Allen and Heath Desk/Roland Digital Snake compatibility?

[chgriffiths]

Hi,

 

We are looking at upgrading our desk to the Allan and Heath Qu-24 after reading good reviews and previous positive experiences with Allen and Heath desks.

 

I've noticed the desk in question has a Cat5 port for direct connection from a Allan and Heath dSnake, however, we already have Roland Digital Snakes, does anyone know if we could connect the Roland Digital Snake direct into the Allen and Heath desk, or would we have to replace our Roland snake with a dSnake (as we use a Cat5 system to link our sound inputs to the control desk anyway)

 

Many thanks,

 

Charlie

[cedd]

I'm pretty confident that the answer is no. Unfortunately Roland and Allen & Heath both have their own protocols for their digital snakes. Roland being REAC 40 channels in each direction, and Allen & Heath being dSnake, which I'm less familiar with. It's only when you get in to protocols like Madi and Dante that you start to see cross-compatibility.

 

Would the cheaper option not be to look in to a Roland M480, which in my opinion is as good-a desk as any of the Allen & Heath GLD range currently. They can be bought for not very much money at all currently. Buying a new A&H desk would mean having to buy stageboxes as well, which you already have for the Roland system. Just a thought.

 

 

 

[MarkPAman]

Hmmmm (Hi Tony)

 

I read that question as just wanting to use the CAT5 cable, rather than the stage boxes. In which case the answer is yes - or at least it works for me. I've changed from Roland to A&H & use the same cables with no problems, though my longest is (only) 70m.

 

A Roland M480 is still more than twice the price of a Qu24 and an AR2412 box. I know it does more, but.............

[pdherring]

I would agree with cedd. The chances are these are not compatible. As Cedd said their protocols are going to be different. Unlike cedd I am the other way around, I know nothing about Roland and a lot about A&H. You are looking at the QU-24 which has 24 channels built in with no need for stage boxes, so my simple cheap option would be to keep your Roland digital snake (assuming you have a roland unit near your mix position) and get a few short xlr Looms made up to link into the roland. The functionality the QU-24 gives you on dSnake is not as advance as the GLD series where you can have multiple remote boxes (3 in total).

 

Obviously if you currently us the Roland connected into a Roland digital desk then this won't work. My only other suggestion is that you look at the GLD and add the Dante or Madi card into it (this is assuming the Roland supports this) and connect it via this route.

[cedd]

More clarification needed then. I read it that they'd got existing Roland snake system (stage boxes and desk end) and were wanting to patch these in to the new desk. That said, I did misread the original post as saying "from the Qu24" instead of "to a Qu24" - I assumed they were stepping up from a Qu to a GLD or something else.

 

So is it currently an analogue console, connected to the Roland stage box system? If so then you've got a few options;

 

- Keep the Roland setup and just do an analogue patch to the Qu. This probably works out cheapest, but means your preamp control will be on the Roland system (be it the desk remote, or pc, whatever you're using currently). Not ideal, but it'll work.

 

- Sell all the Roland hardware and buy a Qu with its' own digital stage box (The cabling will work fine for both, just double check that there isn't a crossover patch cable in there somewhere - the Roland system requires a crossover. At the worst it's a quick reterminate of an RJ45 to fix).

 

- Tweak your desk choice to match your existing Roland stage boxes. Now realising that you were looking at a Qu, you'd probably do better with an M300 than an M480. You could sell the desk end bits of the Roland snake as they'd be redundant - I'm guessing that'd be an S-0816 stage box or the rackmount front of house unit, plus remote control. They should help fund the new desk and make a dent in the difference between Qu24 and M300 pricing.

 

All perfectly viable options. My personal choice would be the 3rd one, but that's because I prefer using the Roland console over the Qu. Ultimately it's down to whatever you get on with best.