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I'm already a Raduga user. Almost five years ago when I needed such a program, Raduga was an affordable solution. Its is rock solid, and easy to use. What it is missing in it, and also in Zara, is artist and song protection. You can accidentally have five Beatles songs in a row with either one. At least, so it would seem. A little human intervention can prevent this, but it would be nice to have artist and song title separation that is user definable.
Unless there is some ugly surprise down the road, I have to admit that Zara looks really good. The price is certainly right.
Have you ever considered one of the products from Prophet Systems? They have an automation system called NexGen that is far beyond anything that is on the market (in my experience). They have a scaled version called PSI101, where you can purchase only the functionality that you need. I have been using NexGen for several years and it has performed circles around most of the other products. There website is www.prophetsys.com.
Have you ever considered one of the products from Prophet Systems? They have an automation system called NexGen that is far beyond anything that is on the market (in my experience). They have a scaled version called PSI101, where you can purchase only the functionality that you need. I have been using NexGen for several years and it has performed circles around most of the other products. There website is www.prophetsys.com.
No problem with their product. It's an industry standard. At the time we needed an automation system, it was a lot more money than Raduga.
That was a long time ago. For us, Raduga has chugged right along and done what we need to do. There is an add on music scheduler for Raduga that solves any song protection problems. It is not included in the basic package. Zara doesn't seem to have one either. That looks to me to be Zaras's weak spot, which was the point I was trying to make. But for free, it looks quite good. I wonder what the catch is?
When it is time to upgrade our automation, I'll shop Prophet, as well as several others to see what makes the most sense for our situation. You usually get what you pay for. Right now, Raduga is still working fine for us.
I have some automation background. I installed an Audisk system in the early 80's. I have installed Prophet, Enco Dad, Audiovault, BSI Wacestation, Arrakis (many versions) , and have built my own.
I have worked with the old step type systems from Harris.
I just recently completed my first Digital Jukebox system for WJCF/WRFM. On sale through Nov 30 ($649).
What system offers built in music scheduler? Artist,Title, Tempo, Gender protection. Replaces Selector.
I love the weather. Time and Temp in any of the jock's voices tied to the NWS.
The ability to track and generate reports for liners, songs, underwriting or commercials built in. You can use this system to verify commercials.
The Multi Cut carts allow you to place liners by sat jocks in specific hours. You can also place multi cut underwriters or commercials in these cuts.
Built in Audio Grabber to rip cd's directly into the hard drive. Mirror Ware built in to save your cuts to a production computer with ease.
I bought 2 inexpensive computers at Fry's for under $600. Used the on board audio cards to play audio. Broadcast Tools switcher interface to switch audio. (Live programs on the weekend and weekday as well as pre recorded content can be flawlessly switched without worrying the sat will restart.)
This station has been using a DL4 for 6 years. In 6 years 3 hard drives with new non ripped audio.
My misunderstanding of Mirrorware caused me to destroy several hundred music cuts during setup. Quickly re-ripped. I never see a time when I will have to redub muisc as the system is saving all the music and data. I just bought another prod system to have dual backup. Over 3000 cuts and I still have 121 gb of available space. I recorded an 8 hour live thanksgiving broadcast too.
If lightning destroys the on-air system (never happen?) I can use the first prod system as a backup immediately. I can play cuts from either on-air or prod. Who else offers this?
Voice Tracking and Internet VT.
The company offers the manual and help/support online at their website. Every manufacturer has their own way of doing things.
I still have an Enco system I maintain and am not happy with the paid support. I am not happy with the support offered by any of the big manufacturers. I have been able to get my questions answered on the DJB website and with the help of Jim Backus.
Digital Jukebox is the best system available. Then beyond that look at the cost.
Happy to answer any questions about this great program.
One that hasn't been mentioned is Pristine Systems CDS32. Check the website at www.pristinesys.com for details. I'm very familiar with the older CartWorks systems and am getting up to speed with the CDS32 system. Easy to learn, easy to program and very flexible.
One that hasn't been mentioned is Pristine Systems CDS32. Check the website at www.pristinesys.com for details. I'm very familiar with the older CartWorks systems and am getting up to speed with the CDS32 system. Easy to learn, easy to program and very flexible.
I sure hope you think that down the road when you need support! I had the DOS-version of Digital Jukebox and while it was ok, it wasn't without flaws. The Windows version is a total nightmare! I've seen more blue screens and trashed database files than I would ever want to imagine. And don't get me started on support (or lack thereof). I was working on migrating my station and a "feature" totally trashed the WinDJB database file. That convinced me to run for the competition! Besides, I refuse to trust any program that is simply a runtime application for any mission-critical operation. I was really, really thrilled to finally toss my Digital Jukebox into the crapper! I almost brought the DJB internet STL software from Raduga (I recognized it as being a rebranded copy of the DJB's STLWare) and told Bill Spry why I refused to buy it - I don't need a client station (a non-comm FM) cursing at me for a bad choice and lack of any support (not from Raduga, but DJB). If you can get DJB support worth your $300/year good freakin' luck! For me, it's best to avoid any the DJB product line.
