I would like to see the signal light on a DCA fader light up when signal is passing through one of its group members. This is extremely helpful for corporate AV work. You will be able to see that audio, video and graphics playback sources are active before you bring up the fader.
Comments anyone ? Thanks !
DCAs are not an audio path. They are simply “remote controls” for the individual channel faders of the DCA members. Therefore there is no way to tell if audio is passing through a DCA because there is never audio passing through a DCA.
I realize that other manufactures have this functionality, so obviously there are methods to “fake” the functionality. However the methods that must be used to “fake” this functionality are going to consume some of the available processing power.
For example, the consoles have the ability to “PAFL a DCA”. However the DCA is not an audio path and therefore there isn’t any “DCA audio” to actually PAFL. Instead, the system must fake this functionality and they do it by actually turning on the PAFL of each DCA member in an “additive mode” so that you hear all of the DCA sources in the PAFL audio path. However when you PAFL a DCA, it is utilizing the normal PAFL resources. You could recreate this functionality with the PALF system by manually choosing each DCA member in the additive mode. The system automatically “builds” this for you when you PAFL a DCA which is obviously quicker and easier, but it is important to realize that you aren’t using any additional resources to PAFL a DCA. It’s simply using the regular PAFL resources in a specific way.
To “show signal” being passed through the DCA, A&H could monitor all of the DCA members audio levels using a very similar method to PAFLing a DCA. However those resources would have be turned on/used all the time and each and every possible DCA would require a different set of resources/processing power to accomplish this. In other words, monitoring DCAs in this fashion would require dedicated resources to be allocated for this functionality.
I only share this in an effort to explain that while it is technically possible to do it, it seems to be something A&H has decided they don’t want to do. You are obviously not the first person to request this. For as long as A&H has been creating digital consoles, people have been requesting this feature, along with the ability to have a way to meter DCA channels. Long story short, these features have been requested more times that I can count across all the console lines within the A&H world for 20 years or more and it hasn’t been implemented by A&H yet. Clearly that is a conscious decision on their part.
Hi Brian,
Thank you for defining the situation so clearly. Yes, I understand a DCA is not audio.
Still would like to see this happen operationally. Processing power should not be too much of an issue. What would it cost ? Probably under $ 100.