AVID – Nitris DX – 8 Channel Audio Setup with Mixer (Mackie 1402 VLZ4)

[Trevor Asquerthian]

You’d need disembedders to > 4 channels, only 4 analogue outs on Nitris DX. I think there’s 8 channels on the AES connector but you’d need the AES lead & DACs.

[Bob Zelin]

this is an unusual question. When you say the editor wants “control” — if you go into this mixer, you will be able to monitor the independent channels into your speakers, but it’s not going to “control” the audio mixer in the AVID user interface. So even if you get this wired up for audio monitoring, please be aware, that this is not going to do a “mix” for you.

The AVID Artist Mix
https://www.avid.com/products/artist-mix
will do this for you.

But if you want to just monitor the audio, you buy this cable –
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/135067-REG/Pro_Co_Sound_DA88XM_5_Multi_Track_Recording_Cable.html

and stick it into Audio AES Digital to Analog converters like this – (you will need 4 of these)
https://www.amazon.com/Behringer-Ultramatch-Src2496-High-Resolution-Converter/dp/B0002E50J0
and take the 8 analog outputs (2 per box) and stick them into your Mackie.

Isn’t there a cheaper way to do this ? No.
Isn’t there a single mixer that can handle all of this (control of the AVID and control of the monitoring)
No.

As you already know the Nitris DX has only 4 XLR analog outputs. If you had a fancier audio mixer with AES inputs
you could take the 25 pin with the cable that I listed above that breaks out into XLR’s and stick that into a digital
audio mixer, and do your monitoring – but it won’t control the AVID timeline for mixing – just monitoring.

Bob Zelin

Bob Zelin
Rescue 1, Inc.
bobzelin@icloud.com

[Brent Marginet]

I had to deal with an editor like that once as well. At the time Avid used the Digidesign 888 as there Audio Output Interface so I was able to give him the 8 analog channels that he wanted into the Mackie Mixer.

Thing is, no matter how much I tried to convince him this was a bad idea he put his foot down and forced me to do it.
Then the shit hit the fan when he realized that he could only adjust the audio manually during real time playback.
The producers were beyond PO’d because during the preview of the movie he was only able to concentrate on this stupid mixing procedure and nothing else. Even worse he was terrible at it. NLE’s have automation in them for a reason, it may take more time to setup initially but in the end saves at least 10 times the initial setup time. Next would be the fact that no automation will be passed on to the audio edit doing it this way.

If the editor still insists on doing this pick up an Alesis AI-3 Optical to Analog Converter on eBay.
There trending at about $100 US which is a lot cheaper than the other hardware options that have been suggested.

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