I've found a wonderful automation program called StationPlaylist (www.stationplaylist.com). Simple, yet elegant and most of all, very, VERY reliable! Right now the station's automation is in a closet and all I do is remote in with remote desktop (something that didn't work at all with DJB) and I can tweak to my heart's content!
my money is on the prophet ps 101 .you can buy the modules you need and should be around your target price.the extreme would be my preference over raduga.But i must say i looked at the station playlist and that would be my second choice .you did not indicate if you have a music or traffic scheduler.i run the Nexgen 2 and just upgraded to nexgen 2006.been running 3 years 24/7 and i can't even get it to burp.IMHO
You are really doing yourself a disservice if you do not look at the Rivendell system. It's very DIY like most open source stuff is. But the learning curve is the same for any other system. You'd have a one-time expenditure for hardware, which you would do anyways, and the OS and software are free. And stable.
I'd really shy away from some of the lower-end windows stuff when you can get a heavily developed system in Rivendell or in PS101.
You are really doing yourself a disservice if you do not look at the Rivendell system. It's very DIY like most open source stuff is. But the learning curve is the same for any other system. You'd have a one-time expenditure for hardware, which you would do anyways, and the OS and software are free. And stable.
I'd really shy away from some of the lower-end windows stuff when you can get a heavily developed system in Rivendell or in PS101.
I had played with Rivendell and it looks pretty nice. The only thing that made me shy away from it was the need to have interoperability with some pre-existing Windows-based software. I ran it on cheap Wintel hardware so it's pretty flexible as far as the hardware goes.
I found Raduga leaving me with a feeling that I needed more to a system and Digilink will be a constant monthly drain on the pocket at $100/month. Paul, in what you'd pay Arrakis for Digilink in five months you'd have StationPlaylist and a year's worth of tech support as well as a little change left over.
StationPlaylist is certainly very flexible when compared to others and the price point is great. Where else can you get an on-air playout system AND a companion scheduler for under $500? With the Pro version (which is the one I opted for ) I have unlimited categories, flexibily playlists and dayparting, true voicetrack overlapping and all sorts of other goodies.
Once I decided that the Digital Jukebox was garbage I started looking to go in a completely different direction. I looked at NexGen101 but it would have been upwards of $1400 dressed the way I wanted it (and with no backup system). StationPlaylist comes with two licenses so you can have an on-air system and a production/backup system in case something crashes. So far I've had my system up for more than 37.5 days without any major incident. I don't recall my old system doing that. This is the first time I've had it "on-air" as I was doing all the format tweaking offline. The best part is I can remote into it and do changes on the fly - I can hardly wait to do remotes and control my studio from a remote!
You can remote into almost any automation system using a program like VNC or even Windows XP Pro's "Remote Desk Top." That is nothing exclusive to any particular product. I do it all the time.
Buying an automation system is a little like buying a car. Most of them will get you to where you are going. The ride is a bit more pleasant with some than others. I'm not selling Raduga, but I have used on the air it for over four years. It has never crashed, and is very easy to use. The learning curve to get on the air is about ten minutes from the time you download the program. Even my volunteers at our radio station can figure it out with no problem. There is a lot to be said for that, even if it is at the expense of some advanced features.
Because it does not integrate into a traffic and billing program, it is not going to be a good choice for a large commercial operation. I do know of some small commercial stations that do use it though. They seem happy with it. It is just fine for most non-commercial, LPFM, Community or Internet radio stations.
It's true that you sometimes have to get ingenious to get it to do some things, but I haven't found much that it won't do with a little thought. My only objection to it is a lack of song and artist protection. There is an add-on scheduler that does provide that. For the most part, it really isn't that big a problem.
The best news is it is very stable. You could walk away from it for weeks or even months, and it will keep on playing, assuming the computer has an adequate back-up power system.
I hate to merge topics, however our nexgen system has a slightly watery top end. Only on material that is recorded in Studio A. If it's recorded in Studio B it's fine.
I understand there are better things out there thgen Raduga and such, but my issue is the fact I can't spend more then $200 at once for anything right now.
The only reason Im not considering Rivendell is due to the fact it runs on Linux..
The fact that it runs on Linux is its strongest point.
Yes. You do have to learn some of the nuts and bolts of the OS and go under the hood. But there are a vast number of sites that will tell you step by step exactly what to do.
Rivendell runs on OpenSUSE, which is an awesome Linux distribution.
Most of the OS tinkering can be done using a web-brower interface, and in the past 10 years Linux installation is practically drop the CD into the drive, boot the machine from the CD, and you are done, with the exception of setting the network configuration if you are going to use static IPs.
Linux also has a mature version of SAMBA, which inferfaces seamlessly with Windows networks and file sharing.
Total software costs: $0.00.
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