Resolution V5.7 Oct 2007

AUDIO FOR POST, BROADCAST, RECORDING AND MULTIMEDIA PRODUCTION

V5.7 ocToBeR 2006

Mick Glossop — From Manor to Town House to his own house Sound & More: hotel, sports centre and recording studio in Warsaw Rewriting record collections by machine and new technology Bob Katz on why analogue is not plug-and-play Audio through RoHS-tinted glasses Ten early reverberations REVIEWS: SSL Duality • Mackie Onyx Satellite • Sound Devices 702T Pro Tools HD 7.2 • Thermionic Earlybird 2.2 & Pullet • Neumann TLM49

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october 2006 V5.7

issn 1477-4216 THE PRO END-USER AUDIO PRODUCTION MAGAZINE

News & Analysis 4

4

Leader

News

Sales, contracts, appointments, biz bites and the bigger picture.

16 66

Products

New introductions and announcements.

Headroom

That compression issue.

Craft 16

40

46

49

Sound & More

A hotel, a sports centre and a recording studio in Warsaw: it’s all about the package. It’s all about sound and more.

Mick Glossop

He was in on the ground fl oor at two of the most infl uential studios that marked the birth of the modern recording era yet he’s still inspiring musicians.

54

56

Ten Early reverberations.

Sweet Spot

Blue Sky started at the end of the sound chain and worked backwards for the design of its nearfi eld and midfi eld monitors.

60

Meet your maker

Graham Boswell and Ian Dennis — Prism Sound’s founders still drive the technology of the manufacturer.

Katz’s column

Analogue is not plug-and-play — Bob explains the audio interfacing problems we face and how to conquer them.

JBL at 60

JBL is celebrating 60 years in monitoring design — a period that has seen remarkable shifts in work methods and environments.

Business

50

We can’t rewind

Why Generation @ will never understand the infl uence of a half-hour 1970s weekly music show and how record collections are being ‘rewritten by machine and new technology’.

Technology

58

Audio through RoHS-tinted glasses

We look at the impact upon manufacturers and end-users of the EU directive for Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances.

Reviews 22

Solid State Logic Duality

24

Mackie Onyx Satellite

26

Sound Devices 702T

28

Digidesign Pro Tools HD 7.2

eDiToRial editorial Director: Zenon schoepe Tel: +44 1444 410675 email: zen@resolutionmag.com editorial office: po Box 531, Haywards Heath RH16 4WD, Uk contributors: Rob James, George shilling, keith spencer-allen, Terry nelson, Jon Thornton, neil Hillman, nigel Jopson, andy Day, Dan Daley, John Watkinson

64

Your business

Hip-Hop has made record production a lifestyle choice and brought with it a speed of workfl ow that makes other music production lines seem sluggish by comparison.

62

30 32 34 36 38

Slaying Dragons

All we fi nd about us today is compressed, to the detriment of sound quality.

Watkinson wonders if there is a solution.

Thermionic Earlybird & Pullet Neumann TLM49 Presonus ADL 600 RME Fireface 400 UA Solo 110 and 610

aDVeRTiseMenT sales european sales clare sturzaker Tel: +44 1342 717459 email: clare@resolutionmag.com Us sales Jeff Turner Tel: +1 415 455 8301 email: jeff@resolutionmag.com

pRoDUcTion anD laYoUT Dean cook Dean cook productions Tel: +44 1273 467579 email: dean@resolutionmag.com

news appointments

HHB coMMUnicaTions has created a dedicated UK distribution division called Source. Headed by director of distributed brands Howard Jones, key personnel include distribution sales manager Tony Musgrove, MI sales manager Chris Hawkins and sales administrator Caroline Cook.

T h e m o v e c o i n c i d e s w i t h t h e appointment of Source as UK distributor for Universal Audio products. Other brands distributed in the UK by Source include Røde, PreSonus, Event, Millennia, Lynx Studio Technology, Rosendahl, Sony Oxford Plugins, Eventide and HHB. HHB Communications Canada is now distributing SSL’s Duende product in the region. neW la-BaseD US distribution company CW Sales & Marketing has been started by Chris Walsh, formerly at AXI and Pro Audio Design, and is representing Audient, LA Audio and Tube Tech in the US. Multi Voice Electronics has been appointed distributor for LA Audio in Indonesia.

HaRMan pRo UK has appointed Vince Borrelli as senior music retail sales manager in charge of MI sales in the UK. He was previously with Mackie UK for more than seven years.

W o H l e R T e c H n o l o G i e s has appointed Alan Bunting as Regional Sales Manager for Europe. He was instrumental in establishing Hitachi/Denshi as a major manufacturer and supplier of professional television cameras in Europe and prior to that he was MD at Lee Communication Limited.

©2006 s2 publications ltd. all rights reserved. no part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publishers. Great care is taken to ensure accuracy in the preparation of this publication, but neither

4

leader

Do not underestimate the security B l a n k e t e ff e c t t h a t t e c h n o l o g y imparts and how distressing its untimely removal can be. every now and again my broadband connection will disappear or lock out inexplicably for maybe an hour.

That’s an hour i spend not in adapting my work flow and life to remain productive in the knowledge that it always returns just as inexplicably, but an hour i spend fretting about it, attempting to uncover the cause and increasingly suspecting that i have done something to cause this lapse in essential service. We are technology dependents and it has infiltrated our lives at frightening speeds. i know little to nothing about the practical mechanical aspects of cars but i knew enough to make an informed guess at why a basic carburetted automobile had rolled to a stop even if i couldn’t fix it. Give me a modern fly-by-computer model with a motivational issue and i’ll tell you it’s the clutch, gearbox or something else. That’s the computer equivalent of cpU, fan or Windows.

The ‘workaround’ is a concept that was once integral to the audio production process and those skilful in averting productivity lapses, through judicious use of gaffa tape or a fast repatch and reinvention of the signal path, were people to aspire to. Just as our car DiYer forefathers worked miracles with a squirt of WD40, a pin, or a lady’s stocking, it was part of the experience and identified those able to continue to think creatively under pressure. a lot of modern production technology has strained this spirit out of the gene pool and rendered us humourless and helpless drones able only to click irritatingly on our mice while we wait for the os to report back and tell what has befallen us. We should be formulating that ‘workaround’ while at the same time openly denouncing the technology that has let us down but unless you use a lot of analogue, you’re probably stuffed — and royally at that.

Redundancy in digital is essential for mission-critical applications but there is now little to no digital redundancy for creatively critical applications. ah, i see my broadband has decided to come back online. now, where was i?

Zenon schoepe

Repeat radio success for Zirkon Barcelona-based Union in Cairo, Catalunya Radio h a s i n s t a l l e d has now installed three Zirkons in a total of ten three on-air radio L a w o Z i r k o n s t u d i o s . E a c h mixing consoles Zirkon supplied as Lawo’s first for the project m a j o r o r d e r was a standalone in the Spanish console with DSP market. Three redundancy.

Z i r k o n s , e a c h R á d i o e with 16 faders, Te l e v i s ã o d e were installed Portugal (RTP), in Girona and Portugal’s public Tarragona during broadcaster, is 2005 while in building a new Barcelona a 20TV Production f a d e r c o n s o l e C e n t r e w i t h w a s p ro v i d e d three studios to for Estudio 17. b e e q u i p p e d A d d i t i o n a l l y, Saarländische Rundfunk’s (SR) newly refurbished with Lawo mc²66 P r o d u c t i o n radio facility in Saarbrücken employs a Zirkon consoles. RTP desk in the studio of the Unser Ding children’s Studio 5, News has adopted a programme.

Studio 3, and tapeless media the main broadcast Studio 1 were also system for the Centre along with 5.1 and HD fi tted with 24-fader Zirkons. capability. The installation starts in October ERTU, the Egyptian Radio and Television with the opening scheduled for March.

s2 publications ltd or the editor can be held responsible for its contents.

The views expressed are those of the contributors and not necessarily those of the publishers.

s2 publications ltd.

Registered in england and Wales. company number: 4375084.

Registered office: equity House, 128-136 High street, edgware, Middlesex Ha8 7TT.

resolution

Production Magic conference MusicTank is holding a Production Magic day-long forum on 11 November at The Magic Circle, near Euston, London for leading producers to air key issues. An all-star speaker line-up includes Guy Chambers, John Leckie, Clive Langer and an opening address by Nile Rodgers. Star interviewee is Phil Ramone.

The conference will discus the fact that with studios closing, record labels seeking an ever quicker turnaround on their artist investment, and online providing new business models and ways of consuming music, producers are finding that their accepted role and methods of making a living are under threat.

M u s i c Ta n k h a s d r a w n t o g e t h e r iconic producers and their pioneering contemporaries to assess the ongoing role, the current challenges, and the future options and revenue streams. www.musictank.co.uk

IABM at 30 T h e I n t e r n a t i o n a l A s s o c i a t i o n o f Broadcasting Manufacturers is celebrating its 30th Anniversary. Formed in 1976, the IABM represents suppliers of broadcast and media technology and is a not-forprofi t Association and one of the industry partners that stage the annual IBC event.

Originally established to represent the exhibitor community in broadcast events, the IABM has now become a full fl edged industry association with member services that embrace industry representation and advocacy; technical standards; executive networking; market intelligence; and information and advisory services.

The IABM’s Quarterly Industry Trends Survey shows that supplier confi dence is still strong although Q2 2006 has not lived up to expectations earlier in the year. The survey is undertaken by analysts at Ernst & Young on behalf of the IABM. Responses from more than 50 companies indicated that order books were ‘better than expected’ or ‘much better than expected’ in 27% of companies compared to 43% in the fi rst quarter. ‘Worse than expected’ order volumes have risen for the second consecutive quarter.

Uptake of HD technology in Europe has been slower than expected and the need to achieve new European Environmental Compliance Regulations has had an adverse impact.

Pressure on suppliers is increasing as selling prices are static and unlikely to increase whereas cost prices are increasing as is the number of employees. Stock levels of fi nished goods are low and in such cases are restricting the ability to fulfi l orders.

printed by The Grange press, Butts Rd, southwick, West sussex, Bn42 4eJ.

sUBscRiBe www.resolutionmag.com annual subscriptions: Uk £37.00, europe £45.00, Rest of the World £53.00

October 2006

news TSL wins Kuwait HDTV build

Riverside Venue for broadcast

TSL has been awarded a contract to build a complete HDTV broadcast facility from the ground up in Kuwait City for Middle Eastern publishing house Dar Al-Watan.

The main site will house the largest TV studio in the Middle-East while a second smaller space will contain the HD studios, MCR and two channels of HD Playout. The second site will also house a further three HD studios with edit suites. Both sites will produce a variety of HD programming that will be distributed to homes in the region via satellite.

Klipsch Group acquires Audio Products International Klipsch Group, the parent company of Klipsch Audio Technologies, has acquired Audio Products International Corp (API), one of the largest speaker manufacturers in the world and the makers of the Mirage, Energy and Athena Technologies brands.

‘The acquisition of API will assist Klipsch in our commitment to greatly improve business operations on a global level,’ said Fred Klipsch, chairman, Klipsch Group. ‘This purchase is another step in our strategic plan of adding unique and successful loudspeaker companies to our portfolio of products.’

Klipsch Group is the parent company of Klipsch Audio Technologies, Jamo Inter national and API brands, with companies remaining as independently operated entities. The product design and engineering of the API brands will also remain separate to maintain their respective character and personality but the Klipsch, Jamo and API brand teams will work in a co-operative fashion to develop global technology platforms and product strategies that ‘leverage’ investments in R&D.

TDF acquires SmartJog SmartJog, a leader in electronic content delivery, has been acquired by TDF SA, a leading operator and provider of audiovisual, new media and broadband services to radio, TV and telecom operators. SmartJog is now part of the newly created Multimedia Division, which currently specializes in production and play-out services for the broadcast, mobile and broadband industry. SmartJog will continue to be run by its original founders as a standalone entity in Paris and Los Angeles.

Marquee Audio’s Andy Huffer (left) with Stewart.

The Riverside Studios arts and media venue in West London has commissioned the UK’s fi rst Digidesign Venue digital console for broadcast use in its main TV Studio 1.

Supplied by Marquee Audio, the system includes a D-Show console, three Sidecar expanders and two Stage Racks for 96-channels plus 16 stereo FX returns controlled by 56 faders. There are 96 mic inputs from stage and 32 additional inputs from internal or external effects along with the standard Venue Pack plug-ins.

Riverside TV’s technical director, Duncan Stewart, said the commissioning marked the end of a three-year programme that commenced when Riverside won the contract to stage ITV’s popular CD:UK. ‘Back then we only had infrastructure; since then we have bought in our own cameras and Digibeta VTR and replaced routing matrix,’ said Stewart. ‘The fi nal part of the deal was to bring the sound up to scratch.

‘We needed a reliable desk that couldn’t break down catastrophically, and since we do live shows one of the fi rst boxes a sound desk has to tick is whether it will stand up to abuse,’ he added. ‘There’s nothing this can’t do that a conventional broadcast desk can’t -— even the mix-minus we can achieve using an aux bus.’

• For the second year in a row, Digidesign supported XM Productions/Effanel in the production of the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs) telecast. The XM Productions/ Effanel audio team again relied on an Icon as the backbone of its L7 mobile recording truck to deliver music mixes for every artist who appeared in this year’s broadcast.

Porter likes his Reflexion

C h r i s P o r t e r was one of the fi rst producers t o t r y S E ’s R e f l e x i o n Filter. ‘It’s very effective,’ he s a i d . ‘ I w a s r e c o r d i n g a b a n d a t Metropolis and they’ve got a very large live area there and I was using the Refl exion Filter on the guitars to contain them. You do get a really good image and it takes out a lot of the background refl ections so in that situation I found it very useful.

‘I also use it in my vocal booth. Generally — so you can see the vocalist — you have them standing not very far from a glass window and, of course, you are getting bouncing sibilance

back from the window into the mic and it can give you really blurry “S”s and “T”s.

The Reflexion Filter cleans those up nicely and I fi nd it also helps control t h e b o t t o m end.’

The SE Gemini is also his new fi rst choice mic. ‘I immediately tried it out on some guitars and was very impressed,’ he said.

‘I’ve since recorded some vocals with Cliff [Richard] and he sounds fantastic, it suits his voice perfectly. It’s a lovely warm, crisp sound that it’s got. I was impressed with the construction as well. The units look really well made and solid.’

appointments s Y M e T R i X H a s appointed S~Wave M a r k e t i n g i n S a n D i e g o , C a l i f o r n i a to handle sales in Asia, Australia, New Zealand and the South Pacific region. S~Wave Marketing is under the direction of Kris Jackson (pictured).

S y m e t r i x h a s appointed Reptex International, located in Rockwell, Texas, as the international rep fi rm for Latin America ( e x c l u d i n g B r a z i l , Argentina and Uruguay). Reptex is headed by Rick Parent (pictured).

DMT’s Clement Choi Dpa MicRopHones has appointed Digital Media Technology (DMT) as its new distributor for China and Hong Kong.

Telos sYsTeMs has appointed Michael Uhl as director of Western sales. He has worked for PR&E and Sierra Automated Systems.

Jim Armstrong has also joined from Sierra Automated Systems and will serve as director of Eastern sales. He has also worked at Burk Technology, Gentner Communications and Klotz Digital America. saDie Has appointed Pete Nash to the new role of worldwide head of sales. He was previously a training consultant and has represented SADiE on numerous occasions as a demonstrator and product specialist. soUnD TecHnoloGY in the UK has been appointed an Apple Authorised Training Centre with a specialist focus on the teaching of Apple’s Logic software.

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October 2006

resolution

5

news appointments

Xl8 for late late show

SBES features Future Zone

paUl caRelli has been appointed VP of sales and marketing at Morin Productions, the North American Distributor of Outline P r o A u d i o . H e previously worked as market manager of touring systems for EAW. pRo-Bel Has a p p o i n t e d D a v e C o l l i n s a s c h i e f e n g i n e e r. H e h a s been with Pro-Bel for 18 years joining as a project engineer and has most recently been tasked with managing the automation development and contracts management team.

Alex Chelleri has b e e n a p p o i n t e d president, Pro-Bel Asia Pacific. He joins with more than 20 years’ experience in the broadcast, fi lm and video industry, and has lived and worked in the Asian region for the last 12 years.

P r o - B e l h a s appointed Adrian S c o t t a s d i re c t o r and chief marketing offi cer.

He has held the position of VP of marketing (EMEA) for Avid’s newsroom subsidiary iNews and director of marketing for Autocue. For the last four years he has been running his own company, the Bakewell House Consultancy.

J B l p R o F e s s i o n a l has been awarded US patent protection on its ScreenArray cinema loudspeaker technology. This patent, the third for the ScreenArray family, applies to mid-range array loudspeaker design for use with low-frequency and highfrequency modules in cinema or theatre loudspeaker array systems. e n G i n e e R / p R o D U c e R / e n t e r t a i n m e n t manager Eric Elwell h a s b e e n n a m e d studio manager for Paragon Studios in Franklin, Tennessee. panaMaX Has announced the promotion of Dave Keller to the new position of senior vice president of sales and marketing, replacing departing Panamax VP of sales, John Maloney, who leaves the company after 18 years to pursue educational interests. Prior to this, Keller was executive VP of sales and marketing at Furman.

6

RTE staff sound engineer Mick Woods (left) and Pike.

Ireland’s national broadcaster RTE has purchased a Midas XL8 for use on its longestrunning TV talk show The Late Late Show.

‘With The Late Late Show and our other music format shows we strive to deliver the highest possible experience for the artist, the studio audience and ultimately the television audience,’ said Ian Pike, senior sound supervisor at RTE. ‘When we can get the best performance from an artist and reaction from a studio audience — that connection between the two — great television is made. Through the excellent sound quality of XL8, together with its accurate and total recall capabilities and a creative control surface for our staff engineers to work on, this new system will ensure we can maintain and develop our TV output with our core value of high quality TV central to all productions.’

Paragon bags first US C300

Multiroom recording and postproduction facility Paragon Studios has installed North America’s first SSL C300 in its Studio B, where it will be used for surround and mixto-picture work. The desk complements Paragon’s 80-frame XL 9000 K Series in Studio A. ‘The fi rst time I sat down at it, I had the same reaction that I had with the K Series,’ said Paragon Studios owner and president Fred Paragano. ‘There’s just a huge difference between the sound of something of this calibre and a plug-in. Functionality and expandability are important too -— this is a system that will grow with me.’

Also in the US, The Bold and the Beautiful, The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, The Price is Right, Real Time with Bill Maher and other CBS programmes rely on a trio of C Series consoles: a C232 in postproduction

suite APP1, a C140 in Studio 58, and a C156 with custom patchbay integration in Studio 33.

On the East Coast, ABC has installed C100 consoles for a variety of applications. At the network’s New York headquarters, TV3, site of the World News Tonight, features a C156, while TV24, home of The View, houses a C140. Another C140 is being installed at the network’s Washington DC News Bureau.

CBC, the Canadian Broadcasting Company, recently purchased its fourth C Series console and will install it in a new HD remote broadcast truck. The custom C148/64 is a duplicate of an earlier installation of a C148/64 in CBC’s fi rst HD truck named HD Premier. CBC has also installed a C140 for national news and a C264 in its Toronto HD entertainment production studio.

resolution

The SBES exhibition, which will be held at the Birmingham NEC on 15-16 November, will include its own lecture theatre, known as the Future Zone. Organised by Broadcast Bionics, a variety of sessions will run each day in which industry experts will introduce ‘exciting new concepts and technological advances’. Full details of the various presentations, as well as the chance to register in advance, can be found on the Broadcast Bionics website at: www.bionics.co.uk According to SBES organiser, Dave McVittie, this year more exhibitors than ever will provide hands-on opportunities to get a feel for particular equipment. ‘The chance to compare kit and get expert advice has always been one of the show’s strong points,’ he said. ‘The highly focused nature of SBES makes such an approach possible, and all without having to sort through masses of irrelevant material and walk for miles between exhibition halls as often happens at some of the larger, general broadcasting events each year!’ www.sbes.com

US adverts post in double Dream deal Leading independent advertising firm, Doner US, has chosen two Fairlight Dreams to support the expansion of its audio postproduction capabilities. Two Constellation XTs will form the heart of the facility with integrated Pyxis video systems all networked through Fairlight’s MediaHub server-based workfl ow.

‘The sound, the speed and the ease of operation is what sets Fairlight apart,’ said department head/senior mixer Bob Miller. ‘With the amount of work that fl ows through our department, we needed a product that was a workhorse. With the Constellation XT we’re able to provide our in-house clients with the highest quality production value and speed. In addition, being seamlessly networked to our DS and Avid video editing suites we needed an interface that was fl awless.’

October 2006

news appointments

Vista 5 for paris VcF

pHaRos coMMUnicaTions has a p p o i n t e d D a v i d Barnes as director of sales and John Walmsley in presales s u p p o r t . B a r n e s began his career with Racal-Carlton and has worked for IBM, ADFlex, World Circuit Te c h n o l o g y a n d Tandberg Television.

Walmsley has worked for BBC Television OBs, Link Electronics, Ampex, Sony Broadcast, Quantel, Tektronix, Drake Automation, Omnibus Systems and Television Systems Ltd. sinTeFeX aUDio and inventor Mike Kemp have announced that the US patent offi ce has granted two patents on the EQ and dynamics sampling technology used in its FX8000 Replicator, and under licence in the Focusrite Liquid Mix and Liquid Channel. The two patents cover the Dynamic Convolution process and the techniques for digitally simulating dynamics processors by storing the parameters of an analogue system.

FenDeR MUsical Instruments Corp.

(FMIC) is to serve as a distributor of Furman Sound’s AC power conditioning products to the musical instruments market.

M e G a H e RT Z B R o a D c a s T S y s t e m s h a s a p p o i n t e d B e r n d Kaltenschnee as sales manager for Eastern Europe and French speaking Africa. He worked previously for Bosch, Philips and most recently Hitachi Denshi (Europa) as sales and marketing manager for the Middle East and Africa.

M e g a h e r t z h a s appointed Rob Jones a s j u n i o r p ro j e c t engineer. The company has also expanded its facilities in Witchford, C a m b r i d g e s h i r e , by taking an additional 10,000 square feet of workshop space to increase its throughput of OB vehicle projects. kloTZ DiGiTal has joined forces with CG Group Dubai who will offer service and support and sell Klotz Digital’s range in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan. cUsToM consoles has appointed Canford as a reseller for its Media Desk range of studio furniture and Monitor Arm display-screen support equipment.

8

VCF (Video Communication France) has selected Studer’s Vista 5 console for its top-rated TV talk show on France 2. VCF is France’s leading commercial provider of television services and the desk will be in permanent use by On a Tout Essayé (We Have Tried Everything), a topical chat show presented by Laurent Ruquier that has been running for fi ve years and has won a 20% share of the viewing audience. VCF’s dedicated television studio is situated above the Moulin Rouge cabaret theatre in Paris.

The show format has proved so successful that its producers recently introduced a new edition of the show for Saturday nights. The new Saturday show is recorded in front of a live audience of 500 at the same time that the Moulin Rouge cabaret is performing in the theatre downstairs.

‘We wanted the ability to switch between the two programmes without having to patch round the problem,’ explained VCF engineer Remy Dessaut. ‘It was an opportunity to move into the digital domain and get the better quality of sound, especially the allimportant dynamics.’

Two Vista 5s are being delivered to the Korean Press Foundation (KPF), which will install them in the International Conference Hall of the Press Centre in Seoul.

Cable and satellite channel Arirang has ordered a Vista 5 for the Live Studio in the network’s News Centre in Seoul. Korean Broadcasting System is the country’s public service broadcaster and has ordered a Vista 5 as a mobile console for use on live productions. A Vista 5 is also destined for the Korean Broadcasting Institute, to be installed in the High-Defi nition Editing Studio in KBI’s Digital Multimedia Centre.

Total AV for school

Total Audio specified and installed a professional recording studio for Trinity Academy secondary school in Doncaster, UK based around Merging’s Pyramix with video taken care of by a Sony Anycast video broadcast and editing system.

‘At first we had them [Total Audio] in to look at designing the music studio,’ explained Mark Boyers, project manager for the Emmanuel Schools Foundation, ‘but

it soon became apparent that they could build all of the audio-visual facilities.’

‘They had the expertise,’ added head of the Creative Arts Faculty, Nick Mather, ‘and they were prepared to put time into thinking about the systems they were building for us. Some teachers are given a budget and then aren’t sure how to proceed. We had lots of ideas, but Total talked us through what we could do with all of this equipment very carefully.’

resolution

Nautilus buys three SADiE PCM8s

Leading Milan facility Nautilus Mastering has bought three SADiE PCM8 systems as part of a general upgrade.

‘Nautilus was founded in 1996 and since that time we have invested in ten SADiE systems at the rate of one per year!’ said Antonio Baglio, Nautilus’ chief mastering engineer. ‘We have made so many stereo and 5.1 mastering, CD and SACD masters during this time and have never run into a serious problem. All the technical staff here love the SADiE user interface, the editing features, the rock-solid system stability and the great sonic quality of SADiE. So when we decided for a major renewal of our hardware there was no other choice but SADiE 5 and we ordered three PCM8 units to go along with our DSD8 and the older systems. I can’t wait to enjoy the extend Giga network capabilities, SAN disk and centralised Back-up solutions.’

• VCS and SADiE have created a tapeless and networked production and playout environment for BBC Radio & Music, which has recently been accepted and commissioned for service in London.

The joint solution integrates SADiE craft editors in the VCS dira! production and playout systems operated by the BBC’s radio networks.

DTS targets D-Cinema DTS has entered into an exclusive licensing agreement with Avica Technology Corporation, a name in the digital cinema market. The license agreement provides DTS exclusive global rights to exploit Avica’s suite of technologies, products and services. The agreement ‘leverages’ existing DTS technologies, including the recently completed acquisition of the Digital Booking Systems software, and positions DTS to compete more aggressively in the D-cinema market. Under the terms of the transaction, DTS also has the exclusive option to acquire the assets of Avica.

Meanwhile, Coding Technologies and DTS have showcased their combined a a c P l u s / D T S t r a n s c o d i n g s o l u t i o n enabling 5.1 multichannel sound for HDTV broadcasting at a fraction of the typically required transmission bandwidth. The solution incorporates the MPEG-4 aacPlus audio codec with the DTS audio technology available in more than 50 million DTSenabled home theatre receivers.

The new aacPlus/DTS solution enables broadcasters to profi t from the bandwidth saving of the aacPlus audio codec for transmission and enables backwards compatibility by transcoding into DTS within the set-top box.

