NAB Show: Barix To Launch New Audio-Over-IP Broadcast Codec

Barix continues to build out its next-generation line of audio-over-IP encoders and decoders with a new broadcast-specific solution that introduces important new benefits for STL, studio-to-studio and other audio networking applications.

The new LX400, to be unveiled at the NAB Show in Las Vegas (April 14-17), Booth C2348, represents the successor to the Barix Exstreamer 500, a solution that remains an important product in Barix’s broadcast portfolio. The LX400 carries over many of the same features that Barix customers rely on, including multiple contact closures, relays and a USB port for direct-from-device playout. It “adds several important new features that introduce new benefits and efficiencies to broadcasters, and is customizable to support legacy point-to-point and cloud networking scenarios such as syndicated program distribution,” the company said.

Top of the advanced new features list, Barix said, “is the addition of premium quality software codec options, including OPUS and AACplus for compressed transport, and PCM to support uncompressed transmission. The LX400’s inclusion of the OPUS codec is especially attractive given its high-efficiency bitrate performance, ensuring broadcasters the best possible audio quality for compressed transmission. OPUS essentially delivers lossless quality audio to listeners while using far less bandwidth, reducing audio contribution and distribution costs for broadcasters in the process.”

Other first-time features for broadcast-specific Barix hardware products include absolute end-to-end delay control for RTP streaming, adherence to the latest security standards (HTTPS), and stream redundancy modes for uninterrupted broadcasting. The LX400 also enhances buffering performance for Icecast streams, “ensuring constant and consistent playback.”

The LX400 is configurable as an encoder or decoder and is compatible with the Reflector EVO service, exclusively offered through Barix’s longtime partner StreamGuys, for full-duplex audio contribution and distribution in the cloud. For more traditional point-to-point applications, the LX400 is configured with Barix STL firmware.

Reto Brader, Barix CEO, said: “The LX400 continues Barix’s rich tradition of supplying broadcasters with reliable IP audio solutions that allow them to migrate away from expensive satellite and TDM networking system for program audio transport. The underlying platform builds in the same features and capabilities of our recently introduced MultiCoder M400 solution for live IP audio encoding and streaming, and packages them into professional, compact and cost-efficient codec solution that meets today’s audio networking requirements for the broadcast community.”

Barix added: “Power redundancy is assured in either scenario through the availability of PoE and 24VDC service, providing failsafe operation for those that want to use the network as their primary device powering option. Other standard features include eight dry contact inputs, eight output relays, a digital AES3 audio output for StudioHub wiring infrastructure. Local music playout is achieved via the LX400’s USB port, providing an absolute failsafe solution for AM and FM stations should they be unable to receive audio due to network outages.”