QU32 + AB168 + Aviom system

[bossarbParticipant]

We are thinking of replacing our ageing Yamaha LS9-32 with a QU32 and remote stage racks (either 2 of the AB 168s or an AR2412 and AR0804). We have an Aviom system that we currently feed from the dedicated Yamaha Aviom plug-in card to an A-net distributor box.

My initial review of the manuals suggested to me that since I need 4 analogue outputs on stage to feed the main amps and some fill speakers, I would only be able to send 12 analogue channels to a new Aviom distribution box (AN-16/i, which does A to D conversion) because there are only 16 analogue outputs available on either the combo of 2 x AB168s or an AR2412 plus AR0804. This is a bit of a limitation although not quite a deal breaker.

But am I missing a trick here? Could I create a different set of sends for the physical XLR outputs on the desk itself and locate my Aviom AN16/i unit by the mixing desk, sending 16 channels out down a second ethernet cable from the A-net port of the AN16/i to the first of the Aviom personal mixers on stage? This would only work if I could create at least 4 analogue sends/outputs on the stage boxes that are NOT the same as the 16 output channels that I’d be using on the physical XLR outputs from the desk surface. I don’t know whether that is possible. I’m confused about how “hard” the allocations are to matrix and mains on the physical outputs on the QU32 itself. If they are fully flexible, like the X32, then why aren’t they just labelled 1 to 16 or 1 to 20?

That all sounds very complex (sorry). Here’s a practical example of the question. Could I configure my QU32 and stage boxes like this?

DESK OUTPUTS: 1 – 10 are direct outs of various channels
DESK OUTPUTS: 11 – 16 are mix outputs [for example]

STAGEBOX OUTPUTS: 1 & 2 are main L & R.
STAGEBOX OUTPUTS: 3 & 4 are other mix or matrix outputs.

Thanks for your help

Andrew

[Mike CParticipant]

The outputs on the QU32 or any QU board are fixed with the exception of the Alt Out and the AES Out. The outputs on the stage boxes are fully configurable in any combination.

[Dick ReesParticipant]

You could move up to the GLD or use the ME system with the Qu. ME has an Aviom compatability mode.

[[XAP]BobParticipant]

You don’t get direct outs, and the I/O on the desk is not patchable.

You could run ‘single channel’ mixes to simulate – and mix to MTX for additional mixes. If you don’t need the FX busses then you may be able to abuse those as well…
But the ME1 is the ‘proper answer’, or letting musicians use QuYou to drive a simple headphone amp…

[bossarbParticipant]

Thanks for the responses. Very helpful.

I think that means I could run the Aviom distribution box next to the desk and feed it 16 dedicated channels from the physical XLR outputs on the desk as a combination of:

1-10 the standard mix outputs [can these all be switched between pre-fade and post-fade?]
11-16 the first six group outputs [can these all also be switched between pre-fade and post-fade and can I make the ones that are labelled as stereo into mono channels?]

Then I could just send the stage box 4 channels that would be the main L&R plus a stereo group pair using the unused group channels.

Does that sound like it would work in terms of routing on the QU32 and stage boxes?

Given that the stage box outputs are fully patchable and I would only be using 4 of them in the configuration above, could I still send another 20 channels of outputs from any source (mix/ channels/ matrix) to the 24 physical outputs of the stage boxes or would these have to mirror the configuration of the desk? I’m guessing that “mix 5” has to mean the same thing regardless of output source, so if I set up mix 5 and grab it from the physical local XLR on the desk then if I send “mix 5” to an XLR output on the stage box it would be carrying the same signal. So it’s really a question of mix buss capacity and matrix buss capacity, shared between the desk outputs (where the configuration is fixed) and the stage boxes, where the configuration is patchable.

The manual says that there are a total of 24 busses on the QU32: made up of 12 mix busses (4M, 3ST, LR) plus 8 group busses (4ST) plus 4 matrix busses (2ST). So if I have used 16 busses for my local outputs and I don’t want to duplicate any of those on the stage box outputs, I will have a total of 8 remaining busses to play with from the stage box, including some which are a limited like the L&R (fixed inputs from the main faders, I assume) and the remaining matrix pair (needs to be fed by a group or a mix or by L&R).

This sounds as if it will work for us but please let me know if I’ve misunderstood.

Incidentally, the reason we are not going for the ME monitoring system is simply cost to change. Similarly the GLD series is out of our price range and equally importantly doesn’t have enough physical faders for our semi-trained volunteers (church setting) – we want 32 physical faders on a single layer for ease of understanding.

Thanks again

Andrew

[[XAP]BobParticipant]

Be aware of what you can send. How many musicians do you have?

[Dick ReesParticipant]

Good luck.

[airickessParticipant]

The stereo output busses are married together and cannot be separated to create two different mix busses. So because of that your buss math is not correct.

[bossarbParticipant]

@airickess : can’t I use panning to create the same effect? So if I wanted mix 5 to be acoustic guitar and mix 6 to be violin, could I send both of those channels to the Group 5/6 buss and then within the bus sends (not affecting the mains) pan the guitar hard left and the violin hard right? Or is it not possible to pan the send to the buss without affecting the send to the mains?

@[XAP]Bob : we generally have 3 or 4 vocals, 2 guitars, stereo keys, bass guitar, 1 or 2 wind/ string and 8 channels of drums. To make life simpler for the operator, every channel is dedicated to a single mic or DI box, so even if we don’t have a 4th vocalist (say) that day we will still be using a channel of the desk (and of the Aviom) for that mic position labelled “Vocal 4”. We sub-mix the drum channels down to 3 channels for the Aviom inputs.

[MarkPAmanParticipant]

Yes, the panning on stereo mix busses is independent to that of the main L+R

However, all the subgroups share one pan control with L+R (I think), so what you can do with these is more limited for this application.

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