Cranborne Audio 500R8, 500ADAT, Camden 500 - a modern approach to 500 series
by Karpmentalise   24th January 2018

wow

Daaaaaaaaaaaamn @ Sean ,

One word Kudos to all @Cranbornd Team. You guys just pushed the boundaries even further in terms of 500 series hardware box. Tha 500R8 audio interface is quite something. Only i see it missing on the 500R8, an optional handle in case if you're traveling with it. Because you can just bring this one to any location and you're et to go, no need to bring other module 500 rack unless needed but as said, you put your best ones in that 500R8 and you can just travel easy.

I'll keep my eyes on this product for sure.

Congrats on the new products. Looking forward to see or hear reviews and hopefully your product will see the light in Canada Montreal

Also hope that the price of these babies are affordable in a certain way ;-) Because if put at the right street price, you guys will sell like hot 500 cakes :-)

Cheers ;-)

Awesome!!!!!

Finally! Someone has made a 500 rack with ADAT. Seems like an obvious niche to fill when you consider how many audio interfaces provide ADAT I/O.

The Cranborne Audio 500ADAT is now on my radar and wish list. The Camdens look good too. Very interesting.

The 500ADAT is exactly what I've been saying someone should build (even mentioned it to Aurora Lynx, AVID and a few other manufacturers at AES and all of them either laughed or said "nope") can't wait to check it out

Nice work! Great design and engineering

Cool stuff. The FAQ isn't working for me ("What is CAST?") When will the ADAT rack be available? What is your booth number?

oh yes, this will be mine.

Super duper great idea and price

I'm right there with you. I was really bummed when the Emanate Audio Cerberus went belly-up. The ADAT-friendly 500 rack format has been a long time coming. Very stoked to see someone do this and do it right. The I/O on this thing is great. The only possible thing that might've been an added bonus would have been DB25's on the analog I/O (but not at the expense of the standard XLR/TRS connections) but honestly I could care less about that considering all of the other I/O on this thing. Great design and looks great too!

That sounds interesting !

I have join the movement.
Let's see....

R.

Thanks so much! Very kind words indeed! We did think about a handle, but now you mention it, we have thought a way of making one out of the metal we cut out for the module slots - saving the planet one handle at a time!

Thanks so much! We did actually consider adding DB25’s but we were so pushed for space internally and the only way could add them was to increase the unit from 4U to 5U - adding size, weight, metalwork and ultimatly cost... for us we wanted to keep the unit as compact as possible to accommodate location recording and travelling engineers!

Great to hear you’re stoked to see it! We will be shipping in April/May time.

Hey there, sorry the FAQ is not working for you! Been a mad rush lately and we’re still working on the site - But essentially:

CAST stands for Cat5 Analogue Snake Transport. CAST is Cranborne Audio’s way of repurposing off-the-shelf Cat5 Networking cables to transport 4 channels of balanced analogue audio over a single cable.

The difference between CAST and other Ethernet-based digital audio transports (AES67, AVB, Dante) is that CAST is 100% analogue and requires ZERO setup. Plug one end of the cable in one box, and the other end in another box and it just works. No setup. No latency. No fuss. And it sounds great.

Cranborne Audio will be releasing various CAST-equipped products that allow tons of possibilities… Watch this space!

If you come to the booth (1442 hall E) maybe I could tell you a little bit more about what we have in mind for CAST!

Thanks a lot!

Sorry to hear other manufacturers said no! We’ve had loads of ideas like this in the past that have been shot down by company executives and finance departments but we don’t have that restriction now!

Seemed like a no brainier for us!

Thanks for your kind words!

Looks impressive, 500ADAT is an overdue thing for certain. One thing seems missing though: DAW control of 500 units, recall via plugins etc. Wes Audio have this down already, not seeing anything like that in the specs list for these products. Unless I've inadvertently skipped over it...

Hey there,

Wes Audio employ a digitally controlled analogue cirtcuit to achieve that level of integration. Their own modules can be recalled within their own racks however unless more 500 series manufacturers adopt that same protocol and method of control then only Wes Audio products will facilitate that recallability feature.

We believe the beauty of 500 series is the ability to mix and match modules from other manufacturers. Whilst it would be in our best interests to implement a feature where you can recall OUR preamps from within OUR racks, we don’t think it would be in the best interests of you guys due to cost (digital pots and controllers are expensive!) and lack of variety.

Hope that makes sense! Thanks for your feedback!

very interesting

What is maximum sample rate?

I wish you luck with your endeavor but you may want to change your use of "Mojo analogue saturation circuit" as it makes you appear to be ripping off Louder Than Liftoff Silver Bullet and Chroma.

Where did 'mojo' originate?

Mojo's not a trademarked word, and to be honest I didn't think of the Silver Bullet until you mentioned it. Then I had to go look at a faceplate of it to see if it even said mojo because I didn't even know that it did.

But Mojo is a word that's been around forever. I certainly don't associate it with louder than liftoff.

Wow, this is very cool. Highly interested in checking this stuff out

Hey.. that's finally something interesting
Just about week ago I've searched over GS to find other mentions about some 500 rack with built-in converters and ADAT.. there was a guy from some other small company, who posted about that couple years ago, but AFAIK they never released it.

For me, it's also really refreshing, that you don't want repeat common stupid mistake of some other vendors, who lately starts to release otherwise very interesting products only just with built-in USB interface without any option to fully integrate it with existing audio interfaces via some standardized digital I/Os.
Studio consisting of all-in-one I/O box hooked to notebook via USB isn't everyone's choice. Besides of that seemingly quite a few companies can realistically judge, XMOS MCU with USB audio firmware and OEM driver (for PCs) isn't really on par with custom solutions by RME, Lynx, MOTU or likes with regards to both latency performance, efficiency and maturity of their drivers, which are being continually tweaked for years. And that own software development resources, would be really exhausted just by development of some control panel and repackaging of 3rd party drivers without any chance to really improve underlying audio streaming part or ASIO or CoreAudio driver.
So ADAT option for 500 box in the product line is a wise choice IMO.

Anyway good luck with that!

Michal

I never said it was trademarked otherwise I would've said they have to change it. Louder than Liftoff has been calling their color stages "Mojo Amps" for years - if this company wants to differentiate itself it should stay away from terms well established by other brands. Mojo in the Silver Bullet is describing how much API flavor or Neve flavor to add. In this box it's describing how much Neve flavor to add.

I completely believe it wasn't an intentional rip off but was instead parallel thinking. Either way I was just giving my 2 cents to help them establish themselves as unique thinkers as their products seem to indicate.

Question: Do you need to have modules loaded in the 500ADAT for it to serve it's purpose as an A/D converter? I.E., if I had no modules (yet), could I buy the 500ADAT and be able to use it as a stand-alone 8 channel A/D converter?

Yes absolutely, In fact that’s something we stipulated from the beginnng. The rear XLRS will function as standard line inputs straight into your DAW or through ADAT. That’s also per module so you can use a few modules and then have a few sources going straight in too.

Hope that helps.

Well, but there's the Arp Chroma. That's the only Chroma as far as I'm concerned (and no, I don't mean cbs or fender chroma or polaris etc). The one and only Chroma. It was an Arp. And it didn't save the Arp company. I dunno what Louder Than Liftoff is thinking in taking THAT. It's just not right in my mind. Darn millennials.....whatever.

Maybe next year, they'll come out with an Enron box.