October 2006

news The Big picture

Juliano summing with api

Switchcraft celebrates 60 years

BiZ BiTes — A planned new download service called Spiral Frog has caught the attention of the press and music industry, writes Nigel Jopson. The eye-catching feature is that music is free, paid for by 90-second adverts running while the downloads arrive. Ad revenue is split 50:50 with copyright holders, the service was given clout as UMG agreed to make its catalogue available. It’s actually music rental by another name, as tracks are DRM equipped and will de-authorise if consumers do not revisit the Spiral Frog site.

I t s e e m s far more signifi cant t h a t MySpace has announced it will use SnoCap (founded by Napstercreator Shawn Fanning) e-commerce infrastructure to host DRM-free MP3s for bands who wish to sell songs from their MySpace pages. MySpace has a user base of 100 million worldwide, that’s four times the estimated original Napster audience before it was shutdown in 2001. Meanwhile, the story of increasing digital and waning physical music sales continues.

Nielsen Soundscan reports year-to-date US CD sales dipped 6% compared to 2005 while digital sales surged 73%. UK research shows a changing demographic in physical sales — over 40% of all singles were bought by people aged 40-59.

Universal, the third largest music p u b l i s h e r, h a s purchased fourth ranked publisher B M G . T h e £1.11b purchase is subject to regulatory approval.

European independent labels, led by Impala, have launched a formal protest against the acquisition. As I reported

last issue, Impala successfully annulled the already-concluded Sony BMG merger, sparking a drawn-out review between the European Court of First Instance and the EC. Impala president Patrick Zelnick noted regulators ‘will have little choice but to reach the same conclusion with BMG and Universal in 2006, where the market is even already more concentrated than in 2000.’

Zelnick asserted a merger would have ‘serious repercussions for competition in publishing and recording music.’

10

Mixer Jeff Juliano’s credit list includes John Mayer, the Dave Matthews Band, Lifehouse, and OAR and all have his API 8200 8-channel summing mixers and API 7600 input module channel strips in common. ’I have this theory that nothing sounds good until you put it through at least fi ve pounds of metal,’ said Juliano. ‘I’ve been mixing in the box for some time now and I thought my mixes were in a good place, but when I started putting them through API summing mixers, the results fl oored me. The API 8200s have given me a console sound in just two rack spaces.’

Juliano has built a career on making the most of the rough mixes that get sent to him and has integrated two API 8200 8-channel line mixers into his Pro Tools HD setup. ‘The API units opened up the imaging tremendously and added depth and punch,’ he remarked.

‘The result of the summing is as if you set your speakers ten feet farther apart. If you take the mixes you make in the box and pump it through 16 — or even eight — channels of the API 8200s, you’re going to sound 70% better right off the bat. It’s undeniable.

‘By spreading the tracks of your session out over the API 8200 summing mixer you’re taking a lot of the summing workload off of the computer, really widening the audio funnel, and taking away a lot of the math that’s been killing the sound of records the last few years,’ he adds. ‘Another great feature that the API 8200 has is that it gives you the availability of hardware inserts, so you can easily insert your favourite compressor on any channel. I can’t tell you how many times management calls to ask what I’m doing that improves the mix — even when they hear a cut on the radio.’

Belgian broadcaster RTBF presented its two new HD-enabled OB trucks at the IBC exhibition. The hd8 accommodates eight workplaces and supports up to six cameras while the hd22 has 22 workplaces and up to 24 cameras. Both vehicles are equipped with Stagetec Aurus and Nexus digital audio-mixing/routing units and half of the embedders and de-embedders in the trucks are provided by the Nexus.

The trucks have a tapeless design — standard player formats are integrated for transfer purposes only — and after returning from an outside event, the recordings are transferred via network into the broadcasting centre.

resolution

Switchcraft is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year.

Started in 1946 by three former GIs fresh from their radio experience in WWII, Switchcraft was an early leader in the development of high quality components for the electronics industry and continues to develop and expand its product line today.

Products include a wide variety of connectors, jacks and plugs, moulded cable assemblies, jackpanels and patchbays, and switches. To enhance its role in the harsh environment industry, Switchcraft acquired the Conxall Corporation in 1999. Conxall provides standard and custom solutions for environmentally sealed connector and cable interconnects.

Switchcraft has made a large commitment in ‘vertically integrating’ its 24,000sqm facility in Chicago. Core sub-components are stamped and formed, moulded, plated, and assembled using automated processes.

Remote production services offered Mixingbox has teamed up with audioMIDI. com to offer four mixing services for music and postproduction — session Mix Complete, session Mix, vocal Fix and drum Fix. Musicians can submit projects created using any of the major DAW applications and receive back high-quality mixes, vocal correction and drum editing done by professional engineers. Unlike other mixing services, the Mixingbox not only delivers a bounced version of the fi nal project/song, but also returns the entire Pro Tools session, including the individual tracks and stems, so that end-users can open the session and learn from the Mixingbox experience.

‘Many end-users don’t even know where to fi nd a professional to help them mix and improve their music,’ said Scott Church, co-founder of the Mixingbox.

‘If they do fi nd someone, issues such as schedule and price make working with a producer like buying a car, except even worse — many top-notch engineers won’t take on the end-user who may not be at their level. This fear of rejection, plus the hassle of negotiating, is more than many musicians are willing to undergo. When you buy one of our products/services, at a fl at-rate for one project/song, you get a team of professionals working to take that project/song to the highest level. Each team member of the Mixingbox does what they do best, elevating the quality of the entire project/song.’

October 2006

news The Big picture

As suggested in my Resolution V5.5 business column, Apple Computer has launched feature-length movie downloads from its iTunes Store. An initial offering of 75 fi lms from studios owned by Disney, where Apple CEO Steve Jobs is on the board, will be sold for $12.99 if pre-ordered or purchased during their fi rst week of release, while library titles will cost $9.99. Next year, Apple plans to introduce a device to s t r e a m video and music from a Mac or the Internet to a television.

Codenamed i T V, t h e US$299 box will be Apple’s fi rst entry into consumers’ living rooms.

Remade in europe

Made In Europe, the largest dubbing and postproduction facility in Brussels, has installed a large networked Pyramix, VCube and Luxor system.

Located in a former dairy and sharing premises with Belgian creative agency and sounddesigner Masda, Made In Europe specialises in dubbing fi lms and TV programmes into French and now occupies 14 studios.

The refi t replaced the older equipment with a networked system built around two Merging Luxor servers for the video and audio along with two VCubes and 16 networked Pyramixes.

The Pyramix systems are operated from Isis controller and fader expander units.

• Postproduction work on Komaneko, a five-part children’s animation for Japan’s NHK, employed two Pyramix systems by audio and dubbing engineer Mick Sawaguchi (pictured, back left, with the programme’s post team).

Sawaguchi did the premixing dubbing work on a Pyramix at his home studio with the Dolby 5.1 dub carried out at Studio 3 in Tokyo’s TV Centre again with a Pyramix.

Custom subs for Nashville Blackbird Harmonix Music Systems, makers of the Guitar Hero Playstation game — about which I waxed lyrical in Resolution V5.6 — has been bought by MTV Networks for $175 million cash. It’s all about powering interactive musical experiences, remixing songs and involving the listener in different ways with an artist’s music. The new Sony PS3 has the ability to run a full-fl edged DAW in software, 512 audio channels with eight DSP effects on each stream ... in the background while a game is on-screen.

sHoWTiMe AES, San Francisco ..........................6-9 October SATIS, Paris ......................................7-9 October Broadcast India, Mumbai ............ 26-28 October SBES, Birmingham .................. 15-16 November Interbee, Tokyo ....................... 15-17 November Tonmeistertagung, Leipzig ..... 16-19 November CES, Las Vegas ..................... 8-11 January 2007 NAMM, Anaheim ......................... 18-21 January Integrated Systems Europe, Amsterdam ................................. 23-25 January CabSat, Dubai ....................................6-8 March Musikmesse/Pro Light & Sound, Frankfurt .........................................28-31 March NAB, Las Vegas ................................14-19 April AES, Vienna ...........................................5-8 May

12

Co-owned by engineer John McBride and his country superstar wife Martina, Blackbird Studio in Nashville offers a total of six recording and production areas, plus several pre-production suites. All tracking and mix areas are equipped with ATC monitors ‘When the time came to outfi t our newest room, Studio F, we turned once again to ATC, whose SCM300ASL and SCM150ASL Pro systems can be found in all our other rooms,’ said John. ‘Since this room was being designed specifi cally for use by Justin Niebanks, one of our city’s most successful recording engineer/producers, we consulted with him and chose this system together.

One of the requirements of the room was

to be able to deliver a high SPL without distortion, because of the wide variety of musical projects that come into the studio.’

Having retained studio designer Mike Cronin to build the 750sqft Studio F, it was during a visit to Blackbird that ATC owner Billy Woodman and transducer/R&D engineer Ben Lilly fi nalised John’s idea of a custom subwoofer. ‘The new 5.1 system sounds outstanding,’ said John. ‘We have a very accurate, very smooth low-frequency response down below 20Hz and great accuracy up to 20kHz. The room also translates extremely well to other listening environments. Justin has mixed a large variety of projects in this room with great success.’

resolution

Sy48 sent to Russia for OB van

German system integrator Broadcast Solutions has supplied an OB van complete with an Innovason Sy48 console to Moscow-based radio and TV station, Kultura. ‘Kultura specifically wanted a small footprint console to go into a van rather than a truck that offered high quality audio and the fl exibility to carry out simple stereo recording and broadcast functions on a daily basis in addition to multitrack recording at the Bolshoi Theatre,’ said Broadcast Solution’s Wladislaw Grabowski.

‘The Sy48 handles all of this with ease. The other big bonus points are Innovason’s bullet-proof Stagebox, which never lets you down, and the fact that all Innovason consoles offer EtherSound connectivity as standard, which makes connection to a digital audio network a piece of cake. The benefi ts of digital networking are many, not least of which is the space it saves, especially in a small OB van!’

Okno TV has built a broadcasting centre for Channel 31 in Russia and included a Telex/RTS A DAM CS with 16 ports, KP-32 and MKP-12 keypanels plus the headsets and microphones to go with them. A new studio complex being built in Novosibirsk for GTRK also needed an upgrade and Okno TV opted for a similar ADAM CS system.

Russia Today commissioned an ADAM CS with 64 ports as well as KP-12, MKP12 and BKP-4 keypanels, complemented by a BTR-80, 4-wire connections and several TIF-2000 units. For its Arabiclanguage broadcasting operations, Russia Today opted for a Cronus 64 x 64, which it combined with its existing ADAM CS.

October 2006

facility

sound & More a hotel, a sports centre and a recording studio in Warsaw: it’s all about the package.

Zenon scHoepe says it’s all about sound and more.

i

n MY TRaVels I’ve seen studios built in lots of different places: in basements, on the roofs of multi-storey buildings, up a mountain and down by the sea. However, I had to come to Poland and Warsaw to find a studio located in a fitness centre.

The idea may initially cause you to smirk. There’s a seeming incompatibility between the ‘burn the candle at both ends’ machismo of the studio tan generation and the ‘my body is a temple’ mindset of the caffeine-free crowd. However, things have changed in the studio industry and the generation of engineers coming through are likely to live a little longer with their acknowledgement of the need for a healthy and balanced lifestyle. However, for Sound & More studios, which is located on a luxurious plot surrounded by the greenery of the Czerniakowskie Lake just outside the centre of the capital, the title says it all.

They know they are situated off the traditional studio track and understand that they have to work a little harder and smarter to attract the business. They give you the ‘Sound’ in the shape of an Ingemar Ohlsson of Audio Data Lab-designed complex with three control rooms and a splendidly large and adaptable live area. The main control room has an AMS-Neve 72-channel VRL working to Pro Tools HD, Sonic, and Pyramix with multichannel Lipinski Sound 707 monitors with two 15-inch Lipinski 150 G stereo 14

subwoofers. There’s also a smaller tracking control room and video editing suite.

And they give you ‘More’ by virtue of offering concessionary tie ins for accommodation at Warsaw’s only boutique 5-Star hotel — the art deco-themed Hotel Rialto — and all the healthy off-session activity you can handle in the Sinnet members-only sports centre in which the studio is located.

They are big on the concept of the package; they’re in to offering you more than sound. Its owners are successful businessmen who have, as reformed musicians, indulged a dream in opening the studio three years ago. At the same time they also opened the sports centre and completed the refurbishment of the Rialto hotel, which they also own. You can see how it hangs together.

‘We are flexible on price because from the beginning we learnt that you have to be,’ explains Sound & More producer Tomek Czulak. ‘We charge around 80 Euro per hour and when you switch to a day rate it’s a lockout for around 600 Euro for the main control room. We know that’s cheap but you have to add your travelling costs and your accommodation and your engineer costs. You have to be aware of it and for international productions we try to offer a package. If they want a really nice hotel — we’ve got it in the Rialto — or if they want an inexpensive hotel then we can offer them one three minutes resolution

from the studio. There’s also a restaurant here that serves from 8am to 10pm and you can call it from the studio and order your dinner at a given time and you can order whatever you like. That helps working because if things are really tense with time you can use every single minute in the studio and you don’t have to leave it. From my experience engineers and artists like to have a break so there’s the sports club downstairs.’

It’s worth pointing out that we’re talking about a pretty exclusive members-only sports club with a swimming pool, tennis and squash courts, a spa and fitness centre. You can’t just walk in, you become a member only through recommendation and it’s frequented by politicians, business people and celebrities so it’s quiet, low key and geared to creating a hassle-free environment.

Very similar to the studio then, which has a Scandinavian feel to it as you might expect from Ohlsson, and is as modern as it is different from the other studios you will find in Poland that were built at a time when different colour schemes were in favour. Sound & More knew they could only have one statement control room and the choice of desk was predictably between the four- and three-lettered brands. Engineer opinion was canvassed but the biggest decider was the observation that while there are a small handful of SSLs in Warsaw there was no big Neve. The VRL 72 with Encore automation came from Sony studios in Hollywood and includes the VSP upgrade and came via Burnley where it was fully serviced before delivery.

The main control room opened originally with Dynaudio M4 monitors but a pair of Lipinski 707s were installed as a trial and found to be great for jazz, acoustic and classical music but less so for popular October 2006

facility

Hotel Rialto

material. Polish born Andzej Lipinski, now living in the US and carving a business with his monitors and mic preamps, visited the studio and said they should have been using the 707s with his L150G subs as he recommends. The engineers loved them and Lipinski and Ohlsson measured the room and were happy with the results, positioning the subs above the LR monitors as the optimal position — there’s around 4m of trapping space above the ceiling. The control room now runs a Lipinski 5.1 system and is well up to the demands of hip-hop and heavy metal as confirmed by mixer Sebastian Witkowski who works in the room regularly.

Gear quality throughout the facility is absolutely top-notch. Tomek says that with no hire industry within Poland you have to self-sufficient and well equipped if you want to compete internationally, which it does with a selection of some 80 mics including lots of ribbons. The outboard rack would shame many Western establishments with some multiples of TubeTech MEC-1A, SMC-2B and PE-1C, Eventide Orville and SP-2016, Avalon VT-747 and AD-2044, UA 2-610, LA-2A and 2-1176, Summit Audio DCL-200 and EQP-200B, Prism Sound MMA4, Millennia HV-3D, NSEQ and TCL-2, Lexicon 960L, GrooveTubes Vipre, TL Audio VP-1, TC M6000, Manley Variable MU and Massive Passive, Waves October 2006

L2, Sherman FilterBank, BSS DPR944, Amtec PEQ1A, SoundField SP451, and Empirical Labs Distressor and FatSo. Control Room 2, which can serve as a tracking, editing and feeder to the bigger room, is based around the luxury of a Crookwood custom mastering console with a selection of outboard and sound modules. The Video Suite works on anything from commercials upwards, can handle voiceovers and boasts what is claimed to be the biggest sound effects library in Warsaw. It runs Avid XPress Pro, Media100, Final Cut Pro, Apple Shake and Adobe AfterEffect along with audio DAWs. The jewel in the complex is the large live space with doors that peel back to open the area up with isobooths and perfect sight lines across and through the various glass partitions. It can be arranged to provide five defined recording areas and the second control room can also be employed as an additional live space for soloists. The studio has hosted a 60piece choir and a 27-piece ensemble — they get a lot of section-by-section orchestral work.

‘The whole philosophy of this place is that it was created to serve the international market,’ explains Tomek. ‘English is our second language here and that applies to the fitness club and the hotel. The studio is also a centre in terms of social life. We work with all resolution

the top engineers, composers, producers and there’s always someone around the studio. If I’m not here at the session I’m downstairs in the restaurant hanging out with musicians and producers. We’ve got clients who are members of the sports club who do their daily fitness routine here and drop in to the studio to tell us personally when they want to book in.

‘Our main competitors in Poland now are people with project studios, just as anywhere else,’ he continues, ‘but they can only do part of the job at home. Our advantage is our acoustic environments for tracking and mixing and the outboard gear.

We have achieved the same level of equipment and acoustic standards as leading studios in other countries. Everything here is of a consistent level and there is no other place like it in Poland. Others might have a good desk but you won’t get our mic list or our outboard or the acoustics of our rooms. You’d need to go to Germany or Sweden to find comparable facilities.

‘We know that the European market is spreading East and Poland is the next step; so that’s why we are ready.’ They certainly are. ■

contact soUnD anD MoRe, polanD: Website: www.soundandmore.pl

15

review gear

products equipment introductions and announcements.

Digital soundfield

The DSF-2 is the latest generation of Soundfi eld technology, and the fi rst in which all internal processing is performed digitally. The 1U DSF-2 controller unit offers live decoding to stereo, stereo M/S, and four-channel B-Format.

The stereo signal may be output directly from the DSF2 in the analogue or digital domain via rear-panel XLR and unbalanced 75ohm BNC connectors respectively, while the Stereo M/S and B-Format signals are available only as digital signals. From here, the B-Format signals may be decoded to a variety of surround formats by Soundfi eld’s existing SP451 hardware processor or by the company’s Surround Zone decoding software plug-in, now available for use with Pro Tools, Nuendo, and SADiE. Digital output is possible at 48, 96 and 192kHz. The fi rst DSF-2 systems were used to originate stereo and 5.1 ambience during international TV broadcasts from various German stadia during the 2006 World Cup. The stereo output from the DSF-2 was used for SD broadcast while the B-Format output was decoded to 5.1 surround for the HD transmission. Sky Sports is now using DSF-2 systems for its live HD coverage of UK Premiership matches. www.soundfield.com

RTW’s new surroundMonitor The rackm o u n t a b l e SurroundMonitor 10660-VID from RTW is targeted at multichannel r a d i o a n d T V a u d i o a n d f e a t u r e s a n integrated surround sound analyser that can be installed next to other instruments in the video rack — for example, next to the waveform monitor.

The 10660-VID is described as ‘budget-friendly’ and features comprehensive display capabilities for stereo and 5.1 surround signals. It has three AES3 signal inputs for seamless integration in fully-digital studio environments, six multistandard peak level meters, a ten-fold correlator display, RTA, SPL/LEQU and Dial Norm meters plus an informative status monitor.

All data is presented on the unit’s large VGA display but it is also possible to connect an external VGA monitor.

Information displayed includes the balance between the front and surround channels and between the front LCR, phantom audio sources, dynamic display of the loudness centre of gravity within the surround fi eld and the phase relationships. www.rtw.de

16

platform news: Digidesign Mbox 2 pro is a portable, ‘high-definition audio/MiDi production system’ that provides high-speed FireWirepowered connectivity, 24-bit/96kHz and a wide range of analogue and digital i-o. other features include MiDi Time stamping support, Word clock i-o, and dedicated studio monitor outputs.

Mbox 2 pro (Uk£480) supports up to six simultaneous inputs and eight outputs and includes pro Tools le software and more than 50 effects and instrument plug-ins, including DigiRack, Bomb Factory, the Xpand! sample-playback/synthesis workstation, and the pro Tools ignition pack. For Uk£60 more, customers can purchase Mbox 2 pro Factory, which includes an additional five Digidesign and Bomb Factory plug-ins (worth more than £650), the Mbox 2 pro system, and an ilok key. strike is a virtual instrument from the advanced instrument Research (aiR) group. an RTas instrument plug-in that is described as ‘one part intelligent virtual drummer, one part professional drum module’, strike features a wide range of high-definition drum kits and style choices. www.digidesign.com

platform news: steinberg cubase 4 and its streamlined sister product, cubase studio 4, include a range of new features and technologies. new features in cubase 4 include the soundFrame universal sound manager that helps users organise, preview and retrieve audio, video and project files, patches for software and hardware synths, and Track and instrument presets. control Room integrates cubase 4 within analogue monitoring environments with up to four separate monitor mixes, external audio input integration, speaker selection, and talkback. a VsT plug-in set with more than 30 new plug-ins includes studioeQ, cloner, ModMachine, ampsimulator and guitar tuner, and a new Multiband compressor. a redesigned user interface has enhanced navigability, the configurable channel strip and track inspector while score and notation features have also been enhanced. steinberg has released of a 64-bit-capable version of its asio technology. The asio 2.2 sDk provides software engineers with a set of tools for creating asio-ready host applications and drivers for 64-bit versions of Microsoft’s Windows operating system. audio stream input/output (asio) architecture forms the backbone of VsT. ‘asio 2.2 and its asio 2/64 component will form the backbone of a new generation of 64-bit host applications and audio devices for Windows,’ said Markus stehlik, steinberg’s director of engineering. ‘The new version of this open standard will also ensure both 32-bit and 64-bit driver versions are available to customers of audio software and hardware, easing the transition to the new 64-bit Windows versions. and because asio 2.2 was specified in close cooperation with other companies from the a u d i o i n d u s t r y, we expect that the new standard will see wide adoption in the foreseeable future.’ www.steinberg.net

resolution

October 2006

review gear Beyerdynamic Headzone Headzone provides accurate headphonebased 5.1 surroundsound reproduction through a patented Ultrasonicheadtracking system that locates the orientation of the listener’s head with respect to the source material and adjusts the audio accordingly.

This allows freedom of movement, while the source material remains fi xed in position, just as with a ‘real’ 5.1 loudspeaker arrangement.

Headzone also offers an advanced room simulation program that allows the user to adjust an auditory space within which to monitor the surround audio. The system is portable.

The new Opus 900 benefi ts from the experience drawn from the Opus 500 Mk II and 800 systems. Two new microphones are available, with metal or durable plastic housings with charging contacts on the base. Both models feature colour-LCD display, Automatic Frequency Scan and Setting function.

card may contain two decoders. Dolby Digital or Dolby E encoded signals may be directly connected to the card’s front panel or patched via the console’s internal software patch window. In combination with Studer’s D21m SDI deembedder card it becomes possible to decode Dolby E signals originally contained within an SDI stream.

Studer has upgraded the DSP backbone of its Vista range of consoles with the introduction of the smaller yet more powerful SCore Live DSP platform.

SCore Live occupies 6U and provides up to ten DSP card slots and can also hold up to 12 I-O cards of various formats. It is user-configurable to maximise use of the DSP in different applications and a new facility in the DSP permits delays of up to 10 seconds to be added to signals to compensate for such things as video delays through satellite links. www.studer.com

XlR chassis DlX Neutrik’s DLX series XLR chassis connectors feature a compact all-metal housing with an ‘ingenious’ duplex ground contact, which offers excellent RF protection and shielding. It is a match for Neutrik’s EMC XLR cable connector.

The male connector now offers a metal retention bar that improves pull-out force.

Larger solder contacts ease the assembly of the chassis.

The DLX series is available in 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 pole confi gurations with gold or silver-plated solder contacts and nickel or black metal housing. www.neutrik.com

The Opus 900 system offers a range of interchangeable capsules. The DM 960 S and B capsules are fi tted with the TG-X 60 dynamic hypercardioid capsule, while the DM 969 S has the Opus 69 dynamic supercardioid capsule. The EM 981 S has an electret condenser capsule and the CM 930 B features Beyerdynamic’s ‘true condenser’ capsule.

Three new receivers feature true dual diversity working in UHF. The NE 900 S is a single channel receiver, the NE 900 D is a dual channel receiver, and the NE 900 Q is a quad receiver. Two choices of pocket transmitter are available. www.beyerdynamic.com

Vista and onair 3000 get Dolby e

The Studer D21m I-O system, used on the Studer Vista and OnAir 3000 digital consoles, has been enhanced by an optional I-O card for signals encoded with Dolby E. A single I-O card accepts any AES-EBU stream containing signals encoded with Dolby E or Dolby Digital, decodes the stream within the input stage and then provides up to two sets of 8 channels to the console.

One D21m I-O frame can take 12 of these cards and each

October 2006

resolution

17

review gear Version 2.6 software for the Aurus console adds details, such as a switching contact originally used for controlling PFL can be used for accessing external devices. The automation keys now provide a similar functionality too and customers who do not use the dynamic automation can use the automation keys for signalling or other control purposes. www.stagetec.com

nexus and aurus tweaks

charteroak M900 small condenser Key features of Matrix 5.2 control software for the Nexus include multichannel metering. Now, 48 signals rather than 24 signals can be viewed at the same time and clicking the meter, for example, of a microphone input will open a window where all relevant parameters of that input are displayed and can be modifi ed. This functionality is also They´ll Grow 05|05|2006 15:03 Side 1 available for output meters.

The CharterOak M900 is the only small diaphragm condenser mic in the CharterOak line and features a twostep sensitivity switch (-10dB and –20dB) and a two-position bass roll off at 150Hz and 75Hz. M900 owners can swap capsules as the M900 ships with cardioid, hypercardioid, and omnidirectional capsules. www.charteroakacoustics.com

THEY WILL GROW ON YOU - BOOTH 1305 -

[GREAT SOUNDING TUBES SINCE 1985]

18

AKG’s Perception 400 is a largediaphragm condenser mic with cardioid, omnidirectional and fi g-8 patterns and a switchable 10dB pad and bass-cut fi lter. It is supplied in a metal-framed carry case with a shockmount and two-year guarantee. www.akg.com

euphonix upgrades core and convertor options

Euphonix’s DF66 DSP SuperCore works with Max Air and System 5 - B / B P b r o a d c a s t consoles and is also a v a i l a b l e f o r t h e System 5-F/P audio post models.

The modular DSP system supports dual-redundant power supplies and an optional 100% redundant DSP SuperCore system. This failover redundancy system allows for a completely redundant backup DF66 DSP core to run in parallel with a primary DSP core. In the event of a failure, the entire DF66 audio path, including all I-O devices and router, is switched over to the backup system.

