I/O, I/O, IT’S OFF TO WORK WE GO

The premise is that the more I/O, the more pathways you have to the components in the airchain for troubleshooting and fixing problems remotely. Rob pointed out that adding more Blade I/O seems like overkill at first, but it’s often impossible to troubleshoot and correct problems remotely without that access. “There are not enough of us out there to keep all the stations going that need help. We’re going in and constantly thinking, ‘What can we leverage to ensure that we’re able to respond wherever we are, to whatever problem comes up for a client?’” commented Rob.

“Unfortunately, we’re not growing new broadcast engineers,” agreed Jay, adding that Blades decentralize the Ethernet switch as a practical, affordable way to get to problems quickly in the absence of a nearby engineer. 

Also discussed were the declining use of turrets and other source gear as studios bring in more audio from the outside, and the greater need to share resources among stations in a cluster. “Today, it’s any number of IP codecs that are centrally located for a cluster of stations and we’re using automated mix-minus management via the WheatNet platform, and easily sharing those codecs among studios,” commented Rob. 

Jay and Rob were joined by Alex Bonello with HDVMixer, who added insight on automating visual radio into the audio over IP networked studio.

Wheatstone’s Studio Master Class series is happening Wednesdays throughout the month of October. For a schedule or to replay any Studio Master Class in the series, click to https://wheatstone.com/webinar/