Large-format location recording and outside broadcast truck The MixBus has added the DirectOut Prodigy.MX for MADI and AoIP routing and management as part of its expansion.
The DirectOut Prodigy.MX is a modular routing matrix designed for professional live sound and broadcast applications. Its six modular I/O slots allow users to choose from a variety of digital audio connections to suit the demands of a project, with routing capabilities controlled via the globcon control software.
“Due to both the size and weight restrictions of a mobile recording truck, all of our equipment has to be as light and space efficient as possible. Not to mention being 100 per cent reliable,” explained sound supervisor Conrad Fletcher.
“The Prodigy.MX really seemed to fit the bill in that regard. But its capabilities actually extend a lot further than we’d originally planned to use it for, such as sample rate conversion and support for a range of IP formats.”
The technology supports AoIP formats alongside several options for MADI.
“MADI remains a kind of universal standard between trucks – which often don’t require IP – with the main benefit being that MADI devices tend to require very little in the way of setup,” added Fletcher.
“The truck has the capability to accept up to 18 MADI I/O streams. This forms the primary backbone of our infrastructure in terms of going in and out of the desk, as well as going to recorders, stageboxes and other gear,” he continued.
“Obviously with this amount of MADI we need a way to keep on top of all the routing, which is where the Prodigy.MX comes in. We opted for the HD-SRCs which are the hardware version, so we can have up to six cards in there with 4 x MADI SFPs per slot. The SFPs are a joy to use, as you can have any type of connector and swap them out if required – optical, micro-BNC, full-size BNCs, multimode, singlemode – anything you want!”
Along with its extensive MADI capabilities, the DirectOut Prodigy.MX supports a number of audio networking formats such as Dante, Ravenna/AES67, MILAN/AVB and Waves Soundgrid.
“That’s another other thing which we hadn’t really envisaged,” Fletcher said. “A lot of the live-to-cinema events we cover are reliant on Dante, Ravenna, AVB etc. Previously we’d have to hire in various interfaces to convert these formats to MADI to bring it into the truck.”
