Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Mark,
What are some of your favorite activities to do in the summer?



Evan

Going to the beach, getting away somewhere on vacation and Audioversity

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Yamaha also just acquired Revolabs which is another wireless company, albeit geared towards corporate meetings and presentations. Will we see a Yamaha branded wireless unit in the future or are they simply becoming part of Yamaha's diverse portfolio?

Hi Cameron,


As with the Line 6 acquisition, Revolabs is a wholly-owned subsidiary that is autonomously operated. Yamaha briefly had products in the microphone category many years ago, but our present intention is to add to the portfolio and collaborate in areas to strengthen products or even potentially create new categories.

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Welcome Marc and I thank you for embracing an interactive medium (forum). Some here would like to collect the homework and have you grade and return it next week, really? I know my question will take some digging and careful response but I have patience.

Hi William,

I believe you had a question about why we didn't implement the Dugan Music System along with the Dugan Speech System, although I don't see your post anymore. Thank you for your patience while I responded.

The answer is fairly simple - when we did our initial research we found that the Speech System was in much greater demand (and Dan Dugan agreed with that) so we focused our efforts on the Speech System. Like other manufacturers, engineering is not a limitless resource and we have to adjust priorities on what features will benefit the majority of users. So the Music System is not being overlooked, just at a lower priority of an ever-expanding list of future upgrades.

 

[Tim Padrick]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

...non-folding screens on the M7, CL-series, and QL series are very tall. While this presents a nice screen angle in use, it adds a tremendous amount of volume to the road case.... it would be nice if there was a way to not have to have a road case twice as tall as it otherwise would need to be except for the steep screen.

The case needs to be that tall. Otherwise, when on its wheels, it would be very skinny compared to its height, and as such it would tend to fall over with minimal provocation.

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Hi Marc. Thanks for your answers thus far. I have a personal pet peeve about a number of current Yamaha products - non-folding screens on the M7, CL-series, and QL series are very tall. While this presents a nice screen angle in use, it adds a tremendous amount of volume to the road case. We all appreciate the smaller size of the CL series compared to hulks like the 5D, but it would be nice if there was a way to not have to have a road case twice as tall as it otherwise would need to be except for the steep screen.

Before anyone jumps on me, yes, I understand that in many situations this isn't a factor and there may be cost and/or reliability reasons to make the screen fixed.

Hi TJ,

When we first released the M7, we received a lot of similar comments along with suggestions on ratchet/lock mechanisms or kickstands. Since the touchscreen is such a fundamental interface element providing visual feedback and user input, we felt that it should be an extremely stable surface like other user interface controls on the mixer. A console that has a panel that gives when a button is pressed or faders that wobble does not give the operator a feeling of confidence or even that the gear is roadworthy. And implementing some sort of folding screen would create a reliance on a moving part to remain stable and reliable throughout the lifetime of the mixer. We found this to be near impossible without significant cost.

The steep screen slope is necessary to get the touchscreen within arm's reach (and arm's reach varies greatly!) and keep the screen in view so the operator can keep his eyes forward towards the stage. This seems to be a common trend amongst many touch screen digital mixers.

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Hi Marc,


I am curious about the preamp design. With the QL sharing some of the features of the CL family, are the preamps similar? The QL series offers improved rack processing, so I am curious about any other sonic improvements as this product is clearly not a "race to the bottom" level mixer

Hi Kent,

The preamp circuit in QL is identical to the preamps in CL and the Rio units. Our goal was design a less expensive console, but it needed to share the great sound quality. After all, the QL will be sharing the Rio units and the CL could be sharing the QL mic preamps, so they needed to match. We introduced several improvements with CL that were carried over to QL. We redesigned our digital clocking system for use with digital networks (the game changed a bit since digital networks prefer to be the clock master not only for overall clock distribution stability, but also for quicker recovery in case of failure). Our grounding schemes changed to improve noise floor. The feedback from CL users has been overwhelmingly positive.