The DF66 DSP Core consists of a system board and up to six plug-in SP662 DSP cards. Expansion beyond the capacity of a single chassis can be achieved by linking multiple chassis together.

sound engineering

LYDKRAFT

perception 400

www.tube-tech.com resolution

Each of the DSP SuperCore cards features eight SHARC DSPs and an FPGA-based 4096-channel audio router.

With up to six cards in a single chassis there are nearly 25,000 discreet signal paths available within the DF66 DSP SuperCore that can be controlled from the console’s PatchNet software. With each SP-662 card added to the DF66 core there are also four MADI inputs and four MADI outputs available for connecting I-O devices and other external devices such as DAWs. Up to 24 MADI I-Os are available from a single DSP SuperCore chassis, which at 48kHz equates to 1,536 audio channels in and out of the DSP SuperCore, 768 channels at 96kHz and 384 channels at 192kHz. A new range of convertors are available with ten different I-O cards offering combinations that include AES 10 MADI, AES-EBU (75 and 100ohm), SDI with embedder and deembedder, and analogue convertors up to 24-bit/96kHz. A 24-bit, 142dB S/N, 4-channel mic preamp module is also available with remote Ethernet control of gain and phantom from one or multiple consoles. The system can handle up to 56 mic preamps, with MADI card connectivity, in a single rack. www.euphonix.com

October 2006

review gear

Two new modules for SSL’s X-Rack system are the Four Channel Input, a four mono line input module, and the Master Bus, a summing, metering and control room module.

Together the new input and output modules allow users to build a 28-input, dual stereo bus mini SSL with Total Recall.

The Four Channel Input module takes four line-level mono signals, each with their own solo, volume and pan

controls and provides options to route them into either the X-Rack Master Bus or Record Bus. Each input also has its own insert point that can be switched. The Master Bus module allows control of the X-Rack’s internal Master and Record stereo buses, as well as acting as a studio control room module. It has mix insert and insert sum points, mono compatibility check, and metering of the master out. It can be connected to two pairs of speakers and provides dedicated controls for level, dim, and cut. www.solid-state-logic.com

Big Blue

True full-range stereo monitoring that stays true, even when you pump up the volume.

Some of us like it loud. But monitoring at high volume usually means distortion, poor imaging and an unbalanced sound.

Big Blue changes all that.

By including the subwoofer as an integral part of the design – not as an afterthought – Blue Sky's latest and most powerful powered monitoring system delivers a thrilling, full-range performance that remains accurate, especially in the lower octave, even when you pump up the volume.

And all that at a price that's far from inated.

So if you want to be moved by your music, make the move to Big Blue.

5.1

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CEDAR Audio has made major changes and improvements to its  agship Cambridge system including more powerful hardware, a new software core, and many improved processing modules. It is available for immediate shipment.

The Cambridge Q host PC represents a significant s t e p f o r w a r d with up to four processing cores ( d u a l - d u a l - c o r e Athlon processors) that offer more t h a n d o u b l e t h e p r o c e s s i n g power of previous hardware revisions.

The increase in power is of particular beneďŹ t to multichannel users.

CEDAR Cambridge V3 represents a major rewrite of the core software and incorporates improvements to the user-interface, an improved File Processor and automation system, much-enhanced audio handling capabilities, and superior performance in many of the audio processing modules.

NR-5 retains the style and layout of NR-4 but removes more noise than ever before with ‘even fewer sideeffects or artefacts’. Building on the algorithm developed for the rackmount Duo DDH Auto Dehisser and the Auto Dehiss process already available on CEDAR Cambridge, NR-5 works equally well with or without a noise ďŹ ngerprint, and an array of tools allow you to manipulate the noise identiďŹ cation and reduction proďŹ les in ways that are unique to CEDAR’s  agship products.

Noise Free EQ in NR-5 is a mastering quality EQ that a c t s o n l y u p o n that part of the signal identified as genuine signal.

This allows users to restore the brightness and warmth of the wanted audio without reintroducing unwanted noise. www.cedaraudio.com

X-Rack modules

" This three-way, triamplified, mid-field design packs crisp highs, thundering lows and superb transient response in a system that's not for the faint of heart. " George Petersen, Mix

,%

cambridge Q and V3

'2!$!"

pyramix and Vcube get XMl Merging’s Pyramix and VCube now feature Final Cut Pro XML interchange, making them the ďŹ rst PC-based systems to do so. Like the AAF or OMF interchange formats (both of which were implemented in Pyramix and VCube), XML interchange enables audio and video clips, clip gain, fades, effect deďŹ nitions, envelopes and other parameters and work-in-progress to be imported and exported with ease, making for a solid and integrated work ow.

XML interchange allows users to move work between Pyramix, VCube and Final Cut Pro by importing and exporting entire projects, compositions, and bins. www.merging.com

October 2006

EXCLUSIVE 5+ $ISTRIBUTOR

WWW BEYERDYNAMIC CO UK T

bigbluejr..indd 1

resolution

4/5/06 1:52:28 pm

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review gear cadac s-Digital desk C a d a c ’s S D i g i t a l h a s been designed specifically for theatre sound a p p l i c a t i o n s a n d r e f l e c t s t h e s u r f a c e architecture of its J-Type analogue console. In its basic confi guration it offers a minimum specifi cation of 72 input channels, 66 mix buses, and three stereo listen buses. It enters production in October.

Features include single or multi-operator control with multiple listen systems provided as standard and extra

console surfaces can be used for tech and then relocated/ removed. It has the ability to confi gure multiple control surfaces within a single mixing system, allowing control over all console parameters from multiple locations — such as control room and FOH pit, or FOH and monitor. A proprietary high-speed communications protocol links the control surface, multiple audio I-O racks, and processor rack. All input and output modules are hot swappable and the on-board CCM computer is only used in system confi guration and Sound Manager Automation operation.

The control surface consists of the input frame, output frame and a central control module and a single input frame can control 144 input channels and an output frame has control over all 72 output and listen buses. Additional frames can be used to give physical control of every channel input and bus output, mirroring a multiple-frame J-Type. www.cadac-sound.com

SoundField Portable

ls9 digital desk Yamaha’s LS9 live digital console is available in 32 and 16fader configurations with 16 or 32 mono input faders plus 4 stereo retur ns into 16 mix buses, 8 matrix buses, plus stereo and mono buses with an LCR mode. The LS9-32 is fitted with 32 recallable head amps, the LS9-16 with 16. Both include 8 virtual racks for on-board FX and processing, 6-point LED channel metering, 12 userdefinable keys, 8 mute groups plus MP3 playback and recording. LS9 uses Yamaha’s Selected Channel Interface that combines channel selection and physical controllers with a large colour LCD. A built-in USB port allows recording of MP3 fi les and the playback of MP3, AAC, and WMA fi les at 96, 128, or 192kbps. Playback of specifi c fi les can be cued from the console’s User Defi ned Keys.

ST350 Microphone System

the front end...

Now Shipping!

The new ST350 Portable offers SoundField’s unique technology in a miniaturised package.

Powered by battery or mains the ST350 offers a ‘pocket-size’ solution in 5.1 recording for HD broadcast or location recording for film and DVD productions.

The system consists of a lightweight multi-capsule microphone and fully featured compact micpre/control unit that generates surround and stereo simultaneously at balanced line levels.

The mix capabilities can be expanded by using a combination of external preamps and Mini-YGDAI interface cards — both LS9 consoles have a second layer of channel processing for an additional 16 or 32 channels of audio inputs from digital and/or analogue sources. Also included are scene storage and recall and data libraries for EQ and FX parameters.

Following the news that Yamaha is to license the EtherSound Ethernet protocol, the NAI48-ES (Network Audio Interface) is a 48-channel bidirectional AES-EBU-to- EtherSound format convertor. Used with Yamaha digital consoles, NAI48-ESs can be connected to remote I-O, such as AD8HR mic amps and DA824 audio convertors. www.yamahacommercialaudio.com

Dakingplus debuts digitally controlled analogue

post-production...

The ST350 combined with the SoundField Surround Zone software represents the most comprehensive surround and stereo recording/post-production package available. now available for:

Surround Zone 5.1 page

Surround Zone Stereo page

SoundField • T: +44 (0) 1924 201089 • E: info@soundfield.com • W: www.soundfield.com

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resolution

DakingPlus is a joint venture between Geoff Daking and Dave Thibodeau that is focusing on digitally controlled versions of classic analogue processing modules. The initial offering will be the DakingPlus EQ500 4-band ‘A Range’ equaliser followed by the DakingPlus Stereo Compressor, which will offer higher performance than the current Daking FET II mono compressor by providing remote digital control of the analogue circuitry.

The DakingPlus EQ500 uses the same four bands and fi ve fi xed frequency select points as the Daking 52270 mic-pre/EQ but a single rotary encoder provides access to all parameter settings.

A single hard-wired relay bypass removes all active circuits in the audio path and individual frequency bands are automatically bypassed when the respective gain is set at unity. All EQ settings are retained in memory when the module is powered down.

DakingPlus modules can be combined to confi gure a 96:24 console.

The DakingPlus Stereo Compressor 2U has dual monochrome LCD displays with LED backlighting to display current compressor settings in a graphic representation of rotary knobs and pointers. www.daking.com

October 2006

review gear api 5500 dual eQ

API Audio’s 19-inch rackmounted 5500 dual equaliser has an all-discrete signal path that combines the features of the API 550B 4-band EQ with the boost and cut precision of the 550D and the 550M mastering equaliser.

Each channel of the 5500 features four independent bands of equalisation that cover the frequency range from 30Hz to 20kHz. Each band operates in conjunction with a range control that offers three choices of boost and cut: the standard API 2dB, 1dB, and a 0.5dB setting.

API Audio’s VPR All iance is a programme of standardisation and consistency guidelines for manufacturers wishing to make products designed to fi t into API’s 500 series rack format. www.apiaudio.com

auralex sonosuede The SonoSuede Pro System from Auralex Acoustics is a decorative and complete doit-yourself room treatment system that helps tame first reflections and low frequency anomalies.

It consists of four 16-inch x 48-inch x 2-inch thick back-bevelled panels predominantly used for corner trapping, and eight 16-inch x 48-inch x 1-inch rectangular-shaped back-bevelled panels for a total of 64sqft. The system’s mounting blocks provide superior acoustic and aesthetic benefi ts.

SonoSuede is available in black/red and black/tan with other colour combinations and individual panels available as custom orders. www.auralex.com

cD changer

Marantz Professional’s CC4001P Studioline 5-Carousel CD changer will play up to fi ve CD-R/RW and MP3 discs, providing a jukebox of nearly 5,000 tracks. Up to 999 tracks can be contained on a single disc.

The machine incorporates coaxial and optical digital outputs as well as a headphone output and a bidirectional RS-232C terminal. Another addition is the IR Flasher input terminal that allows users to set up a separate IR sensor outside the rack or link a controller directly to the unit via a cord for reliable control of the CC4001P. www.d-mpro.eu.com

a-Designs has attitude

A-Designs’ ATTY2’D (pronounced ‘attitude’) is a multichannel passive line level controller that is the big brother of the ATTY stereo passive line level controller.

Housed in a 1U it has two stereo and two mono channels, all four sporting their own individual mute switches and large aluminium rotary level controls. A single master mute switch is located in the centre of the front panel. www.adesignsaudio.com

More edirol portables Edirol’s R-4 Pro is a 4-channel portable field recorder based on the R-4 but with added video sync capabilities. It accepts S M P T E t i m e c o d e and can be synced to video equipment as the slave for four channels of up to 24bit/96kHz recording to video. The R-4 Pro can also act as master sending out timecode to slave devices.

It has an 80Gb drive while for back-up and more storage options a USB 2.0 port is provided along with a 4-pin XLR DC input for Anton-Bauer-style external battery power.

Like the R-4, the Pro has wave editing, recording resolution selection, pre-buffer recording, effects and a limiter.

T h e h i g h l y c o m p a c t R - 0 9 features 24-bit uncompressed recording (at 44.1 or 48kHz) plus the ability to record and play back in MP3. Files can be monitored via headphone or exported to computer via the USB port.

There’s also a built-in stereo mic complete with a dedicated input control, mono/stereo selector, low-cut fi lter and gain boost.

The screen employs OLED technology to display functions including audio signal levels.

Other features include one-touch recording, an auto gain control, a low frequency cut switch, and A-B repeat for comparative recording.

The unit records to a removable SD card, has an extra mic input, claims long battery life and has a list of optional accessories. www.edirol.com

October 2006

resolution

21

review

solid state logic Duality First there was the aWs 900, which combines DaW control with analogue processing bulk, now comes Duality which adds more bulk and some big console sensibility. RoB JaMes looks at a desk with at least two different sides to it.

D

UaliTY — THe naMe says it all, the yin and yang of the audio world — digital and analogue. All but the most die-hard exponents of the recording arts accept that the DAW is now an indispensable feature of the production landscape.

At the same time, even the workstation’s strongest advocates are coming around to the idea that analogue still has a lot to offer. A high-quality analogue front end has long been recognised as essential and there is a growing body of belief that analogue summing is preferable to digital. Recognising this, SSL says it is exploring what the next evolutionary stage will be. In its own words: ‘The concept was to produce something not quite as large or expensive as a 9000XL yet bigger than an AWS 900+. It’s all about choices, different ways of working. As always in audio technology there are ten different ways of achieving the same result. Duality kind of addresses all of those things at the same time. It’s grown out of the AWS 900 but it’s an awful lot more than a big brother. It has the SuperAnalogue mic pre technology from the 9000 married to the workstation control of the AWS. It’s a beast of an analogue front end for a workstation.’

Duality is more than skin deep. SSL has dispensed with the traditional in-line architecture but has built two inputs into each channel strip. This allows the workstation to be inserted at some point along the line into an analogue channel path. The channel can be split with the resources divided between the inputs.

In a normal tracking scenario the workstation will 22

take its output just after the mic preamp, returning the signal for monitoring through the rest of the strip.

Cue feeds can be sourced from the same point as the workstation feed to provide zero-latency monitoring.

In this scenario the control room monitors will be subject to the workstation latency but this is of no practical consequence. Each strip actually has two mic preamps. The first is the ultra clinical SuperAnalogue, the second is VHD Variable Harmonic Drive from the E-Signature strip. VHD adds second or third order harmonic distortion in controlled amounts. This feature is born out of customer feedback on earlier consoles, which were considered to be just too clean for many modern production styles. People have been using plug-ins to achieve a similar effect but these tend to be rather one-dimensional in terms of sound.

With normal drive the effect is just to warm up the signal a bit. Thanks to a channel trim on the output of this stage it is possible to heavily overdrive the VHD input and then it can be as dirty as you like. Here we have the essence of Duality’s split personality.

Line inputs can be returned to the mic preamp for mixing. The gate/expander has side-chain listen, a fast attack setting and a hold mode. Adjacent channel dynamics can be linked, but there is a restriction.

If, say, you want two stereo pairs linked separately you have to leave a strip unlinked between them.

Otherwise you will have a link group of four strips.

Unlike the AWS 900 there are dual filters, low pass and high pass. EQ characteristics default to E-Series with G-Series a button press away. The insert point resolution

is a moveable feast and the two stereo cue sends can take the post fader signal or the other unused input.

This can also be used as another input into the mix bus, providing extra inputs at mixdown and there are four mono aux effect sends. Every strip has a surround panner with LFE feed, Left/Right pan, Front/ Rear pan and front divergence allowing the centre speaker contribution to be varied. A new variant of SuperCue monitoring automatically mutes DAW returns on record enabled tracks when you punch-in.

Routing bears more than a passing resemblance to digital console practice. Most of the channel control is done from the centre section routing tile. This makes it possible to set multiple channels at the same time.

There are 24 track buses with masters and the bus outputs are available on the channel inputs providing sub-grouping capabilities alongside the usual VCA and servo control groups, all without any physical re-patching.

Track buses are partitioned in groups of six providing four reassign 5.1 stems or four triple stereo. The main 5.1 compressor has a new ‘average’ mode. This makes sense since the usual link arrangement where the loudest signal sets the processing for all linked channels is inappropriate in many circumstances, e.g. when there is a lot of LFE activity. The three main mix buses (A, B and C) can be three stereos or one 5.1. Downmixing to stereo is also provided with adjustable parameters. Four stereo return channels accept line level signals for routing onto the main mix and foldback buses.

October 2006

review

Multiple TFT screens offer a lot more information than a conventional meterbridge with automation fader position, analogue level and workstation level.

Processing assignment in each of the two paths is also shown. When it comes to resetting the console, each screen can be paged through the settings for each of its six associated channel strips. Therefore multioperator Total Recall becomes possible, speeding up the process to the point where it is almost painless.

Total Recall on steroids.

Talkback, listen, slate and red-light control are included as expected. All audio interfacing appears on 25-pin Sub-D connectors on the rear of the console. Thanks to comprehensive logical patching the need for external manual patching is considerably diminished when compared with a conventional analogue console. The external patchbay can be significantly reduced with consequent cost and space savings. To extend the console in the same style an optional Producer Table will be available along with a patchbay module.

The built-in automation offers fader and cut and is always slave to an external clock source. SSL has experimented with full dynamic automation for analogue consoles but has concluded that it is just too expensive and cumbersome to implement properly.

Automation can also be written to the workstation under control. A few unassigned keys in the centre section allow for future software developments.

While the console obviously works quite happily in stereo, 5.1 is certainly not an afterthought. Duality is an up-front acknowledgement that 5.1 is here to stay as the de facto surround format driven by the requirements of HDTV. 5.1 music for its own sake is still regrettably rare.

The marriage between analogue console and DAW control is the most obvious manifestation of split personality. DAW control is basically the same as the AWS 900, which means multiple HUI for Pro Tools and Mackie Control for workstations that can use this protocol. Pro Tools has a limit of 32 faders for HUI control, something not shared by most of the other DAWs, such as Nuendo and Sonar, which can currently use up to 48 Duality faders. Every eight faders require a MIDI DIN socket. There are eight of these, one is used for MTC and one is for ‘future expansion’.

The fader and rotary above it control console and workstation levels respectively. These controls can be flipped at a button press to put the workstation level control on the faders, in effect ‘layering’ the console.

Of the two basic approaches to DAW control, HUI/Mackie Control or proprietary protocols, the former is more common. SSL’s choice of these protocols means Duality will work with all major workstations, including Pyramix, Pro Tools, Nuendo, October 2006

Logic Audio, and many others. Ultimately though, control performance will depend on the DAW. The same applies to DAW automation. The analogue fader and mute benefit from the on-board SSL automation while the workstation automation is dependent on the DAW under control.

A large, four-button trackerball with concentric shuttle wheel connected to the workstation is mounted in the armrest. The rest of the DAW controls are almost identical to the AWS-900. This means a lot of dedicated buttons (Duality has an extra row), a 5-inch TFT with soft keys and rotary encoders, transport control keys plus jog/shuttle.

Plug-ins can be controlled from the screen, encoders and softkeys in the centre section or, in Mackie Control mode, you can have up to 48 faders controlling a plug-in ‘horizontal’ style, ideal for complex instruments. It is easy to become obsessed with being able to control every last workstation function from the console but this rather misses the point. Providing there is adequate control when tracking and mixing it will often be quicker and easier to use mouse and keyboard for complex editing, especially for the generations weaned on computers.

Some of the less visible features also warrant attention. There is a lot of surface mount componentry in Duality. This brings potential reliability benefits and also considerably reduced power consumption.

Each bay of 24 strips requires one IEC mains cable and that’s it. Current draw is remarkably low at around 600W for a 48-channel board resulting in air conditioning savings and at least one prospective client reckons he will save one monthly lease payment a year on energy savings alone. Since all the processing and power supplies are contained in the surface there is no longer any need to waste space on a separate machine room.

Although Duality’s internal intelligence uses SSL’s proprietary processors rather than a disguised PC, there is an Ethernet port to communicate with an external computer. The new Studio Browser software is not only for housekeeping, along with the built-in CompactFlash socket, but in the future will also offer other possibilities. One SSL innovation is dubbed ‘Eyeconics’. This allows a small image to be placed in the screen above each channel strip making identification of sources intuitive and of course there is no language barrier. SSL provides a library of icons and, via the Studio Browser, users can add their own pictures (You can imagine where this will lead. Ed).

On the face of it Duality could be seen simply as the AWS 900’s bigger brother but when you see it in the metal there is a lot more to it. This console has an instant air of rightness about it, in the ‘big gun’ console sense. There is real gravitas that the resolution

AWS 900 has never quite achieved. Not only will upper-end project studio owners like it but it has client appeal as well. The console is available in 48-, 72- or 96-channel configurations with UK£130,000 as the entry point. Extra 24-channel bays can be added to 48 or 72 frames as a retrofit.

The face of music recording is changing once again. SSL is convinced there has been a resurgence in the middle level studio market, driven at least in part by the current popularity of bands playing ‘real’ instruments. So what is Duality? An SSL for the ‘Noughties’ perhaps as at the time of writing three 48s and a 96 have already been sold. It offers a number of distinct sound signatures and, for a lot of music production, this is exactly what is required.

Continuing the split personality theme, the dual architecture with split signal path allows you to route the signal through the channel strip in several ways.

It gives you the best of both worlds, you can track using mix sound and it’s all easy to configure. You can do these things on a traditional console, but with lots of patching and messing about. Unlike the AWS 900 every channel has dual dynamics and dual filters so this is a true large format analogue console in the SSL tradition.

For me, variable harmonic drive is certainly one of the stars of the show. In the short time I spent with the console this feature transformed some very ordinary drum sounds into something far more interesting and an equally ordinary bass guitar into something reminiscent of late 1960s Colosseum.

Where the AWS 900 is more obviously an adjunct to a DAW, Duality is a distillation of SSL’s analogue wisdom with digital control expertise. The internal patching and multiple-operator Total Recall make this a very quick and intuitive console to operate.

The DAW facilities are a recognition of the facts of modern recording life. They are here to stay, they’re not going away, so we may as well get used to it.

Duality gives us an interesting glimpse of where the future may lie. ■

pRos

Mid-range analogue lives!; at last, some analogue console innovation; fast and productive; interesting sounds at a touch.

cons

Workstation control, especially with pro Tools, is out of scale with the console i.e. limited to 32/48 strips; more 5.1 compressors would have been useful.

contact soliD sTaTe loGic, Uk: Website: www.solid-state-logic.com

23

review

Mackie onyx satellite it’s one of the coolest implementations of fairly commonly encountered functionality that Mackie has uniquely packaged together and presented. RoB JaMes can’t decide whether it’s two-in-one or one-in-two but he still wouldn’t want to drop it on his foot.

F

iReWiRe pRoMiseD a lot for audio and video applications, not forgetting its uses as a general peripheral interface and networking interconnect. After initial hiccups, video is now mostly sorted as are external hard drives, audio not for the first time, has taken a lot longer. Early implementations were flakey to say the least and even thoroughly laudable attempts such as MLan are not without snags. Part of the problem is that the FireWire interface in PCs uses the PCI bus, which is already a very busy highway. The architecture of the motherboard and the chipset used in the FireWire interface directly impacts on the success or failure of FireWire as a real-time audio interface. Against this background products with under-developed drivers and their own inherent problems have not helped the FireWire cause. The good news is there are signs of real progress and at highly attractive price points.

Mackie regularly delivers a lot of performance for a modest asking price and Onyx Satellite continues this tradition. For an almost unbelievable US list of $500 you get two boxes — a mobile recording interface, primarily intended to be used with a laptop, and a docking station that significantly adds to the functionality with six output channels and versatile connections. Two sets of speakers, two pairs of headphones and up to 8 sources can be simultaneously connected, although there are only two concurrent input channels.

Construction immediately inspires confidence. Part one, the Pod, is a simple, no-nonsense, two-channel recording and monitoring box intended for use ‘in the field’. The case, built into a massive aluminium extrusion shell with steel front and back plates, would support the proverbial brick outbuilding (Frequently located in the field. Ed). I once broke a toe dropping something less substantial onto my foot while filming.

Not so sure that the knobs would survive though. Part two, the Base Station, is similarly butch and the Pod slides into a massive slot and docks via a three-row connector. Satellite Pod and Base Station can be powered 24

directly from FireWire (assuming the computer has a 6pin FireWire connector), or from the 12V DC wall-wart included in the box along with a less than generous 1m FireWire cable and handy 6-pin to 4-pin adapter.

Installation is reasonably straightforward. For Mac users it’s plug-and-play but Windows whines about installing an unsigned driver as usual. More worryingly, despite following the instructions to the letter, i.e. not plugging the Satellite in until requested to do so by the installer, the Windows ‘found new hardware’ dialogue appeared and, when installation was complete, there was an error message suggesting the driver might not be correctly installed although in fact it was. WDM, GSIF, ASIO and Core Audio drivers are included.

Onyx Satellite ships with a fully-featured copy of Mackie’s Tracktion 2 music production software with mixing and mastering tools that I also installed but, in the interests of a level playing field, elected to test with Wavelab. After selecting the Satellite ASIO driver it just works. An Onyx Satellite Control Panel is installed along with the driver. Just two adjustments are possible — sample rate (44.1, 48, 88.2 or 96kHz) and latency i.e. buffer size. With external power Satellite can also be used standalone for monitoring the inputs without turning on the computer.

Two Neutrik Combo inputs on the Pod back panel deal with microphones or line with instrument options for each, selectable via buttons on the front panel. resolution

Two jacks provide monitor out, a single 6-pin FireWire connects to the computer and a coaxial power connector caters for laptops that cannot supply power over FireWire. On the front, two pots set input level with four signal level LEDs apiece. These light at -40, -20, -10 and Overload. 48V phantom powering can be imposed on both mic inputs by pressing a button, which also lights an indicator LED. Satellite uses buttons from the Mackie parts bin. These small round items are pleasing in use and are bi-coloured such that when they are ‘up’ a white ring shows. In theory this obviates the need for LED indicators. In practice, it can be quite difficult to tell if they are up or down from normal viewing angles.

The first output volume pot influences the Control Room outputs and the Phones 1 front panel socket while the second controls the Phones 2 circuit. Around the back of the Base Station the Pod connections are expanded with two pairs of Control Room outputs, outputs 3 to 6, Mic XLR, Instrument and Line 1&2 jacks for each of the two input channels along with an insert. On the front panel under the Pod are Mic, Instrument, Line 1 and Line 2 select buttons. These are joined by a To Phones button for talkback to Phones/Control Room outputs, a talkback volume pot and a To DAW button that routes talkback to the DAW source channels, 1&2.

Then comes Source Select for the Control Room outputs, default DAW, down equals inputs routed to the monitoring. The Control Room Level pot is followed by an A/B output select button and the 1/2, 1/6 select switch. When this is up the control room level control adjusts the level of Control Room outputs (1/2) on the rear of the Base Station.

