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scorpio!


daniel

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26 minutes ago, Wandering Ear said:

It's Mackie Control so a lot of different surfaces should work, but SD sounds like they don't want to provide technical support for other surfaces understandably.

 

Of course, I wouldn’t expect them to. Mackie Control is capable of many controls so it remains to be seen how that will translate to the Scorpio. But generally, I think allowing 3rd party controller access is a brilliant move

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What does the antenna connection do? 

In the near-future the antenna will be used to connect the Scorpio via Bluetooth to SD-Remote, the companion application for Android and iOS.

 

Ohhhh.... an antenna for Bluetooth! One of the big downsides of Bluetooth is that  it is designed for quite short range.  I wonder if this will make the Bluetooth range good enough to remotely monitor and control the Scorpio from a chase car if the recorder has been dropped in the boot.

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43 minutes ago, Wandering Ear said:

It's Mackie Control so a lot of different surfaces should work, but SD sounds like they don't want to provide technical support for other surfaces understandably.

 

As you may have already seen, SD addresses this in their FAQ:

 

=====

Can I control Scorpio from a USB Control Surface with linear faders?

Yes. Sound Devices supports open protocols wherever possible. Scorpio supports the ubiquitous MCU (Mackie Control Universal) protocol which many USB-connected control surfaces use. At launch, the iCON Platform M+ (along with D2 Display) is supported.

Why the iCON Platform M+?

The iCON Platform M+ impressed us with its small footprint, DC powering, and bank switching allowing control of all 32 channels. From the iCON Platform, it is easy to adjust trim and fader levels of all channels and other functions, including channel soloing, mutes, record arming, bus levels, transport control, and more. This controller is being used on A-List tours and is a great value.

Will the control be open protocol, so customers can program their own controllers for use with Scorpio?

We conform to the MCU protocol, however Sound Devices cannot guarantee proper operation with anything other than the iCON Platform M+ due to the idiosyncrasies present in many controllers. While you are free to make your own controller, we cannot offer any technical support. 

=====

 

The whole FAQ takes a similiar reasonable approach to a bunch of questions. Worth reading:

https://www.sounddevices.com/scorpio-faq/

 

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Impressive! As always with SD. There's something Ferrari about the design, nice!

Great move to be able to use Mackie controls. I noticed the port for TC and Word Clock also has GPIO, Which is interesting. Nowadays I work in radio, and our problems with mixers, mainly, is the lack of coms and PFLs. With a controller and GPIO, I could imagine one being able to program buttons for talkback on different outputs and so on. Dreaming, obviously. But that’d be nice. 

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17 minutes ago, Paul Isaacs said:

Yep, two com circuits and a slate circuit and the ability to mute, duck or not mute program when a com is active. 

 

That‘s very good news! To be honest, I‘m getting more and more excited by this. 

I‘ve been hoping for a long time that something like the Overdub feature from the MixPre series might find its way to the Scorpio. Any chance?

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32 minutes ago, Paul Isaacs said:

Yep, two com circuits and a slate circuit and the ability to mute, duck or not mute program when a com is active. 

 

So the two com circuits are routed to two specific channels, like boom1 and boom2? Or is it two com circuits as in you can com, via a button for example, to any output but only two at once, as in you have outputs routed to boom 1, boom 2, director, dop, script supervisor and camera feed, and you could talk to any of those channels, but only two at once? 

 

edit

Reading the block diagram, from what I gather, the former would be true. Any of the two com signals can go to any output, so talking to com1 will feed Audio on selected outputs, and same for com2 and slate. 

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If used with an Icon M+ surface, can tracks 1-12 be controlled by the M+, or only with the rotary faders on the unit?

 

 

3 hours ago, Constantin said:

 

Of course, I wouldn’t expect them to. Mackie Control is capable of many controls so it remains to be seen how that will translate to the Scorpio. But generally, I think allowing 3rd party controller access is a brilliant move

Found the MCU control list:

"Control and display parameters include the following: 1. Channel Name 2. Channel Faders 3. Channel Trims 4 Channel Pans 5. Channel Mutes 6. Channel Solos 7. Channel Record Arm/Disarm 8. Channel “fat channel” (Source, Limiter, HPF, EQ, Bus sends) 9. Channel bank switching 10. Bus Master Faders 11. Output Master Faders 12. Transport Controls"

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10 minutes ago, daniel said:

https://www.sounddevices.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/ScorpioSpecifications.pdf

"AES3 or AES42 available on XLR inputs 1 and 6" - which I thought meant up to 12 AES channels.

 

sounds more like 4 AES channels on two inputs to me? (two on XLR1 and two on XLR6)

and from the same link:

"Digital outputs: AES3 transformer-balanced, in pairs; 1-2 (XLR-L), 3-4 (XLR-R), 5-8 (Hirose 10-pin A)"

 

here the manual for the full details:

https://www.sounddevices.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/ScorpioUserGuide.pdf

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Interesting product, but from a "Pull out my 788, insert new recorder" here's what I see..

1. No gain control for headphone on any MCU controllers... It's just not a thing.. It 's big for me as I find myself on a lot of whisper/bang/whisper shows.