Yamaha's philosophy is to have a natural sounding analog input stage and give the engineer an opportunity to create color where he wants it. That's where the Premium Rack comes in. We've have a technology called Virtual Circuitry Modeling (VCM) which recreates analog circuits in digital -starting from an analog circuit and carefully modeling each electrical component in digital to recreate all the non-linearities of a particular device. This technology impressed Rupert Neve so much that he allowed us to model his Portico 5033 EQ and 5043 Compressor. The Premium Rack also contains several famous classic units and an original Dynamic EQ processor.

Also, kudos to Yamaha for introducing a product, with a manual and actual specs online and actually shipping the product AHEAD of the announced date!

Thank you for noticing. Like other manufacturers, we have been guilty of announcing products too soon and delivering late. We are making a wholehearted attempt to buck this trend. I was very pleased to see QL consoles leaving our docks on their way to customers already.

 

[Russel Murton]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

The studio/dealer I work for just acquired a Nuage system, I see with the latest update you added AD8HR remote control support into the Nuage Master section. Do you plan on adding native RIO support so the RIO units do not have to be in AD8HR mode?

Do you plan on making an OSX version of R Remote? I find it amusing that you make a Windows only application that requires Bonjour.

I was surprised to see the QL series not priced to compete with the GLD80, are you aiming more specifically in terms of market with the QL, commercial and corporate rather than music?

I'm surprised to not see the QL series faders split into banks, so you can have DCA's and input faders available at the same time. Also the placement of the fader layer buttons and UDK's seems to be a bit weird.

 

[Christian Boche]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Hi Marc,
thank you for doing this here. Here is my question.
Some years ago Yamaha acquired Steinberg and I thought, this would lead to a new dimension of VST-Plugin/ASIO insert integration into the new Yamaha live desks. But nothing really happened.
I'm still puzzled, that Yamaha does not make use of that untapped potential. By now this claim is taken by Waves and all the "waves solutions" are "Waves only":-(
So a lot of nice plugins, that would be very useful in a live enviroment (f.e. Drumagog, Trigger, FabFilter and so on) can't be used in Waves Multirack and such. I thought, Yamaha & Steinberg could pull off a new standard of VST Plugin integration, that would allow the user to use any VST plug (even Wave) they like. Why is that?

 

[John Roberts]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Hi Kent,

The preamp circuit in QL is identical to the preamps in CL and the Rio units. Our goal was design a less expensive console, but it needed to share the great sound quality. After all, the QL will be sharing the Rio units and the CL could be sharing the QL mic preamps, so they needed to match. We introduced several improvements with CL that were carried over to QL. We redesigned our digital clocking system for use with digital networks (the game changed a bit since digital networks prefer to be the clock master not only for overall clock distribution stability, but also for quicker recovery in case of failure). Our grounding schemes changed to improve noise floor. The feedback from CL users has been overwhelmingly positive.

Yamaha's philosophy is to have a natural sounding analog input stage and give the engineer an opportunity to create color where he wants it. That's where the Premium Rack comes in. We've have a technology called Virtual Circuitry Modeling (VCM) which recreates analog circuits in digital -starting from an analog circuit and carefully modeling each electrical component in digital to recreate all the non-linearities of a particular device. This technology impressed Rupert Neve so much that he allowed us to model his Portico 5033 EQ and 5043 Compressor. The Premium Rack also contains several famous classic units and an original Dynamic EQ processor.



Thank you for noticing. Like other manufacturers, we have been guilty of announcing products too soon and delivering late. We are making a wholehearted attempt to buck this trend. I was very pleased to see QL consoles leaving our docks on their way to customers already.

Thanks for taking questions here... I was wondering how you would answer that question. Customers still want to believe that mic preamps are some yet to be conquered design problem, and that more expensive consoles must use more expensive parts (it's the features that cost money guys). I favor the flat/neutral audio path philosophy, with bypass switches on intentional coloration, so +1 on that.