When pressed, all six outputs are adjusted. Fixed output level is nominal +4dBu, +18dBu max and a talkback mic is built-in. Last on the right is a sturdy power switch.

This Onyx is a somewhat enigmatic creature.

When the Pod is docked in the Base Station it is one chunky beast that has little in common with a gazelle.

On the plus side, it certainly isn’t going to trot off your desk; on the minus side it occupies a fair bit of space, especially vertically. The Onyx mic amps are far from shabby along with their AKM 24-bit, 96kHz convertors and the utility of taking such a relatively small and robust box on location with a laptop for stereo recording is undeniable.

Once the Pod is docked, the extra I-O and studio facilities are most welcome and allow for working in 5.1. For musicians with a laptop and a studio computer there are obvious attractions not least is that you don’t have to dismantle your mixing set-up to go off recording. Conversely, there is no digital I-O or MIDI interface. In many situations, where the product will be a CD-R or just a file, the lack of digital I-O will be irrelevant. The absence of MIDI seems a stranger omission in a device so clearly aimed at music recording. As a one-stop solution for recording stereo on a laptop followed by mixing back at base, Onyx is both attractive and amazingly affordable. ■

pRos

Good sound; value for money; well thought out for convenience; an innovative two-in-one solution; from a quick look, the Tracktion 2 software is a considerable bonus.

cons

looks — love it or hate it; no MiDi or digital i-o; nothing else at this price.

contact Mackie, Us: Website: www.mackie.com

October 2006

Pro Audio

ESSENTIALS

AKG’s new Perception 100 and 200 Large Diaphragm True Condenser Studio Microphones combine classic warmth and transparency with exceptional value for money.

The new Soundcraft Vi6™ Digital Live Sound Console incorporates Vistonics® II and FaderGlow™ technologies to deliver sophisticated digital mixing with new levels of control & intuitive operation.

The Lexicon® MX400 and MX400XL Dual Stereo/Surround Reverb Processors offer 4-in/4-out operation for live sound and studio applications through their intuitive front panel or ‘hardware plug-in’ control.

JBL LSR4300 Studio Monitors featuring RMC™ Room Mode Correction, JBL’s exclusive technology that analyses and corrects the response of each speaker for absolute accuracy at the mix position.

The dbx 162 SL Stereo Compressor/Limiter with AutoVelocity™ matches a stunning front panel design with equally impressive dynamic range, sonic clarity and ultra-low distortion.

The BSS DPR-402 Dual Compressor/De-Esser/Limiter features a double side chain and subtractor architecture for unrivalled flexibility in conventional applications, and unlimited effects.

www.harmanprouk.com

review

sound Devices 702T

Displaying the same ergonomics and stunning designs as the company’s original recorders, sound Devices is now offering an entry level compactFlash machine with timecode. neil HillMan is once again mightily impressed.

i

once MeT a Man who claimed to have a fullscale map of the United States in his living room. If this were indeed true, and I obviously have no way knowing if his claim was little more than some bizarre, beer-filled, bar-room boast, it would certainly have made my quest to pin-point Reedsburg, WI a whole lot easier. But I found it anyway, in the South-Central area of Wisconsin, 50 miles north of state capitol Madison, where its 8,000 population enjoy a continental climate modified by the proximity of Lakes Michigan and Superior. It’s also closer to Silicon Valley than San Diego is and so this community is not one that just comes together for Youth Hockey Steak Feed and Gun Raffle events, it’s one that also usefully exploits the high-tech industries based in its own backyard. It’s also been home to Sound Devices since its inception in 1998 and where it addresses the location sound recording market with new combinations of innovative design, impressive feature sets and its trademark acute ease of operation.

The catalogue of the full range of Sound Devices’ mixers and recorders shows how the models have been designed to work cohesively together: the compact MixPre — a stereo in/out mini-mixer; the delightful 302 3-in/2-out MS field mixer for ENG; and the highlycapable 442 fully-featured 4:4:2 MS production mixer, designed to sit happily on a film mixer’s trolley or over a documentary recordist’s shoulder. They’re all mixers that look like they have been built to make a serious attempt on the World Record for ‘features-per-fingertip’, while simultaneously conforming to mechanical specifications demanded by Anakin Skywalker and capable of surviving the rigours of travelling to galaxies far, far away. And into this family of light-heavyweight mixers, dove-tail the Recorders. Innovative they are; light they are — as Yoda himself, might have said.

Sound Devices’ 7-series hard-disk recorders are available as the 2-track 722 and the 4-track 744 and they brought about several industry firsts. Up until the introduction of the 7-series, location hard 26

disk recorders had been large, reasonably ugly and frankly, cumbersome. The 7-series models are compact yet robust, rigidly constructed from aluminium and stainless steel; they write and play 16 or 24-bit audio files at all sampling rates up to 192kHz, record uncompressed PCM audio in .WAV or .BWF format, mono or poly files, record compressed MP3 audio at 64, 128, 192, 256 or 320kbps, use FireWire technology for their high-speed data transfer, weigh less than their rivals at 1.2kg naked, carry an onboard charger for their light and inexpensive Sony Li-ion camcorder-style batteries; and are capable of writing simultaneously to a FAT32 hard-disk and

to the cheaper back-up medium of type I and II CompactFlash. They make a logical replacement for DAT recorders and — joy of joys — they are cheaper than their serious rivals.

Now there are two new additions to the 7-series — the 2-track 702 and 702T — good-looking, almostidentical twins, differentiated from each other by the timecode capability designated by the T suffix and from their older siblings by writing only to CompactFlash.

The 702 (UK£1895 +VAT) is without doubt a well-priced entry-level stereo CF recorder of quality; while the oh-so-useful timecode additions from the Ambient modifications are what otherwise differentiate the 702T from the 722 and mean that now there are timecode versions of the 2 and 4-track machines. But what other significant differences are there between the new 702/702T and the 722, other than the absence of that hard-disk? Very little, as it happens and with the CompactFlash 702T being the same price as the nontimecode dual hard-disk/CompactFlash 722 Sound Devices has provided a twin-track choice: the utility of timecode or the comfort of dual recording.

Now as a recordist you certainly could make a successful, cheaper pairing of 4-channel mixer and 2-channel recorder. For instance, my excellent Audio Developments 261 MS mixer interfaces nicely with anything I’ve ever needed it to; but these Sound Devices products are so suited to each other that their purity and purpose of design brings about a feeling of supreme confidence: two well-designed and stylish halves working seamlessly together.

Neither the 702 or the 702T have the 7,200rpm of a hard disk, but they signify a real revolution in the industry: soon, very soon, we may at last see an integration that becomes the properly designed mixeRcorder; equipment that is fit-for-purpose rather than being a hybrid of two disparate units, a pairing predominantly strong in just one of its capabilities.

Single-sector manufacturers in the mid-West Midlands please hear the call because my full-scale map of Walsall Wood takes up much less apartment space than the one I have for Wisconsin. ■

contact soUnD DeVices, Us: Website: www.sounddevices.com

pRos

Both versions of the 702 share the same silent, balanced, input preamps, bomb-proof limiters and rainbow-metering of the sound Devices mixers.

cons

You still need both the mixer and the recorder in your arsenal, if you need to get the job done thoroughly.

eXTRas

Released in september, Version 2.0 software for the 7-series recorders adds real time recording to external FireWire storage drives, programming and control of the cl-1 remote control and keyboard interface, faster FireWire transfer speeds, and numerous file management and metadata additions. all 7-series recorders can now record to internal and external drives simultaneously with no need to wait for a postrecord mirror, plus files can be played back and verified before turning them in to postproduction. 702 and 702T recorders can record to compactFlash and external FireWire drives; 722 and 744T recorders can record to compactFlash, internal hard drive, or external FireWire drives. either hard drive or DVD-RaM in FaT32 format can be used as external storage volumes. Users of 722 and 744T models have triple redundancy for mission-critical applications and recorders also gain the ability to play back from any of the recording destinations, a capability not found in other portable digital recorders.

resolution

October 2006

Success is a matter of adjusting one’s efforts to obstacles, and one’s abilities to a service needed by others.

Henry Ford)

Producing the perfect sound whatever the circumstances is an art. Whether the project is a live event or a production, TV or theatre, in a studio or OB truck –

Industriegebiet See 96155 Buttenheim Germany

keeping everything under control requires versatility and creativity. And, of course,

Tel.: +49 (0) 95 45 440-300

a console which emphasizes these talents.

Fax: +49 (0) 95 45 440-333 www.stagetec.com sales@stagetec.com

AURUS is just such a console and all digital to boot. Its singular flexibility brings any challenge, however daunting, within your reach. In live performance AURUS’ modest footprint allows an optimum view of the action, while all parameters can be controlled intuitively. In production its huge scope and sublime audio quality never fail to impress.

review

Digidesign pro Tools HD 7.2 it’s been billed as a substantial upgrade that is above and beyond the scope of a more regular nip and tuck. The latest version of pro Tools takes years off GeoRGe sHillinG.

i

T Doesn’T seeM that long since the last major update took Pro Tools to version 7.0, and indeed it isn’t. Interim free updates have included 7.1.1 for MacTel machines, the Xpand! softsynth, and a number of bug-fixing CS updates, but new operational features have meanwhile been gathering on the shelf marked 7.2. A lot of innovative stuff is here, and this could just as well have been named 8.0. The emphasis is on mixing and automation, and there are a further raft of features targeted at the post fraternity, plus functions for Icon users, such as window scrolling with the Scrub/Shuttle wheel. Video import/export and editing is vastly improved too; you can resize and chop up video with audio. Meanwhile, a few new free Digirack plug-ins have been issued, and Dynamics III has had a make-over with animated displays.

Pro Tools 7.2 is a paid-for upgrade (UK£105), authorised by iLok — you can keep the 7.0-7.1 authorisation — but I had random niggles at start-up and it seemed best to put them on separate iLoks. Launching a session with the new version, as is often the case with Pro Tools updates, it was hard to immediately spot any difference from the old version. However, the ‘What’s New’ guide runs to well over 120 pages, so plenty is new or different under the bonnet. Screen layout, keyboard shortcuts and basic functionality remain unchanged so, essentially, it is again a long list of tweaks and add-ons to add features, all helping 28

workflow and flexibility.

Usefully, the whole track grouping system has been updated — instead of 26 you can now make 104 groups for editing and mixing (four banks of 26).

A new, more advanced Create Groups dialogue box allows grouping of plug-in controls and bypass buttons, record enables and pan controls. The last of these was oft-requested by post engineers, and will allow linking of offset pans, retaining their offset relationship during moves. Furthermore, there are new VCA-style masters, created in the New Track dialogue and selectable in the Groups window. Although it might seem an unnecessary luxury at first glance, these allow you to operate in a fashion similar to a large traditional console. When muting and unmuting VCA masters, for example, individual mutes are remembered. When automating, it is even possible to merge in the VCA data to individual faders.

When writing automation, you can now see the new data as a red line in real time, while the original is black, until stop is pressed and they are merged. This is really handy to see how far above or below you have adjusted while you are making the move — just to be sure you haven’t imagined the change!

Additionally, the status button text turns bold when data is being written. There is now a separate Trim data stream and display, so you can compare, coalesce or revert to the original data. You can also now perform edits on Regions while in automation views, and resolution

Fades’ shapes are now shown in automation views, helping automation editing.

A new automation mode, Touch/Latch, allows Touch adjustments to faders without the annoying momentary operation of (Mute) buttons that was often frustrating. There is now also a means to capture automation settings and punch them in somewhere else in the track, with preview also available. If you write updates that go ‘off the scale’, Pro Tools now remembers the excess level moves if you trim back down again.

There are now right-click and scrolling mouse functions a-plenty, whether you are on a Windows or Mac machine. Right-clicking pops up a little context menu in various locations. For example, on a track name this brings up functions such as Hide and Make Inactive (one command), Rename, Delete, and suchlike. Right-click functions are also available when clicking Regions, and these can really speed up the workflow. On the other hand, some users with mice set up so that Right-Click is the same as Control-Click on a Mac have moaned that it slows them down having to select the previous function from the pop-up menu. But the benefits are huge; you can now right-click and Delete Groups, rather than having to de-select others before deleting active Groups. I do, however, still wish there was an easier way to select Playlists — the button is small, and some sort of shortcut or memory function would be most welcome.

The Preferences pages have had a sensible reorganisation — long overdue, this makes everything more logical, but, like the menu reordering of 7.0, takes a little getting used to. Solo mode has been removed to the main Options menu, for example. Audio Import functions are streamlined and changed for the better, and even recording functions are enhanced.

DestructivePunch is a new mode that allows punching in on tracks without creating additional audio files.

Great for fixing stems and mixes recorded back into Pro Tools. And in Punch modes, the trailing waveform is now displayed — as it should be.

When editing, irritating error messages when Fades exist have gone, as Fades no longer get in the way and can be moved or adjusted to the new splice point. You can nudge Regions with fades, with fades stretching as necessary. Fades can also now be automatically applied to REX/ACID files for smoother loops.

To ‘old school’ engineers, this kind of function and flexibility is the stuff of dreams, but the new breed demand quicker workflow, more functions, more groups, more of everything, and Digidesign seems to have been listening. Inevitably, there are a few small issues and bugs, but the DUC forum was fairly quiet on the subject of 7.2 at the time of writing.

This update won’t stop people wanting even more options and features, but there are plenty of helpful improvements here. This represents a comprehensive overhaul of much of the way Pro Tools works, and will benefit all users. ■

pRos

Vca Groups; right-click menus; plenty of new goodies for mixing, automation and postproduction; lots of other things too numerous to mention.

cons

You still can’t instantiate a send onthe-fly; lacks a ‘snap-to-zero-crossings’ editing option.

contact DiGiDesiGn, Us: Website: www.digidesign.com

October 2006

Listen to your music, not to your speakers

Solo6 Be Active 2 way, professional nearfield speaker (2 built-in amplifiers –150 + 100W RMS), comprised of a Focal 6.5” “W” cone sandwich composite driver and a Focal inverted dome pure Beryllium tweeter. Thanks to its exceptional impulse response the tweeter is capable of going flat to 40kHz with an SPL figure of 113dB @ 1M. The Solo6 integrates the best of Focals 30 year technical design and manufacturer experience. £1148.00 inc VAT a pair

Twin6 Be Active 3 way professional nearfield/midfield speaker (3 built-in amplifiers – 2*150 + 100 Watts RMS) comprised of two Focal 6.5” “W” cone sandwich composite drivers and a Focal inverted dome pure Beryllium tweeter going flat to 40kHz and capable of 115dB SPL @ 1M. Both 6.5” drivers handle low frequencies but only one (selectable) is passing lo-mid frequencies. Like every Focal Professional product the Twin 6 Be has been designed from the ground up to be a professional tool that reproduces the reality of sound without enhancements or degradation; just for you to ”listen to your music not to your speakers”. £1642.66 inc VAT a pair

Focal® is a trademark of Focal-JMlab® - www.focal-fr.com UK Distribution by Unity Audio Limited - Tel: UK+ 1440 785843 - Fax: UK+ 1440 785845 www.unityaudio.co.uk

review

Thermionic culture The earlybird 2.2 & The pullet Designed to be true to the heritage of valve processing complete with the idiosyncrasies and the off-the-wallness, Thermionic culture has established itself as a foremost purveyor of glass bottle-based outboard. clean-living GeoRGe sHillinG admits to being something of a bird fancier.

W

Hile cRanesonG lovingly crafts transistor-based birds, Thermionic has been building an increasing reputation for birdbased quality valve gear. I have long been a fan of its big-sounding Phoenix compressor, and its latest models have evolved into solidly-built, high-class boutique products with their feet firmly in the valve past. The legending and finish on these two units exhibits a few idiosyncrasies, with panel layouts that require a couple of minutes’ consideration to fully absorb. Instead of Boost EQ In you are presented with Active Lift. Legending is a messy mixture of block caps, italic caps and lower case. And some of it is slightly obscured by toggle switch surrounds. Flipping the Power toggle On illuminates a ludicrously blinding green lamp but it’s absolutely part of the unique and slightly eccentric charm!

The Earlybird (UK£2225 + Vat) is a dual-channel mic/line preamp, with separate line, mic and Pullet inputs, with three-band boost EQ on each channel.

Valves are run at 330V on the input and 250V on the output.

The Pullet (UK£750 + VAT) is a companion unit, described as a ‘Mini Passive Equaliser’. This provides additional mid and high EQ in a stereo unit. However, being completely passive, The Pullet requires a preamp with +40dB gain on its output to bring the level back to normal. Any microphone preamp can be used but the Earlybird features a separate pair of Pullet inputs for the purpose, and impedances are factory set (but adjustable) in the Pullet so that its Bypass results in unity gain when the units are paired. However, with the extra post-Pullet gain requirement, for two full mic preamp and EQ channels, you will need a Pullet and two Earlybirds!

The Earlybird’s lethargic non-standard VUs sensibly feature a compressor in their path so as to damp the indication at normal (digital) levels. There are two indicated impedance settings for the mic inputs. At 1200ohms, a large condenser sounds clear and open, but at 300ohms it sounds more gluey but in a nice, warm, vintage radiogram manner. The same goes for a cheaper dynamic mic. Despite the choice of impedances I felt the Earlybird slightly underperformed with the budget ribbon mic I had to hand. It sounded absolutely fine, but not noticeably improved than when the mic was paired with a 1073 clone, whereas other mics 30

sounded clearly better through the Thermionic with more depth and immediacy. The third position, marked Pad, lowers level by 18dB and increases impedance to around 20kohms, for a clear, open sound similar to the 1200ohm position.

The Bass Cut section features varyingly shaped filters at four different frequencies. The lowest setting of 40Hz is quite dramatic — you might even hear its effect (just) on NS-10s. Higher frequency settings are increasingly gentle. The ‘Active Lift’ section is a threeband boost-only EQ. Boost amounts are, strangely enough, extremely dependent on the particular Gain setting of the preamp, as they work in the negative feedback loop — as mic gain is increased they become less effective (as feedback is reduced to increase main gain!) The Top boost is a shelf lift above 7kHz, but at full boost there is a peak at 10kHz. Large increases can emphasise harshness, but smaller amounts add sparkle. The Mid boost is a broad curve selectable at 0.8kHz or 2.5kHz, the former great for enhancing vocals, the latter adding grit. The Bass section boosts as a broad 60Hz or 100Hz shelf, for a great warm bottom end. This is the kind of broad EQ where overall gain always increases, and turning everything up sounds good!

The add-on Pullet unit is a dual EQ with XLR I-Os on the rear but no mains power input because the unit is entirely passive. As such, it requires approximately 40dB of gain on the outputs to bring the level back up

to normal line level. When using the Earlybird at line level rather than as a mic preamp, you can employ the Earlybird’s preamplifiers, but if a mic preamp is required, chaining the Pullet back into the second channel is a possibility. There are dedicated Pullet inputs on the rear of the Earlybird that are selected from the front panel. These seem to operate exactly as the microphone inputs but without the provision of 48V phantom power.

The Pullet provides Mid Lift of up to 21dB, with 11 switchable frequencies and three different Q settings.

In typically eccentric fashion, the Q toggle for the mid band is Hi at the top position, Lo at the mid position, and Med at the bottom! The Mid Cut settings have a broader set of frequencies, allowing low-mid cuts, at a fixed, fairly narrow Q. The High Top section provides a fixed 6dB Cut at 6kHz, 11kHz or 15kHz, or Lift at 10kHz, 12kHz or 15kHz. Bypass toggles leave the transformer in circuit for level matching.

The Pullet makes a great partner for the Earlybird, especially for mix or track insertion. It is difficult to seriously harm the signal with EQ like this. Although narrow Qs are available, this isn’t what you would call surgical but more akin to the gentle shaping of a Pultec, yet perhaps even broader — more powerful, honest and straightforward. On both the Pullet and the Active Lift sections, the Cut and Boost knobs simply range from 1 (no effect) to 11, with no particular scaling — this is a suck-it-and-see device, where ears are required! (Shouldn’t that be hear-it-and-see? Ed) It is thoroughly satisfying to use, and works a treat on mixes and individual or stereo signals, with lovely juicy enhancement.

Designer Vic Keary is without question the finest practitioner of valve audio design, and these lovingly hand-built units are highly desirable to the keen-eared.

Birds, eh? Can’t live without ‘em! ■

contact THeRMionic cUlTURe, Uk: Website: www.unityaudio.co.uk

pRos

expertly designed valve and passive gear with thorough regard for design heritage; all the knobs go to 11.

cons

no instrument inputs; no +48V indicator light; you need another dual preamp for both mic amps and pullet simultaneously.

eXTRas

Thermionic culture has met demand from mastering engineers and studios by producing a transformerbalanced version of the culture Vulture stereo valve distortion device. The MV has the same front panel controls and operation as the standard Vulture, but features bypassable sowter transformer-balanced i-os on stereo jacks. The unit also has large indented input drive controls and indented output controls.

resolution

October 2006

Gone Platinum New AWS 900+ Analogue Workstation System

Everything you need to record, edit and mix

The original AWS 900 established a new category in modern console design.

Every inch a ‘real SSL’, it scooped the 2005 TEC Award in the Large Format Console category – despite measuring just 56" across!

Installed in more than 150 of the most prestigious project studios in the world, this unique combination of a compact, world-class analogue mixing console and a comprehensive DAW controller has notched up an impressive catalog of credits from the Rolling Stones’ ‘A Bigger Bang’ to Alicia Keys’ ‘Unplugged’ and Barbra Streisand’s ‘Guilty Pleasures’.

Now the new AWS 900+ builds on the successful formula by adding even tighter integration with all popular DAW platforms, enhancements to the

• Combined SSL console and DAW controller

displays and meters, and a sleek ‘platinum’ styling.

• Legendary SSL SuperAnalogue™ mic pres and signal processing

Love analogue? Work digital? Find out more about the AWS 900+.

• Full monitoring system up to 5.1 surround • Direct control of DAW recording, editing and mixing functions • Flexible signal routing

Oxford +44 (0)1865 842300 New York +1 (1)212 315 1111 Los Angeles +1 (1)323 549 9090 Paris +33 (0)1 48 67 84 85 Milan +39 039 2328 094 Tokyo +81 (0)3 5474 1144

www.solid-state-logic.com

review

neumann TlM49 adding meaningfully to a range of products that includes a number of classics is a tough task when you don’t want to be accused of tokenism, but neumann has achieved it with a ‘budget’ model. Jon THoRnTon can believe his ears.

i

T MUsT Be DiFFicUlT for a microphone manufacturer with a history and pedigree like Neumann to release a new microphone these days.

In an age where we’ve become accustomed to seeing large diaphragm condensers at ridiculously low prices, it’s a trend that has put pressure on price points at all levels, and conscious that any corners cut in build quality or performance are likely to reflect badly on the marque as whole, it must be tempting to just stick with the status quo.

Tempting, but not necessarily good business, which is why this microphone has such a lot riding on it. Not because it is necessarily revolutionary — it’s a fixed-pattern cardioid large diaphragm condenser — but because you get the sense that everything about this microphone — its size, looks, sound, construction and price point — has been a very tricky balancing act.

Starting with size and construction, there’s absolutely nothing here to suggest that you’re getting anything other than rock-solid Neumann quality.

Unashamedly taking its rather retro styling cues from the venerable M49 and M50, the TLM49 is a squat, purposeful looking thing. The extremely large, wide meshed head grille

32

protects a classic K47 diaphragm, as employed in the company’s legendary U47.

Internally, as you would expect from the TLM designation, the output stage is solid state throughout with not a transformer in sight, and externally no switches or controls get in the way of its classic looks.

The microphone is supplied with an elastic suspension mount, and the whole ensemble looks as understated as a microphone of this size can be with its satin nickel finish. In fact, the only sign of building to a price here is the fact that it is supplied in a cardboard box, rather than the usual wooden case.

From the outset, Neumann’s designers have focussed and tuned the TLM49’s capabilities as a vocal/speech microphone with a ‘retro’ sound to match its looks. The published response figures show a gently falling response from 1kHz, finishing about 5dB down at 30Hz. An equally gentle rise from 1kHz to +3dB at 5kHz is followed by a dip around 7-8kHz, and another +3dB peak at 10kHz, before falling off to –6dB at 20kHz. Not a microphone that’s been tuned for linearity then, but I have to say on vocals it really does work straight out of the box.

Spoken voice and male and female sung vocals have that ‘mix-ready’ quality to them that is the hallmark of a classic microphone.

Lows and mids are smooth and well extended, high mids have a great sense of clarity while still sounding very rounded and full, and there’s plenty of air to the top end that never once verges on being harsh or gritty — even across a range of different singers. In comparison to a U87 it doesn’t have that ‘catch’ to the mid range that helps a vocal jump out of the studio monitors, but it does make pretty much any vocal sound completely stitched together.

There’s a useful degree of tuning available by varying distance and angle on mic, as proximity effect is smooth and progressive, and the TLM49’s tendency towards a really pronounced hypercardioid response above 8kHz means that softening up an overly harsh high register is easily accomplished with a gentle twist off-axis. The size and construction of the head-grille also means that popping, while still present with close mic positions, seems to be less of an issue at medium distances to the extent that a popshield isn’t sometimes necessary.

So it performs admirably on voice, but how does it fare in other applications? After all, this isn’t a bargain-basement microphone, and most potential buyers would want something fairly flexible for their money.

Acoustic guitar at a reasonable distance gave a tone that sounded a lot more immediate than you would expect from the placement — plenty of body and nicely defined resonance with a good degree of high frequency detail. The TLM149 didn’t seem to capture quite the same degree of transient detail as the Brauner Phantom used in comparison here — which resolution

wasn’t necessarily a bad thing as it had the effect of rounding out and softening the sound a little. And purely because that was the way the session was going, I tried it about 45 degrees off-axis but close up to a bass cabinet, which resulted in one of the nicest tones I’ve ever had from that particular rig — deep but not boomy, rich but not lacking in definition, and a good hard edge to the mid frequencies that worked wonders in the mix.

All of which makes this microphone a tremendous specialist and a more than competent generalist.

