CM-J50 Digital Audio Console

Overview

The Cadac CM-J50, with its 96 input channels and 56 busses, has been designed to provide a truly intuitive user interface, with class leading audio performance, in a very competitive package.

CM-J50: Welcome

CM-J50: Introduction

CM-J50

Introduction

The CM-J50 delivers a unique mix experience and provides a genuine emotional connection to the audio. It delivers greater connectivity, control, and flexibility all within a distinctive form factor that is faster, smaller and lighter than previous generations.

Cadac’s exceptional gesture-based navigation, via an impressively large 23.5-inch optically bonded touchscreen, allows the user to fluidly scroll through the console’s 96 input channels and 56 busses. A simple swipe, touch and turn gives you complete creative control of the audio, with the faders and encoders seamlessly mapping to the screen's active functions, resulting in a truly intuitive mix experience.

The unique combination of a compact form factor, exceptional user interface, legendary Cadac mic-pre’s, state-of-the art DSP and FPGA processing, coupled with astonishingly low latency, makes the CM-J50 an incredible proposition for those who do not want to compromise on either audio quality or creativity.

CM-J50: Hardware Oveview

Hardware

Overview

Intuitive graphical user interface
Proprietary FPGA / DSP mix platform
96 kHz, 24-bit Delta-Sigma A/D-D/A converters
32/40 bit floating point SHARC processors
23.5” flush fit 16:9 hi-def LCD touch screen
6.5” LCD touch screen for system control
64 x 64 Waves card
24 user definable colour OLED displays
20 segment stereo channel metering
20 touch sensitive 100mm motorised faders
16 fully programmable Mic inputs
8 analogue outputs
8 AES3 inputs and 8 AES3 outputs
2 MegaCOMMS ports on coax (4 x BNCs) or optical (2 x duplex optical LC ports)
Dual internal auto switching PSUs

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console custom rear input and output panel

Features

Highlights

Sub 0.4 millisecond total system latency
96 input channels
56 busses, 48 are assignable as Groups, Auxes or Matrix in FoH mode
Unique Monitor Mode
Custom Fader Layers
16 VCA groups including ‘VCA unfold’ navigation
16 assignable buttons with OLED displays
16 stereo (or 32 mono) on-board effects
31 band EQ on outputs plus 4 band fully parametric EQ
One Dynamic EQ on each input and output
Compressor / limiter plus gate with side chain filter on all inputs
Compressor / limiter with side chain filter on all outputs
Input and output delays
Snapshot automation system with Cue Ripple and Cue Preview
Dugan Automixer post fade insert for Waves
PC offline editor
iPad remote control
Console Mirroring
Side car mode

CM-J50: Features Overview

CM-J50: Features

The Intuitive Touch

With a minimal learning curve sound engineers will instinctively be navigating the console's interface without the need for any intensive formal training.

GESTURE NAVIGATION

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console intuitive user interface

The flush mounted, optically bonded, 23.5 inch 16:9 true HD LCD touch screen provides the engineer with an exceptionally clean and intuitive graphical user interface (GUI).
The unique combination of a large touch screen, displaying the intuitive GUI, plus traditional encoders results in an instinctive use of touch, turn and swipe.
The faders naturally follow the GUI on the screen.
No layers to navigate, resulting in a streamlined workflow and a stress-free learning curve for the engineer.

MIC PRE

The CM-J50 proudly bears the hallmark sound from Cadac's golden age of recording and its audio heritage is directly linked to the legendary analogue theatre console; the J-Type.
The CM-J50's digital audio performance improves upon its analogue forebears with an astonishingly wide dynamic range and low noise floor.

PHASE COHERENCY

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console MegaCOMMS and Waves Interface Card

The clean and transparent sound of the CM-J50 is partly due to the attention paid to latency management (often over looked) where differences in latency of less than 0.1ms will have a detrimental effect on audio quality.
The extensive automatic latency management system manages all internal routing and associated processing latency, resulting in all audio samples being synchronised before summing, and providing absolute phase coherency at all outputs, all with sub 0.4 millisecond latency.

EFFECTS

16 stereo effect “slots”, each with reverb, modulation and delay elements.
The 3 elements within each effect slot can be ‘dragged and dropped’ in either series or parallel, and in any order.
Effects can be patched as inserts on any channel, or in-line on an aux send/return basis.
All Effects are phase coherent and time aligned.
Effects settings can be stored in a User Library.

EQ

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console EQ screen

All input and output channels feature 6 band EQ, with a 4 band fully parametric section and variable low/high pass filters.
All 6 bands can be independently switched in or out, and the whole EQ bypassed with a master EQ bypass.
The LF and HF bands of the EQ feature a Bell/Shelf option.
All EQ settings can be stored in a User Library.
Output channels feature a 1/3rd octave GEQ in addition to the 6 band EQ.

GEQ

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console GEQ screen

All output busses feature 4-band fully parametric EQ, plus variable HPF and LPF plus a 1/3 octave GEQ.
All parametric and graphic EQs can be used simultaneously, without compromise.
GEQ parameters displayed as a virtual GEQ on the screen, and adjustments made using the console's 100mm faders.
Additional features include GEQ in/out, an “instant flat” switch and a bypass function for individual GEQ filters.

AUTOMATION

A cue-based automation system capable of storing hundreds of Cues within a Show file with a number of Show files in a single Project.
Cue Preview allows the engineer to recall, amend and store individual scenes during a show in an offline preview mode, allowing changes to be made “on the fly”.
Cue Ripple allows a channel’s individual parameters to be “rippled through” any, or all cues, to make global changes to a show file mid show.