Since we are supposed to ask questions I guess I am most curious about the "Dugan" algorithm implementation. I have been waiting a long time for this to show up inside a desk since it should not be very heavy lifting for the typical digital console engine. To phrase this as a question, "is Yamaha looking at automating any other aspects of the sound mixers job?". I notice that your company has access to the Line 6 technology so is that a possible source of future feature direction? IMO we are just scratching the surface of how digital decision making could off-load mundane routine decisions and simplify the sound mixers job.

JR

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

The studio/dealer I work for just acquired a Nuage system, I see with the latest update you added AD8HR remote control support into the Nuage Master section. Do you plan on adding native RIO support so the RIO units do not have to be in AD8HR mode?

Hi Russel, that has been a common request from Nuage users, and I'm happy to say yes, Rio control will be coming soon. Stay tuned!

Do you plan on making an OSX version of R Remote? I find it amusing that you make a Windows only application that requires Bonjour.

Yes, there will be a Mac version. I'm afraid I don't have any specific release timing to share at this time though. The Rio unit (and Dante) utilize mDNS (Bonjour) to identify and keep track of devices by name since they use self-assigned Link Local addresses by default.

I was surprised to see the QL series not priced to compete with the GLD80, are you aiming more specifically in terms of market with the QL, commercial and corporate rather than music?

QL utilizes many core elements from the CL series (Faders, Channel strip, touchscreen, mic preamps, Dante network implementation, etc.), so it was a challenge to keep the maintain the lower price point. Historically our SR consoles have had a broad application profile, and with QL we wanted to give it some "specialty" tools for corporate a/v applications. So it wouldn't necessarily be fair to say it was designed for one application over another since in terms of quality and other available tools (see the info about the Premium Rack in post #26) it also excels for music applications.

I'm surprised to not see the QL series faders split into banks, so you can have DCA's and input faders available at the same time. Also the placement of the fader layer buttons and UDK's seems to be a bit weird.

We already have a split bank console series - CL. QL was designed to have a simpler interface at a lower cost than CL, and still be part of the CL family. Besides, you can have DCAs next to input faders by using the custom fader banks.

Get your hands on a QL. Like any new tool, you'll need to get accustomed to the placement of the different controls. Maybe you can give more detail to what you mean by wierd. In my opinion, the UDKs and Fader Bank selection is in a convenient location where your hand is likely to be for quick access.

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Hi Marc,
thank you for doing this here. Here is my question.
Some years ago Yamaha acquired Steinberg and I thought, this would lead to a new dimension of VST-Plugin/ASIO insert integration into the new Yamaha live desks. But nothing really happened.
I'm still puzzled, that Yamaha does not make use of that untapped potential. By now this claim is taken by Waves and all the "waves solutions" are "Waves only":-(
So a lot of nice plugins, that would be very useful in a live enviroment (f.e. Drumagog, Trigger, FabFilter and so on) can't be used in Waves Multirack and such. I thought, Yamaha & Steinberg could pull off a new standard of VST Plugin integration, that would allow the user to use any VST plug (even Wave) they like. Why is that?

Hi Christian,

I'm really glad the moderators asked me to join for this Q&A.

Regarding your question, I have a few different answers, and hopefully one of them addresses your question:

Many options for VST Host software exist (Cubase and Nuendo to name a few that I would recommend ~~:smile, so why not use one to get external inserts? Latency through the interface and software could be optimized to be very low (depending on the interface and computer of course). Connection would be done using the corresponding MY-card flavor. This is not too far from the Waves Soundgrid concept. Yes, in this case we aren't providing a finished plug-and-play solution, and it is up to the user/sound company to assemble and test a viable solution, but it is something that is reasonably attainable.

