Hi All,

We're trying to get an idea of the different methods stations are using to switch on-air control between different playout machines.

The 2 most common scenarios that we are aware of are:

1) At the end of Live Programming, the last presenter sets an Automation PC going (in a rack or wherever) and routes that direct to air, leaving the studio computer free to be used for production, or just to be powered down to save power.

2) The traditional switch from being live on-air in Studio 1, to being live on-air from Studio 2.

In these scenarios you will presumably be releasing on-air control from the "current" onair playout pc, then using some sort of remote control tool or physically controlling the "next" onair playout PC to get it to the right point in the log, then setting it On-Air, routing it's audio live to transmission in some way before then pressing GO to finish the job.

What we're interested in knowing is how you go about doing this? Although this is done in an awful lot of stations, we are always hearing new and different ways that stations are achieving this same switchover.

If you are regularly (or not so regularly!) doing this, could you take a moment and post here to let us know how you are doing it? Also, any pitfalls that you have when doing it and how you educate your users on the best way to manage it all?

Thanks!

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Peter Jarrett, Technical Director
Broadcast Radio Ltd.

Bill Bailey: No win, no fee, no basis in reality. Just a room above a minicab office in Acton and a steady stream of greedy simpletons whose delusion is only matched by their clumsiness

At Radio Royal we have 2 Automation machines running 24/7 to supply the sustaining feed for the 2 networks we run when no studio is live, which frees the studios up for training etc and also makes running the 2 services easier.

We have autotrack send the schedule to a separate database so that any tinkering in the studio's doesn't cock up the automation feeds.  Boh these machines are set without on air control and to assume they are always on air.

Switching sources is always done during IRN news junctions.

The 2 studios then get their on air status from the Myriad Network machine, although this has no bearing on actual on air status.  On air routing is done with an Audionics eMM88 and combines the feeds of the various sources (2x Automation 2x Studios, clean IRN feed and 3x Myriad Network feeds) to the on air networks.

In effect we also have a pseudo 3rd transmission feed which is the main Radio Royal feed combined with a separate network feed creates a "Royal Replay" or listen again feed which is fed to Powerlog  which then through various schedule tasks extracts a clean studio feed (no IRN on this one) to be re-imported back into Myriad to be replayed.


It works for us anyway :-)

Craig Arthur

Engineering & IT Manager
Radio Royal, Royal 2 & Royal Gold.

We keep studio 1 on 24/7 and only switch live to studio 2 when required, although studio 3 does goes live for the live and local show each week,

It's worth adding to Paul's comment, the process is a manual release of control in the on air studio then take control in the new studio before switching the audio source using a switcher.

Here at Hospital Radio Bedside we have 2 on air studios which normal alternate with the presenter.

We use hardware lines on the 1750 GPI/O card to switch which computer is on air. This is controlled by the station’s logic which also switches the audio and on air lights.

This works most of the time, but sometimes fails! One of the computer will refuses to release control even though the hardware lines are telling it to.

When the presenter leaves for the night they switch off part of the studio which is not used for automation.

Here at Bay Trust Radio

Studio 1 is the main studio 24/7

Studio 2 is our Newsroom-Sports feeds & Voice Tracking. (we can make studio 2 live if we need to do any repairs our upgrades to studio 1)

Our Office acts as our editing suite, scheduling programmes, adverts and uploading our listen again from Powerlog.

And our Apple servers are in our Office.

John Williamson

Bay Trust Radio

Hi Will,

You can indeed do this As Simon noted, you can assign hardware lines to take and release onair control, though ideally you do need to have a small delay between the signal to release control in one studio and take in the other as otherwise you stand a very small chance of the taking one firing first and being upset that the other studio hasn't released yet.

Another option would be to have the hardware line actually execute a Myriad Macro command instead - that way you could have the "releasing" studio put the studio into standby, then release on air control. The "taking" studio would start with a short wait (to allow the other studio to do it's work) then take onair control, then set the log running.

The only downside is that you would have to manually make sure that the "taking" studio had the correct part of the log lined up before you fired it.

On the subject of which - is anyone here at the Radio Festival next week? We will have something interesting to show you if you're going that will help though!

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Peter Jarrett, Technical Director
Broadcast Radio Ltd.

Bill Bailey: No win, no fee, no basis in reality. Just a room above a minicab office in Acton and a steady stream of greedy simpletons whose delusion is only matched by their clumsiness

We'd love to come to the Radio Festival, but have you seen the prices !!

We run 2 on-air capable studios through a Sonifex RB-OA3. Live programming typically ends at 10PM each night at which point overnight automation simply plays out from whichever studio the last show on air was broadcast from.

We have a dedicated automated Myriad playout pc for non-live programmes and so at the end of each live programme the presenter has to manually release on air control from the studio pc. This is ok unless they forget to release on air control and therefore causing the log's timing's to go out of quilt.