Back in the days recording studios were designed to be a stand-alone island. Customers recording their music in the studio by using the studio DAW(Pro-tools) rig. Today producers are working in their own studios and hire a commercial studio mainly for being together (social event) and recording things they can’t do very well at their own place. They prefer easy access to the studio equipment and remain working on their own laptop. Oh, and they are used to work hybrid. Using their DA/AD converters to insert analog gear into their DAW session and Pro-tools is no longer their preferred DAW.
So, what to do?The introduction of Dante (AoIP) in the studio can change the customer perception (or journey if you like) of your studio by 180 degrees. It can also create flexibility and saves you money on cabling. Let’s dive in.
Do you have an easy connection between producer laptop and your studio?
When a producer enters your studio, it is most likely that He/She/Mx wants to connect their own laptop to your studio environment. Starting with the studio monitoring system but preferably much more than that.
What I’ve seen is that studios offer a (simple) USB audio interface connected to their monitor speaker system. Most Apple laptops will be fine with this but for a Windows laptop a software driver installation process is needed for the USB audio interface.
Okay so the speakers are connected. But how can a producer get access to the rest of your studio gear so that he can use your studio to its full protentional?
Most likely your high-end AD/DA converters are connected to your own Pro-Tools rig, right? Not to mention that great analog console and racks full of analog outboard gear that is staring at the producer. How can he access this without transferring the DAW projects onto the studio computer and leave his laptop alone?
You need a kind of digital middleman layer between the producers’ laptop and your studio environment. Welcome to the world of Dante AoIP.
What can Dante bring on the table for the modern producer hiring your commercial studio?
Dante is what I would call a “digital middleman layer”. It connects on one side to the producer’s laptop and on the other side to your studio environment. Be it your console, outboard gear or high-end AD/DA converters. The middleman layer takes care of the routing between everything and if desired even sample-rate conversion can be performed within this layer. The routing within the middleman layer is completely flexible, for instance the stereo output channels 1+2 on the producer’s laptop can be routed within the Dante network to any channel input number in your studio environment. You can even send it to multiple destinations at the same time. With a maximum of 512 Dante channels in each direction there is capacity enough for even the most complex set-ups.
The producers buckle-up phase with Dante
With a Dante enabled studio the producer (customer) enters your studio and can connect to your full studio environment. This can be done in two ways. A software solution or a hardware solution.
The simplest route is if the producer already has Dante in its own studio. The customer just connects his interface wit a standard CAT6 LAN cable to your studio Dante network and off you go, the customer is connected to your whole studio environment. No driver installation, no setting changes in the DAW project. Just route the inputs and outputs in the Dante layer with some mouse clicks.
If the producer does not work with Dante (yet) you have a hardware or a software solution.
You can ask the producer to install (on forehand) the Virtual Dante Interface software on his laptop. Then the laptop can be connected to your studio environment via the LAN port of the laptop. A license will cost around $60, and you can provide this license as a temporary license to your customer. Reusing it later for the next customer.
Alternatively, you can offer a USB class compliant Dante hardware interface. The good thing in this case is that after connecting to your Dante interface the producer has not only access to your speaker system but to all studio equipment that is added in the Dante network.
How to get your console and outboard gear into the Dante network?
To get your studio accessible on the Dante network, you need to invest into Dante enabled hardware. For any type of interface (analog, AES, USB etc.) there are hardware products from many manufactures available. This includes both the top tier brands as well as the more affordable middle class and cheap ones (see the different articles on dantesupport.com).
Your analog mixing console needs Dante-to-analog converters (your digital one most likely Dante-to-AES converters). These can be placed next to your patch-bay so that you can attach them through the existing cable infrastructure if desired. The Dante converter needs just one CAT6 cable for the Dante network connection.
Outboard gear
The input and outputs of your analog outboard gear need an AD/DA interface to the Dante network. Most likely you have all the outboard gear also on a patch-bay so this would be a good place to install the Dante AD/DA interface. High number count IO Dante interfaces are available on the pro-audio market.
With this done your customers can use the outboard gear in a hybrid way with a few mouse clicks into their own DAW session. Analog mixing and summing on your beloved analog console can be done from the producer’s laptop as well. This all with a latency below 1ms and no quality loss.
Adding your high-end AD converters into the Dante network by using their existing AES ports and connecting these to the Dante network forwards the analog summed mixer output signal back into the laptop of the producer.