There’s enough familiarity in its looks, build and sound to reassure, yet enough of a distinctive character in every respect to really make it stand out from the crowd. It’s tempting to think of this as a ‘budget’ Neumann, but that would be doing the TLM49 (UK£899 + VAT) an injustice. We’ve seen some perfectly fine ‘budget’ mics from it before — the TLM103 springs to mind, which was never exactly cheap, but very capable. The 149 though, sounds like it’s in a completely different league to its (not inconsiderable) price bracket. A fine balancing act of all the parameters mentioned earlier it might be, but one that has been executed to perfection. ■

pRos

Terrific sounding vocal microphone; build quality; looks; reasonable price.

cons

no HpF; a proper case or box would have been nice.

eXTRas

neumann has added to its solution-D family with new digital models kM 183 D, kM 184 D and kM 185 D — three different directional characteristics are being offered initially; four others will follow in 2007. The modular construction of the new microphones permits the passive omni, cardioid and supercardioid capsules to be combined with the kM D output stage. in the microphone, the neumann a-D convertor from the D01 is located immediately next to the capsule and claims a dynamic range exceeding that of the capsule. if required, the Dsp functions integrated into the microphone can be configured and controlled

remotely via the DMi-2 digital microphone interface and Rcs remote control software. These functions include gain setting, a compressor/ limiter with de-esser, and a peak limiter.

Updates to the DMi-2 include support for 192kHz, aes 11 synchronisation and improved jitter performance. a key feature continues to be data exchange via the aes 42 standard.

contact neUMann, GeRManY: Website: www.neumann.com

October 2006

review

presonus aDl600 The story of italian-american designer of boutique outboard antony DeMaria meeting up with presonus president Jim odom at a Us aes show will be familiar to some readers from press releases. odom noticed a prototype mic preamp at the back of the aDl booth and was intrigued and, upon hearing it, mightily impressed. convinced this was a match made in sonic nirvana, the aDl 600 was eventually born .

D

eMaRia’s aDl BRanD is known for expensive all-valve outboard, especially vintage-inspired compressors (the ADL 1500 was reviewed in Resolution V5.4). Presonus, on the other hand, is known for modern designs at a lower price point, but with a reputation for reliability, clean sound and excellent build quality.

The ADL 600 is a dual channel mic, line and instrument preamplifier, built in the US to apparently exacting standards and featuring three tubes per channel. Out of the box, it is a mightily impressive piece of kit, a deep 2U with a contoured charcoal front panel, large chrome toggle switches, unusual matt-finished knobs and VU and LED meters. The two channels are similarly but not identically laid out. The Instrument input jack for each channel is on the outer extremes, while the toggles and knobs run left to right on both sides, meaning the physical relationship between toggles and knobs is different on each channel. You therefore have to look carefully before flipping the similar looking toggles — their indicator

34

GeoRGe sHillinG

LEDs are lusciously but unhelpfully all blue! The toggles are high quality components and not overly stiff. All functions are accompanied by a reassuring relay click. Interior construction is equally impressive, with a dividing metal wall around the power supply.

The VU Meter -6dB switch usefully pads the meters, allowing higher output indication with less needle bending. Additionally, these VUs are legended to +5dB and the needle stop is just past that. Although the meters are deeply recessed, a warm backlight helps visibility. Furthermore, between the VU meters are a pair of 8-segment LED bargraphs, ranging from -18 to +24, with all LEDs blue except the top one in red which is around the maximum output level.

All knobs are click-switched, except the Trim knob which is virtually undamped, providing a smooth -10dB to +10dB adjustment with no detente — perfect for riding dynamic vocalists up the verses and down in the choruses, or just setting as appropriate. Coarse Gain goes up in 5dB steps from 30dB to 65dB, so with the Trim at full tilt, there is an indicated 75dB of gain and certainly plenty of enough clean, quiet amplification for anything I could throw at it. For loud signals a -20dB pad is available. The HP Filter is selectable at 40Hz, 80Hz or 120Hz, but the knob to select this is placed away from the enabling toggle. Looking from above when mounted in a rack, it’s slightly difficult to read the legending with the toggles down and off but this is a very small niggle, and any other arrangement would spoil the beauty of the front panel!

On the rear are clearly labelled Neutrik XLR sockets, with separate mic and line inputs. A large heatsink is bolted on between these and the IEC mains socket. Mains voltage is factory preset. There is also a Chassis Ground Link strapped across two tag screw binding posts. resolution

In use, I was immediately struck by the silkiness and smoothness of character. This unit has a distinct character that sets it apart from the competition, and seems to bring the best out of any microphone in terms of depth and clarity. The exceptionally low noise floor undoubtedly helps the detail to shine through. It sounds decidedly posh, and especially suits female lead vocals and stringed instruments; but that’s not to say it lacks guts. This is a modern design that does not set itself up as a vintage copy but claims — and achieves — a genuine improvement over its predecessors.

There are four different mic impedance settings, from 1500 down to 150 ohms. With a trusty large condenser, differences between adjacent settings are subtle but a more open sound is produced at higher settings, as expected. The lower impedance settings tend to sound clogged. With a cheap dynamic mic an exceptional level of high frequency detail is extracted, giving the mic something leaning towards a condenser’s character, but again, lower impedance settings tend to be less appealing for vocals. With a ribbon mic, again an enhancement was evident, with a sparkle and clarity not normally expected, although there was none of the slightly exaggerated ‘air’ found on Focusrite Blue models, for example. I was expecting the ribbon to perhaps do something interesting with the lowest impedance settings, but at 150 ohms the level was significantly lower than at other settings, with no obvious benefit to the tone.

The Instrument inputs are a bonus feature, they sound great, and provide plenty of gain for low output guitars. However, on higher output instruments like bass and Les Paul, I found my Neve imitator box sounded a little livelier.

Line inputs are provided for mix processing. I was expecting this to be subtle, but cranking the Gains and lowering the Trims really gelled a rock track in an instantly gratifying manner. The effect was akin to mixing through a big analogue desk as opposed to inthe-box, the ADL took away a little digital nastiness, and added pleasing analogue glue — it really was like hearing great vinyl versus lacklustre CD! Oddly, approximately half the manual is taken up with a basic guide to mic techniques for various instruments, and even more oddly there is a small Allen key taped to the cover, apparently for knob removal.

However, all functions and features are adequately explained, and the ADL 600 (UK£1701 + VAT) is a joy to use and looks and feels a million dollars. ■

pRos

silky smooth mic pre with exceptional performance; line inputs warm up your mix; beautiful design and impeccable build.

cons

poor pointer on Trim knob; lower impedance settings rarely useful.

contact pResonUs, Us: Website: www.presonus.com Uk, source: +44 208 962 5000

October 2006

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review

RMe Fireface 400 RMe makes rock-solid pci cards, interfaces and convertors so a FireWire box from the company is worthy of attention. RoB JaMes overcomes his prejudices.

H

iTHeRTo, i HaVe Been less than keen on FireWire audio interfaces. Some work well enough with Macs but when it comes to PCs I have always had problems with drivers and not entirely trustworthy performance. Curiously, I’ve never had any bother with FireWire DSP accelerators.

Physically, the Fireface 400 is a 1U half-width rack box attractively finished in the RME house colours of blue and silver. Included in the pack are some rubber feet (That’ll put a spring in your step. Ed), an in-line power supply (the unit can also be powered from a 6-pin FireWire host), a MIDI breakout cable, optical cable and a decent length (4.5m) FireWire cable.

The feature set is promising: 8 channels of analogue I-O with two digitally controlled mic amp inputs plus two balanced instrument/line inputs on the front panel; ADAT optical and coaxial SPDIF usable simultaneously in Enhanced Mix Mode; and TotalMix mixer in hardware with 42-bit internal resolution and 32 channels of high-speed MIDI. Fireface 400 can also be used as a standalone A-D/D-A convertor with settings retained in flash memory and levels adjustable using the front panel rotary encoder. Remote control is also possible via MIDI and any control surface supporting the Mackie Control protocol.

Installation is very smooth. Connect the Fireface to the computer (with the power Off — although FireWire is supposed to be a hot-plug interface, more devices die during hot-plugging than at any other

time), power it up and insert the driver CD. Windows finds the driver without any help and, after a re-boot, two new icons, Mixer and Settings, appear in the task bar. No doubt Mac installation is equally painless.

I also updated the firmware and driver to the latest versions, downloaded from RME. With Wavelab fired up I checked out ASIO, WME and MME. All worked immediately without any buffer fiddling. Wavelab can be difficult with some ASIO drivers so this is encouraging. You can use the Fireface 400 as a simple interface, largely ignoring the TotalMix application, but you would miss out on some elegant and very powerful features. The DSP-based TotalMix mixer offers fully independent routing and

The package

Two balanced XlR/jack neutrik combo connectors feed a digitally controlled analogue input stage and 48V phantom power is individually switchable. leDs indicate phantom, signal present and clip. preamp gain of up to 65dB is available adjustable in steps of 1dB over a 55dB range. inputs 3 and 4 are balanced jack with signal present and clip leDs and have a choice of line (10kohm) or instrument (470kohm) impedance and are equipped with preamps to provide up to 18dB of gain in 0.5dB steps.

Below the bright green two-digit display the rotary encoder incorporates a switch. a short press toggles between channel selection and i-o level adjustment while a longer press toggles stereo pairing on/off. eight leDs show valid input of Word clock spDiF and aDaT. Host lights red when FireWire is disconnected or if there is a problem. Four yellow leDs indicate MiDi activity and the stereo headphone jack takes outputs 7 and 8. on the rear, the coaxial power socket has a cable retainer and a switch to select external or FireWire power. Two 6-pin FireWire sockets connect to the host and provide hub functionality to connect a further device. a mini Din socket provides two MiDi inputs and outputs when used with the breakout cable. Word clock i-o Bncs are accompanied by a neat little 75ohm termination switch. aDaT Toslink i-o sockets are the shuttered type; no blanking plugs to lose. phono coaxial spDiF i-o is fully aes-eBU compatible and works at up to 192kHz. spDiF can also be accessed through the optical i-o, which also works up to 192k — RMe claims this is a world exclusive feature. Balanced line inputs 5-8 and balanced line outputs 1-6 are jacks. all are switchable between -10dBV, +4dBu and loGain(inputs)/HiGain(outputs) equivalent to +2dBV, +13dBu and +19dBu for 0dBFs.

36

resolution

mixing of all 18 input and output channels to all 18 physical outputs with up to 9 independent stereo sub-mixes. Routings, ganging and groupbased operation of faders can all be copied and pasted and there is an alternative Matrix view of the mixer that is arguably easier to operate.

RMS and Peak level metering for all audio channels are calculated in DSP hardware with minimal CPU overhead.

The mic pres were a nice surprise, perfectly decent with ample gain to deal with insensitive mics. All the analogue circuits are commendably quiet. The Settings dialogue applet is installed with the driver. This is where you will find sync reference settings and tallies along with analogue hardware gain settings and such like. It is also where settings can be saved or read from the unit’s flash memory. Among the expected items is a drop-down labelled ‘Limit Bandwidth’. This allows the amount of data carried across FireWire to be reduced in the interests of improved stability by disabling certain channels. RME makes the point that FireWire necessarily involves greater CPU and system overhead than its PCI cards and that any lost data packets will affect all channels rather than just the last ones. RME designed its own FireWire interface with hardware-based data packet check and drop-out correction to combat this.

RME’s sync and clock technology, SteadyClock, also features and can be used as the master sync reference for the studio. SteadyClock also refreshes clock signals and reduces jitter and offers pull-ups and pull-downs. The Settings dialog offers a choice of the most common sample rates or two faders can be used to set the sample rate in real-time, within the range of +/-4% and +/-0.4%.

At UK£552 (+ VAT) this would be a tempting proposition but not earth-shattering. However, the fact that it can be used standalone changes that. Thanks to the internal flash memory, all settings including the mixer are recalled during boot. Therefore it can be used as an instrument or microphone preamplifier, submixer, A-D and D-A-convertor, headphone mixer, format convertor or monitoring mixer, among other things. This extra functionality lifts it into a class of its own.

With a total of 18 I-Os at normal rates and 8 analogue and two digital inputs and outputs directly available even at the highest sample rate, this is a very useful box. Despite my misgivings about FireWire as an audio interface I am suitably convinced by RME’s implementation. Fireface 400 has a lot going for it. ■

pRos

RMe pedigree; convincing performance; versatility thanks to MiDi remote and standalone capabilities; convenience, especially for laptops.

cons

any real problems are likely to be due to the host computer’s pci bus segmentation, FireWire interface, etc; runs rather warm, particularly the psU; no separate headphone volume pot.

contact RMe, GeRManY: Website: www.rme-audio.de

October 2006

review

Universal audio solo 110 and 610 While you seemingly can’t move these days for multichannel mic preamps, there also seems to be space for the other extreme of channel endowment, namely a single channel device in a ‘luggable’ form factor. Universal audio’s solo range is a case in point, coming in two flavours — the solid state 110 and the valve-based 610.

i

nTeRnal aRcHiTecTURes aRen’T the only things that differentiate these two boxes, which although identical in size and shape (shoebox sized with integrated carrying handle and a sloping front panel), differ slightly in appearance. The 110 favours minimalist pushbutton switchgear with a plethora of blue LEDs and smooth contours to its controls, while the 610 gives a nod to a vaguely retro styling with sub-miniature toggle switches and chunky, bakelite-esque knobs (You can mount three solos in a rackmount side by side. Ed).

Having said that, both units offer identical features and connection options. The rear panel features a microphone input on XLR, and an output, which rather curiously can be switched to either line level or mic level output level, also on XLR. I guess that the thinking here is about the possibility of chaining preamps, or perhaps in case an end user’s recording input possibilities are limited. A signal ground lift switch for the output completes the picture here.

Cosmetic differences aside, the front panels are dominated by the two stage level controls that are a feature of Universal Audio’s more recent offerings. A Gain control drives the input stage of the preamplifier –- FET-based in the case of the 110 and valve (12AX7) in the case of the 610 — while the Level control adjusts the overall output level for the unit. In this way, it is possible to drive the input stage very hard to colour the sound, while still delivering an acceptable output level to the next device in the chain.

Metering is via a tri-colour LED, and is post-gain but pre-output level. Signal present lights up green, near clipping turns amber and clipped is red. It’s not the most accurate form of metering there is, admittedly, but sensible level points for the three stages means that it’s perfectly useable. And in practice, your ears tend to tell you far more than the LED does anyway.

Switches for a high pass filter, phantom power and 38

Jon THoRnTon

phase reverse are all available on the front panel, as is a switch to select two possible input impedances (500ohms or 2kohms). Also on the front panel are a DI input and associated Thru socket — both on 1/4-inch jacks, making it possible to DI a guitar or bass, and then pass the signal through to a cab for recording. A neat trick here is that the variable input impedance also applies when the DI input is selected, albeit with correspondingly higher ranges (47kohms or 2.2Mohms).

Build quality is everything you might expect from Universal Audio — the chassis is sturdy, and a poke under the hood reveals that everything is nicely spannered together inside too (All built in the US even at this price. Ed). Fully discrete circuitry is employed throughout both of the Solo flavours, with the same fundamental design and component choices as the more exotic (and pricey) 4110 and 8110 models.

This is immediately apparent in the first audition of the 110. Fans of Universal Audio’s newer range won’t be disappointed, as I was hard put (by memory at least) to distinguish its performance from the 4110. An open, honest sound, perhaps a little bit ‘hyped’ in the upper mids, but delivering a very clean and useable tone from a variety of microphones.

Experimenting with the balance between gain and output revealed that when you hit this unit hard with a signal, the effects are those of a kind of gentle limiting — again most noticeable in the upper mids and highs. This isn’t an unpleasant characteristic at all and in fact was useful in softening a female vocal recorded with a Brauner VMA — a combination that can sound a little hard with some voices.

Switching to the 610 and the differences, particularly when driving the preamp hard, become clear very quickly. While the 110 tends to soften the sound slightly here, the 610 adds a level of harmonic distortion that warms up the bottom end nicely, but to resolution

my ears actually lent a touch of brittleness to the high mids. It’s a matter of taste, of course, but I always came away feeling that perhaps it was trying just a little too hard to attain that ‘valveness’ to the sound.

Both units, though, make terrific DI boxes. Bass guitar DIed through the 110 gave a really thick but clear sound with just the right amount of cut to the low mids. The same bass fed through the 610 gives more of the same, with just a little more buzziness in the low registers, particularly when cranked hard.

And while the variable impedance switch on the mic input revealed very little in the way of sonic difference with the particular microphones I was using, it proved very versatile with the DI input, with the lower setting able to extract a little more clarity to a slightly boomy sounding bass.

On balance, I was drawn more to the sound of the 110 than to its valve-based stable mate the 610, although there’s no doubt that they are both quality bits if kit that sound impressive. If portability is key to you, or if a single channel is all you’re likely to need, they should be on your audition list. And if you also fancy a really tasty sounding DI box, well that gets thrown in for free. ■

pRos

Well built; 110 sounds just as good as the 4110 and 8110; portability; Di capability very impressive; form factor makes it very luggable.

cons

only a single channel; form factor could be a little clumsy in some applications; metering effective but crude.

eXTRas

Universal audio’s UaD-1e express pak and UaD-1e expert pak, pci express Dsp cards and powered plug-ins will ship

with Ua’s core 15 free Mix/Gtr FX plugin suite plus a UaD Us$100 (express) and UaD $750 (expert) voucher that customers can use to pick and purchase Ua plug-in authorisations on-line. The paks offer DaW users with new pciebased Mac/pc computers access to Ua’s Dsp-powered mixing and mastering plug-ins.

contact UniVeRsal aUDio, Us: Website: www.uaudio.com Uk, source: +44 208 962 5000

October 2006

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Mick Glossop He was in on the ground floor at two of the most influential studios that marked what is acknowledged as the birth of the modern recording era yet he still retains the passion and enthusiasm that influenced a generation of engineers who sat beside him. Mick Glossop talks to NIGEL JOPSON about quadraphonic pan pots, the first SSL, and inspiring musicians.

M

ick Glossop’s name is synonymous with two benchmark UK recording studios of the late 1970s and early 1980s — the Richard Branson-owned Manor and Town House — and he was chief engineer at both. Mick worked with many of the legendary early Virgin Records acts including Kevin Coyne, Mike Oldfield (Orchestral Tubular Bells) and Tangerine Dream, for whom he recorded and mixed the groundbreaking Rubycon and 40

later Ricochet albums.

He went on to work with an influential array of new wave and post-punk stars including The Ruts, Penetration, The Skids, The Alarm, Tubeway Army, Gary Numan and Public Image (who’s eponymous debut album he recorded and mixed). Glossop developed something of a reputation as an audio guru, as many of the assistants and engineers who worked in his studios went on to become well resolution

known producers and engineers in their own right, among their number Alan Douglas and Steve Power.

Mick moved on to form successful and enduring partnerships as a producer with bands like The Waterboys, Furniture and The Wonder Stuff. Never one to rest on his laurels, Glossop continued to work with bands so cutting edge their talents sometimes slid between the cracks, such as Lower (The Gentle Art of Conditioning) and Shin Hae Chul’s arty N.E.X.T., as well as finding time to form a productive late-album affiliation with Lloyd Cole.

The most defining landmark in Mick’s career must surely be his long association with Van Morrison, having recorded and mixed 15 of the Irish troubadour’s albums, and had his fingers on the faders of practically every tune the prolific songsmith has written. Resolution interviewed Mick at the Town House, on the day of the legendary facility’s official closure, as he awaited the completion of an Andy Munro-designed studio in the basement of his own townhouse. (Photos www.recordproduction.com) October 2006

craft You have such a wide ranging career, are there any milestones you could single out?

Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m lucky to have worked with at least two artists of whom I was a great fan, Frank Zappa and Van Morrison. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d listened to their albums and bought their records several years before I worked with them. I was still chief engineer here at the Town House when I first worked with Zappa. I was recording an album he was producing for an Indian violinist by the name of L Shankar, a virtuoso prodigy whoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d crossed over to rock through playing with John McLaughlin. That was my introduction to Frank, I just got the gig through being in the right place at the right time. He then asked me to record four live shows at the Hammersmith Odeon on the Rolling Stones mobile, which was fun â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the RSM was the original truck built in the UK and had quite a modest Helios desk â&#x20AC;&#x201D; this was a Frank Zappa show, with percussion players, four guitarists, drummers and lots of singers! Later on, when Frank was recording Joeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Garage, I was in California at the Record Plant recording Into The Music with Van. I got a call from Zappa to say â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;How much time have you got? Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve got a triple album to mix!â&#x20AC;&#x2122; I had ten days so I went down to LA and mixed three sides, Steve Nye ended up doing the last three. Zappa had a house in the hills with a very well equipped studio with a large Harrison desk. The air conditioning broke and it became ridiculously hot, so we ended up mixing at Kendun Studios Burbank. They had an early SSL B series, which I was pleased about as Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d been working on the same system at the Town House. I was keen to demonstrate my chops on this new system and show Frank how great it was â&#x20AC;&#x201D; but the automation was broken! I heard a story later on that the tech engineer at Burbank had been impressing his mates by getting into the software and tweaking stuff, and in the process had completely screwed up the computerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s operating system. Joeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Garage is a long track, so we had to mix it in sections by hand, with lots of chalk marks on the faders and half-inch edits.

I hear youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re mixing all of Van Morrisonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s archive material for a boxed set.

The boxed set is an ongoing project. A huge amount of tape arrived from the US at the Wool Hall studio about 15 years ago. They were recordings from all the sessions Van had ever done, presumably during the entire Warner period. Some of the material was mixed immediately and came out as the Philosopherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Stone album, pretty much everything else has been mixed by now, Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve spent a fair amount of time doing that. It was extremely enjoyable, there were some great bands, great playing and performances. It was fabulous fun to work on, the tape was running all the time during most sessions, so you get the atmosphere and chat from the time. A lot of the tapes were not labelled, so a lot of detective work went on. Fortunately Vanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s memory is incredible, he was right there with all the names of people heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d played with 30 years ago.

Vanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Inarticulate Speech Of The Heart album was recorded here at The Town House, wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t it?

We spent six days in the old Studio 2, which doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t exist any more, I think we recorded 12 or 13 songs including Rave On John Donne.

So can you now exclusively reveal to Resolution readers the existence of an extended studio version of John Donne?

Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s one of the longest tracks Van has recorded in the studio, 32 minutes or something â&#x20AC;&#x201D; we had to change October 2006

the tapes in the middle of it â&#x20AC;&#x201D; or maybe we had two machines running, I canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t quite remember. A lot of editing went on. But thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s what happens with free improvisation, which is what largely developed in that song. Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a particular type of Van Morrison song which starts out as a sheet of lyrics and some melodic ideas on his part, but basically nobody knows whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s going to happen.

You always had a bit of a reputation for pushing the boundaries. Dave Ruffy [of the Ruts] said that you: â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;used recording techniques which were ahead of their time.â&#x20AC;&#x2122; Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s very nice of him! ... itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s just a matter of looking for new things. Thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s such a lot of music out there, you have to think in terms of making records that have got something original. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a very English thing, to always

think about being original. If you can create something sound-wise that is happening then that in turn inspires musicians. If you make something sound a certain way, which they didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t expect, then that can stimulate a certain sort of performance. When the recordbuyer hears a song, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the performers theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re listening to. People I know who arenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t in the industry donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t talk to me about sound ... youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve got to do something very extreme sonically with a record for the average bloke in the street to say: â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;ooh, that sounds different.â&#x20AC;&#x2122; Theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re listening to the instrumentalists and singers, thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s what gets through to them, so thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s what you have to spend a lot of time stimulating if you are producing a record.

Most good engineers and producers have this sort of maverick idea â&#x20AC;&#x201D; letâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s turn the knobs up all the way (I know weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re not supposed to) â&#x20AC;&#x201D; letâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s see what it

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21-08-2006 11:31:02

41

craft sounds like. Sometimes you abuse the equipment ... it’s a creative process, you want to do something new all the time. I deliberately look for new ways to mic up drum kits these days, because I’ve recorded so many conventionally close-miked kits.

Which new system have you arrived at now with the drums?

The last recording I made I used two kick drum mics, one top snare mic, one overhead ... the hi-hat mic was about 10 feet away ... some room mics in funny places and no close microphones over the toms. You have to be aware and stop doing things when you find yourself doing them automatically. When you have the time to experiment as an engineer, I think you have to deliberately steer yourself away from the techniques you know will work, to force yourself to do something different.

Do you insist on an analogue console nowadays, or do you use a worksurface?

Well — I’ve probably mixed seven or eight albums completely inside Pro Tools. I haven’t used a Pro Control, although it’s something I might end up getting for my own studio.

H OLOPHONE A D R esolution

Are you a balance person rather than a radical EQer? Yes, it’s like playing an instrument, you can do so much more by just moving a fader a quarter of an inch. Once you realise that potential ... I’m looking for those tweaking opportunities all the time when I am mixing. I hardly do any offline mix joins. But with Pro Tools I do a little tweaking with the mouse on vocals.

I never thought I’d work that way, because I always believed vocal rides were a feel thing. But in fact you 1/2 page Horizontal can do much more precise work, for example for de216mm wide x 125mm high

Mick Recalls His TiMe as cHieF enGineeR aT THe ManoR anD ToWn HoUse: ‘When i was at The Manor in 1976 i’d only been engineering for around four years — i was still learning — in fact, i’m still learning now! The Manor had a unique atmosphere; the recording studio had been there since around 1970, built for Richard Branson by Tom newman. it worked fine for what they had been doing, but by 1976 it had become a bit tired. initially The Manor attracted a lot of heavy clients, because it was such a great place to visit. But i don’t think many of them came back, as it was a bit funky technically. Richard wanted to rejuvenate his studio, phil newell (Manor technical director) managed to prise a pretty good budget out of him. We got great gear, a quadraphonic monitoring system, lots of toys, and an automated mixing system with the new allison 65k programmer.

ReDesiGninG THe ManoR: ‘phil had met acoustic designer Tom Hidley in the states, Tom was interested in moving to europe and had already designed Mountain studios in Montreux. He’d worked at the Record plant and developed his own system for a comprehensive studio monitoring design, which appealed to us. prior to that, an acoustician might design a control room, then the owners would choose the loudspeakers and hang them up on the walls, there was no integration.

Tom was the guy who came in and said: “You can’t separate the two, they work together.” it wasn’t a conscious attempt by us to be cutting edge, we just wanted it to be really good, and phil and myself had been given the freedom to do just that, it was

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craft a great feeling. at the Manor we put a Helios console in. Helios was a Uk company that only made custom consoles so it was fantastic — you could have whatever you wanted — i had quad panning joysticks on every channel! in those days of discrete input channels and group outputs the tape monitors were not used during mixes. so i requested that Dick swetenham (the Helios designer) find some way of routing them to the mix as extra inputs. it was a good team of people and the studio was managed extremely well by Barbara Jeffries. it was really successful on the basis of that — so Richard decided — “i think i’d like a london studio ... would you like to get on with that now?”

