Latest revision as of 15:17, 21 February 2018

Wegener Unity 4000 Setup

Serial Port Setup

• Start RDAdmin and then select "Manage Hosts".
• Select you computer from the list (it will be the only one unless you have added others since installing Rivendell). Double-click or select "Edit"
• Select "Serial Ports"
• Set the port ID to "Serial0" (This is what Rivendell will use to identify the serial port. If you use more than one serial port you will need to use another port ID.)
• Check the box "Enable"
• In the TTY Device box type one of the following depending on which serial port you are using. The references that follow them are the serial port names in Windows (com1,com2, etc.)
  • /dev/ttyS0 (com 1)
  • /dev/ttyS1 (com 2)
  • /dev/ttyS2 (com 3)
  • /dev/ttyS3 (com 4)
  • /dev/ttyS4 (com 5)

Note: if you are using a USB to Serial port convert you will have to figure out what port the Serial port show up on. /dev/usb/tts/0 has worked for me on my Linspire box.

• Set "Baud Rate" to 19200
• Set "Parity" to None
• Set "Data Bits" to 8
• Set "Stop Bits" to 1
• Set "Terminator" to None
• Click on Close

Switcher Setup

• Select "Switchers GPIO"
• Select "Add"
• Set the "New Matrix Number" to 0 (This is assuming that you have no other switchers setup, otherwise select another number. The Matrix number is what Rivendell uses to identify the switcher matrix.)
• Set the "Switcher Type" to Wegener Unity 4000
• In the "Edit Switcher" window that pops up:
• Fill in a "Description" for the switcher (This is what it will be known by in RDCatch.)
• Set the "Port" to "Serial0" (or a different port ID if you set it differently in the Serial Port setup.)
• Set "Outputs" to either 2 or 4 depending on how many audio ports your U4k has. (The Unity comes standard with 2 audio ports but you can buy an expansion board to add 2 more. Still not sure look on the back of you unit If you only find "CH 1" and "CH 2" near the middle of the unit and do not find "CH 3" and "CH 4" on the left hand side you only have 2 ports, otherwise you have 4.)
• Set "Inputs" to any number you like. We will use these to set up the audio port/route combinations. You can have as many as you like.
• Click "Configure Outputs"
• Select and Output to edit and click "Edit"
• Edit the label to something meaningfull (These are used in RDCatch to identify where you are sending the output to. If a chanel is say going to your automation to be recorded this is the place to label that. If you are sending one channel to the Program Managers office so he can preview program a label of "Program Manger's Office would be good.
• Label the rest of the Outputs to something meaningfull, then click "ok" to exit the "List Outputs" window.
• Click "Configure Inputs"

TIP: For each audio route/program combination you need to set up a "Input Channel." Program being the 3 character identifier of the satellite channel (MB1 Moody Broadcasting Channel 1, US1 USA Radio Network Channel 1, etc.) Rivendell calls this a "Feed." Route being one of the following Stereo, Left (1), Right (2) or Reverse Stereo. There is no provision for the last in Rivendell. You set the route in the Mode selection box under "Configure Inputs". Therefore if you record mono program off of a network that has split the left and right channel and send different programing on each channel you will need to make a input for the left channel and one for the right channel if you need to take programing from both at different times.

TIP: There is a script that will setup thes feeds for you. It will setup a list of 47 input channels. On SUSE Go to a terminal and run the script crc-unity4k.sh For other Linux distributions you may need to download the Rivendell source code package from the rivendellaudio.org download page. You can find crc-unity4k.sh in the scripts directory after unpacking the archive. The station name parameter is a bit confusing. It is referring to the hostname of the computer "station" that the switcher is hooked to. Once in the directory where the script is type

./crc-unity4k.sh

to run the script. You do not have to have the Unity 4000 hooked up to run the script.

• Select a Channel to edit. (Note: You do not need to put your channels in any order. RDCatch will alphabetize them and present the list that way in RDCatch. I suggest starting with the first one then working down. Then delete any unused inputs so they do not fill up your list and cause problems with your sort order.)
• Set the Name to what you want the input channel to be know as (You will see this latter in RDCatch.)
• Set the Feed to the 3 character identifer for the satellite channel.
• Set the Mode to Left, Right or Stereo. (Left means that the audio on the left side of the feed will be present on both the left and right channels of the output port of the U4k. Right means that the audio of the right side of the feed will be present on both the left and right channels of the output port of the U4k. Stereo means that the left channel will be present on the left channel and the right channel will be present on the right channel of the output port of the U4k.)

Once you have finished setting up your inputs.

• Click "OK" twice and "Close" once to put you back to the "Host:<hostname of your computer here>" window.

Setup RDCatch

• Click on "RDCatch"

• Select your Record Deck (i.e. 1 for the first)

• Set "Switcher Host:" to the hostname of your computer.(I am assuming that you could have the switcher host be on another computer on your system if you want. I am dealing with a setup were the Unity 4000 is connected to the serial port of the computer you are working on).
• Set "Switcher Matrix" to the name of your Unity 4000 switcher that you assigned earlier.

• Set "Switcher Output:" to the Output port of the Unity 4000 that you plan to use to record program in to Rivendell with.

Note: To use multiple ports, after setting the first, change your "Record Deck" from "1" to "2" and change your ports!

• Click "Close" to finish.

Adding your events to RDCatch

I believe that this step is covered well in the Rivendell Operations Guide in Chapter 4. You can download it from these links.

rog-0.9.1.pdf The Rivendell Operations Guide in PDF format

rog-0.9.1.odt The Rivendell Operations Guide in OpenDocument format

You can also check the Rivendel Download page for newer versions.