AHM users: Some questions on "will this work?"

[brandon-k]

Hey all.

I have a job to spec and install that I’m looking at using AHM for. I have no hands on experience with AHM, I would typically engineer with Q-Sys This client is really budget constrained, AHM is significantly less expensive and at the end of the day, leaning AHM looks to be a viable option for a lot of my clients. I’ve watched a number of the training videos (admittedly, not all. They have a HUGE number of videos which is great!) as have been playing with the software. The hardware is reasonably priced, you don’t have to jump through hoops to order it and BYOD for Custom Control is a huge money saver, especially for this client which is primarily seasonal.

This is clearly a very different product than Q-Sys. I think it will do what I’m looking to do, but since I can’t visualize it in a flow like Q-Sys, I’m struggling.

The venue is multiple buildings with one main outdoor paging zone (broken in 4 physical amp channels) and 7 separate indoor zones. There is a current system in place, all analog. My goal is to make a hybrid system utilizing their existing analog systems and tying them all together with Dante and ultimately processing and routing with AHM.

Zone 1 mic is a single desktop paging mic. In normal conditions it goes out to the outdoor grounds page.

Zone 2-8 are all indoor zones. Pretty basic; 1 or 2 mics with a 3rd aux input channel for music. Mostly mono zones. One is “stereo” in logic (really I’m just sending announcer + music to the bleachers (L) and announcer only (R) to the waiting areas).

Audio transport between everything will be Dante. All zones will have a 2x2 analog interface to get audio on and off of the network. The plan is to take the mix out of each local zone mixer, send it to the AHM via Dante for processing (just PEQ and X-over as most of these are compression paging horns), then send it back to the local amplifier for each zone.

I’m currently struggling with mixing sources within AHM System Manager. I need to mix anything from the grounds page (Zone 1) in to each of the other zones unless a particular zone is having a show. The use-times are random enough that I can’t schedule it, so the plan was to have a mounted tablet at each location with a “Show In Progress” button that would disable the grounds page from being mixed in to the zone, if that is possible. I think this would be accomplished with Priority Input or potentially Crosspoint Routing? Maybe have both the local zone and the grounds page as inputs for the crosspoint, with a local (to a given zone) mute button on the tablet for the page? Unfortunately I can’t test this theory in Custom Control since I don’t have a AHM to connect to.

The second thing I need is to have a “All Call” from Zone 1 that goes out to every zone. Primarily for inclement weather and closure. I think this is best served by having a “Typical” scene for normal day to day operations with a second “All Call” scene (or presets I think AHM calls them).

What do you guys think? I would appreciate any insight or advice!

[newk]

Hi Brandon,

Achieving the “All Call” and “Show in Progress” scenarios should be more than possible with the AHM.

I’d advise using a button in Custom Control that’s simply designed to “mute” the Outdoors Channel in the x-point section of a zone that currently has a show in progress (in the screen shots attached you can see I set up a X-point mute for channel 1 inside Zone 2. You’ll want to design a button and custom control layout for each room that you wish to have ‘Show in Progress’ button available).

Next, you’ll want to set up a button and layout just for the Outdoor area labelled “All Call”. This will be a preset recall button. You’ll then design a preset recall that has a recall scope of only the Mute Zones for Channel 1 enabled. This means when “All Call” is pressed, Every X-Point of Channel 1 (Outdoor) that is muted will be overridden. If this button is not pressed and the outdoor mic is used, all unmuted zones (NO Show in Progress) will receive the signal.

My only concern with this set up is that in the scenario where “All Call” is pressed and the preset is loaded that unmutes this channel in the various zones, the onus is on the folks in those zones to then re-enabled “Show in Progress” after the All Call announcement is made.

Using a Priority input + Paging doesn’t seem to address this scenario either. That said, I’m going to keep digging in to see if I can come up with an appropriate alternative if needed.

-NewK