8.2. Player

Each player of each playlist can be configured independently on the appropriate configuration page. The options for each player are:

Caption

This should be a single character (for example, 1, 2, 3, ... or A, B, C, ...) that identifies the corresponding player. It is displayed in the player control in the main window, and also in the playlist next to the playlist item loaded in the respective player.

Color

Each player is assigned a color that visually identifies it in the main window. The color is used to indicate that the player is active, and also in the leftmost playlist column to mark the loaded playlist item. If you place colored stickers on your mixing desk, your presenters will quickly find the right fader.

Output device

Click the Select-button to choose the sound card to use for this player. The sound device selection dialog is described below.

PFL device

Here, you can choose the sound card to be used in PFL mode. If you own a mixer with PFL capabilities and switch the channel to PFL while pre-listening, this will probably be the same as the normal output device. But you can also choose to route the PFL signal to a different sound card, for example to a special PFL bus.

EOF warning

The player will start to flash the specified time before reaching the end of file. Setting this option to 0 disables EOF warning.

Show PFL/START/PAUSE/STOP buttons

Disable this option to hide the PFL/START/PAUSE/STOP buttons inside the player. This is useful when you do not want to control the players with the mouse but only through other remote control mechanisms like hotkeys, gameport closures etc. (see Section 8.5, “Remote Control”).

Advanced PFL

If checked, the Advanced PFL dialog will be displayed while in PFL mode, and you can set cue points.

Auto load*

If checked, the player automatically loads the next available item from the playlist.

Auto unload on STOP*

If checked, the player is automatically unloaded when a STOP signal is received.

Auto unload on EOF*

If checked, the player is automatically unloaded when reaching the end of file.

Auto STOP on EOF*

If checked, the player is stopped and reset when reaching the end of file. This setting is ignored when “Auto unload on STOP” is set.

Include in logging

Check this option if you want this player to be included in the start and stop log files. Logging must be globally enabled on the “Logging” configuration page (cf Section 8.7, “Logging”).

Include in database logging

Check this option if you want this player to be included in the database logging. SQL database logging must be globally enabled on the “Logging” configuration page (cf Section 8.7, “Logging”).

Show time in seconds (instead of 1/10 s)

If checked, the elapsed/remaining time will be displayed in full seconds, otherwise in 1/10th of a second.

Show ramp in seconds (instead of 1/10 s)

If checked, the ramp time countdown will be displayed in full seconds, otherwise in 1/10th of a second.

Auto-truncate time

If checked, leading 0s will be stripped from the elapsed/remaining time if it is less than one hour.

Simultaneous playback and PFL

By default, playback and PFL are mutually exclusive; you cannot pre-listen to an item when it's already playing in a player, and vice versa. However, if you use distinct sound cards for PFL and playback, you can enable this option and thus decouple PFL and playback. This is useful for end monitoring while the player is already active. (If this option is disabled, you can still pre-listen to an active item by opening an Extra PFL window for it.)

The options marked with * can be toggled at run-time through the player context menu.

8.2.1. Output Devices

For each player, you can choose which output device used for the on air signal and the PFL signal, respectively. Furthermore, mAirList allows you to route the signal to a specific channel pair on multi-channel (5.1 or 7.1) sound cards. The Output Device dialog allows you to select the desired combination.

mAirList supports three different output methods (or “drivers”), all of which rely on the BASS.DLL audio engine, which must be present in the mAirList program folder.

BASS.DLL (WDM/MME hardware mixing)

This is the default. BASS.DLL decodes the input stream and uses DirectSound to send it to the WDM or MME driver of the sound card. When multiple files are played simultaneously, the sound card takes care of the mixing.

BASS.DLL (WDM/MME software mixing)

While most sound cards can handle simultaneous playback of files with different sample rates, some can not, and distorted or pitched sound output will result. In software mixing mode, the mixing and sample rate conversion is done on software level, and only one (fixed rate) stream is sent to the sound card. Use this option only if your sound card suffers from the above mentioned problem, as it consumes more CPU resources. The file BASSMIX.DLL must be present for this driver to work.

BASS.DLL (ASIO, software mixing)

ASIO is a driver model offered by a number of (mostly mid- to high-end) sound cards. As software mixing takes place before the stream is sent to the ASIO driver, you need both BASSASIO.DLL and BASSMIX.DLL. Unfortunately, due to the construction of the BASSMIX engine, mAirList cannot take advantage of the famous low latency of ASIO, in fact, latency can even be higher than with WDM. So you should only use ASIO if WDM doesn't work for your card.

Having chosen the driver to use for this channel, you can set the following options:

Device

Select the sound card to use.

Old Sound Cards and the “Emulated” mode

In case the sound card is marked as “emulated”, it does not support WDM drivers but only MME. This is a disadvantage, and you should better get a different sound card with WDM support (which almost every card has today).

Channel

For multichannel sound cards, choose the pair of channels (speakers) to be used. If you intend to use separate channels for your players, avoid using the “default” setting, but explicitly assign a channel to each player. Otherwise, clicks and pops may occur.

Making all Channels Visible

To make all channels of a multichannel sound card appear in this list, you have to set the speaker type in Windows' Control Panel to 5.1 or 7.1. If the speaker type is set correctly, but still only channels 1/2 appear here, try to set the “force multichannel output” option on the BASS.DLL page and restart the configuration dialog.

Sample rate

You can enter a fixed sample rate to use for this sound card. If you have multiple players using the same card, make sure to enter the same value for each player. This setting is ignored for BASS.DLL hardware mixing.