5518 support SMPTE ST 2110 and utilize our latest analog and digital circuit designs. These units are hardware “cousins” with the new Dante-enabled Model 5412 Audio Interface and Model 5418 Mic/Line Interface. We knew that the performance specifications of all the units as measured by our test equipment was very good.

New Model 391 Firmware Released

Version 1.2 of the Main Firmware for the Model 391 Dante Alerting Unit has been released. It adds some nice enhancements to what’s already a very interesting and useful product.

A major new feature allows the unit to simultaneously monitor Dante receive channels 1 and 2 for the presence of a call signal. When a call signal is detected (typically 20 kHz in the audio channel) the visual indicator will respond with a different color depending on which channel the call signal was received.

Dante Ultimo Subscription Issue Corrected!

In a previous Tech Note (https://studio-tech.com/tech-notes/problem-with-dante-subscriptions-re-establishing/) an issue was described that impacted certain of our Dante products. In some cases Dante subscriptions (“routes”) would not re-establish upon a power cycle or when disconnecting and reconnecting to the Ethernet network. Over the past several months some of our customers have experienced this issue and we simply couldn’t offer a good solution. It was stressful for everyone involved and sometimes lead to less-than-optimal operation.

Cool New Button Function for Models 204, 205, 206, and 208

Version 1.02 of the application firmware for the Models 204, 205, 206, and 208 Announcer’s Consoles have been released to support the addition of a fifth button mode selection. The Push to Mute/Tap to Latch mode was added in response to a request from a “power user” friend of ours. Rick Cutler knew what his customers needed to do their best for live “radio” events and he suggested it to us. After a few minutes of consternation,

New Model 5401 Sync FPGA Firmware

Time flies and it’s already been about a month since we released version 1.01 of the Sync FPGA firmware for the Model 5401 Dante Master Clock. We recommend that all Model 5401 units be updated as soon as possible. Loading this update is not critical but is highly recommended.

Updating is done using the unit’s internal FTP (file transfer protocol) client which establishes a connection to the Studio Technologies’ FTP server. Assuming that network access to the “outside world”

Version 1.07.00 of STcontroller Released

Yesterday we released a new version of the STcontroller application. It’s 1.07.00 and we really like it. It incorporates a number of additions, changes, and bug fixes.

It adds support for a couple of upcoming products, the Model 381 On-Air Beltpack and the Model 5418 Mic/Line Interface.

It supports the latest version of firmware for the Models 204, 205, 206, and 208 Announcer’s Consoles. The new firmware adds a fifth button operating mode (Push to Mute/Tap to Latch) for the main button (Models 204,

Problem with Dante Subscriptions Re-establishing

Over the past few months the Studio Technologies support team has received reports from users in the field who’ve had issues with Dante subscriptions not correctly re-establishing upon device power up. This always involved Studio Technologies products that used the Audinate Ultimo X2 or Ultimo X4 integrated circuits to support their Dante interface. Specific products that were involved in the field included the Models 214, 215, and 216 Announcer’s Consoles, Models 370, 370A, 374, 374A Intercom Beltpacks,

Supporting AES67 (PTP v2) with the Model 5401

The Model 5401 Dante Master Clock was initially designed for use in applications that utilized devices running “native” Dante. To support the master timing needs of these devices Precision Time Protocol Version 1 (IEEE-1588-2002 or PTP v1) was implemented. The unit’s PTP v1 implementation functions very well, including in redundant Dante applications. (Independent Ethernet networks connected to the Primary and Secondary Ethernet ports on the back panel of the Model 5401.) Even in large installations with literally hundreds of Dante devices,

Configuring Ethernet Switches for Audio-over-Ethernet Use

This document from Lawo regarding setting Ethernet switch parameters for optimizing audio-over-IP operation is really terrific:

https://www.lawo.com/support/know-how/ip-networking-guide/specific-switch-configurations.html

We implemented the suggested settings on an SG300 and it allowed much-improved performance when testing our new ST 2110-compliant products. We had been told that only “PTP aware” Ethernet switches were acceptable for use with ST 2110-10, but our simple test showed that maybe this is not the case. Once the changes were made the occasional “clicks”

Using Two Model 5401 Dante Master Clocks for Redundant Operation

The Model 5401 Dante Master Clock has proven to be a solid product that’s found successful use in the field. But trying to use two units on a single local are network to achieve redundant master clock operation currently has one limitation that’s worth noting.

In the Dante Controller software application both Model 5401 units will, by default, appear as Preferred Master and allow an external sync reference. Dante will automatically select one of the units to be the active clock master.