2. Does the Stop Button have the "Hold for 1 second" before stopping feature of the 788

3. I know the MCU has Mute and Solo buttons. Is there anything that can be remapped to Arm/Disarm tracks???

4. Comm... Only the one toggle on the unit like all 6xx units.. Can you remap buttons to trigger Comm's.

5. Line input gain.. Again, my 788 tops out at 50 on line input, this tops out at 38... Those db are precious for me..

6. Power connector????? WHY WHY WHY... 4 Pin Hirose was perfect.

7. Is the controller listed the only one supported? Presonus has a 16 channel model? Will this support Banking? Will the fader move when you bank back?

In my day to day world.. These things are super important to me.. The higher track count is nice.. The form factor is nice.. I/O is nice.. 

Honestly don't know what I was expecting from the announcement, but I'm not feeling the overwhelming need to switch like I was hoping.. It will be a great product for SD and will serve many mixers very well but until some of the dust settles about how these controllers can be integrated I will hang back and let others test..

Just me,

  

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3 hours ago, Constantin said:

 

That‘s very good news! To be honest, I‘m getting more and more excited by this. 

I‘ve been hoping for a long time that something like the Overdub feature from the MixPre series might find its way to the Scorpio. Any chance?

 

This is Sound Devices. You know the score. We prefer to announce what is definite!

3 hours ago, Wandering Ear said:

If used with an Icon M+ surface, can tracks 1-12 be controlled by the M+, or only with the rotary faders on the unit?

 

 

Found the MCU control list:

"Control and display parameters include the following: 1. Channel Name 2. Channel Faders 3. Channel Trims 4 Channel Pans 5. Channel Mutes 6. Channel Solos 7. Channel Record Arm/Disarm 8. Channel “fat channel” (Source, Limiter, HPF, EQ, Bus sends) 9. Channel bank switching 10. Bus Master Faders 11. Output Master Faders 12. Transport Controls"

All channels 1-32 can be controlled with the Icon.

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5 hours ago, Mungo said:

Still only two AES inputs ...

As Scorpio is a product which will last many buyers the better part of a decade (just look at the lifespan of the 788!), then it seems very short sighted to have so few AES inputs when many pro wireless have AES out as an option (and this will only become even more common place as times goes by).

1 hour ago, Mark LeBlanc said:

6. Power connector????? WHY WHY WHY... 4 Pin Hirose was perfect.

 

The new connector is needed so as to be able to supply the great power demands, and to give a communication avenue for usage with smart batteries. 

On both points this feels like a good change. 

 

1 hour ago, Mark LeBlanc said:

7. Is the controller listed the only one supported?

I expect many other controllers will work with the Scorpio, but only the Icon is being actively backed and supported by Sound Devices to work 100%
Because there are just too many many options out there to cover them all! 
But people are welcome to try at their own risk other controls if their form factor might suit them better, but it is a "try at your own risk" scenario. 

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2 hours ago, Mark LeBlanc said:

Interesting product, but from a "Pull out my 788, insert new recorder" here's what I see..

1. No gain control for headphone on any MCU controllers... It's just not a thing.. It 's big for me as I find myself on a lot of whisper/bang/whisper shows.

2. Does the Stop Button have the "Hold for 1 second" before stopping feature of the 788

3. I know the MCU has Mute and Solo buttons. Is there anything that can be remapped to Arm/Disarm tracks???

4. Comm... Only the one toggle on the unit like all 6xx units.. Can you remap buttons to trigger Comm's.

5. Line input gain.. Again, my 788 tops out at 50 on line input, this tops out at 38... Those db are precious for me..

6. Power connector????? WHY WHY WHY... 4 Pin Hirose was perfect.

7. Is the controller listed the only one supported? Presonus has a 16 channel model? Will this support Banking? Will the fader move when you bank back?

In my day to day world.. These things are super important to me.. The higher track count is nice.. The form factor is nice.. I/O is nice.. 

Honestly don't know what I was expecting from the announcement, but I'm not feeling the overwhelming need to switch like I was hoping.. It will be a great product for SD and will serve many mixers very well but until some of the dust settles about how these controllers can be integrated I will hang back and let others test..

Just me,

  

 

1. HP gain will be available on our first supported MCU controller, the Icon.

2. Pretty simple request

3. There's dedicated arm/disarm buttons on each channel

4. There is currently an extra toggle on the Scorpio for Com1 & 2. There are user programmable buttons on the Icon. 

5. We will up line gain to 50dB. Our bad!

6. From our FAQ: The Scorpio has a ton of functionality, include 16 full-featured (and full-powered) mic preamps. These, along with full 48 V per channel as well as two battery chargers means the Scorpio can draw a significant amount of peak current (the battery chargers can draw over 3 A alone). The 4-pin Hirose connectors are rated for 2 A per pin, which is not enough. Thus we went to the TA4 connector, which is good for 5 A per pin. Additionally, the TA4 delineates the connector on the Scorpio as a Smart Battery connector.

7. At launch, yes.  Icon ticked most of the boxes, that's why we went with that first. Other's will follow. Banking is supported and includes motorized fader support.

 

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