Sonifex have a history of developing hardware based audio loggers. In 1995, the Sentinel multi-channel logger was launched, which recorded audio to DDS2 data DAT drives and to SCSI hard-disk. Although the Sentinels were a great success, the need for audio playback from the desktop and the requirement for integration with an IP based network lead to the release of the latest product – the Net-Log network audio logger.
The Sonifex Net-Log is a 4 channel audio logger which can record weeks of programming on a large internal hard-disk. The unit was designed as dedicated hardware for reliability reasons (i.e. there’s no PC motherboard in this machine). Although PC based systems are great for playback, they generally aren’t robust enough for continuous recording 24/7/365. The Net-Log was designed from the ground up to offer high quality audio (mpeg compressed), compatibility with existing systems (bwf files can be saved) and automatic operation with very simple to use software. All audio created by Net-Log is Windows Media Player compatible so files can be emailed to colleagues and customers and played out on any PC with a sound system.
Even if logging isn’t regulatory, Net-Log provides audio to the desktop of anyone at a radio station – they don’t need to go to the racks-room, or central technical area to play out a recording previously made. From their desktop, the sales team can check to make sure that advertising was played on time and can create audio files to email to customers. Program controllers can snoop on their presenters, checking performance and checking that scheduled music was played. Station managers can check up on their competition and compare it with the sound of their own station. The production team have much easier access to recorded audio from past radio shows for the preparation of future stings and trailers.
The most recent change to the Net-Log is the “new-look” chrome front panel. The new hardware supports much larger disk capacities (currently 300GB) and some important features have been added into the software. Firstly, each channel can start and stop recording automatically by setting audio threshold levels, which means that it can be used for voice controlled systems and telephony recording. Secondly, it can make up to 250,000 recordings per channel and has an increased number of recording programmes (up to 20) making it much more adaptable in situations where a large number of recordings need to be made and later searched. Already, sales of the Net-Log have been made into banks, for telephony recording, and law courts, for pre-trial judgement recordings, using the new software.