THe ToWn HoUse: The spec was for two rooms, so we started creating our wish list of equipment. We decided to put another Helios console in studio 1, but for studio 2 we wanted something different ... it was that idea of offering clients a choice. at the time there were neve, cadac, Mci and Harrison as headline contenders. although they all made good consoles, neither phil or i were terribly knocked out with the idea of having any of them. We must have spent six months sitting around the kitchen table at the Manor saying “We’ve got everything else sorted out, what are we going to install in control room two?” a guy called John Romer did the weekend maintenance at the Manor, his day job was at nearby acorn studios in stonesfield. John had been rabbiting on about this console at acorn — we kept saying “Yeah, yeah John (never heard of these people) please go away!” But in the end we thought we should really go and check it out, so we all went to meet colin sanders.’

October 2006

colin started to talk about compressors and gates on every channel, and the tape remote in the centre and tape monitoring switches on every channel. This was revolutionary at the time, there weren’t any console manufacturers who had even thought of that. colin invented the supercue, where the musician could listen to what he had just played, play along and hear the combined mix just before you got to a punch-in point. after working at his own acorn studio, colin thought that would be good and just built it in ... to me it’s a revolutionary idea that we now take for granted. and autocue: you stop the tape and talkback comes on. such a simple idea, but nobody had done it. By this time i was pretty much sold on the new mixer ... then he started talking about the automation system! We had been used to using the allison, or similar tape-based automation systems, where the time delay between successively updated mixes was silly. You always had to redo the cuts at the very end or they came in late. Here was colin’s delay-free system that was tied to a sMpTe timecode. You could keep all the mixes — it worked! — and it was an autolocator as well. This was a mega-leap forward at the time. We had the first ssl in the Uk and i became a real advocate of the system.’

soliD sTaTe loGic innoVaTion: ‘colin explained the channel strip he had designed, everything was in the right place. We take it for granted now, but one of my main complaints about neve then was that, ergonomically, nothing sat right in the channel strip: you had to stand up to reach for some adjustments.

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on THe FaMoUs ‘in THe aiR ToniGHT’ ToWn HoUse DRUM RooM: ‘i can remember having a conversation with phil newell about that room: “What are we going to do with this, it’s pretty live in here, doesn’t it need some treatment?” phil said: “Basically, we’ve run out of money. let’s just see what happens, and if we need to do anything with it then we’ll deal with that on the next budget.”

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craft essing a vocal. However, you always have to be mindful of the fact that, as humans, visual information seems more powerful than the ear, and be wary of tweaking a waveform just because it looks louder. For example, I much prefer EQ plug-ins that don’t display a curve, it is too influential.

It is possible that your studio will just consist of a DAW and some mic pres?

I think these things are still evolving, but sonically it is possible to get very good results working completely in-the-box. Even without using external analogue gear, there are several plug-ins, which I’ve spent a lot of time researching, that help you on the way. But the only reservation I have about working in-thebox, even though you may end up with a very good sonic result, is that it’s not a lot of fun. It’s rather like hard work! As my own studio gets going, it’s a major decision I have to make: do I bus out on 24 submixes, with or without automation? It’s a big topic of debate at the moment, whether you need to sum in the analogue domain. I’m not really sold on the arguments in favour, but I’m going to wait until I get a stable listening environment and have the opportunity to make my own extensive listening tests.

Do you think it’s essential for today’s producers to have a studio of their own, do bands and labels expect it?

Not from my experience, but I’ve always wanted one! I’m expanding my house and creating a basement, I’ll have a booth, I might even be able to get a small rhythm section in there. There are a lot of projects I’d like to work on, very interesting projects, that are probably not going to have the budgets to allow me to rent the modern version of the Town House. That’s a major reason for setting my own studio up, it will mean I can just work on projects I’m attracted to from a purely creative point of view. This question of what is going to be successful in the future ... the whole model of how artists are signed to record companies and have their albums financed is changing completely. Now it’s possible for people to make records without spending humongous amounts of money. I’m quite happy to work for a much lesser fee — which is compensated for by a different kind of royalty structure or something — that’s the sense in which a producer really needs to own a facility.

Did you start with a fantasy idea of your perfect listening room?

Not really, because I only had the space: 40 square metres! It’s just a question of sitting down and thinking — what is the best way to use this? I’m probably spending more money on the acoustics than anything else in my studio, actually.

Andy Munro has designed the soundproofing, which is essential because I live in an Edwardian terraced house, and he is doing the acoustic treatment, which is basically going to be a series of panels about 200mm deep. I didn’t give him a brief, because he is the expert as far as I am concerned. I believe in hiring experts and then listening to what they tell you.

Is the era of the large Town House-style facility over?

We are not going to have the same number of big studios around — look at the Scissor Sisters, they recorded themselves in a flat in New York, straight into Logic — their record sounds great, what can you say? If you think back to the late 1940s, in the formative years of Atlantic Records, Tom Dowd would clear the desks at Atlantic’s office building and record great songs on 4-track or whatever.

I’ve recorded lots of albums on location with mobile rigs, which undermines the notion that you have to have a big expensive studio.

What inspires you? Is it still the reference point of the musicians playing in the room?

That and a sense of arrangement. It’s not just a matter of reproducing what’s happening in the room. We are making records, we aren’t making recordings.

What inspires me is still that thing of what makes a record sound great — not just sonically, but impact, emotional communication, expression — all of those things are still there. ■ 44

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October 2006

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sweet spot

integrating monitoring into the chain During the stipulation of requirements for Blue sky’s nearfield and midfield monitors, the company started at the end of the sound chain and worked backwards to the beginning. Blue sky international co-founder pascal siJen explains the process and the integration of the subwoofer.

Almost all 2–way nearfield monitors are ported, use a 5-, 6-, or 8-inch woofer and have a low frequency cut-off between 38 and 65Hz. Since ported designs roll off at 24dB per octave, or greater, these monitors are incapable of reproducing much of anything from 20Hz up to their lower cut-off frequency. This kind of performance was perfectly acceptable when consumer playback systems had similar performance limitations. However, since many of today’s consumers have full-range speaker systems with subwoofers, the typical 2-way ported design, just doesn’t cut it anymore.

The other problem is what happens when you place these monitors in a typical recording studio. Although major movies have their final mix completed on a large dubbing stage, typically with a volume of 20,000 cubic feet or greater, a lot more material is mixed in studios with an internal volume closer to 3000 cubic feet, especially for music, radio and TV applications. Unfortunately, as the physical dimensions of the studio get smaller, the acoustic conditions change as well. The biggest change occurs at low frequencies, which in a large space is an issue relating to low frequency reverberation time. When you move into a smaller studio, the main acoustic factor at low frequencies is room modes, or standing waves. Room modes occur in all rooms/studios at frequencies where the wavelength of sound is an integer fraction (i.e. 1/1, 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, etc) of the distance between two walls, or the distance between the ceiling and floor.

Whenever you place a speaker in a small room or studio, its measured low frequency response

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VeR THe lasT 25 years audio technology has changed and improved dramatically.

Twenty five years ago people in their homes were listening to scratchy vinyl records and watching movies on analogue cable or VHS, in mono. The speakers they used were those that came built in to their TV, or at best, stereo 2-way ported bookshelf speakers. In their cars, they had a choice of AM radio, FM radio, cassette tapes, or 8-track tapes, which were played through 6 x 9 speakers with whizzer cones. Back then the typical 2-way studio monitor was much better than what the typical consumer had available to them for playback.

However, today’s consumer now has a dizzying array of choices, such as HDTV, digital cable, satellite TV, DVDs, MP3, video games, and so on. Many of these sources are capable of high bandwidth, wide dynamic range stereo or multichannel audio.

Likewise, speaker technology has also improved with the use of stereo and 5.1 speaker systems, with integrated subwoofers. Similar technology advances have occurred in the car audio world. Drivers now have access to CDs, DVDs, digital satellite and HD radio and, like the home, many autos now have complete, factory installed, stereo and 5.1 bi-amplified speakers systems, also with integrated subwoofers.

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Following a parallel course, most studio equipment has improved much over the last two decades.

With the introduction of digital audio workstations, hard disk recorders, digital mixers, all of which include high performance 24-bit A-DCs and D-ACs, studios today can essentially record DC to daylight. Unfortunately, studio monitors in many studios have not kept up with this trend and in many cases seem to be stuck in an infinite time loop. Like 25 years ago, many professionals are still mixing content for today’s consumer systems on a set of conventional 2-way ported monitors, which tend to exhibit poor low frequency extension. Looking at this situation, we felt that there had to be a better way.

Next we moved one step up the sound chain to examine the precise reasons why a typical 2-way nearfield monitor is no longer suited to the task of creating mixes destined for today’s consumer. resolution

October 2006

sweet spot will be altered by the boundary effects and room modes that form in the studio. This means that invariably some frequencies are reinforced and some frequencies are cancelled, resulting in peaks and dips in the frequency response at the listening position.

These frequency variations change depending on the location of the speaker and where the listener is located in the studio relative to the speaker and boundaries of the studio. Because of this, bass reproduction from multiple speakers in a studio can be very inconsistent. To add a further complication, the speaker location that is best for imaging is almost never the best place for bass reproduction. So given little choice, recording engineers choose imaging over low frequency performance.

Granted, the use of broadband absorption, which we consider very important, can reduce the effect of the studio/monitor interaction to a degree and absorption can definitely be used to improve low frequency performance, but in a typical small studio, broadband absorption will not fully address these problems.

So what is the solution? True full-range monitoring, is the phrase that best describes our goal. Not just full-range monitoring for those willing to spend huge amounts of money on large in-wall monitoring systems, but true full-range monitoring for all applications, from the desktop on up. The technologies we employed to achieve this are based on well understood principles of physics, are relatively simple to implement and deliver superior real-world results.

First, to provide real low frequency reproduction, reduce intermodulation distortion and to reduce the influence of the studio on low frequency reproduction, we decided to incorporate a subwoofer as an integral part of the monitoring system. This is in sharp contrast to an optional subwoofer added on to an existing ‘quasi full-range’ 2-way monitor.

The second improvement was to eliminate ports or passive radiators and go with sealed box designs. There were three reasons for doing so. Sealed box speakers have superior transient response when compared to ported or passive radiator designs. Satellite speakers using the correct sealed box design integrate much better with a subwoofer than typical ported speakers.

The 12dB per octave roll-off of a sealed box subwoofer provides a better match to the rising low frequency characteristics of small rooms/studios.

This ‘room gain phenomenon’, which was documented in an AES paper by Louis D Fielder of Dolby Labs, shows that smaller sealed rooms, such as the typical music studio, exhibit a 12dB per octave gain below 30 to 35Hz. This type of roll-off perfectly matches the sealed box response of our subwoofers, allowing for in-room low frequency extension down to below 20Hz. Compare this to a typical ported or passive radiator roll-off of 24dB per octave, or greater, and you can see why the sealed box response is a much better choice for accurate full-range monitoring in a typical recording studio.

The next improvement was to tie this all together with a technique called bass management or bass redirection. Bass management uses filters to extract low frequency information from two or more main channels and redirects that bass to one or more mono subwoofers. This is the same technique that is used in virtually all consumer home theatre systems and many high-end car audio systems.

Bass management when used in conjunction with satellite and subwoofer speakers provides a number of advantages. First, since the satellite speakers do not have to reproduce low frequencies they can be smaller, which makes them easier to place in the environment, and they can be placed for best imaging without worrying about how that affects their low frequency 48

a common misconception about subwoofers one of the more common concerns we hear is that because the bass in our systems is being reproduced by a mono subwoofer, the user fears that they may be able to perceive it as a separate, locatable source.

This is actually not the case and in a correctly designed 2.1 system using proper bass-management it should not be an issue at all.

To understand why this is the case, we must first understand how our brains process location cues from our ears. above approximately 700Hz (depending on the size of your head), your brain uses interaural level Difference (ilD) as the primary factor in determining the directional location of a sound (a slightly oversimplified explanation). ilD is the difference in level of a sound between your two ears.

Below approximately 700Hz, your brain begins to rely on the interaural Time Difference (iTD) between your ears, also known as — phase shift, to determine the directional location of a sound. This works very well until the wavelengths get very long, the source becomes omnidirectional, such as a subwoofer which radiates energy spherically in its pass band, and you are in an enclosed space. in an enclosed space, such as a studio, with a source that is radiating spherically (again, such as a subwoofer), the iTD will be close to zero. This is because energy from the source is arriving at the listener from many paths, with many overlapping time differences and your brain will not be able to derive the primary location cues from your ears. Therefore your directional acuity at these low frequencies will be near zero.

However, you will have very high directional acuity at higher frequencies and because your directional cues are coming from the sats, which typically are playing the harmonics of the lF fundamentals, this is where your brain believes the sound is coming from. provided there is no audible distortion or sonic artefacts at higher frequencies (port noise, etc), and the sound emanating from the subwoofer is limited to below approximately 100Hz, it will be impossible for the listener to identify the location of the subwoofer in a studio.

performance. Second, since bass reproduction is coming from a mono subwoofer, the sub woofer can be placed in the optimum position in the studio so as to offer the best overall low frequency response. Third, because low frequencies from multiple channels are now summed electronically, instead of acoustically in the studio, low frequency phase issues between channels are resolved in the most absolute and accurate way possible — electrically.

Now that we have a monitoring system that has the bass being reproduced by a separate source, we have to find a way to ensure repeatable and accurate setup of the system. We have found that many listeners can actually do this very effectively by ear, when using familiar broadband source material.

However, to make this process a little more foolproof and repeatable, we provide a free set of .Wav test files that allow the end user to quickly adjust the electro-acoustic level of the system. These test files can be downloaded from our website (www. abluesky.com). To use them, you just need an inexpensive SPL meter.

The purpose of calibration is to adjust the relative resolution

level of the Sub and Sat, along with the overall electro-acoustic system gain, so that 0dB VU equals a certain acoustic level at the listening position. Since most recording media is now digital, the reference electrical signal level is typically around –20dBfs with 20dB of headroom. The acoustic calibration level may vary, depending on the application and standards being used. For film applications this level is typically 85dBc, but because music is typically more compressed, a lower level, often around 78 or 79dBc, may be more appropriate.

Once the calibration procedure is completed, the end user has a system that provides extended bandwidth, seamless summation between Sat and Sub, along with an overall more accurate and repeatable system response. We believe this new methodology, which is based on simple and proven technology, makes for a clearly superior monitoring system. This true full-range monitoring system design allows the engineer to create more compelling full-range mixes that translate exceptionally well to the wide variety of modern consumer playback systems currently available on the market. ■ October 2006

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early reverberations First there was the echo chamber, which needed a lot of space, and then came the echo plate, which was smaller but still large and needed to be cared for. With multitrack recording and close miking becoming the norm, alternatives were developed alongside. keiTH spenceR-allen identifies some early landmarks. akG BX20 — Mechanical reverbs first appeared commercially in the 1930s using springs with oil as a damping medium.

Performance improved over the years but they were upstaged by the appearance of echo plates in the 1950s. However, in 1971, AKG launched the BX20, a large box that was the result of some seriously effective R&D. It employed something known as the Torsion Transmission Line principle that managed to control a complex arrangement of springs and keep them isolated from external vibration — so in-control room use was possible. It could be run as two mono channels or as a stereo unit and later models were able to control decay times. The BX20 generated around a dozen different units and development continued until the mid 1980s with the BX25ED where an increasing amount of digital electronics was included with the springs. AKG’s purchase of Ursa Major and its digital reverb technology saw the BX range fade away.

MicMiX MasTeRRooM — Around the same time as the BX20 appeared in Europe, US company MicMix introduced a family of mechanical reverbs, MasterRooms, each specifically modelled to equate to spaces of different volumes.

These had fixed decay times of 2, 5 and 7 seconds and just a simple Brilliance control. Their high degree of immunity to airborne sound plus the imitation wood finished columns made them a common sight in small and medium sized controls rooms. The units performed well and the only problem was deciding which sized unit to select. MicMix continued developing mechanical reverbs with increasingly greater amounts of electronics until the death of the founder. eMT 251 — It was the distinctive appearance of the EMT 251 in 1980 that alerted the studio world to what EMT had been up to. The EMT 250, in 1975, was arguably the first digital reverb and was followed by a number of specialised units largely in the form of rack processors with remotes. However, the 251 saw the processor up-ended, a mechanically orientated remote control placed on top, and the sides forming heat sinks to diffuse its heat output. This freestanding ‘car radiator’ offered quite sophisticated 16-bit performance at 34kHz sampling rate including a high degree of control over discrete reflections and individual control over the reverb parameters in three frequency bands.

It also added a range of special effects including Doppler-Reverb where the pitch of the reverberation could be changed to simulate movement.

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QUaD/eiGHT sYsTeM 5 — The early 1980s saw several totally digital reverb systems launched using the processor rack with compact controller approach. The System 5 was one of the first and our modern experience might lead us to expect a little more from this unit. There were just 5 programs — Plate, Chamber, Concert Hall, Repeat Echo and Space — with provision to adjust echo delay, reverb time, HF reverb and a simple EQ. Word length was 15-bit at 36kHz giving a claimed dynamic range of 105dB — and of course only analogue I-O. The marketing people calculated that it was somehow possible to squeeze 13,440 different audio combinations from this unit but development tailed off by the mid 1980s. sonY DRe-2000 — Launched in 1980 and operating at 16bit, 32kHz, this was one of Sony’s earliest professional digital products. The 2000 quickly became the 2000A, doubling the number of ‘master programs’ from four to eight. Full digital 16-bit I-O was present but there wasn’t a lot to connect it to at the time. A good range of reverb times, delay, reflection controls were available including the concept of a sub-reverberation with its own settings at a low signal level. The unit disappeared as Sony brought more digital products to market. leXicon 224 — Lexicon already had a strong reputation in digital signal processing before the announcement of the 224 in 1978. Early versions were little more than Hall and Plate simulations but more elaborate programs were added with software and hardware upgrades. It became the 224X and then the 224XL in 1984 with the LARC controller replacing the dedicated remote, and at this point it was a completely different product to the original 224, but it is the XL that most will know. The unit could now operate in split mode as two stereo reverbs while the 18 programs now included a family of effects that were able to use a max reverb time of 70 seconds (So useful. Ed). The system had been pitched with just the right degree of complexity and grew with the user’s experience. aMs RMX 16 — Advanced Music Systems entered the digital reverb market in the early 1980s with the RMX 16 and being a UK-made product it was far more cost effective than equivalent imported US products, such as the Lexicon 224, and take-up was strong. With 18kHz bandwidth, 90dB resolution

dynamic range and an internal wordlength of 27-bits, this was a good compact performer with a distinctive sound. However, it became famous for some of the more adventurous programs that dispensed with the notion of emulation — Nonlin, Reverse, Image and Freeze were all over recordings of the period. A regular supply of programs, with the option to enter via barcode, ensured a long life.

YaMaHa ReV-1 — In 1984 Yamaha launched a number of high-end pro audio products and among them was the REV-1, a very sophisticated digital reverb that introduced a number of new features.

It had adopted 16-bit, 44.1kHz performance and there was provision for digital I-O. An RS-232 interface allowed connection and control by computer for SMPTE timecode related roles, and control of the clock frequency for better digital sync. Particularly interesting was the control over reflections with their display on a timeline within the remote. Its very complexity probably counted against it and Yamaha made its later reverbs more instantly accessible.

leXicon pcM60 — By the mid 1980s it seemed that everyone was making low cost digital reverbs but it was becoming obvious that not all reverberation was of the same quality — some algorithms were better than others. The PCM 60 was Lexicon’s first lower cost reverb stripped down to Plate and Room simulation with variations in Size and Reverb Time.

Simple to operate and able to create 128 sound variations, the reason it is in this ‘Ten’ is because all the algorithms were derived from the 224XL with its smooth dense sound character, and was made affordable due to proprietary LSI chips. Initially aimed at the smaller studio everyone wanted one.

klaRk-Teknik Dn780 — By the end of the 1980s K-T was increasingly established in the live sound market. The entry into the digital reverb world with the DN780 reflected the need for simplicity and ease of use at a low-mid price point. All the controls had digital readouts of their value permanently on show, large enough to be seen across a room. A worthwhile range of programs were included but the emphasis was placed on ease of accessing user memories, including RS-232 and MIDI control. Processing was 16-bit, 32kHz but no provision for digital I-O. • As a last point, at least two thirds of these units would still find a useful role and are still seen in modern studios. (That’s because they all had character. I wonder how our current batch will fare in 20 years? Ed) 49

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We can’t rewind niGel Jopson explains why Generation @ will never understand the influence of one half-hour 1970’s weekly music show, and finds the content of his record bag has been ‘rewritten by machine and new technology’.

i

T’s THe 1970s and I’m on the way to my friend Joe’s house. People in the street glance at me, possibly because of my extravagant tonsorial folly but I believe it’s because of the record bag on my shoulder. It’s an illegally odorous, vaguely Moroccan (by way of the NME classified ads) carrying device, with room for a couple of 12-inch plastic discs of pure dynamite. The contents of a record bag such as this are socially and politically explosive, it is a time in history when vinyl seems mightier than the sword, pen and everything else combined. I’m happy because the bag contains a record I’m sure will cement my friendship with the ultra-hip Joe. Our musical association has reached stand-off, you see. I put on Led Zeppelin, he plays Love ... he drops the needle on Arthur Brown’s Kingdom Come, I take it off and play Free. Despite the awesome power of his father’s stereo, I’m reluctant to endure any more Chocolate Watchband albums. But, with assistance from the young lady with thick NHS glasses at my local record

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shop, I tracked down an LP I feel sure we’ll both be happy to blast from his Dad’s Lowther PM7s. It’s Quicksilver Messenger Service’s Happy Trails — ‘acid rock’, a word I knew would appeal to High Timesreading Joe — an album packed with loud guitars, each note redolent of imminent feedback ... which of course was what appealed to me.

The 1970s was a decade when, despite parental pressure to stay out all night, music-loving Brit teens and twenty-somethings had to be home at 11:30pm every Friday, to watch ‘whispering Bob Harris’ present the BBC2 music programme The Old Grey Whistle Test. Before round-the-clock television, stations would shut down at night. Being the last programme of the evening, if music was rocking the Whistle Test might go on for an hour and a half. The OGWT had a derisory budget of £500 per show, but the enthusiasm and sense of occasion was palpable.

If you didn’t watch it live, the show was gone (VHS machines were not introduced until 1976).

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And every week 15 million younger kids and families tuned in to Top Of The Pops to watch their favourite chart acts — about the same number of people who have supposedly downloaded songs illegally in Britain today. Before the concept of ‘event television’ had been invented, every edition was a musical talking point for the week. The Starkicker logo of OGWT was last seen in 1987, and this July the BBC finally axed TOTP after 42 years. ‘Music is everywhere,’ said Jimmy Savile, the octogenarian co-creator and first presenter of Top Of The Pops. ‘You don’t have to wait a week for a musical television fix any more, you get it every minute of your life and you can buy it right away without caring whether it makes it to Number 1 or not. It’s just for you.’

In the same week the venerable Top Of The Pops was read it’s last rites, MTV celebrated its 25th birthday. The network launched on August 1 1981, the first music video was Video Killed The Radio Star by The Buggles. MTV is now available in 179 countries to 500 million households. In the UK, eight of MTV’s 100 channels provide round-the-clock music clips. The flickering musical eye-candy from the ever-glowing screen in the corner shaped tastes for several different incarnations of the ‘MTV generation’ ... now the ‘@ generation’ is increasingly turning to more interactive and personalised online resources.

As musical entertainment becomes more diverse, the chances of a huge pop album for which the same formula can be rolled out nation by nation, selling

October 2006

business in volume at big-box retailers, has diminished. The age of the blockbuster album is rapidly departing, the number of gold and platinum CD albums has fallen by 50% over the last five years, and yet demand for music and sales of music products are strong. Chicago rock band OK Go, whose album Oh No was produced

by Tore Johansson (Resolution V3.6) recently scored a PR triumph with a video shot for a budget of $24 in the singer’s backyard and released by the band via the Internet.

This band video (youtube.com/watch?v= pv5zWaTEVkI) now has had over 6.6 million views, and has been favourited 38,544 times by youtube. com members. ‘This is a paradigm smasher of the first order,’ says OK Go manager Jamie Kitman. ‘Internet drives press drives VH1 drives retail drives MTV drives label drives radio. Exactly backwards.’ We are seeing the emergence of the grassroots hit drawn from musical niches. The key to the value of this new approach is knowing exactly who your fans are, opening the door to targeted advertising and dedicated fan-base building. This is the data-mining potential of websites like youtube.com and myspace.com.

Every top producer and engineer I’ve interviewed for Resolution magazine agrees the role of record labels is changing, and that dramatic transformations are afoot in the consumer delivery mechanism for their productions. Major record labels, despite belated attempts to integrate new business models, are on the wane: they still rely, as always, on sales of round pieces of plastic for most of their revenue. CD sales in the world’s largest market, the US, are down more than 20% from a peak of $13.4 billion in the year 2000. Large scale consolidation within the industry — such as the BMG/Sony merger — is a typical business milestone for mature or sunset industries: it may have kept corporate size impressive, but large labels are in decline. And yet the market for music is thriving. There are now more sources of revenue for music than ever before: ringtones, digital downloads, video games, licensing to film and TV and live-show recordings. Tellingly, sales of concert tickets have more than doubled since 1999. Music has not seemed so omnipresent and so cool since ... since I carried a record bag!

‘The future of the business isn’t selling records,’ says Terry McBride, CEO of Nettwerk Music, ‘it’s in selling music, in every form imaginable.’ Canadianbased Nettwerk is an artist-management company, one of a new breed of mavericks who are shaking the tree. Nettwerk has been actively encouraging its acts with dedicated grass roots followings, such as Sarah McLachlen, The Cardigans and Bare Naked Ladies, to dump their deals with majors and form their own labels: 12 of the 40 acts on their roster now have their own imprints.

‘We become the management company, the publishing company, and the record company rolled into one,’ McBride says, ‘we take our 20% cut of the whole pie.’ A bit like Sanctuary, then ... only better ... we hope. Cynics might think artists have just swapped one middleman for another, but there are genuine differences, including the key artist-ownership of recording copyright. Many of us have recorded bands where a major has then pronounced: ‘sorry, the album’s not doing as well as we’d like — you’re dropped!’ There is a much greater symbiotic link for an artist to a management company, who are taking on board large financial risks to promote concert tours, and have a greater imperative to make a success of promoting a band’s recording with live appearances.

Another key advantage to the new band-owned micro-labels is speed of decision-making, a fleetness of foot that is essential in today’s market.