If you are asking about implanting VST inside the console, we have consciously chosen not to do so. VST is an open standard, and as an open platform, anyone can create a VST plugin. You can find many types of VST plugins on the web (including student/hobbiest experiments and non-commercial). There is no governing body that verifies the stability or implementation of VST plugins, and as a result, some VST plugins can produce errors resulting in noise or even crashing the VST engine, or just have unsuitable latency for live use. Reliability and stability are fundamental principles for Yamaha digital consoles, and so far we have opted to suggest the external VST route.

if you are suggesting that we create a different standard or VST "offshoot" for live plugins, you'd have to consider the business model for plugins. In order for a software company to produce yet another version of their plugin technology, they would expect to sell a relatively high volume of units to recoup at least their engineering efforts. Digital consoles do not sell in the same volumes as DAW/Performance software, so we believe this would not be an attractive business proposal for plugin designers. VST is a high-volume format with a multitude of host software platforms.

 

[Michael John]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Hi Marc,

Thanks very much for taking the time to Q&A here.

I work with many small churches who are keen to make the jump to digital, especially to have working presets for the mostly volunteer sound teams. I've installed some LS9-32's but most churches balk at the price. (01V96's are too small in fader count and more complicated.)

So when I heard about the QL series, I was hoping for a slightly cheaper LS9-32 replacement. I was disappointed. It would appear (at least for now) that Yamaha are leaving the small, live end of the market to the Behringer X32 and others.

Can you share any information that could help me convince people to wait, rather than head to the competition?

Thanks,
Michael

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Since we are supposed to ask questions I guess I am most curious about the "Dugan" algorithm implementation. I have been waiting a long time for this to show up inside a desk since it should not be very heavy lifting for the typical digital console engine. To phrase this as a question, "is Yamaha looking at automating any other aspects of the sound mixers job?". I notice that your company has access to the Line 6 technology so is that a possible source of future feature direction? IMO we are just scratching the surface of how digital decision making could off-load mundane routine decisions and simplify the sound mixers job.

Hi John,

We believe in providing tools to help the operator perform their job more efficiently to produce a better result. The Dugan Automixer is a great tool because it allows the operator to focus on intelligibility and sound quality rather than worrying about number of open mics or gain before feedback. I use the broad term "operator" because we realize that there is a wide variance in the skill level of our users - from church volunteers to professional sound engineers. So yes, we are looking to provide appropriate tools to help the different skill levels. In some cases we may be aiming to simplify for novice users, and in other cases we are looking to create solutions by increasing flexibility or introducing new paradigms for the advanced sound engineer. Sorry I can't be more specific, but we have many new ideas that will be revealed at the appropriate time. But I do have to say that the absolute best tool for a sound engineer is their own ears.

Yamaha-owned companies have been known to share technologies and know-how, so future collaboration with Line 6 is certainly a possibility.

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Hi Marc,

Thanks very much for taking the time to Q&A here.

I work with many small churches who are keen to make the jump to digital, especially to have working presets for the mostly volunteer sound teams. I've installed some LS9-32's but most churches balk at the price. (01V96's are too small in fader count and more complicated.)

So when I heard about the QL series, I was hoping for a slightly cheaper LS9-32 replacement. I was disappointed. It would appear (at least for now) that Yamaha are leaving the small, live end of the market to the Behringer X32 and others.

Can you share any information that could help me convince people to wait, rather than head to the competition?

Thanks,
Michael

Hi Michael,

I'm sorry you were disappointed. I know it is typically expected that over time the cost of technology decreases, but we felt that the industry was not looking for a slightly cheaper LS9, but rather a much more useful tool that incorporated modern functionality like a touchscreen and audio networking. We've heard the requests for a product in the low range, simpler than 01V96.

I don't have specifics to share today, but we will be aggressively perusing all ranges of digital mixers that will carry Yamaha's reliability and quality. Stay tuned...

 

[Robert Lofgren]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Yamaha-owned companies have been known to share technologies and know-how, so future collaboration with Line 6 is certainly a possibility.

Given the line6 stagescape will this product be moved over to the yamaha mixer products (in a sense that sounds logical to me) or will there be some yamaha products coming out from the stagescape concept?

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Given the line6 stagescape will this product be moved over to the yamaha mixer products (in a sense that sounds logical to me) or will there be some yamaha products coming out from the stagescape concept?

