audio interface

[AlexD]

I am planning on getting sound cue system for my school, I will be having 4 surrounds L&R (combined with a mono) and L&R at the back of the audience. I am going to use all of these speakers to do sound effects, I am going to connect the computer to the sound board using “ESI gigaport HD” audio interface, witch has 8 out puts witch I will connect the 8 channels on the board and route them to the right speakers. I am going to be getting SCS professional witch can send a single to 4 stereo devices (i.e the speakers).


The problem is the gigaport has 8 mono RCA outputs, not good for what I want because it means I can only send a single to 4 mono speakers. Not good! I am planning now to get SCS professional plus witch can support 8 stereo devise (I will do this is I can find an 8 stereo output device that I can get), this means that the system can be upgraded with subs or whatever they want when they want to.


SO


my question is, dose anyone know of a 4 or 8 stereo output device for under £150, under £100 would be amazing.

[jkowtko]

Alex, each output channel should go to a speaker. Generally each output can act on it's own as a mono channel, and adjacent channels (i.e. 1/2, 3/4, 5/6, 7/8) can act as stereo pairs. In > 2 channel interfaces you can also often use the channels in a surround mode , as in four channel (L/R/C/Sub) or six channel (L/R/C/Sub/LR/RR), and I'm not sure about 8 channel (L/R/C/Sub/LSide/RSide/LR/RR?)

The RCA "mono" jacks just mean they are two conductor, vs "stereo" jacks which have three conductors. However the three conductor jacks in this case would most likely be used to provide balanced connections (vs unbalanced). Pro audio almost always uses three conductor 1/4" jacks for balanced connections -- low-end prod audio and home audio equipment generally uses three conductor jacks to provide stereo (two channels) signal, each channel being unbalanced and sharing the same ground conductor.

I suggest doing some reading on wikipedia for starters, on multi-channel audio and balanced connectors, just to understand those concepts. Then take a good look through your gigaport user guide and see if the above configurations are supported.

As far as SCS goes, it can support all of the configurations I mentioned above ... and you will see the device options show up as different entires on the device list when you go into the SCS editor to the program definition screen.

Hope that helps.

[AlexD]

I am going to be using a configuration of (L,R,Lside1,Rside1,Lside2,Rside2,LR,RR) and the C will be added to the L&R (or on its own if we don’t use LR,RR). keeping in mind this is the biggest set up we will be able to do with the stuff we have, we probably wont use LR,RR most of the time but the Lside1,Rside1,Lside2,Rside2 will be permentaly fixed into the wall.
As far as I am aware you can not group two mono channels into a stereo channel on SCS, FYI I want stereo because it will save space on the cue list on SCS because I would use a splitter at the stereo outputs and I will send the L&R from that stereo out to two mono channels on the board, I will not be using a mono channel as stereo if that is what you though I was going to do (sorry I should have stated this before) and i also want stereo so i dont have to buy SCS Professional plus.
This system is purely for directing sound for a theta, so I want each channel able to be sent a different single defined by me and not the audio file, but if I want surround sound I will just set it up by just using L,R,C,Lside,Rside,LR,RR (a 7.1 without the sub). I would probably use the Lside2,Rside2 as the LR,RR for the surround sound when I want it or just combine Lside1,Rside1,Lside2,Rside2 into Lside,Rside and use the PA system (that I will be using for LR,RR if I wanted all 4 surrounds). All it would need is turning a couple knobs on the mixer. SCS can support 7.1 surround sound can’t it? If not then I would just set it to 5.1.

[jkowtko]

SCS will recognize 7.1 devices IF the audio interface supports it. It's up to the audio interface to "announce" the devices it has available. I've used 6-channel AC3s and WMA before, but not 7.1.

I see your concern on the 2xmono-> stereo issue. You can send each mono channel to one side of the stereo channel individual, but it chews up two output device slots on the audio cue property sheet. And in SCS Pro you can send an individual audio cue to a max of four devices. (Pro Plus gives you 8). In this case I would suggest you consider using an audio file editor to mix the two mono channels into a stereo file. Audacity is a free Java-based product, and Goldwave is a popular (purchased) product.

Fyi, here's a link that describes a Windows up-mixer ... maybe this (or something like it) can also be used as a shortcut to create your stereo files from mono:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/win...ng71audio.aspx

[AlexD]

That is sort of my problem. I don’t want mono I want stereo outputs so the cue sheet doesn’t get messy. After the single goes out of the computer, out of the stereo output, after this I want it split into mono so I can send it to a speaker, I would keep it in stereo but that means I can’t rout to the speakers, I’m being forced to use aux at the moment so I need to convert into mono for routing issue.

I have found the M-Audio Delta 44 PCI Card W/ Breakout Box witch I think will be ok for what I need, it has 4 outputs, witch I think are stereo. I’m doing some more research into this at the moment. thank you for the link

[jkowtko]

I'm pretty sure the devices can mix-match multiple signals. So, for example, you can play a stereo audio file on Device "1/2", and at the same time play a different audio file to only Device 2. The audio interface hardware or the software drivers that accompany it, usually have their own internal mixers to handle this.

We also have a Delta 44 at the theater. It's in the same boat -- shows devices "1/2" and "3/4", and from SCS you can address a cue to either the stereo pair or to just one channel of a stereo pair.

Example:
- in the SCS Production properties panel, define the following devices:
* Name: "L/R", Physical device: M-Audio 1/2, Speakers: Left & Right (stereo)
* Name: "L", Physical device: M-Audio 1/2, Speakers: Left (mono)
* Name: "R", Physical device: M-Audio 1/2, Speakers: Right (mono)
* Name: "LR/RR", Physical device: M-Audio 3/4, Speakers: Left & Right (stereo)
* Name: "LR", Physical device: M-Audio 3/4, Speakers: Left (mono)
* Name: "RR", Physical device: M-Audio 3/4, Speakers: Right (mono)

you can now play one audio cue to "L/R", another to "L", another to "R" and "RR", etc. You shoudl be able to mix and match devices when you configure each audio cue. Between SCS and the audio device they will handle the mixing required to get the sounds out to the correct speakers.

[AlexD]

Ah ok thank you

[SHARYNF]

the problem with just routing the sound to speakers is it depends on what you are trying to accomplish. As soon as you put the same sound into two speakers that are not positioned so that they work together you are asking for problems. It is like the inexperienced dj that just shows up with a whole truck load of speakers and places them all over the place and wonders why the sound sounds so bad.

7.1 of 5.1 set up is based on specific phase and delay properties to build a sound space that is supposed to recreate what the artist wants. Problem is that this approach has an audience listening sweet spot that is quite small

If you want to be able to have sound effects come from specific locations as soon as you feed the same signal to two speakers that are in totally different locations you need to be careful, especially with side and rear speakers. Just hanging a bunch of speakers around and routing sounds to them acan easily result in a technical solution that is a sonic disaster. Unless you have the routing, phase and delay tools to be able to position a sound properly, once you move from routing a specific sound to ONLY one speaker on the sides and rears gets to be extremely difficult sonically

Sharyn

[AlexD]

Yes i will have to put a delay on them, if i am going to send audio to difrent speakers. When I set SCS to play 5.1 it wont be able to do the delay and phasing its self will it?