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Renda drops Pristine CDS32 for Maestro

B

BobDillehay

Guest
We have spent the last two weeks installing the latest version of Maestro.

It’s a GREAT product and provides 24/7 factory support.

All of the Maestro production room computers can run the playlist for any station with just a few mouse clicks.

Even with a mushroom cloud in one of the control rooms, we could be back on the air in moments from another studio.

The central server eliminates the need to send audio files to individual studios.

This thing rocks.

Bob
 
Great to hear, Bob. It's way too easy to tune out nowadays if listeners get dead air. Great move and good to see Renda make this type committment.

Something else that I think is critical is signal. I am completley clueless about this. For some reason, I understand how AM works but FM gets me baffled. Example, why is it that I encounter some interference with Sunny 94.1 in the mornings when I leave the house but others parts of the day are fine? I wouldn't think FM goes directional or changes power at night like AM does or am I wrong here? Anyway, I was just curious why I experience signal issues with Sunny only first thing in the morning. Hopefully, this will change as it can turn off potential listeners. Thanks.
 
Having been involved in the change over to Maestro, I'm really impressed with this new system. I provide the IT support for these radio stations, and I can tell you that this system has many features (from an IT standpoint) that make it far superior to the software that Renda Jax had been using. I'm certain that the "dead air" caused by software will be greatly reduced, or eliminated.
 
Wow, how "Cox" of them (Cox Jacksonville has been on Maestro in some form since the launch of The Point - I'm pretty sure they went full Maestro back in spring or summer 2002, while I was working there as Imaging/Production Director for WKQL).

It's a smart move, though, since Google now owns Maestro (I kid you not):
http://www.google.com/radioautomation/

I would imagine this will mean constant improvement and almost no chance it'll become vaporware (we were worried there for a while...)

I dug Maestro a whole lot more than Prophet, but the NexGen I'm using here in Austin isn't so bad - much better than old Prophet.

Maestro always seemed a lot more stable to me...
Brian V.
 
Signal noise is not uncommon on smaller-signal FM stations,
when you are on the fringe of the pattern - and atmospheric conditions
can also interfere.

Sunny is not a Jacksonville signal, and you probably live/work outside of the
primary service area and are hearing it on a second-tier contour.

To compare signal maps, go to
http://www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/info?call=WSOS&service=FM
 
We had a few problems after the initial install; mostly with the satellite delivered programs and the streaming audio.

Maestro sent the tech back for a post installation check.

These guys are GREAT.

Since we did have a few problems, the return trip was at no cost to Renda.

Maestro rocks. Pristine (to be polite) doesn’t.

The Maestro support team has provided excellent service without insulting either Engineering or Programming.

Bob
 
The stations I worked for used Maestro from 2000-present and yes, it's an easy program to use. We did have the occasional glitch with satellite shows, but their tech guys walked us through it and figured the rest out on our own. If used correctly, your station will sound tight. Enjoy it!
 
Hello.
I think the reason you have trouble with sunny is because if i remember correctly sunny is stil in st. augustine? i understand they are in the process of moving the transmitter to jax.
now i'm blind so if i'm wrong i'm sorry :). but that's my understanding of the situation. I remember when 94.1 was "the music station". and it mainly served st augustine and people in parts of jax could not get it because it was only 25000 watts.
the way i know is because i went to the florida school for the blind untill 2006 so i learned about jax radio. thx.
 
Below is a response to a Google/Maestro questionnaire about my satisfaction with their service.

Bob


Every year we produce a Christmas special to air on WEJZ which begins at noon on Christmas Eve and runs until midnight Christmas day.



Last year we were using the Pristine CDS32 automation which runs on scripts. There is one script for each day of the week. The satellite information is buried in these scripts and no one at the station knew how to write or edit the scripts so we asked Pristine to do it for us.



We e-mailed all seven scripts to Pristine. They were modified and returned, however they didn’t do what we wanted. The Christmas programming was a disaster, but that was only the beginning.



We couldn’t get in touch with anyone at Pristine to help. Only a voice mail message saying some would contact us soon. “Soon” turned out to be several days.



We e-mailed scripts back and forth many times but it took about three weeks for things to return to normal.



We had dead air, we missed spots, but the worst was the morning when the midnight switch from Delilah to Tesh didn’t happen and we ended up with “The Bob and Tom Show” on our Lite AC music station.



This call for support was to have someone at Maestro verify we had made the correct modifications for this year’s program.



What we had done was correct and one additional change was recommended.



I do not possess the vocabulary necessary to describe the feeling to be able to obtain competent support at a moment’s notice even when it’s not an emergency.



Thanks again guys.



Happy Holidays.



Bob Dillehay

Renda Broadcasting, Jacksonville
 
The NON-switch to Delilah was perfect tonight.

Waiting now to see if Maestro tries to switch to "Tesh" at midnight. we don't want that.

My guess is it won't.

Maestro rocks...

Bob
 
My experience with Maestro has been that you either love it or you hate it. There's pretty much no middle ground. The cluster where I do weekend work inherited a Maestro system when we bought some other stations about 50 miles away. The OM was looking at standardizing everyone on Maestro and quickly decided against it saying it was the worst system he'd ever seen and that spending almost $20,000 to upgrade it made things worse, not better.

However, I have friends who love it because it's very robust and can run for long periods of time without even a hiccup. I've been told you're more likely to have a hiccup because Windows fails rather than Maestro. Renda seems to have pretty good luck with it. I know they at least used to use it in Oklahoma City. One of my friends moved from Oklahoma City to their Tulsa cluster and said she loved Maestro and was disappointed to see Tulsa using CD's.
 
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