Calrec Network Primer V2

CALREC NETWORK PRIMER V2 Introduction to professional audio networks - 2017 edition Putting Sound in the Picture calrec.com NETWORK PRIMER V2 CONTENTS Forward 5 Introduction 7 Chapter One: The benefits of networking 11 Chapter Two: Some technical background 19 Chapter Three: Routes to interoperability 23 Chapter Four: Control, sync and metadata over IP 27 The established policy of Calrec Audio Ltd. is to seek improvements to the design, specifications and manufacture of all products. It is not always possible to provide notice outside the company of the alterations that take place continually. 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NETWORK PRIMER V2 FORWARD This Primer is a new edition that updates field of computer networking technology the original 2013 Calrec Networking might gain a clearer understanding of the Primer to reflect the many changes that subject. have occurred in the world of broadcast networking technology since then — four This Primer aims to explain the increasing years is a long time in this field. use of data and IP-based networking technology in broadcast applications, Nonetheless, our aim is still to explain examines the benefits that this technology the background and technology behind can offer forward-thinking modern data and IP-based networks with broadcasters, and considers where it may specific reference to its application in take the world of broadcast in the future. broadcasting, such that a broadcast engineer with no formal training in the Hebden Bridge, Spring 2017 Putting Sound in the Picture 4 NETWORK PRIMER V2 calrec.com NETWORK PRIMER V2 INTRODUCTION Putting Sound in the Picture 6 NETWORK PRIMER V2 calrec.com INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION The word ‘network’ has a long a separate physical connection is required and even to work ‘in’ - virtual broadcast greater flexibility and geographical history; it was first recorded in for each audio channel, whether from a studios, where the control surface is in freedom available to them. the mid-sixteenth century, but its microphone, mixing console, or recording one location, the DSP used for the mixing roots hint that it may well have device. in a completely different building, and the In the longer term, the broadcast industry been in use much earlier than that. audio inputs and outputs somewhere else will further borrow from the IT industry Like much of modern English, it Modern networked broadcast systems altogether - perhaps even in a different by shifting away from bespoke hardware has gone through a variety of ever offer more flexibility; all of the hardware country. towards software processing running on more abstracted meanings, from is permanently connected to a data commodity computing platforms. While a description of a physical object network, and the precise nature of the As long as they are all connected to the not all broadcast processes will fit this to more figurative, intangible interconnections between the equipment same network, they should be able to model, many will, and in doing so, offer concepts. What began as a way of can be redefined and reassigned at any interoperate just as effectively as the days benefits in scalability and economy. describing an invention for catching time under software control, remotely if when all these components were part fish was later applied to similarly required. of a single mixer in a hard-wired studio, As the shift to an IP infrastructure interconnected physical systems, permanently located in one place. continues, we will be encouraged to drop including those of canals, railways, Such ideas are not new, and small- our conventional signal-based approach in telephone wires – and eventually scale proprietary networks of this type These more flexible, abstracted favor of a services model, where content, computers. have existed in broadcasting for many implementations of once-tangible, both live and stored, may be discovered years. But the declining complexity hard-wired, and immovable resources, and accessed by anyone in possession By the early 20th century, the word and improving cost-to-benefit ratio of offer broadcasters many benefits, as of access rights and an appropriate IP had come to refer to systems of implementing large networked broadcast we shall see. These include the ability to connection, regardless of their location. related entities that were no longer systems, coupled with the widening move projects swiftly from one studio to physically connected, as with radio and capabilities of the technology, has another by reassigning connections, or However, at the time of writing, much TV transmitters belonging to a single tempted more and more of the world’s controlling aspects of the mixing process remains to be done. Standards enabling broadcaster, or groups of business forward-thinking broadcasters to move to remotely, without having to be in the same practitioners to define and realise all of colleagues. networked systems. geographical location as the event being these possibilities are still being written mixed. and ratified, and manufacturers are still In the last few years, we’ve had ‘wireless In the past few years, the spread of IP- developing networking protocols based networks’ (which medieval speakers based IT networking technology across At the same time, we’re getting closer on open standards that will allow their of English might have regarded as the world has furthered the development to the goal of being able to transmit equipment to interface and work together. an oxymoron) and ‘social networks’ of such networks. Increasingly, broadcast broadcast audio, video, sync information, composed of users that ‘connect’ technology manufacturers and standards control data and metadata together over There is no doubt that there are solely via data transmissions over the organisations are developing systems that agnostic, scalable IP-based data networks huge opportunities for forward- Internet; itself a network of physically utilise, at least in part, hardware, standards consisting simply of data cable and IT thinking broadcasters and technology disconnected, but nonetheless linked and data transmission protocols originally switches. manufacturers who are prepared to computers. created for the world of IT, rather than embrace and engage with the changes. developing proprietary systems. This promises further advantages which It’s time to look at some of these benefits A similar process of abstraction has been will transform how audio, video and in more detail. taking place in the world of broadcast This is bringing costs down further, as control data is encoded, transported and technology, transforming the hard-wired, well as adding a more global dimension managed, such as the prospect of being localised studios of the past into more to the capabilities of the networks being able to dispense with separate audio, flexible, networked systems. Forty years developed for broadcast. video and data transports, expensive ago, television studios consisted of analogue audio and video cabling, and cameras and microphones hard-wired As IP networks make geography and relatively inefficient embedded-audio into discrete hardware vision mixers, the physical proximity of resources less video interfaces such as SDI. patchbays and audio mixing consoles and less important, the very concept of a which routed to specific video tape studio itself is becoming more abstract. In the medium term, broadcast workflows machines in one location. In such systems, Already, it is possible to conceive of - will evolve to take advantage of the 8 NETWORK PRIMER V2 CALREC Putting Sound in the Picture 9 NETWORK PRIMER V2 CHAPTER ONE: BENEFITS OF NETWORKING Putting Sound in the Picture 10 NETWORK PRIMER V2 calrec.com CHAPTER ONE: BENEFITS OF NETWORKING CHAPTER ONE: BENEFITS OF NETWORKING A networked broadcast studio, of these simultaneously are still under dedicated to a single room again when the editing suite or transmission station development, but progress towards that job is complete. isn’t necessarily more efficient goal is moving fast. Mixing Console - including Mixing Console - including than a hard-wired one — indeed Even with patchbays that allow flexible control surface,

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