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Topic: Connecting 3 CAB16o's and 1CAB16i to 1 Nion

Is this possible?   I have a NION N3..  and I would like to use that NION to push 3 CAB16o and 1 CAB16i.   I  have not tried this before, and honestly I am not sure how I could set it up given the current options in configuration on the NION N3 Audio Network Configuration.  Am I shooting a star here?    Do I just need to get another NION N3?

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Re: Connecting 3 CAB16o's and 1CAB16i to 1 Nion

You have 32 channels of input and 32 channels of output via CobraNet with one NION. How you want to divide those channels is up to you.

If you would like all three of your CAB 16o's to have the same signal, that is pretty easy to do.
If you would like two of the three CAB 16o's to have the same signal and the third to have a different signal, that is also pretty easy to do.
If you would like all three of your CAB 16o's to have different signals, you will need another NION because this would require 48 channels of output. Or, you can move 16 channels of output to cards in the NION.

Regarding controlling 4 CAB's with one NION, no problem.

Of course, on the input side, your 16 channels of input from one CAB 16i is no problem.

Josh Millward
Burnt Orange Studios

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Re: Connecting 3 CAB16o's and 1CAB16i to 1 Nion

How would I go about setting 2 CAB 16o's to have the same output signal?   That would work.  The output from those 32 I could use for the general zones that will all be playing the same music 24/7.    Do I just set both CAB's to the same ID?  Or?

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Re: Connecting 3 CAB16o's and 1CAB16i to 1 Nion

There are two different, though similar ways to accomplish this.

All CAB's will have unique ID's.

The first (and simplest) method to accomplish this is to multicast the bundle from the NION so that multiple receivers in the CAB's can listen to this bundle. Setting the bundle to be a multicast bundle is done by selecting a bundle number of 1 through 256.

Bundle numbers above 256 are all unicast and what we generally recommend for point to point transmission of a bundle. However, it is possible to configure a unicast bundle to be a "multi-unicast" bundle (sounds like an oxymoron, doesn't it!) You can configure a unicast bundle to be transmitted to up to 4 receivers by using the multi-unicast feature. (if you need more than 4 receivers, it is recommended to consider multicasting the bundle if possible) You will need to use the Advanced CobraNet configuration in the NION to configure a bundle for multi-unicast operation.  To enable Multi-Unicast operation, simply set the number in the "Max Unicast" column to the number of destinations you want the bundle to go. (The available settings are integers 1-4) This will allow your bundle to be sent from one transmitter to up to four receivers.

I like to think of bundles as subsnakes. You have a maximum of 8 channels available in a subsnake, but you don't have to use them all (again using Advanced CobraNet Configuration). To provide a split so the subsnake can reach more than one destination, it is easy to either multicast or multi-unicast a bundle depending on what you need to do. Of course, lots of subsnakes can be aggregated into a main trunk by linking switches together with gigabit interfaces because you have a lot of bandwidth available in the gigabit link. This can easily provide hundreds and hundreds of channels over a single connection.

Josh Millward
Burnt Orange Studios