Tech Notes from the Field

Phew! Here I was expecting to already have my next Dante post by now. With this Covid-19 virus thing going on it has been much busier than one would expect. First I do not condone the media scaring people every 10 minutes. Yes, this virus is serious, but I think people have become numb to your fake expertise or reporting. And I work in the media!

OK, that’s off my chest. Now what have we done to keep you informed and entertained. Mostly the latter as we have 4 music formats and a sports format, and we all know that sports is not information and more of a distraction. We have done our part in clearing the building. Remote voice tracking is the norm for all music stations with the exception of morning shows. Sports “talk” and morning so far have a producer in house while the talent are remote. Tieline is our #1 go to on that front with Comrex filling in the blanks. We have deployed our old Tieline Field Units and iMix-G3 units. We also have the Report-IT app in use for other sites. Basically we are saving our 2 Via units for the extreme cases if and when that may happen.

Remote voice tracking is via the WideOrbit (WO) system. It works. I built 16 PCs just for deployment. I think we only have 5 spares of the bunch. We are in the process of figuring out how to remove all personnel from the facility, so I have beta the Remote Console app from Sierra Automated Systems (SAS) with the Rio Bravo and Rubicon consoles. It works. It is configurable. For now, no bells and whistles, but a remote operator can turn sources on and off, and remote sources like codecs get their proper mix minus. Level, or fader control is available, too. The only hitch now is how to get “the powers that be” to provide a decent remote access to the WO workstations on which I can install this app. When we can do this the operator can control WO and the console with a single remote access point.

And that is what has kept me busy the last couple weeks. I am studying up for my Dante Level 3 certification, too. That is in the “free” time. So, in conjunction with that, I hope to have my next installment of Dante posted soon. In the meantime stay save, stay healthy, stay home if you can. Keep that chin up, we will get through this.

Cheers!