October 2006

A quick browse through the pages of myspace. com reveals a hip culture of mix ’n’ match that is wrong-footing traditional marketing types, many of whom grew up in an era of more solidly defined trends. Previous generations of parents became used to changing fashions — ‘No Goth make-up, darling?’ — ‘That was last month, Mum. I’m a New Romantic now!’ Taste in music followed a similar pattern, as Siouxsie & The Banshees were binned to make way for Duran Duran. As soon as the suits latched onto the key features of a new trend they could sign the right acts and do the promo. But to the myspace.com generation there is no big trend, to them it’s the musical equivalent of combining a velvet jacket from the ’70s with punk boots and goth eyeliner ... and it will all have been

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remixed by tomorrow.

The social-networking sites spin faster than the traditional gatekeepers to stardom, record labels, TV and radio. These sites are the spiritual descendants of the Old Grey Whistle Test, as the biggest bands in the world compete with complete unknowns on what is potentially a level playing field. Some of the most promising new acts, such as Arcade Fire, Arctic Monkeys, Coppermine and Dashboard Confessional owe their success almost entirely to online word of mouth and grassroots marketing.

So what does it mean for the production professional back in the studio? It means that, in future, we are never going to be able to lean back in the Aeron chair, pat ourselves on the back after the playback party and say ‘well done, we’ve finished a good record.’ No

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business http://music.aol.com/sessions/videos/sessions: aol recently opened its vault of 300 specially recorded sessions, previously reserved for aol customers. a diverse selection of artists, from ludacris through the Yeah Yeah Yeahs to audioslave and Tom petty. Well recorded and not available elsewhere.

w w w. b b c . c o . u k / d n a / c o l l e c t i v e / c 1 0 7 4 : interviews and sessions with artists from amy Winehouse to public enemy and Maximo park. a mine of information, organised in a sort of sensible public-service manner that assumes you might know what you are looking for.

Realplayer is required as the Beeb sticks to this long-in-the-tooth encoding format.

www.elbo.ws: a blog of blogs — an aggregator of opinion and Mp3s. Be warned: if you have broad musical taste and a thirst for discovery your browser will get a work out.

www.fabchannel.com: live music webcaster, with a video library of 400 concerts filmed at amsterdam’s paradiso and Melkweg. The audio is very dry — clearly a live sound desk feed — but the gigs rock.

www.mondomix.com: if you like World music check out this French site. especially good for north african Rai music, hundreds of live concert videos from French station TV5.

www.mtv.co.uk: Full of news such as ‘chris Martin to perform with Jay-Z’ this site is invariably highly rated by reviewers, to me it feels too text-based, as if it were a trailer for the cable channels.

http://music.myspace.com/index. cfm?fuseaction=music: There’s no point in going to the expense of making yourself a website if you are a young band, just get a myspace profile going. Music playback is quick, robust and reasonable quality. i’m not alone in thinking this is one of the best things to have happened to music. Use 2 browsers and myspace can be your radio. owned by (ahem) Rupert Murdoch’s news corporation.

52

resolution

October 2006

business

www.pandora.com: This could be the best personal radio ... ever. Give pandora a couple of tracks you like and it will build you a custom station. Train the station with a simple thumbs up/thumbs down system. it’s great and it’s ad-supported so it’s free.

album is ever going to be ‘finished’ in the traditional sense ever again, there will be no fixed song list. The album will become a long workbench of songs and products, both physical and digital, each carrying their own release date, distribution path and price tag. The multiple versions, multimedia experiments and mashups are just part of an artist’s interaction with their audience, stringing favourite songs, short videos and remixes into one ideal playlist for each individual for each particular moment.

As musician Beck points out: ‘I like the idea that I can quickly record a few acoustic songs that I’ve been working on and immediately put them online for people to download. And then I can record songs with a producer ... and put them out as a CD, a DVD and a remix project and let people experience that music in different ways.’ Beck’s Interscope-released CD Guero (which sold 800,000) was also to be heard

as a ‘bootleg’ rough mix, a surround mix, DVD with a 52-page book, fan mash-ups, vinyl LP, and a commercially released album Guerolito (which sold 30,000), remixed by artists as diverse as Boards Of Canada and Dizzee Rascal.

There has been a seismic social shift over the last 30 years, and now the round vinyl disc is no longer of cosmic importance, and music is no longer a great cultural definer for the myspace generation. For those of us who were making music in the 1970s, it may seem sad that our rock hero’s power chords will not, after all, bring the walls of Jericho tumbling down. But it does mean that my son listens to, likes and adds to his Pandora playlists Led Zeppelin, Jethro Tull and Miles Davis in an open and tolerant way that I would never in a million years have considered if referencing Frank Sinatra, Charlie Parker or Xavier Cougat and his Waldorf Astoria Orchestra. ■

www.uk.launch.yahoo.com: if you like promotional music videos look no further. 300,000 chart-focused promos ready for viewing, good encoding preserves the colours in all their garish detail.

www.youtube.com: To video what myspace is to music, full of controversial material. called ‘copyright infringers’ by Universal ceo Doug Morris recently, they lack a deep-pocketed parent company to defend them. The massive amounts of older and obscure music videos available demonstrates there is an under-served market here. Fast loading, anarchic and funny.

October 2006

resolution

53

meet your maker

Graham Boswell and ian Dennis The two founders of prism sound still drive the technology of the manufacturer. They talk about the wordlength issue, true resolution and why not all convertors are created equal.

Graham Boswell

p

RisM soUnD Was originally founded in 1987, the brainchild of engineers Graham Boswell and Ian Dennis who first met when working at console manufacturer AMS-Neve in Cambridge, England. The concept was to develop an R&D consultancy specialising in digital audio applications.

By 1991 the company had grown from two engineers to a team of 12 and the Prism Sound brand had also grown from an initial business start up to a brand known for performance, quality and reliability, which it still commands today. One of the prestigious projects Prism Sound undertook at this time was the development of a large commentary and communications matrix, which was implemented by the BBC at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. This product was a market leader for many years in the intercom market for television applications.

1992 saw the arrival of Prism Media Products, a company set up to develop, market and sell ‘Prism Sound’ branded professional audio products. The result was a range of products that put Prism Sound on the map and established it as a force in professional audio.

The current range encompasses ultra-high resolution A-D and D-A convertors, including the ADA-8XR, AD-2 and DA-2, analogue signal processors, including the MEA-2 stereo equaliser, MLA-2 stereo compressor and the MMA-4 4-channel mic preamp, and test and measurement through the DSA-1 hand-held AES-EBU transmission analyser and dScope Series III analogue and digital audio test system. Prism 54

Zenon scHoepe

Ian Dennis

Sound also produces multichannel networked digital audio and data recorders for monitoring and logging applications.

Today Prism Sound, continues to provide R&D consultancy to outside clients while still expanding its own portfolio of products.

What’s special about Prism Sound products? ian Dennis: A lot of different things, but in summary it’s probably ‘attention to detail’. We have tended to adopt a cost-no-object approach to each critical element of the box, whether it’s clock generation and recovery, analogue signal path, isolation, PSU or the convertor element itself. We also like to provide all the features we can think of!

What were the significant technological steps historically that has brought conversion to where it is today? iD: In the early days, when audio conversion technology was not well explored, digital audio in general got quite a bad name as a result. Dealing with basic things like adequate dynamic range and linearity made a huge difference in those days. Next of course were considerations of clocking and jitter susceptibility.

In terms of the low-level convertor technology itself, advances in chip fabrication technology have brought us the possibility of monolithic sigma-delta solutions with good front- and back-end linearity and sufficient real-estate for a really good filter. But you can still do it better ‘the hard way’! resolution

What’s the single most misunderstood aspect of conversion? iD: It’s become a highly technical subject in recent years. While most people could understand the principle of a base-rate ladder or successive-approximation convertor, today’s sigma-delta technology, as well as dither in general, and sampling jitter effects require more mathematical capability than is common. DSP is integral to all convertor technology nowadays.

On a practical level, a couple of things keep coming up: using the best box in the studio as clock master is usually misguided, since good boxes are equally at home as master or slave whereas bad boxes are usually OK as master but perform poorly when slaved. Also, the practice of setting digital output wordlength to, say, 24 bits when feeding a 16bit input and thus creating undithered truncation distortion is still popular.

GRaHaM BosWell: While we’re on the subject of misunderstandings, what about wordlength? It is still said that 16-bit resolution is not enough, but the ‘resolution’ is not limited by the wordlength — the noise is. With a good convertor topology (as Ian has described) and correct dithering, resolution is preserved to incredibly low levels. Of course, this has to be true, as most of the delta-sigma quantizers around today sample at nothing like even ’16-bit’ wordlength although they do run at blisteringly fast sampling rates up in the megahertz range. I think the trade-off between sample-rate and wordlength and the associated techniques of noise shaping are often misunderstood resulting in erroneous statements such as the example above. If it is not wordlength that matters — what is it? Well that is where Prism Sound comes in — we make convertors that have highly extended resolution.

All convertor manufacturers use largely the same sorts of chips so all convertors are largely the same — discuss. iD: At the very top end there are still bespoke solutions out there that are unique, and bring some singular benefits. But I suppose in the high-end market as a whole, nearly everybody is using the same handful of very good chips. But there are still things that can make a huge difference outside the chip, perhaps clock generation and recovery being the most critical.

But most of the other things that sort the sheep from the goats aren’t really convertor-specific — they’re October 2006

meet your maker the other hand as technology has provided us with 96kHz sampling, why not use it? It is unlikely (though not impossible!) that this could be detrimental. And then there is DSD/SACD. That is why the ADA-8XR is modular â&#x20AC;&#x201D; we provide all the flavours.

Whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the Prism Sound recommended â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;best practiseâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; procedure for 44.1/16 CD production? iD: Unless you want to archive for the future in some hi-res format, you canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t do better than a great A-D conversion at 44.1k, 24-bit for all analogue sources.

Mixing in the digital domain, but with a system where all the math is looked after correctly, and delivery to 16-bit with a high quality WLR (noise shaping) system like SNS2 at the final stage. The practice of converting at higher sampling frequencies and downsampling later canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t really inherently add anything, but it can really make things worse unless the downsampling process is beyond reproach, which it usually isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t since it requires a lot of processing power. things like uncompromising analogue design, PSUs, interference elimination and, of course, feature set.

GB: These factors inevitably affect low-level accuracy and resolution â&#x20AC;&#x201D; so just because there is a so-called 24-bit chip in the box you have no guarantee of truly high-resolution performance.

Sampling frequency or bits â&#x20AC;&#x201D; which is most important? iD: We see these as only two of many â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;bottlenecksâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; in the ultimate conversion system (and these particular two are often dictated by the practices of the industry and so are often beyond our control). We often hear the observation from users that a really good convertor at 44.1kHz sounds better than a workmanlike one at 192kHz, for example. In general, for most applications, both might be argued to be adequate nowadays, with other factors dominating.

For example, current flagship chip performance is about -117dBFS unweighted noise and -110dBFS full-scale THD+N. In theory, we wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t need to

go beyond 24 bits until one of these drops below -142dBFS. Never say never, but there are significant boundaries of physics that will prevent this for the foreseeable future, particularly in the case of THD+N. As regards sampling frequency, there were a lot of limitations in 44.1k and 48k systems resulting from the proximity of the desired upper band-edge frequency and the Nyquist frequency; the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;transition bandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; for high-end systems was vanishingly small, resulting in the need for ambitious filtering that could rarely be adequately implemented. Once we were at 96kHz, these problems were largely resolved. I guess this may have become a marketing question, what do you think Graham?

GB: I think that this question also brings up the issue of the trade-off between sampling-rate and wordlength that we touched on earlier, which is part of the debate about what bandwidth ultimately the finished product should have. This is really a question for our users and we will make what they ask for. A really well-made recording sampled at 44.1kHz is hard to beat, but on

Why as an industry are we so obsessed with high sampling rates and more bits when most of the product is now listened to through data compression algorithms? iD: I fear that those days may be coming to an end.

There will always be a few of us striving for ultimate quality, but itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s not as many as perhaps it once was.

On the other hand, the recent universal acceptance of DAW technology has been very good for the convertor business, since itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s easy to demonstrate the advantage of third-party boxes over most of the standard offerings.

GB: Actually I suspect that the big electronics companies are keen to see the cycle of re-invention continue so we keep buying new music players, phones and TVs and I suspect that the increasing popularity of high-bandwidth Internet connections (2M to 10M) will allow audio quality to be rediscovered to some extent.

Whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the next great leap in convertor technology, where is it heading? iD: Who knows? I suppose that this will probably end up being a format-marketing matter again. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m a little sceptical about this, because there are still so many opportunities to improve what we currently do within existing formats. There have been quite a few â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;quantum leapâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; technologies proposed recently, and the ones I know have all been either a quantum leap in the wrong direction or else largely irrelevant! But something exciting is sure to come along.

GB: I hope we can get back to something as good as Vinyl â&#x20AC;Ś...tkâ&#x20AC;Śâ&#x20AC;Ś..tkâ&#x20AC;Śâ&#x20AC;Ś..tk â&#x2013;

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AKM COM PRO From advanced mixing consoles, music on the go, cinema, live performance you name it - AKM mixed signal technology is there.

From mastering grade ADC to our space saving CODECS, AKM has the professional solution.

October 2006

resolution

55

katz’s column

analogue audio is plug-and-play — not!

This is the last installment in BoB kaTZ’s ‘analogue interfacing’ series. in previous articles we learned that only some audio manufacturers make gear with enough headroom to properly handle a +4dBu nominal level. even worse to discover, there’s no guarantee that you can plug one piece of gear into another and get the right level, frequency response or low distortion, and that’s what he’s writing about this issue — the audio interfacing problems we face and how to conquer them.

s

o, HoW DiD we get into this mess?

It’s easy: follow the money. High-quality audio transformers can make a piece of audio gear virtually bulletproof, but a heck of a lot more expensive (as well as much heavier).

A well-made output transformer costs about US$110 in singleunit quantities, an opamp around $2.50 or less.

Manufacturers using transformers simply could not compete when their 16-channel gear cost $1600 more than that of their competitors, and so the transformer became virtually obsolete. We made our equipment cheaper, but at what real cost? By using cheap opamps instead of expensive transformers, we lost the ability to survive a high-voltage spike from a nearby lightning strike, eliminate hum due to voltage differentials from gear plugged into distant power sources, eliminate RFI (radio frequency interference), crosstalk, and just as importantly, our equipment stopped being plug-and-play.

THe poT lUck sTanDaRD — Take a look at Figure 1. About all you can know with reasonable assurance is that pin 2 carries the hot signal, and pin 1 is grounded.

Before about 1980 the situation Fig. 1. The was really murky, as some manufacturers were pin 3 hot but mystery fortunately the last holdout gave XlR. pin 1 is up and succumbed to the majority. grounded. pin For the rest of the deal — never 2 is probably assume. Don’t even assume that high. pin 3 is a piece of gear with ‘professional’ probably low, but it may also XLR connectors has balanced inputs and outputs. Many run unbalanced be grounded. circuitry through three pins and no guarantee are only semi-compatible with the on anything rest. Perhaps 1% of professional else!

Fig. 2. Balanced and floating output. either lead can be grounded without losing signal, headroom, adding distortion, or affecting frequency response.

equipment manufacturers build like Figure 2, 90% like Figure 3, and the rest run some form of unbalanced circuitry.

FloaTinG oR sYMMeTRical To GRoUnD — Figure 2 is a transformer-coupled amplifier. At the 56

left is the internal active amplifier that drives the primary side of the output transformer. At right, the transformer isolates the internal circuitry from the adversities of the world. Signal is present on both leads of the output transformer and both leads are isolated from ground. We call this floating, so either side can be grounded, or unbalanced, without losing level, causing distortion, or affecting frequency response.

The one thing you should not do with a floating output is tap off signal from one lead and ground (unbalanced). The result will be a serious loss of low frequency response or no signal at all. To unbalance a

amplifier output and they grounded you? In the simplest of active output circuit designs, grounding one lead results in high distortion on the other lead, or crosstalk (leakage… you’ll start hearing the signal from the source even if the input is muted). Not much fun if the source is timecode, which leaks in the most immature ways.

In a slightly more sophisticated version of the symmetrical output circuit, grounding one lead forces the other lead to produce 6dB more level and so the circuit looks like it’s a transformer to the unsuspecting user, but there is a 6dB loss of headroom. Suddenly

Fig. 3. active balanced (symmetrical) output. With very few exceptions, neither lead can be grounded without some adverse effect.

Fig. 5. interfacing active balanced output to unbalanced input. With few exceptions, leave the source’s pin 3 open, floating or unconnected.

floating output you must ground one lead.

Figure 3 shows an active balanced output, more correctly called a symmetrical output with two active signals that are at equal level and opposite polarity from ground. Feed in a sine wave, set it to produce +4dBu between the high and low terminals, then each lead alone will measure half the voltage relative to ground, which is 6dB lower, or -2dBu. The two signals are out of polarity to each other and their sum produces the higher signal level.

your +26dBu-capable circuit clips at +20 so you should run this circuit at lower level when you unbalance it. To unbalance this type of circuit properly, you need an adapter that floats pin 3. Connect pin 2 of the source to pin 2 of the load, leave pin 3 floating (Figure 5). You may not see this advice printed in the user manuals and in fact you may see the wrong advice. The fact is that 99% of active balanced outputs are built this way and it is completely wrong to short an active output to ground.

The one exception I’ve found is the Cranesong brand *. Cranesong boxes are almost truly plug-andplay. Cranesong’s active balanced outputs behave effectively like transformers. If you try to take a signal from the hot pin and ground, you will get a weak signal. When unbalancing, you can (and must) ground the low side of the output without fear and without causing distortion or change of level. We may never know exactly what’s inside our audio gear, but we must learn how it behaves before we put it into service. So next time you buy a new piece, put it up on the test bench first, measure the resistance of its input pins with an ohmmeter, try grounding a few output terminals, listen for distortion, measure for any level jumps. Not until then will you know for sure how it likes to be used. Audio is rarely plug-and-play! *Any other manufacturers whose outputs simulate a transformer please write and I’ll mention you in my next column. We want to plug and play! ■

Fig. 4. Balanced input can accept balanced or unbalanced sources. one lead can be grounded with no serious trouble.

When interconnecting, note that a balanced input (Figure 4) doesn’t care whether the source is balanced, unbalanced, transformer-coupled, or active.

This input will properly ‘decode’ and everything will work (barring Murphy’s law). Fortunately, most manufacturers have become wise to this and use balanced inputs even if they use unbalanced outputs.

It’s not always through altruistic reasons but because you can construct a cheap balanced input stage with a single opamp and a few resistors and capacitors. This cheap balanced input doesn’t reject RFI or hum very well, but you get what you pay for.

The major problem comes when you try to interface a symmetrical output with an unbalanced input. It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature. Take a look again at Figure 3. A symmetrical output is really two active circuits. How would you like it if you were an active resolution

information Resolution recommends Bob Katz’s book Mastering Audio — The Art and the Science as an essential source of information for every pro audio enthusiast who cares about sound. You can buy it on line at www.digido.com

October 2006

technology

audio through RoHs-tinted glasses Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last year or so you cannot fail to have noticed the rather menacing little acronym, RoHs, creeping into equipment specs. an eU directive, it stands for ‘Restriction of the Use of certain Hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment’. RoB JaMes looks at its impact upon manufacturers and the implications for end-users.

T

He DiRecTiVe anD the regulations implementing it came fully into force on the 1 July 2006. They restrict the use of lead, cadmium, mercury, hexavalent chromium, and the flame-retardants polybrominated biphenyl (PBB) and polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE) in electrical equipment covered by the regulations. The ‘covered by the regulations’ qualifier conceals some murky deals.

Already exempt from the rules are military, medical and network hardware and cars.

There is considerable doubt over the validity of the science behind this directive. At least two studies have concluded that there are few if any benefits, and whether or not tin has environmental effects equal to, or — worse than — lead, the extra energy tin requires will result in many, many tonnes of unnecessary CO2 emission.

Although RoHS is an EU phenomenon the rest of the world is catching up fast. China already has its own version and in 2007 California legislation will effectively ban the sale of electronic equipment that does not meet European RoHS standards.

Two important exclusions exist. RoHS does not apply to spare parts for the repair of Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) placed on the market before 1 July 2006 and it doesn’t apply to replacement components that expand the capacity of and/or upgrade EEE placed on the market before 1 July 2006.

So far the only exemption relating to audio and video applied for and successfully obtained is for the use of lead alloy solders in transducers for highpowered loudspeakers designated for operation for several hours at high acoustic power levels. Other exemptions covering most if not all of the audio and video manufacturing business have been applied for.

However, even if further exemptions are granted it is looking increasingly unlikely that many non-compliant components will continue to be available due to the

58

cost of manufacturing and maintaining dual inventory.

All exemptions are, in any case, subject to review every four years.

Lead is of course one of the main constituents of the solders hitherto used to glue electronics together, whether manually with a soldering iron or in mass production with wave and flow soldering machines.

Printed circuit boards and component leads and pads are usually pre-tinned to facilitate soldering. Less obviously, solder is used in the construction of many of the components themselves, for example capacitors.

The only viable alternatives to lead/tin alloys are tin/ silver in various proportions with a little copper.

The first ‘gotcha’ is that these require higher temperatures to achieve a satisfactory joint — something of the order of 260C rather than 205C. These temperatures require greater skill in soldering and may also affect reliability. The wetting characteristics and ‘look’ of joints are different and it is much harder to tell if a joint is satisfactory. Tin-based solder is ‘harder’ which results in the slow development of cracks instead of plastic deformation when thermal expansion and contraction takes place as parts heat up and cool down during operation. Some PCB substrates delaminate if flow soldered at the higher temperatures. Tin can

resolution

‘grow’ whiskers after assembly and these can lead to short-circuits. Many components absorb moisture over time. RoHS compliant packaging will inhibit this and have an expiry date. Out of date parts can be destroyed during flow soldering due to the water boiling.

Apart from these practical problems RoHS adds to the administrative burden. For larger manufacturers this may not prove particularly onerous but for smaller operations it could be the final straw. I contacted a number of manufacturers and distributors to learn how RoHS is affecting them.

Joram Ludwig at RME tells me the company began the move to compliance early last year. Since July 2006 the entire product range has been RoHS compliant.

Some old products have finally been cancelled because of RoHS. The main effect was a small expense for changing some printing and packaging and some extra expense on compliant components. Ludwig says they were able to absorb these costs without increasing product prices but are unable to attest to any effect on audio quality.

Colin Broad is well known as a manufacturer of RS422 machine controllers and specialist devices for film and post and he’s a typical small audio firm. ‘We started going RoHS about a year ago and there are vast numbers of problems surfacing at the moment,’ he says.

‘Component manufactures are dropping non-RoHS products, so there is no choice in this. All manufacturing will go RoHS because only RoHS components will be available. Some parts are becoming very hard to get because distributors will only buy-in RoHS parts, if they run out of a part and a RoHS replacement part is not yet available then it isn’t stocked. Of course, now we have two part numbers for every part. Soldering irons run hotter so accidental burns are worse. Bits wear out quicker and they are less energy efficient.

In future, buy them with a temperature control knob.

October 2006

technology Solder is not as flexible and very thin solder is not available. Because of the higher temperatures you are more likely to damage the PCB when making repairs.

There will be more dry joints and even if there are not, then more look dry due to the faster cooling. In future, for wiring you will need both leaded and lead-free solder, if you have a choice then use leaded.

‘Some products have obsolete parts in them. This is unavoidable, as the life cycle of parts is very short — no problem since you have them in stock, but not RoHS. The choice is between making the product with one or two non-RoHS parts, redesign completely, or drop the product,’ he adds. ‘All defence products are exempt because lead-free reliability is an unknown quantity.

‘Even our current stock is a problem, making small runs we still have to have the right price so we buy in 100s and 1000s, after all 1000 resistors is only £8.50 and 100 PCBs cost 20% more than 50,’ he says.

Sonifex is a larger scale manufacturer and MD Marcus Brooke has a slightly different spin on the challenge. ‘Although we’re all in favour of being environmentally friendly wherever we can, I can’t help feeling that the plans for lead-free electronic manufacture were ill-thought out from the beginning by the organising bodies that imposed them,’ he explains. ‘I fully understand the danger of lead and the need to remove it from the environment. We’ve put in place lead-free manufacturing and actively recycle as many waste products as we can.

‘However, now that we’re using lead-free manufacturing, we find that the soldering irons and surface-mount reflow oven run approximately 1020% hotter than they used to, thus using 10-20% more energy because our oven has to be kept at the higher temperature. We’ve had to buy energy efficient soldering irons but these still have to attain the higher temperature quickly and the replacement tips are more expensive. We’ve had to put air-extraction in place at each solder workstation because the fumes are quite nasty. The solder spits, so our staff have to use smocks now. The lead-free solder is, naturally, more expensive.

The solder joints don’t seem to be as good as leaded joints, which potentially could cause more waste and scrap through faulty products. Saying that, having good Quality Control and 100% product testing means that products that leave the building work as well as they did previously. Because of the higher temperatures and lack of flow of the new solder, it takes us 50-70% longer to produce a hand-soldered joint. The wetting of the solder happens at a higher temperature and the heat has to be applied for longer. However, we’re not able to increase our product sales prices to account for this due to market forces, so we just make less profit.

‘From a sales point of view, we’ve had 4 or 5 companies ask us for a RoHS certificate, but other than that, no customers have asked us about it and they generally don’t seem at all bothered,’ he adds.

‘In fact the delays caused by us introducing lead-free manufacturing and having to cope with components becoming obsolete due to the “imminent” introduction of lead-free varieties have annoyed more customers than we would have liked. The removal of non leadfree components from the market has caused the biggest number of headaches with us having had to redesign approximately 12 of our products over the last 2 years. Finally though, I’ve heard that over 80% of the world’s lead is used in lead-acid batteries, which are exempt from RoHS, so why do we have to bother?’

In Wisconsin, Cranesong guru Dave Hill is optimistic and supports the removal of lead. All Cranesong products are compliant and Dave tells me a lot of work is going into developing lead-free solders that work at low temperatures and he believes that when these arrive they will cure many of the perceived problems, October 2006

such as stress fractures. Dave also notes that many US States either already have, or are in the process of passing, similar legislation.

Michael Whiteside from Kelsey Acoustics, which manufactures and distributes, finds at least one possible benefit in RoHS. ‘With regard to importing equipment, we have found that most of the US and Eastern manufacturing plants adopted RoHS well before the deadline for obligatory compliance, and they seem to have taken the subject far more seriously than many European manufacturers.

