quote:
Originally posted by antonyjaHi All,
Firstly – you are all correct. The control of the stage box(es) are done over TCP/IP (either thru an ACE tunnel, or directly via Ethernet, etc.). So the networking of control messages is not a problem – and not too dissimilar to using Editor or MixPad. The problems come with the surface audio, obviously there is only 1 PAFL bus, so that would need to be shared (without doing major changes to the architecture), and similarly with talkback. It would be reasonably OK to say the 2nd surface has no talkback and shares the PAFL, but there are other audio issues. One of the major problems is that the Surface PreAmp type (analogue / digital / dual analogue) depends upon what surface is connected and what card(s) are fitted to them, in the case of modular iLive, this information is Tx’d to the stage box on connection. To simplify things you could designate a “Primary” and secondary surface, with only the primary surface being able to supply audio inputs to the rack, but this starts to get complex as the non-primary surface may be switched on first and if this is because the primary is about to be switched on, then fine, but if we now intend it to be used as a single surface, this would need a clear message to the user so as not to confuse (think hire stock here). This connection order problems become vast when you have dual stage boxes as well! Due to these complexities, and the relatively small number of requests for this functionality we decided not to add the feature. I may be worth noting that V1.9 did add some of the work that would be necessary for dual surface. If you point 2 surfaces at a single stage box then you now get individual control of processing (i.e. the sel buttons work independently), which they didn’t in V1.8.
Antony Jackson
Software Manager
Allen & Heath Limited
Antony,
Thank you very much for that detailed reply. Much appreciated 
iDR-48, T-112, Mixpad
College