Hi Robert,

Line 6 is a subsidiary of Yamaha and will continue to operate autonomously. The StageScape M20D will remain a Line 6 product. I'm afraid that we don't have any specific information to give at this time about integrating our technologies.

 

[Andrew Broughton]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Hi Marc;

Thank you for taking the time to answer questions on the forum.

I have been a long time Yamaha user and currently work mostly with the PM5D as it has a few functions that none of the other current models have.
I would love to switch to a CL console, but there are 2 functions that still need to be added to the CL software that are on the PM5D before I would do that.

First is selectable pre/post eq for mix sends on a PER-CHANNEL basis. The PM5D can do this, but every other Yamaha mixer that's currently on the market has only a global selection for each mix, not on each channel.

Second is insertable parametric eq on each channel. The PM5D allows you to switch the GEQ to an 8-band parametric eq which can be inserted on a channel. On the CL you cannot change the GEQ to a PEQ and you cannot even insert a GEQ on a channel!

I know there are workarounds but they end up using additional mixes and/or channels. Since these are simply software changes, it would make sense that your new flagship line had at least the functionality of your previous flagshship consoles. Hopefully you have the ability to suggest to Yamaha to add functionality to the CL software to bring it in line with the PM5D.

Thank you for listening!

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

Hi Marc;

Thank you for taking the time to answer questions on the forum.

I have been a long time Yamaha user and currently work mostly with the PM5D as it has a few functions that none of the other current models have.
I would love to switch to a CL console, but there are 2 functions that still need to be added to the CL software that are on the PM5D before I would do that.

First is selectable pre/post eq for mix sends on a PER-CHANNEL basis. The PM5D can do this, but every other Yamaha mixer that's currently on the market has only a global selection for each mix, not on each channel.

Second is insertable parametric eq on each channel. The PM5D allows you to switch the GEQ to an 8-band parametric eq which can be inserted on a channel. On the CL you cannot change the GEQ to a PEQ and you cannot even insert a GEQ on a channel!

I know there are workarounds but they end up using additional mixes and/or channels. Since these are simply software changes, it would make sense that your new flagship line had at least the functionality of your previous flagshship consoles. Hopefully you have the ability to suggest to Yamaha to add functionality to the CL software to bring it in line with the PM5D.

Thank you for listening!

Hi Andy,

Thank you for your suggestions. We've been catching up on many PM5D features for CL, and we will continue to do so. Your requests are on the "list".

 

[Steve Hurt]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

1) Are there plans to make the ipad ap for the LS9 support multiple users (w/lockout)
2) the ipad ap needs to control effects
3) Need an iphone ap w/lockout for people to mix their own IEM's

note that I'm sure you know: In the clubs, ipad functionality is a buy/no buy consideration. You're losing sales due to the lack of functionality.
(and you guys did the first ipad ap as far as I can know)

bonus: Any plans for an upgraded LS9 line? It's time for one.

 

[Marc Lopez]

Re: Marc Lopez of Yamaha Commercial Audio Q&A

1) Are there plans to make the ipad ap for the LS9 support multiple users (w/lockout)
2) the ipad ap needs to control effects
3) Need an iphone ap w/lockout for people to mix their own IEM's

note that I'm sure you know: In the clubs, ipad functionality is a buy/no buy consideration. You're losing sales due to the lack of functionality.
(and you guys did the first ipad ap as far as I can know)

bonus: Any plans for an upgraded LS9 line? It's time for one.

Hi Steve,

Yes, StageMix was the first iPad mixer controller app out. We are still actively developing it, and it's on version 4 available for 4 different mixer series now.

Regarding #1, LS9 can only connect to one device at a time (one iPad or 1 Computer), so a multi-iPad connection is not possible. Would you be willing to accept multiple connections if there was a proxy device (like a computer) to manage the connections?

Regarding #2 & 3, those are noted for our wish list.

For your bonus question: we are considering a true successor for LS9, although we just released QL which is in a very similar price range with functionality well beyond an LS9.