This page describes how to hear a playout at the control desk. There is one setting, and there is one setup that causes a problem whose cause is hard to guess.
The setting
Under Settings → Outputs → Audio output, you choose the sound device for each playout.
| Option | |
|---|---|
| Off | You hear nothing at the desk. The output is not affected. |
| Windows default device | The default device in Windows. |
| A specific device | The device you choose by name. |
Two playouts can use the same device, and Windows then mixes them. This is only useful if you can tell the two playouts apart by ear.
What you hear is what goes out
The monitoring sound comes from the same point as the output, so what you hear is exactly what the DeckLink and the stream receive. There is no separate monitor mix, which means that the control room can never hear something that the audience does not hear.
Monitoring on a device that is being recorded
If the monitoring output uses the same device that a source records from, the program warns you. Read this warning, because the symptom is misleading.
In this situation, you hear stuttering. It sounds like a computer that is too slow or a damaged file, but neither is the cause. The real cause is a loop: the usual example is a source that captures the desktop audio while the desk monitors on the same device.
There are two solutions:
- Switch off the source that records from the device.
- Choose a different monitoring output.
Practical advice
Monitor on headphones or on a separate output, and not on a device that the computer also captures.
Check the level once, at the desk, with real material. The master fader sets the level of the output, but the volume at the desk is set in Windows. If you confuse the two, a broadcast can go out without sound while the control room sounds fine.
If the audio stutters, read this page first. The settings on this page and on audio tracks cause most audio problems on a playout computer.
The delay of the sound
The delay is about 80 milliseconds, from the moment a sample is mixed to the moment it leaves the card. This is four frames at 50 frames per second. The delay is constant and does not increase during a show.
The program restarts a source that cannot keep up, so the other sources do not wait for it. A capture card with a problem therefore causes a short interruption in its own sound, and not an increasing delay in all sound.
When you jump to another position in a video, the sound fades out and in again over a tenth of a second, so the jump sounds like a clean cut.
What is not possible yet
You cannot listen to a cue before it goes on air. Monitoring at the desk gives you the output and not a preview, so what you hear is what the hall hears. This version does not support listening to a cue in advance on headphones, as on a sound desk.