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USB over LAN


S Harber

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I'm thinking about trying to send USB over a LAN via a switch that will be carried along with Dante.

 

Maybe folks have experience with this and hopefully advice.

 

Here's what I'm trying to achieve:

 

(Set rack side)

Lectro Venues feeding their USB outs into a USB hub

That hub feeding into a USB to Ethernet/LAN adaptor

That signal feeding into a switch that which would have a Dante signal as well. 

 

Into Ethercon/CAT6 cable.

 

(Mixer side)

Ethercon/CAT6 into another switch

One leg outputs to Dante

Another outputs to a Ethernet/LAN to USB adaptor (this hopefully could work for Wireless Designer) and then to a laptop.

                Or it could be carried (along with Dante via the switch) that goes to a Thunderbolt dock and into a laptop.

 

A long shot but possibly very useful without having to buy multiple Lectro DSQDs.

 

Any ideas, experiences or thoughts are welcome.

 

Thanks in advance,

SH

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Many of those USB extenders are USB over Ethernet CABLE, not over switched IP.  They work great, but require their own dedicated cable and can't be extended over fiber networks etc.  I use USB and HDMI over ethernet in my studio regularly.

What you would need is USB over IP.  I have only played with that via software setups, but there are print server hardware that would be worth testing.  Something like:

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004ZMYCRG/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_RSyqFbD6RMCB4

 

 

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I don't have any personal experience, but don't see why it wouldn't work, with the USB over IP drivers it just shows up to the computer as any USB device. Gotham featured this box in a video

https://www.gothamsound.com/library/gotham-labs-building-poe-production-audio-recording-rig

They used a program called Wave Tool which sends remote commands to the wireless receivers, and since that works, I don't see why the native app wouldn't also work just fine.

If you talk to Peter at Gotham, I'm sure he has more experience to share

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I've been trying this exact setup with the Silex USB server, but in my brief tests I couldn't get the device to show up in my Mac Mini. Unfortunately the Silex device software does not support Catalina yet. Well, to be more precise, there are two software applications you need to set it up. One is the "SX Virtual Link" software which runs in the background and allows your Mac to "see" the virtual USB devices (in this case, the Silex Server and the Venue Systems) as if they are plugged directly into the computer's USB ports. Silex does have a beta version of SX Virtual Link that has limited Catalina support. But in order to set everything up properly and assign an IP address to the USB Server, you need to run Silex's setup software, which will not open in Catalina. Their tech support people claim it should work automatically as long as you have DHCP set up on your network, but so far I have not been able to get it to work. It may be possible, but I need to do more testing.

 

If you try this setup as well, let me know if you get it working! I'll do the same.

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I have run Wireless Designer over LAN using a Raspberry Pi.

 

The USB in the Venue Racks uses a standard FTDI USB/serial chip.  So it "is" a USB serial port.  The Linux USB/serial driver, on the other hand, does not recognize the USB VID/PID combination.  I had to write a udev rule to tell the kernel to use the standard FTDI driver.

 

Once you have the driver set up and you have the Venue working as a usb/serial device, you can use a program called ser2net to present it as a TCP device.  Wireless Designer can then connect to it over the network without any additional hardware.

 

I have not used this combination extensively - I would like to do so but I need another application to share the Venues and have not yet written the component to allow that.

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So I was Successful in getting Wireless Designer to work over ip to a Silex DS-510 USB Server to a pair of VRField Venues. I used a Mac Mini with Catalina on it. The beta driver is allowing me to run this setup.

 

I had tried to originally use my older MacBook Pro with High Sierra, SX Virtual Link would recognize the Venues, but it would not connect to them.

 

I did not use the device server.

 

Erik Meiselman

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So it all is working quite well.

18 wires on 3-Venues.

A Ferrofish A32 interface (analog to Dante)

The Ferrofish alone and then the 3-Venues on a USB hub feeding into the 2-USB inputs of the Silex 510.

That outputs Cat5 into a switch along with Dante signal another from the Ferrofish.

 

Sent to my mixer cart via Cat5/6/Ethercon

That hits a switch

One leg goes to a Cantar

Another leg to a thunderbolt adaptor then 

into my laptop on High Sierra.

 

Many links but no issues getting on to Wireless Designer from up to 300'+.

 

Thanks for the help everyone. I'll post if anything noteworthy plays out.

 

SH

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8B27B252-9120-45F9-9E70-1ECCC55A4CC6.jpeg

 

 

163AD471-19BD-46E1-B45C-A175A1BF9A63.jpeg

 

 

 

 

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