The Performer provides the normal features found in analog party-line intercoms, such as side-tone nulling, remote mic kill, program input, stage announce, and so on.
Beltpacks can be daisy-chained or have individual direct runs using a C31 three-way splitter box; these splitters can be added along the intercom line to provide additional splits, even within a daisy-chained line.
Riedel also offers the Artist-series digital matrix systems and audio/video networking solutions such as RockNet and MediorNet.
The Clear-Com HelixNet digital party-line system includes four independent channels, plus power for the connected beltpacks, through a single shielded twisted-pair connection – with a mic cable or a Cat-5/6 data cable. This capability allows existing cable infrastructure to be used with the new technology. The 2-channel beltpacks can flexibly select from all four channels as required for the particular production.
Audio quality is superior to that of a traditional analog party-line intercom, and is virtually immune to signal degradation from electromagnetic interference and extreme cable lengths. Latency is low, though if two people on the system are close enough to each other to hear the other speaking acoustically, a slight delay will be heard.
The system is virtually plug-and-play, and each 4-channel master station will support up to 20 connected beltpacks. Different than with analog party-line, the four communication channels can be named at the base station and those 10-character name labels are also displayed on the beltpacks as a visual confirmation.
The programmable 1RU unit uses all four channel displays for menu selection and parameter changes in a cascading fashion, where the first display has the main menu headings, the second submenus, the third specific parameters, and the fourth the actual level settings.
One large theme park chose HelixNet because it takes advantage of the existing infrastructure, and “gives it a second life.” Because of the very long cable runs in some of their applications, the audio quality on the analog systems was undesirable, with noise, buzz, and lessened intelligibility. Once they installed the digital intercom over the same old cables, the production staff reports that the voices are “crystal clear.”
Beyond Hardware
Going beyond dedicated hardware, virtual intercom systems can turn a smart phone, tablet, or laptop into a multi-channel communications station capable of conference (party-line) and point-to-point conversations. Functioning over local area networks or the Internet, a local production team can be easily joined by participants in other locations.