Omnia Processing Powers MusiquePlus & MusiMax
Montreal-Based Telecasters Serve Omnia to Two Million Québeçois Daily
22 September 2003, Cleveland, Ohio, USA
In a growing trend that has seen major television broadcasters worldwide shift to Omnia audio processing, music-television providers MusiquePlus and MusiMax – part of CHUM Limited (www.chumlimited.com) and Astral Media, Canada's leading media companies and content providers – have standardized on Omnia to serve their viewers, which number over 2.5-million each day.
MusiquePlus has had a long association with Omnia, explains Director of Engineering Alain Charest. “Our goal has always been to provide the cleanest, best audio possible to our viewers. We originally switched to Omnia processing (from Orban and Innovonics) in 1999. That was a great improvement.” MusiquePlus has continued to use Omnia ever since, eventually upgrading to top-of-the-line Omnia-6fm processors.
In pursuit of even cleaner audio, Charest asked Omnia Audio president Frank Foti about new advances in DSP technology during the 2003 NAB in Las Vegas. Foti told him about the new Omnia-6CD.
“We have a very demanding audio environment,” explains Charest. “Our stations feature a mix of live programming, music videos, old and new films, documentaries... almost everything you can think of. Basically, our goal is to try to reproduce on TV what the record producer intended his CD to sound like on a quality sound system.
“Frank suggested that we get two Omnia-6CD (which is an audio processor designed for studio mastering), and he was right… Modifying one of the mastering presets included with the Omnia-6CD, it took us roughly one hour to adapt the Omnia to our environment. Taking advantage of the Deep Bass and Phat Bass enhancements, we were able to make small television speakers deliver ‘kick-ass’ hi-fi sound!”
“Omnia-6CD solved all of our on-air processing problems,” says Charest.
A multi-band processor based on the hugely popular Omnia-6fm found in top radio stations worldwide, Omnia-6CD employs a specially designed final limiter which eliminates the processor-induced aliasing distortion often generated when processing for a “hot” sound. It also provides precise peak control so that clean, loud, distortion-free audio can be output at 0 dBfs.
The Omnia-6 family of broadcast audio processors is the world's first to offer features such as 96kHz sampling with 24-bit resolution, a fully user-adjustable crossover network, and convenient Ethernet and dial-up remote-control interfaces. Omnia-6 audio processors are also available for conventional FM and HD Radio/DAB broadcasters. For details, visit www.omniaaudio.com.
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Omnia, a Telos company, is world-renowned for its digital audio signal processing expertise. Omnia audio processors for FM, AM, TV, HD Radio & DAB, Internet, and audio production are setting new standards for professional audio quality.