The Dante AVIO USB Adapter looks very, very interesting, could this be the go-to interface?

Question

This first caught my eye via SSC's Twitter feed and then having seen this:

https://kyma.symbolicsound.com/configuring-audio-and-midi-interfaces/dante-avio-usb-adapter/ 

Now I'm really curious :) 

This looks like a remarkably flexible solution for Kyma IO, potentially a game changer, could this be or become the best of the lot in terms of flexibility?

I'd love to hear further from SSC or anyone else using this about any downsides.

regards,
Sean

Comments

I'm curious too but don't really understand how Dante works tbh! Does my main soundcard (an ultralite) need to be Dante enabled to get any advantage? It would be nice to ditch the bulkier track 16 I'm currently using for Kyma which is sending/receiving over ADAT.

Edit: Having done a little more research I think I understand that other devices don't need to be Dante enabled, e.g. they can be local audio devices attached to the same computer.  However, am I right in thinking that by using the Dante AVIO usb as Kyma soundcard I am restricted to just 2 in / out in Kyma?  Those 2 in/out could come from anywhere (e.g. built in mac mic/speakers, my main MOTU soundcard attached to mac etc.) however only ever 2 in/out maximum...? For me, that would be the downside/showstopper...

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hi there. i just have a lot of gaps in the audio. dante usb from the pacarana, ethernet via thunderbolt to my mac. output on headphones. first try i had continuous sound. now, the last 2 day's just short amount of sound, plus gaps (3 to 4 seconds!). hints?

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Check to make sure your Mac's headphone output sample rate is 48 kHz (that is the only SR supported by the AVIO)?
Does this happen no matter what Sound you play in Kyma?

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after writing my comment i switched the two thunderbolt connections back and fourth a few times (i saw that dante did only get recognised when the thunderbolt was at a certain connection). after doing that back and fourth a few times, everything worked fine, all sounds i try'd came though fine. after your comment i checked my mac's midi and audio-setup, okey the output was on 44.5, i changed to 48. will try kyma/dante today!

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Word of warning here. As already stated it is limited to two channels and also means that your paca is forced to work at 48kHz and you loose the option to make the paca slave to the incoming audio data.

I'm not sure but I think it is using an internal Sample rate converter to get round the lack of sync, which can screw with the phase relationship of the signal. Note that we cannot hear any phase relationship changes so unless you are recombining the signals you are sending to the paca with the signals you are receiving, this part wouldn't cause a problem. That said trying to run the rest of my studio set up at sample rates other than 48K did give problems and seemed to eat up the computers processing power.

I think the most important thing to know is that the software "Dante Controller" is free, but that will only allow you to connect to other Dante equipment, not the computers daw or internal sound or the headphones or to your computers sound card. If you want to connect to these things you have to buy the Dante Via software which is about half the price of the hardware, which they seem to avoid mentioning in their set up videos. It also means that if you are using more than one computer then this cost can work out to be more than you paid for the hardware.

Also note that Dante Controller software is not yet compatible with the latest MAC OS and if you've downloaded VIA for a free trial and that trial has come to an end, you will be forced to buy the software without know if it's ever going to work.

Also while trying to set it up by replugging/re-powering/rebooting etc in an attempt to let the software see things it should have found automatically, you can easily find that the AVIO dies and need you to upload it's firmware again. This can take a long time as it will not go into the state where it flashes to allow a firmware update to take place, unless it has been powered on in the fault state for quite a long time.

Also getting the software in a state where is sees all your software/daw and hard ware devices at the same is tricky and requires you to booting things up/start things up in the right order, and it loves dropping your ethernet connection which you have to switch back manually in some obscure menu.

All in all I'm not going to risk buying the software if they do get a fix for the OS as I'm not prepared to wast any more money on something that will probably never work.

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t h a n k s !

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lars-lindvall, I am having this very same issue right now! It has been quite frustrating. I notice it is at its worse when using your own samples and trying to do any type of analysis. It plays stock sounds seemingly okay.

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can just say that dante was just an options to travel lighter, instead of bringing my still working tc-interface. my main interface is from metric halo, so the dante options was just meant to be the travel version. but then i heard that metric halo are planning dante-connections, which means, if i get used to the dante option then i can use dante/kyma/metric halo, would be better then to use kyma to  tc-interface and then adat to the metric halo! but, i do not trust dante, had to search the manual several times to get it working, after that it had been running for a while without any troubles.

Answer 1

Running the Dante Controller and Dante Via software on your host computer turns your computer into a Dante device so you can stream digital audio to/from your computer from the Pacarana using the Audinate USB AVIO adapter. It will use the internal speakers/mic on your computer and/or whatever external sound card you have attached to your computer and mix audio from the Pacarana with audio generated by software on your host computer.

Audio input/output is limited to two channels at 48 kHz sampling rate. Streaming audio through the host computer buffers introduces additional latency (delay between the input and the output).

Comments

Any guesses on how much latency? Was is noticeable?

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When we tried routing the computer mic out to the Pacarana and straight back into the computer to play back through the builtin computer speakers, it was noticeable. Didn't measure it, but felt longer than 10 ms.
Routing to Dante native devices (other than your Mac or PC running the Dante software) would definitely reduce the latency. Bypassing the computer altogether and routing from Pacarana direct to a Dante hardware device would definitely reduce the latency.

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Thanks SSC,
I definitely overlooked the two channel limitation in my excitement.