hot swap

folkvalley

I'm new to Soundweb London, so please be kind if this is a stupid question.

I'm considering a DSP system, wich will need 3 or 4 BLU boxes. If one of the unit fails, can I configure a spare one off line and bring it into the system, replacing the failed one with out affect the other units? I mean without them stop the audio, receiving new configure files, reboot and etc.

Dan Lynch

Replacing/reloading one device will not cause any change to other devices on the network unless you change the programming of those devices.

Dan

folkvalley

Hello Dan, in another thread, I read you comment as follow, and I asked a further question which is also related to my first question. What's your opinion? I don't care time sync that much, but I do want to have an over view of the whole system.

“If you have 30 devices on one LAN that all need to be in time sync, then putting them in different design files is the start of your problem. Your requirement that they all be in time sync means that you want them to act like one system but you've decided to not make them one system. Put them in one design file and they'll all get synced to the exact same clock every time the computer goes online.”

Here Dan says it's better to put 30 boxes into 1 design file. What if one of the box fails? What's the procedure to recover the system if I do have a cold spare in hand? Will this influence the other 29 units?

rob birch

So i have saved my design to a PC. I have a 2 box network (BLU80 and BLU32) My BLU80 takes a power spike and needs to go to the shop.

I can take the same saved file, load the configuration onto another BLU80 in the shop, either keep the new units HiQnet address or copy the original units HiQnet address if i am using external (AMX or crestron) control.

I can now take that unit and hook it into my installation and as soon as it powers up it will be operating the same as my original unit. I do not have to go online when back on site and reload any devices.

I have had large networks where i have done the above and it all works.

I have a large system (conference centre on one side and casino on the other) I have recently seperated them, even though the main music feeds are still being fed via cobranet from the casino to the conference centre. The main reason for this is that the casino is going through various upgrades, and every time i modify the design file i need to reload the devices that differ from the original design. As i am modifying a lot of logic and parameter presets, this can affect the entire system. When you re-load a design to the network the audio will stop for about 1 second to each unit you load (a re-sync will not affect the audio).

Now the conference centre does its own thing, so i am not stopping audio during a keynote speech because a gaming area has just come online.

There are a number of other ways to have redundancy in you soundweb system. The first is that you have 2 devices on the network, with one unit acting as a redundant of the main device. In this case you will have copied the same configuration from the main device to the second unit and mirrored all the EQ and gain, etc settings across.
If the main device is transmitting cobranet, you adjust the priority of the second device cobranet bundles so they do not transmit unless the main device fails.
You can also have a preset locking the mutes on via a logic out from the main device to a control port in on the backup. So if the main device fails, the mutes unmute and audio passes.
(You will of course have mirrored all the line inputs to the device via transformer splits, etc )

With regards time sync, that is another issue. If it is imperative that all devices are synced the same, then they need to be in one design.

Dan Lynch

Thanks, Rob.

I didn't feel like typing that much.

Dan