‘Their eagerness to comply may well be rooted in the not so pretty experience of implementation of the CE directives some years back. Like most good importers, we ensure that our manufacturers implement all the requirements to be fully CE compliant and in the past this has meant refusing product that had a token CE marker but did not comply. Manufacturers’ initially lax attitude to CE ended up costing them dearly. Perhaps this is why they are taking RoHS seriously. When RoHS became obligatory, the manufacturers had either modified production to comply, or had used the cutoff date as a handy threshold to discontinue ageing product lines, so the overall effect on imported product supply was almost undetectable,’ he states.

‘Indeed, as a manufacturer ourselves, we have had more trouble sourcing RoHS components as it seems many organisations within the EU are using some exemption clause, or simply flaunting the law in the knowledge that the fine is less than the cost of RoHS compliance. As an RoHS manufacturer, the lead-free part of RoHS has had more effect on our cable fabrication operation than any other. The silver alloy we use requires significantly higher temperatures than lead alloys meaning new soldering stations and nimble work to prevent heat damage to insulation. Also, the cost of the solder is four times that of lead-based. This does not affect us so much, but I would imagine this would add significant cost for console manufacturers when large amounts of tinned tracks are required.

‘More difficult to work with though it is, from the audiophile viewpoint it is worth remembering that the silver alloys are significantly better conductors than lead. In fact silver is the best conductor known, so from this viewpoint, their may be some performance benefits if one considers the large number of tinned conductors and solder joints in most high frequency and precision analogue circuits,’ he says.

It is clear there are a range of problems at present and certainly there is a considerable amount of FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) floating about.

RoHS is closely linked with, and takes its scope from, the WEEE (Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment) Directive and that really is a can of worms.

Despite the debatable benefits, lead-free is here to stay. I very much doubt that appeals for a blanket exemption for audio will succeed. Even if they did, they would be subject to review in a few years and the components industry is now geared up to supply RoHSapproved. Continued supply of lead-bearing components for a tiny niche industry like ours is, to say the least, uncertain. Chances are, even if they are available, price will drive manufacturers to use lead-free. The reliability problems, real and imagined, will no doubt be solved in time. On the other hand, a whole new industry may arise to supply parts for ‘pre RoHS’ equipment.

I hope that the areas that really need at least a temporary exemption, for example high-power loudspeaker transducer manufacturers, continue to succeed in making their cases. But in short, once the turbulence subsides, it would appear that business will continue much as usual, although at present there are definite cost, availability and reliability implications for end users. ■ resolution

sweet spot

JBl’s 60 years of monitoring JBl is celebrating 60 years in monitoring design — a period that has seen remarkable shifts in work methods and environments.

JBl’s JoHn eaRGle says that from its earliest transducer designs to its high-tech studio monitors it has remained at the leading edge.

J

Bl’s HisToRical associaTion with studio monitors actually began before the company was formed. Jim Lansing, the company founder, had originally gone into business in Los Angeles in 1927 as Lansing Manufacturing Company. His first professional products were large-scale 2-way systems for MGM Studios and the burgeoning sound motion picture industry, and as that business grew a need for a more modest system for use in small screening and review rooms eventually arose. For that specific purpose Lansing developed the Iconic loudspeaker, truly the world’s first monitor system. This design established monitoring directions for many years to come, and the basic approach is still in use today, as you can see in Figure 1. The original Iconic system made use of electrically-powered magnetic field coils, because the permanent magnet materials of the day could not provide the field strength that Lansing needed. The 15-inch low frequency driver in the Iconic had a round wire 2-inch voice coil, which was pretty much state of the art at that time. The high frequency compression driver and its associated multicellular horn were scaled down versions of Bell Telephone Labs designs from the early 1930s.

Figure 2. JBl D50sMs7 powered monitor system.

Figure 1. a utility version of the lansing Manufacturing company’s iconic system.

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A little over a decade later in 1946, Lansing founded the company we know today as JBL and continued building components of the same power class that had characterised the original Iconic. In the progression upward, the original multicells were replaced by a new acoustical lens design, and the low frequency driver was redesigned with the industry’s only 4-inch, ribbon wire voice coil. By this time magnetic technology had advanced substantially, and Alnico V material had taken the place of the old field coil approach.

During the early 1960s Capitol Records in Hollywood approached JBL with the idea of building a 2-way state of the art monitoring system. Capitol’s engineering department worked closely with JBL’s Transducer Engineering group and a new monitor system was soon on the drawing board. The new monitor eventually became known as the model 4320 and consisted of a high efficiency 15-inch cone driver with high linear excursion capability, along with a compression driver horn/lens assembly. The crossover frequency was 800Hz, and the enclosure volume was only 6 cubic feet.

Another variation of this system was the model D50SMS7, which was the industry’s first powered monitor. In Figure 2 you can see front baffle details as well as the JBL T-Circuit ‘energizer’ mounted on the rear of the enclosure.

The 4320, and variations of it, immediately caught the attention of the recording industry domestically and in the overseas market. What made the 4320 so attractive was its near flat on-axis frequency response and its uniform horizontal coverage angle which extended out to the highest frequencies. (By allowing resolution

the high frequency vertical coverage angle to decrease linearly with rising frequency, JBL could maintain a fairly constant drive voltage to the compression unit, ensuring low distortion.) It was certainly a boost to JBL’s international prestige when EMI Records of Britain (Capitol’s parent company) standardised on the 4320 for its studios worldwide.

Toward the end of the 1960s, renowned New York pop and classical engineer Robert Fine, of Mercury Records fame, approached JBL regarding a small system that could be used in multiples in the control room. Fine was in the process of converting his main studio in the big ballroom at the Great Northern Hotel to 8-track recording. He insisted on retaining separate monitor loudspeakers for each recording channel, and he soon found that all existing monitors were way too large to fit over the control room window. The result of the Fine-JBL collaboration was the JBL 4310 ‘bookshelf’ monitor, a 3-way system built around a 12-inch LF unit, a 5-inch midrange unit, and small cone high frequency unit. The system was rugged, quite sensitive for its size, and voiced to resemble, to the extent possible, the former monitoring systems Fine had been used to.

Obviously, eight of anything is a lot, and the ensemble of 4310s produced a very healthy acoustical output level with relatively moderate input power-persystem. The 4310 was a great success and soon became one of JBL’s biggest selling professional products. JBL’s management took a good look at this success and immediately brought out the consumer version, the Century L100, likewise a best-seller.

Figure 3 shows the original 4310 as well as the subsequent 4311 version, both with grilles removed.

October 2006

sweet spot

Figure 3. JBl 4310 and 4311 with grilles removed.

Figure 4. partial group of JBl 4300-series monitors. The four-way systems are shown with grilles removed.

October 2006

Before long, the 4311 was adopted for nearfield use on the console meter bridges of the world’s top recording studios. As such, it is said to be the earliest nearfield studio monitor, and its white woofer cone established a visual paradigm that finds descendants through to the present day.

The success of both the Capitol Records and Fine Recording Company ventures kept JBL’s engineering department busy during the decade of the 1970s.

Other monitors in the 4300-Series included 3- and 4-way systems, many of which found their way into various non-recording professional installations as well as into the homes of Japanese audio aficionados.

Figure 4 shows a partial group of 4300-Series products, including the small 4-way 4315B and the giant dual LF 4-way 4350B. The big monitors were clearly aimed at large control rooms during an era of multitrack expansion in the recording industry. In the last two decades we have seen a remarkable change in the way recordings are created. Digital recording has slowly but surely edged out analogue technology, and recording machinery has shrunk to the size of your computer. While most tracking activities take

place in studios, those studios are likely to be much smaller than they were three decades ago. A great many postproduction operations now take place in homes, or in very small studio spaces, and the need for smaller monitor loudspeakers has become clearly evident.

Another important factor here is the ready availability of advanced digital signal processing capability at reasonable costs. This means that we can now build into our loudspeaker systems all the necessary tools for system setup, room and boundary equalisation, and time/level alignment. We can also design these systems so that format conversion is as simple as pointing a remote control unit at one of the loudspeakers and this brings us right up to date with the LSR4300-Series products shown in Figure 5.

The series includes two full-range units (8-inch and 6-inch LFs) as well as a subwoofer, all of which can be accessed via a remote unit and visually monitored over a computer.

JBL’s rich heritage in studio monitors and its current offerings demonstrate its commitment to providing the creative tools required by the industry in the new millennium. ■

Figure 5. JBl lsR4300-series monitors.

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slaying dragons

Data compression ‘choice’ all we find about us today is compressed, to the detriment of sound quality.

JoHn WaTkinson wonders if there is a solution.

john watkinson ‘One of the simplest tests of an audio system is to listen to it for an extended period. If you run out of time, it’s a good sign.’

T

HeRe Was a time when I though I was alone in thinking that the results of most of today’s compression systems were a massive disappointment. But not now. Increasing numbers of people are reaching the same conclusions and saying so, not least our esteemed editor who spoke for many of us in the last issue of Resolution.

There appear to be a number of reasons for the present state of affairs, although I wouldn’t know which are the most significant. Some may be coincidental.

Compared with 20 years ago, today’s audio production equipment needs next to no maintenance.

When equipment was analogue, it needed regular testing and calibration, and more importantly there was a specification it had to meet and someone whose job it was to make sure it did. Thus duff-sounding units were weeded out. Today that maintenance job is gone, and with it a set of critical ears.

Today’s production equipment is IT-based and cannot be operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge of audio. Moore’s Law continues to dominate the price of consumer IT equipment, to the extent that the hardware will be free with the software soon. The cost of digital electronics continues to plummet, while the cost of transducers such as microphones and loudspeakers doesn’t.

Commoditisation has made the cost of all kinds of things plummet. We think that is automatically a good thing, but the result has been that equipment is increasingly available to people who don’t know how to use it. When word processors obsoleted the typewriter, we didn’t see a dramatic increase in the 62

number of people who could write. Another example is PowerPoint, a software package that allows people who can’t make presentations to do so anyway.

The Hi-Fi industry has done a good deal of damage by detaching itself from reality. For the last 20 years we have had a tidal wave of nonsense that frequently violates the laws of physics, to say nothing of ethics, yet the actual sound quality obtained hasn’t risen at all.

I also fear that the number of people who are regularly able to hear live unamplified music has never been smaller. If you don’t know what it’s supposed to sound like, how would you know there’s anything missing?

One of the problems with audio compression is that it’s not easy. The human auditory system is listening for more things than just tonality. It’s trying to judge the size and location of objects as well. Provided all of the things the ear is trying to make out are adequately represented, there isn’t a problem. Unfortunately the entropy or information in an audio signal can’t be controlled. Thus an ideal audio compressor would be one that contained such a good model of human hearing that it could adjust the bit rate to the difficulty of the input material so that everything important gets sent. Unfortunately we don’t do that. Instead we decide what bit rate to use, usually on economic or other grounds and we usually decide on a rate that is way too low.

Another problem with compression is that the basic assumptions about auditory masking simply don’t apply in stereo. A sound that would be masked in mono may be clearly audible if it’s in a different place in the stereo image. There is more than twice as much information in a stereo signal as there is in a mono signal because it contains an image. Yet compression algorithms frequently claim that stereo signals are highly redundant. The result is that spatial clues such as ambience and reverberation are lost by compression. The result is an image that is painted by numbers rather than lifelike.

One of the simplest tests of an audio system is to listen to it for an extended period. If you run out of time, it’s a good sign. I find that with compression I get listening fatigue very quickly and that the artefacts are distracting.

Is there a technical solution to these problems?

Probably not. Lossless coding algorithms, such as MLP, exist and by definition are blameless, but we have to accept the bit rate the coder produces, which is going to be higher than we are used to. Given that the cost of storage media keeps falling and the increasing availability of broadband, there’s no technical reason to prevent it. I could make my own iPod using MLP and a bigger memory that would sound as good as a Discman, but I would only be able to load it with audio from my own CDs. I couldn’t use Internet downloaded audio files as they are pre-destroyed with MP3 coding.

DAB was launched using MPEG Layer 2, which is not up to the low bit rates the marketing people insist on. It would have been far better to wait until AAC was available. AAC is probably the best of the lossy audio codecs as it contains so many predictive tools it usually has one that suits the material.

I have mentioned before that it’s no use auditioning a compression scheme on loudspeakers of indeterminate information capacity. I am sure that many of today’s resolution

sub-optimal systems have come about because someone okayed the bit rate by listening on speakers that didn’t reveal the artefacts. For me the greatest use of audio compression is in loudspeaker testing. If you can’t hear the difference between the uncompressed original and the compressed version, your speakers are removing more information than the compressor.

Prior to the introduction of compression, the quality was determined by the reproducing equipment. One tuned to an FM radio station, or bought a vinyl disc or CD, and those media had a good quality signal embedded in them. How much of that quality was brought out depended on the receiver or player.

Those who were happy with a cheap compact set tolerated the poor audio. Those with good quality electronics and speakers could enjoy the results. Most importantly, the user had a quality choice between a cheap commoditised set or a more expensive better sounding and longer lived product.

In that respect audio equipment was no different from kitchen appliances, furniture, photographic equipment, and so on. There have always been cheap mediocre products and better more expensive ones that might be cheaper in the long run. One of the fundamental differences that the use of compression has brought to audio equipment is that the quality is determined once and for all at the source by the coding algorithm and the bit rate. As a result, beyond a given point further spending on the reproducing equipment would give no quality improvement at all. In that sense the choice has gone out of audio. There is no such thing as a high-quality DAB receiver as the quality is lost before transmission. In adequate reception areas, FM radios and PAL TV sets outperform their digital successors.

This, of course is 180 degrees out from the official marketing position that compression allows more channels that allow more choice. My view is that a large number of channels that induce listening/ viewing fatigue isn’t much of a choice. The quality choice was made for us by someone who has no idea about our standards or views. That strikes me as fundamentally wrong.

I just bought a Gaggia coffee machine after my last commoditised one died. It’s the Quad Electrostatic of coffee machines. If coffee followed the model of DAB and DVB there would be a hundred brands of instant coffee to ‘choose’ between and nothing else.

As far as I can see the only real world parallel with the DAB model is our present ‘choice’ of politicians.

Zenon and I are surveying all of this like Statler and Waldorf watching the Muppets. We’re not impressed, but we’re almost as funny. But maybe the problem is ours. Maybe the majority of society couldn’t care less. Perhaps the answer comes down once more to Gaussian statistics. Commoditisation has always brought product performance down to the least common denominator. It must have been going on a long time to have its own Patron Saint.

I don’t have a MiniDisc player, I don’t have an iPod and I don’t have a DAB receiver. My mobile phone doesn’t contain a camera and it doesn’t play a tune when it rings. I have never downloaded music over the Internet. What’s more I don’t have any inclination to do these things. The conclusion has to be that I am not typical, but I am also not alone.

Maybe the iPod isn’t intended as a sound reproduction system at all. Maybe it is just a trend following in the footsteps of the Hula-Hoop, scooters, tamagotchis and vinyl roofs.

I think it was George Orwell who said: ‘Whenever I see a trend emerging I head in the opposite direction.’

Orwell also coined the term ‘newspeak’ for words whose meaning had been redefined. ‘Choice’ appears to have become a newspeak term. ■ October 2006

showcase

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63

your business

champagne socialites Hip-Hop has made record production a lifestyle choice and brought with it a speed of workflow that makes other music production lines seem sluggish by comparison. Dan DaleY asks who needs pro Tools when we have cristal and can get shot in the ass to maintain our cred?

dan daley

i

‘Sir George Martin may have appeared in an advertisement or two, and Phil Spector’s antics have been attentiongetters, but outside of the trade magazines record producers have historically been invisible to advertisers.’

Was FlYinG Back from Europe one day last year and got into a conversation with my seatmate about champagne. Nothing elitist here — he happened to be the marketing manager for the Krug brand of bubbly. I’m no connoisseur of champagnes but I did know one thing about the subject: that hip-hoppers in New York drink oceans of the stuff. Specifically, they would drink the Cristal brand. I’m not sure if Cristal is any better than Krug, or the redoubtable Dom Perignon, which was much favoured by rockers with too much money in the 1980s, but I know that the name was showing up in the gossip columns along with Puffy, Jay-Z and the rest of rap’s celebrity pantheon, almost as though the champagne itself were another member of the posse.

And in many ways it was.

Anyway, when the fellow from Krug heard my perceptions on champagne, he grimaced and told me that therein lies one of his problems: how do you turn your brand into a high-profile lifestyle choice for a group of well-known celebrities?

I suggested that he ply the rap demimonde with cases of the stuff in the hope that one of them will use a bottle to bash someone else’s head in and be photographed while doing so, preferably by a Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper.

My response seemed eminently reasonable, given the nature of the hip-hop demographic. In inner urban communities across the US, music isn’t so much an artistic choice as it is a survival tactic. As Carlos Bess, the engineer for the Wu-Tang Clan once told me, you have a limited number of options with which to move up out of the ghetto towards serious money: rapping, break-dancing, drugs and sports. More than a few of those who have found fame and fortune on their way up have combined several of those options. Basketball superstar Shaquille O’Neal has made five albums so

far; National Football League All-Star Deion Sanders both sets records and makes them; five-time worldchamp boxer Roy Jones Jr has rapped on more than his opponents in the ring. And they all produced or co-produced their own records.

The hip-hop producer has managed to achieve the ultimate economic goals of music producers. Their revenues from product endorsements (or use of them as missiles), clothing lines, sports gear and so on often exceed those from the more mercurial record business.

The value of the hip-hop producer to merchandisers is enormous because, in the parlance of The City, they can move markets. Back to champagne, for instance.

During a radio interview earlier this year, Jay-Z, who has invoked the Cristal brand name often on records and in music videos, was informed that, according to a story in The Economist entitled ‘Bubbles and Bling’, the managing director of Cristal had been quoted expressing little more than tepid ‘curiosity’ regarding the attention that American rappers bring to his brand, adding with a sniff, ‘we can’t forbid people from buying it.’

This was a serious dis — the verbal equivalent of pulling out a Mac-9 in a club. Jay-Z’s response was quick and decisive. ‘How’s that for a slap in the face?,’ he said on the air. ‘I know I bought about 50,000 cases in my lifetime, personally. Cristal is done — finished.’

What’s remarkable about this is that, while JayZ and Puffy and the rest of the top tier of hip-hop producers revelled in Cristal to the point that it seemed as though the French company had sponsored them, Cristal was actually getting a free ride. As my attorney-turned-professional gambler likes to say, there are things in Las Vegas that no amount of money could buy that you can only get for free, like a night in the John Gotti suite at Caesar’s. All you have

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October 2006

your business to do is come in and lose money. Well, all rappers had to do was buy and drink Cristal and case sales jumped by thousands. At $3,000 a case.

But what’s even more remarkable is that these are record producers moving these markets. Granted, Jay-Z, Puffy and others in that cohort are artists themselves, but their real power in the industry is as the producer. Sir George Martin may have appeared in an advertisement or two, and Phil Spector’s antics — homicidal and otherwise — have been attention-getters, but outside of the trade magazines record producers have historically been invisible to advertisers.

Readers of this space know I advocate changing revenue models from rear-loaded (royalty-based) sources to front-loaded to the extent possible.

The ongoing erosion of copyrights and royalties underscores the urgency of that. Well, the hip-hop industry has figured out how to do that: find a lifestyle millions of other people want to emulate (or think they do) and live it very, very largely.

While rock musicians have lent their names to lifestyle products — Sting and Jaguar come immediately to mind — it’s artists, not producers that are the icons in that genre. What hip-hop teaches us in this regard is that notoriety trumps mere fame every time. Sir Paul McCartney’s divorce proceedings will eventually fade away; 50 Cent will always have an arraignment pending somewhere, guaranteeing ongoing media coverage. In fact, it’s arguable that hip-hop’s producers are more desirable to advertisers because they at least seem to be in charge to some extent. With empire comes responsibilities, and they at least appear to discharge them. The ghost of MC Hammer lingers like some ectoplasmic accountant, reminding all that no empire lasts forever.

Of course, celebrity, like hair and cars and houses, has to be maintained. Both fame and notoriety require accomplishments; they’re of different types but the intensity is similar. The latest bit of extra effort lately has been getting yourself shot. Rapper Gravy has much of New York wondering whether he really did take a .45 slug in the leg outside a rap radio station in downtown Manhattan. But producer Ice-T figures it helps his street cred. The trend has become so pervasive that it was featured in the plot of an episode of The Sopranos this year. Given the sorts of things that Courtney Love (also a producer) and Pete Doherty go through to maintain their infamy, maybe getting shot in the ass (the favoured location for a set-up shooting) isn’t so bad.

It’s worth noting also how hip-hop producers have changed the process of production, and how that in turn impacts their bottom lines. Urban music genres were the first to embrace drum machines. That ability to take unreliable (It was also about expense.

Ed) humans out of the equation and to make a key instrument in recording more accessible to more people was the foundation for what has become the hip-hop assembly line. Producer teams like the Neptunes keep multiroom facilities going on a non-stop basis, often using one or two rooms for basic production, another room or two for vocals and a room for programming, editing and fixing. Even individual producers, like Puffy, can juggle multiple productions simultaneously, in different cities even, by judicious application of the art of delegating responsibility. That’s how Scott Storch did it, pulling the levers for Dr Dre. Any successful CEO will tell you that you can’t do it all yourself — you just need to be ready to take credit for it when it succeeds and distance yourself from it if it doesn’t.

In fact, failed rap records are like baby pigeons — no one ever really sees them. They disappear quickly in the commoditised environment of rap. There are no October 2006

musical Ishtars left behind to remind an industry that it’s fallible. And that’s good for morale.

It’s also good for the bottom line. Efficient production processes keep product pumping. It has to when your product has a short shelf life. (There are plenty of great R&B songs that have become perennials at weddings; that can’t be said of many rap songs.) Pop music is by nature disposable, so the fact that hip-hop has taken that to an extreme is no vice. In fact, the rap charts tend to churn more than the pop, rock and country charts, where a blockbuster artist like Shania Twain or U2 can clog up the upper reaches of the charts, creating a traffic jam for other artists whose labels are also demanding a top slot.

Rap recordings are also the top music genre for ring tones, which you may have noticed have become big business these days. They’re perfectly formed

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for that application: quick, catchy hooks for easy edits and two frequency ranges — bass and mids for vocals. (I’m suddenly imagining a mobile phone connected to a subwoofer!)(It can only be a matter of time. Ed) So hip-hop producers are the crocodiles of the business — the perfect beast for their environment.

They have as much revenue from the front-end as the back, hedging their money streams both ways.

They’re diversified in terms of businesses and genres (a hallmark of rap is that it can be used as a seasoning on almost any kind of record). They’re able to keep content coming, thanks to a unique workflow that Henry Ford would have admired. The lesson is, don’t just listen to the music — examine the machine behind it. There’s a great engine humming under that hip-hop bonnet. ■

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headroom coMpRession issUes I read with interest your leader in September edition of Resolution (V5.6) regarding the negative and wellpublicised issues relating to compression and your personal experiences.

In the early 90s, when compression technology was in its infancy, there were a number of papers published concerning cascading, trans-coding or concatenation of multiple compression algorithms. The defining statement from these papers was that putting together several passes of psychoacoustic based algorithms will produce artefacts; ultimately resulting in listener fatigue followed swiftly by the ‘tune out’ factor. The industry by and large ignored these observations and bundled them under the ‘academic and therefore pointless’ title.

It is fair to say that any compression algorithm which uses perceptual coding as the core principle i.e. throws away content which is perceived to be irrelevant, will ultimately cause a significant negative side effect.

The reason perceptual codecs became popular had to do largely with the fact that 15kHz stereo could be passed over 128kbit/s or 1 ISDN line. In essence, it was cheaper…

However, along comes DAB or HD Radio that has a highly compressed perceptual codec as the final emission technology i.e. MPEG Layer II or AAC. Given the preponderance of other perceptual codecs in the broadcast audio chain, suddenly what was academic is now a real problem i.e. artefacts, fatigue, tune out…

If broadcasters continue to worship at the altar of cash to the detriment of quality then this issue will only get worse.

How do they get round this problem? Simple. Where they have to use compression, use a gentle, near lossless algorithm that is based on ADPCM principles.

A prime example of this type of algorithm is Enhanced apt-X. Jon McClintock, commercial director, APT, Belfast A couple of thoughts on your leader article (V5.6).

In your low-level annoyance test, what proportion of the ‘tugging at your sleeve’ effect is due to each of the following: 1. Compaction (bit-rate reduction) 2. Compression (dynamic range manipulation, mainly automatic) 3. Content.

I think you may have judged the annoyance to be primarily due to (1) but maybe (2) and (3) are having a signifi cant infl uence too?

I thank Jon and Martin and all the others who have voiced ‘broad’ agreement with the tone of my rantings. What we have here is a complicated problem that like all good complicated problems has a number of possible causes that can combine in a complicated manner to exacerbate the problem.

What is also typical of such scenarios is that the true ‘blame’ is consequently difficult to pin on any one stage of the process. Perhaps I was being idealistic, which is convenient, but I chose to concentrate on the inarguable fact that a lot of output is unpleasant to listen to and cannot be judged as an adequate representation of acceptable audio quality particularly when compared to what it replaces. So, to me, it’s not progress.

Picking up Martin’s points, like a lot of people I listen only to stuff that I want to listen to — I won’t watch a TV programme that doesn’t interest me any more than I listen to music that doesn’t ring my bell. I don’t have a requirement to raise my noise floor just for the sake of it — the content is relevant to me. But breakfast in the Schoepe household with the BBC Radio 4 Today programme on DAB is a much more stressful and intrusive experience than it ever was on FM. Similarly I absolutely can’t hack Planet Rock for any length of time even if they are featuring a band and tracks I know I like.

The heavy gain reduction processing of many modern CD releases (and indeed some remasters) wears me down in a different way because, to my ears, it reduces the dimensional attributes of the music and makes it sound flat and unnaturally even. I miss the dynamic range that I associate with music and that’s coming from someone who appreciates the subtle sonic benefits of tape and outboard compression.

I think Martin has possibly identified one combination of the ‘complicated problem’ and that is the gain reduction compression processing of the data compressed stream. Whereas with ‘traditional’ radio, dynamic processing was applied to a comparatively rich and fullsome signal, the same cannot be said when it is applied to a data reduced and psychoacoustically optimised signal. I suspect that more work has to be done in this area. Given the paltry bit rates being used, they are probably at their ‘best’ when left completely untouched and slamming them hard to make them sound ‘louder’ possibly only makes things worse — and they’re pretty damn bad to begin with. Maybe an optimised ‘loud for radio’ algorithm is an answer but I couldn’t see any station letting that pass through clean of any extra processing. Doesn’t bode well, does it? zs

aUDio

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In closing, you say that the industry is tragically over-

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