A full integration between the producer’s laptop and your studio can be achieved this way. From the customer’s point of view with only one single CAT6 cable from his laptop to your studio.
Routings are done in the Dante Controller software. The customer can see all the outboard gear and the analog mixing console by their names. Connections are made in a matrix by placing a connection dot. The Dante controller can be accessed from any point on the network or even remotely from your holiday location, if you want to.
Side note: Computer controlled analog patch-bays
A digital controlled analog patch-pay solution could be a worthful addition to the Dante network, creating even more flexibility in your studio. With this solution the customer can make a chain of analog gear in the analog domain first before accessing it via the Dante network. This reducing the amount of AD/DA conversions. The gear patch chain can be easily configured on a computer. Products are available from Wolff Audio, Flock-Audio, CBelectronics and Anatal. We have tested the ones from Flock Audio and Anatal with excellent results.
Other improvements with a Dante back-bone
There is more to it than the mentioned advantages for your customer. Audio over IP can improve your complete studio backbone. Below some examples.
Cable savings
A hidden major benefit is cable savings. Staying as long as possible in the digital domain and only convert to analog at the destination you can save yourself a lot on the analog cabling. Both on money (analog cable is expensive) and room estate (it needs space). No big cable trees from your analog outboard gear racks but just one CAT6 cable with a price tag of $30 that can easily bridge 30+ meters. Within your rack a short cable from the converter to the hardware. In the future it is expected that hardware manufacturers, like for 500 series, will have a Dante interface build-in.
Connecting multiple rooms in your building
In the case you have multiple studios, guest rooms etc. in your building the use of Dante becomes a no-brainer. With Dante you can interconnect any room or studio with another one, with the use of one single CAT6 cable! So, listening to a mix played from studio A in studio B can be realized with one click or predefined on your monitor controller. By the way, some new monitor controllers (like the RTW) are already equipped with Dante IO making it a breeze (see our article about RTW here)
Sharing outboard gear between studios
Until now sharing outboard gear between studios means taking the unit out of your rack and moving it into the other room. Or have a big multilink analog cable between both studios. But as soon as your outboard gear is connected to the Dante network backbone sharing outboard gear between studios becomes easy. All hardware is visible on the network and can be selected from any point on the network. The current generation outboard gear is often even remotely controllable, and fully recallable. Sharing in life is fun but from now-on sharing hardware in the studios even more. Oh yeah and you might need less units in total.
Combining multiple AD/DA converters into one DAW session
With the use of a digital middleman layer like Dante you don’t need one big AD/DA converter with ADAT extensions anymore. Multiple AD/DA converters (even from different brands if you like) can be combined into one DAW session without having your computer knowing about it (and yes this also counts for Windows machines).
This feature also gives you more flexibility on your AD/DA converter purchase strategy. Giving you the option to grow on demand with the types and number of converters in your studio. You extend instead of replacing converters. This will save you money and supports flexibility in your (future)architecture.
Dolby Atmos
Building an Atmos studio means getting more speakers in your room, replace your monitor controller and audio interface. With Dante you can simplify this process. Your computer remains what it is already. If you have speakers with a Dante interface built-in, you only need a CAT6 cable to your speaker. If not, then an AES or analog converter at your speaker is needed. This converter can be powered via the CAT6 cable using POE. The audio transfer between different computers could be easily done by using a Dante connection. So, preparing an Atmos mix on headphones in studio A and then listening on Atmos speakers in Studio B? You got it covered without moving a laptop.
I don’t want the customer on the studio Dante network
Fair enough. Once you have your studio building converted to an AoIP/Dante backbone this question might come on the table by your IT staff. And what if the sample rate setting between the customer project and your Dante network differ? No problemo, I found the solution and tested it. It’s called: the Dante BRIDGE.
A Dante bridge does what is says. It bridges between your studio backbone Dante infrastructure and a customer Dante network on a digital audio level. In this way the two networks are completely separated. Physical and on IP level if you wish. A Dante bridge has usually also sample-rate conversion built-in between both Dante networks, solving a possible SR mismatch between the customer and your studio on the fly. We have a Dante bridge in our test Lab, and it works flawlessly 24/7 without any hiccup.
Hungry for more information?
After reading this article you might have some more in-depth questions regarding a Dante migration or would like to get some consultancy or project management support on the design and implementation. Both are things I love to do. I’m an independent specialist not attached to any vendor. Drop me a mail at info-at-dantesupport-dot-com or book a consultancy hour – very modern – at “Buy me a Coffee”.
