I wonder what audiophools would think about professional digital audio streaming over IP, for example Dante.
It needs a properly configured network but it works like a charm. Now tell a live sound engineer to buy a 50 metre long
"special Ethernet cable" for his digital snake from Audioquest
But of course audiophile grade routers do exist!
I bet he’s “sick of experts” too
Hear that said a lot by morons.
04:31 anyone with half a brain at all knows that what is this gonna do when
you've got all that crap or crap quality mains cable running in your walls and
through the powerlines
26:41 now look look what happens when i plug the audio quest cable in boom wow now
you see our noise floor went up here it's doing some weird stuff over here it
really went up here i don't think it's detectable because it's still at point zero
two percent here but who knows you know um who knows when you're cranking it up if
it can amplify that even more but look at these spikes so whatever kind of noise
was in the room
33:12 this cable does not live up to the marketing claims from my measurements
um it's difficult to work with in my opinion the connector breaks pretty easily
on it as you can see here just by sticking in the amplifier it broke off...
36:36 tell me if these educational videos are helpful... tell me if you fell victim to some bs markettiing that you now realize was nonsense.
I know you are clever, but when you call Dante "working like a charm" I'd like to question that a bit.
Dante:
- Will not traverse a router
- Is limited to 64 channels
- Will only be routed by a stinking Windows app, also on the same LAN
- Is using PTPv1
- Won't easily interoperate with AES67 or Ravenna
- Is proprietary
- And, I don't like it.
But, seriously. In my application (2000+ sound sources spread over a 2000km long country), Dante is a joke, a toy. Their attempt at world domination would have been spent better in coöperation with other industry forces to build an even better AES67.
I know you are clever, but when you call Dante "working like a charm" I'd like to question that a bit.I guess you have more experience with Dante than me, so I won't argue much. Anyway what I meant (poorly phrased
is that it works without creating any of the "audiophoolic" problems audiophools imagine
QuoteDante:
- Will not traverse a router
- Is limited to 64 channels
Hmm. I think they wanted to play it safe. Running on a single broadcast domain they can do a lot of magical autoconfiguration without
relying on poorly supported multicast stuff.
So, well, it's designed for a building or at most campus level application.
Also I think they haven't done a bad job making sure that it can work with many "enterprise" Ethernet switches and with a reasonable
configuration it can coexist on the same infrastructure.
Quote
- Will only be routed by a stinking Windows app, also on the same LAN
What I have used is Macos based. I haven't tried Dante Domain Controller but I understand it's available on Macos as well? No Linux, though.
Or what do you mean with "routed"?
From what I understood they avoid a central "router" node per se, relying instead on a Dante Controller application that is more like an orchestrator for the capabilites in each Dante interface. That's not a bad decision.
Quote
- Is using PTPv1
- Won't easily interoperate with AES67 or Ravenna
I have used it just for mostly straightforward stuff, so no experience there. Anyway I insist, in the context of this thread the "works like a charm" means it doesn't create "audiophool" issue and I am sure audiophools that have attended live concerts in which Dante was used haven't noticed "imaginary digital issues".Quote
- Is proprietary
- And, I don't like it.
I must agree with this. It should be an open standard instead of a proprietary solution. As for liking, I think they did a good
job for their intended usage (venue level networking, at most campus level).QuoteBut, seriously. In my application (2000+ sound sources spread over a 2000km long country), Dante is a joke, a toy. Their attempt at world domination would have been spent better in coöperation with other industry forces to build an even better AES67.
I think they played it safe taking into account the lack of networking experience in audio professionals and the awful chaos in some implementation aspects of common protocols.
So yes, I saw it's not a "WAN" protocol but still I was surprised at how easy it is to set up as long as you have decent networking knowledge.
...until you have Ravenna and/or AES67 and/or SMPTE2059-clocked SMPTE2110 video. They all use PTPv2 which is an either-or protocol with PTPv1. If you support PTPv2 on your network, the Dante nodes will lose sync, because they can't create their clocking island. We ended up downgrading to a much worse switch for those nodes where Dante can't be turned off.
That is correct. And it is the right decision to make. I meant that the Dante Domain Controller that actually lets you set the crosspoints (i.e. decide which multicast addresses nodes are going to subscribe to) is a Windows app.
All your points are valid. It's a fantastic 1:1 replacement for an analog multicore cable and a small matrix router. The problem is that's there no path upwards. You can't grow, and you can't control things beyond the peephole they give you.
