Multimedia
Newsletters
Blogs
Whitepapers
Events
DCP Directory
Mill Directory
Edit Calendar
Advertisers
Reader SurveyMark In
Nov 1, 2007 12:00 PM
At AES 2007, Fairlight introduced its Xynergi controller, which features "self-labeling" key switches that display full-color images, icons, or text. The new keyboard supports any type of language or icon-driven menu structure.
Next Level of Production
By Dan Ochiva
If you haven't kept up with the latest in computer technology, it might be because you think it has just been a matter of a gigahertz race for the past few years. But if you had a chance to attend the recent IBC or AES conventions, you would realize it's not about raw horsepower anymore.
Ciprico, for example, debuted its MediaVault 5100 direct attached storage, a rackmounted array, at the annual IBC show in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The Minnesota-based company (www.ciprico.com) became one of the first to employ the new PCIe external expansion and cable connection standard. Ratified earlier this year, this extended PCI Express bus architecture moves the full capability of that high-speed interface outside the computer for the first time. Plug a card into a PCIe slot, run a cable to the storage rack, and the system delivers five times the data rate of speedy — and expensive — 4Gbs Fibre Channel solutions.
A PCIe card is also a key component of Fairlight's Crystal Core Engine, the CC-1, but here the card, which plugs into a Windows PC, is used to hold an advanced FPGA processor; the chip technology allows designers to quickly create programmable logic cells to accomplish tasks that used to require DSP technology, which isn't as flexible. The Australian company (www.fairlightau.com) uses the CC-1 engine to create everything from simple, low-cost recording/editing platforms to large-format mixing consoles.
Technology that once required energy-sucking racks of gear the size of a small refrigerator now fits onto one card that uses only 8W. That single card can process 230 audio channels concurrently, even allowing users to edit both SD and HD video simultaneously.
At AES 2007, Fairlight introduced a unique interface for that prodigious processor: the Xynergi controller, which drew crowds with its “self-labeling” key switches that display full-color images, icons, or text. That's right, instead of relying on a piece of tape stuck over a switch, the new keyboard can support any type of language or icon-driven menu structure, because the QWERTY keyboard rearranges itself according to what the user is working on.
Another Australian company at the show, Audinate (www.audinate.com), relied on the ratification of standard IEEE 1588 for its Dante networking technology. The engineering spec created a realtime clocking system for Ethernet networks. Ethernet, the lingua franca of networking worldwide, combined with TCP/IP (Internet protocol), enables users of Dante-networked gear to configure, route audio, and manage audio devices on a simple-to-deploy network.
Standard analog wiring gets complex quickly, due to the point-to-point nature of analog wiring. The typical solution of multicore audio snakes doesn't cut down on the complexity, and standard digital audio still either requires separate cables for each signal or elaborate proprietary networking technology.
Audinate's Dante, which has already turned up in new gear from Dolby, only needs a standard Ethernet connection and a standard Ethernet switch. The technology offers plug-and-play ease too: Hook up a new piece of audio gear, and the system will find it.
