Avid has introduced the next generation of its VENUE live sound software – the Avid VENUE, the S6L system’s most significant software release to date.
Avid VENUE software now supports I/O sharing across three Avid VENUE | S6L systems, providing more workflow flexibility while reducing costs and complexity without any negative impact on sound quality. Support for I/O sharing makes it easy for users to add a broadcast console or second monitor console to their setup or enable fast switchover at festivals and concerts.
With I/O sharing, microphone feeds can be split digitally over the network so engineers only have to build one set of I/O racks, providing significant cost savings for touring productions and reducing setup times. Plus, all I/O configurations fully support Avid’s True Gain technology, which automatically manages gain compensation to ensure proper signal levels are maintained for each engineer.
In an industry first, Avid also announced that users can now send and receive up to 128 channels of audio between Avid VENUE | S6L systems and Milan (media-integrated local area network) certified devices – including loudspeakers, amplifiers and other pro audio devices – with the new MLN-192 Milan Option Card and latest Avid VENUE software.
Seamless plug-and-play connectivity lets users distribute audio with ease to Milan-enabled devices over an Ethernet AVB network, with no switch configuration or IT expertise required. Engineers and sound designers can benefit from the speed, interoperability and reliability that the industry-standard Milan protocol brings to live sound without any fear of audio dropouts or signal degradation.
“As the world’s first live sound console to be certified by the rapidly growing Milan protocol and the only one to offer gain-compensated I/O sharing between three systems, this is more than just a software update – VENUE 7 truly takes a giant leap forward,” said Dana Ruzicka, SVP & GM of Audio & Music Solutions at Avid. “Although live performances have been hit hard by the ongoing pandemic, Avid remains fully committed to innovating for the live sound industry. We’re doubling down with the biggest software release since shipping the S6L system, giving engineers and sound designers the power and performance they need to deliver the best possible live sound productions.”
“In live sound you need reliability, rapid deployment, and high fidelity,” said Richard Bugg, Avnu Alliance Pro AV Segment Chair. “The Avid VENUE | S6L is the industry’s first live sound console to be Milan-certified, guaranteeing it will work with other Milan-certified devices, giving users a fast and dependable solution with expanded functionality.”
The Avnu Alliance is a community creating an interoperable ecosystem of low-latency, time-synchronised, highly reliable networked devices using open standards through certification.
VENUE 7 also provides superior control of delay compensation to help users tackle plugin-heavy mixes with complex routing requirements. Aligning busses and matrixes is simplified through Automatic Delay Compensation (ADC) settings, while the new Input Delay Alignment command makes it easy to align selected input channels to compensate for any plugins inserted on those inputs. Using Avid’s True Time technology, this provides the most comprehensive alignment of audio signals of any solution on the market, ensuring more granular control and visibility over how delay gets managed across the system.