Also, you're completely correct that they wanted an easy sell for a complex problem. Problem is that this does not always work.. Biggest issue is the discovery of nodes and sources. Noone has solved this correctly in the "complete products" area; there's only skeletal implementations of properly designed node discovery systems, like the BBC efforts with NMOS IS-04
But no, Audiophools they're not!
...until you have Ravenna and/or AES67 and/or SMPTE2059-clocked SMPTE2110 video. They all use PTPv2 which is an either-or protocol with PTPv1. If you support PTPv2 on your network, the Dante nodes will lose sync, because they can't create their clocking island. We ended up downgrading to a much worse switch for those nodes where Dante can't be turned off.Out of my "pay grade". I do live jazz and I can work with a 10 channel mixing desk, go figure
But no, Audiophools they're not!So, we basicly agree. Now, how about teaming up and creating 9th Circle fixing all the Dante problems using IPv6, eggs, bacon, blockchain, BGP, egs bacon, quantum cryptography, blockchain and and fuzzy logic and blockchain blockchain instead of discrete bits? I am sure audiophools would love the fuzzy thing and the blockchain would help them feel secure?
Hmm. I think they wanted to play it safe. Running on a single broadcast domain they can do a lot of magical autoconfiguration without
relying on poorly supported multicast stuff.
So, well, it's designed for a building or at most campus level application.
Also I think they haven't done a bad job making sure that it can work with many "enterprise" Ethernet switches and with a reasonable
configuration it can coexist on the same infrastructure....until you have Ravenna and/or AES67 and/or SMPTE2059-clocked SMPTE2110 video. They all use PTPv2 which is an either-or protocol with PTPv1. If you support PTPv2 on your network, the Dante nodes will lose sync, because they can't create their clocking island. We ended up downgrading to a much worse switch for those nodes where Dante can't be turned off.
I don't know anything about Dante, but there are two layers of QoS you can tweak to match your requirements and make things work. Ethernet and IP have each their own QoS functionality which can be combined. Additionally, professional switches and routers support several methods of queueing and queue configuration to map QoS classes to specific traffic handling while also supporting filters to classify specific traffic. If you need to build broadcast domain islands you can use VLANs.
Now, the implementation (and this is common to all switches we've tried, not to bash Cisco) is such, that when you tell the switch to start doing PTPv2 magic, it also stops forwarding PTPv1. Yeah, it sucks. I blame IEEE.
Now, the implementation (and this is common to all switches we've tried, not to bash Cisco) is such, that when you tell the switch to start doing PTPv2 magic, it also stops forwarding PTPv1. Yeah, it sucks. I blame IEEE.
Have you tried switches supporting the configuration of the PTP version per port (e.g. OneTime networks)?
Late to this thread.
Let me say I use Dante in semi-pro way every weekend for years. I have friends that work large venues that have the whole place setup with Dante. Never had an issue with it ever, it just works.
It doesn't require $7k switches. I use a pair of lower end Cisco 8 port switches. Read some of the doc, the switches does have to do PTP, what they do want suggest is a switch with low gitter. They gave a list of switches from Cisco to stay away from. I trunk two VLANs between the switches, one has Dante only on it the other has DMX/Artbet and other low bandwidth data.
The switch does have to run or understand PTP, just be predictable in the forwarding of packets. What you do need to setup onto switch is QOS so that PTP gets priority. Plenty of docs, show the exact settings to use.
I do question two things stated. Limited to 64 channels, NO.
Needing some windows only app, NO. Most times nothing else is needed. If I want to pull a live recording, then the controller running on MacOs and also the Dante Virtual sound card driver, that looks like an ASIO driver to any recording app you happen to have. Controller allows me to map the streams to channels on the virtual sound card.
Mixing and matching withe other new protocols..... No need.
Anyway, what I'd love to know from people smarter than I am is this... He streams all his music to hisoverpricedpremium sound system via a Bluetooth DAC. Does Bluetooth recompress audio and result in degradation of the original source material?Depends on the BT standard and Codec used.
Some Codecs do not compress, they just use the available bit-rate and drop whatever would push past the limit.
Wireless streaming is always lossy.
Important distinction:
Streaming - Information is NOT stored permanently on the receiving device
Transfer - Information IS permanently stored on the receiving device
Not for long:
https://www.qualcomm.com/news/releases/2021/09/01/qualcomm-adds-bluetooth-lossless-audio-technology-snapdragon-sound