Remote mixing on the LS9

Rob Spence

Rob Spence

Senior
Jan 11, 2011
897
4
18
Boston Metro North West
www.lynxaudioservices.com
The topic of digital vs analog has certainly been beat to death recently so I won't go there. I am firmly in the digital camp because of recall, off line config storage & editing, and remote mixing. Next I want a remote stage box.

So, this past weekend I had a chance to use two different platforms to remote mix my LS9.

There have been past threads on the advantages of Studio Manager, SOF, Air Fader and Stage Mix. Each seems to have it's good points and bad ones. So, Saturday night I used Stage Mix on an iPad 1 for a while and then Air Fader on a Motion Computing XP tablet. Note, I do use Studio Manager in the office to make the initial desk configurations since I save the console files for each event or band I work with.

Studio Manager has the most control available but I find the window management too hard to deal with on a small screen and the density of the screens combined with the difficulty of working with rotary encoders, I never use it live anymore.
Adding SOF (Sends On Faders) certainly made setting up monitors much easier though.

Stage Mix has a major "cool factor" and it has much of what I like for dialing in monitors while standing with the performers on stage and getting a good mix during sound check. I found having to select 1-32 vs 33-64 a little awkward as it adds some more motions. Turing rotary encoders was a pain.

The big thing that has me relegating the iPad back to Radar Scanning and Tapatalk is that when I had it connected, it caused the LS9 to become sluggish!!! Not ok.
When I would go to the desk and select something, it would take 1/4 second or longer for it to respond.

So, after sound check, I shut down the iPad, restarted the LS9, and brought out my XP tablet and connected it up using Air Fader (V2) and response time was back to normal.

FYI, I use a Netgear N600 series wireless router. I have the 2.4gHz radio turned off and only use the 5gHz one.
I have the LS9 Ethernet port connected to it along with 2 Dante cards and my MacBook Pro that I use to record the shows.

Anyway, that was my experience. It seems that Yamaha is doing something funny with StageMix to slow down the console. They need to correct it.

Now back to unloading :-)

In all fairness, I am not up to date with firmware on the LS9 but till now, none of the updates have fixed anything I needed fixed.
 
Re: Remote mixing on the LS9

It may have to do with running SM on an iPad 1. At our club, we just got a lightly-used iPad 1 to keep in the drawer. However, when I mix, I bring my iPad 3 along and use it. When using my iPad, I've never had any slowdown issues at all, on either side of the wireless link. However, occasionally I get slowdowns when trying to use the house iPad. I have an 802.11N router set up, dedicated to the LS9, so there isn't any other traffic on the link.
 
Re: Remote mixing on the LS9

I have yet to find a tablet or computer solution that I'd want to mix a whole show on. I still far prefer having my hands on real faders than touch screens.

That being said, I really wish someone would come up with a stage box and wireless console solution that is reasonably priced. The concept shouldn't be that difficult to create, as you're halfway there with the iPad or tablet solutions already. If the console could just tap back into that and then send the control signals to the stage box and it would do all of the lifting inside the stage box, that would be awesome. The A&H iLive systems work this way. Not sure if you can do a wireless link to do that though. I believe the cat5 connection they use is proprietary, but I could be wrong. The neat thing about that system is that if you unplug the cat5 cable mid show, everything just stays where its at. Plug the cat 5 back in, and you can start mixing again. It's pretty awesome.
 
Re: Remote mixing on the LS9

I think you have a router or other conflict problem. My ipad 1 and 2 react the exact same way. The only time the console gets slow is when you let the ipad go to sleep and while sleeping it tries to quit out of its connection with your board. At that point the board can look frozen (tho continues to pass audio just fine). maybe try a different router. Ive found the ipad mixing to be smooth and convenient even when someone else was mixing on the desk at the same time.
 
Re: Remote mixing on the LS9

Brian Frost said:
I think you have a router or other conflict problem. My ipad 1 and 2 react the exact same way. The only time the console gets slow is when you let the ipad go to sleep and while sleeping it tries to quit out of its connection with your board. At that point the board can look frozen (tho continues to pass audio just fine). maybe try a different router. Ive found the ipad mixing to be smooth and convenient even when someone else was mixing on the desk at the same time.
Click to expand...

I don't suspect the network. There are a total of 4 wired connections plus the wireless. Operation with the iPad is fine. The problem is that when the iPad is connected (not when sleeping), there is a lag in response when operating the desk. For instance, you are out front listening and making some small fader changes and discover that you would like to change something not easily done with the iPad so you walk up to the desk, press select on a channel, and it takes a noticeable time for the LS9 screen to show the correct channel. This does not happen when I use the wireless XP based application.

Brian, I too would prefer to mix on the console but it is a bit awkward when the LS9 is located behind the band.
 
Re: Remote mixing on the LS9

I've noticed the lag. It wasn't there on the first versions of Stage Mix, but it's there now.

I use Ipad 1 also.
 
Re: Remote mixing on the LS9

I'm still using Studio Manager on a little netbook, but with a Griffin Powermate (USB knob) to control the on-screen knobs. SM is still a little clunky to navigate, but having an actual knob makes a world of difference in being able to do a practical mix. Plus we've had a fair bit of difficulty getting the iPad 2 to work reliably, even on the same exact wireless setup.
 
Re: Remote mixing on the LS9

Rob Spence said:
Studio Manager has the most control available but I find the window management too hard to deal with on a small screen and the density of the screens combined with the difficulty of working with rotary encoders, I never use it live anymore.
Adding SOF (Sends On Faders) certainly made setting up monitors much easier though.
Click to expand...

Say what? SOF on SM? How do ya get to that?
 
Re: Remote mixing on the LS9

Rob Spence said:
So, this past weekend I had a chance to use two different platforms to remote mix my LS9.
Click to expand...

Your post is an excellent summary of the current state. I think Airfader is pretty far ahead, but the iPad is both ergonomic and convenient.
The Airfader guy has a limited multi-touch Android client. I'm hoping he'll do a full-on iPad one.
 
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