LOCAL I/O

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console 16 inputs 8 outputs 8 AES3 rear panel

Fixed local I/O consists of 16 superb fully programmable Cadac mic inputs with 8 analogue outputs plus 8 AES3 inputs / outputs.
Additional remote stage rack connection, with the same superlative mic pres, is via two MegaCOMMS ports - via either BNCs and two duplex optical LC ports.

CONFIGURABLE BUSSES

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console configurable bus screen

54 configurable busses in Monitor Mode or 48 configurable busses in FoH Mode.
Assignable as any combination of auxiliaries, groups, stereo auxes, stereo groups or matrix outputs.
Bus sends can be individually set as pre EQ, pre fader or post fader, and pre or post VCA.
Busses can be renamed from the pre-set library or with user defined names.

CUSTOM FADER LAYERS

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console custom faders screen

Create, name and colour Custom Fader Layers, or groups, of any mixture of inputs, busses, VCAs and Monitor faders.
Created by simply dragging and dropping from the relevant input, bus, VCA or Monitor page.
A custom layer can be sssigned to any user assignable buttons.

DUGAN AUTOMIXER

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console routing Dan Dougan screen

A Dugan post fade Insert point, with an auto-patch function, allows easy setup of the Dugan Automixer.
Requires a Waves Server connected to the console's integrated Waves card with the addition of the Dugan Automixer Waves plugin.
The Dugan plugin allows automatic cueing of multiple live microphones in real time and simultaneous automixing of up to 64 channels.

DYNAMICS

Input dynamics consists of a gate and dual-mode compressor with side chain filtering, with a choice of both classic or vintage modes of operation.
Output dynamics processing features compression and limiting.
Dynamics settings can be stored in a User Library.
All the dynamics are phase coherent and time aligned.

MUTE and VCA GROUPS

Cadac CM-J50 digital audio mixing console VCA setup screen

There are 16 VCA groups and 8 mute groups with OLED displays.
Any input can be assigned to any VCA or MUTE group, or to multiple groups. The input and the groups can be named using the console’s library or by using the on-screen keyboard.
Enhanced VCA navigation with VCA unfolding allows the members of the selected VCA to be deployed on the faders, giving access to all of the inputs’ control parameters.
Whilst a VCA is ‘unfolded’ all 16 labelled VCA select buttons remain on the screen, allowing direct navigation from one VCA group to another, without reverting to the VCA master page.
The structure of the 16 VCA groups can be viewed on an overview screen, showing all of the members of each VCA, along with their post-fade input meters, your entire mix – at a glance!

MONITOR MODE

Monitor Mode, unique to Cadac, is designed to tackle the specific requirements of the monitor engineer.
When enabled, it gives the engineer the ability to access 54 user-assignable busses and their respective contribution channels in ‘sends on fader’ mode, with a single touch for fast and easy mixing of large numbers of monitor feeds.
When ‘Mix Focus’ feature, and the mix is ‘flipped’ into sends on faders mode, the console will only present with the channels that are contributing to the selected mix.
It is possible to select an input channel and ‘flip’ the outputs onto the faders, allowing a single channel to be sent to multiple destinations simultaneously via the faders.
‘Bus VCAs’, means each individual bus has 16 VCAs to control the level of its members within each bus. This allows mixing on VCAs when in fader flip.

WAVES

The CM-J50 features an integrated Waves SoundGrid interface which provides connectivity to Waves SuperRack.
Up to 64 channels of Waves plug-ins can run simultaneously alongside the console’s own native effects.
The Waves interface can also be used to multi-track record or playback multi-tracks for a "virtual" sound check via a PC or Mac by using the Waves QRec App.

CM-J50: Rear Panel

MegaCOMMS

Coaxial and optical dual ports

Waves

SoundGrid Interface

16

Analogue inputs

PSU

Dual redundant internal supplies

8

Analogue outputs

8

AES3 inputs and outputs

MIDI

In, Thru, Out

Word Clock

Network

Port

Lamp

Word Clock

Out

REAR PANEL

CM-J50: Gallery

Gallery

CM-J50 Specification

Specification

General Specification

FADERS

20 x 100mm motorised faders

SCREENS

1 x 23.5″ 16:9 HD + 1 x 6.5″ Touchscreens

PSU

2 x internal redundant auto-switching PSUs

INPUTS

Up to 192 (inc local I/O)

CHANNELS

96 with full processing

BUSSES

48 configurable in pairs as group/aux/st aux plus dedicated LCR, monitor LR,

headphones LR and talkback

MATRIX

Up to 67 x 48 with full processing

OUTPUTS

Up to 192 (inc local I/O)

GRAPHIC EQ

32 band +/-16 dB on all 55 outputs

INTERNAL FX

16 high-resolution 96 kHz stereo effects processors

LOCAL I/O

16 x XLR Mic Inputs (inc 48 V, PAD and 1 dB gain steps)
8x XLR Balanced outputs, 4 x XLR AES/EBU input
4 x XLR AES/EBU outputs

COMMS

2 x Cadac MegaCOMMS

DIMENSIONS

904.40mm width x 766mm depth x 259.12mm height

WEIGHT

39.5kgs / 87lbs (approx)

Audio Specification

SAMPLE RATE

96 kHz

PROCESSING DELAY

Sub 0.4 millisecond latency through complete signal chain

INTERNAL PROCESSING

40-bit floating point

ADC/DAC

24-bit

FREQUENCY RESPONSE

20 Hz to 44 kHz + 0.5 / -1.5 dB

THD+N

better than 0.005% @unity gain, 10 dB input at 1 kHz

CHANNEL SEPARATION

better than 90 dB

RESIDUAL OUTPUT NOISE

< -90 dBu (20 Hz – 20 kHz)

MIC EIN

< -127 dB with 200 Ohm source impedance

MAXIMUM OUTPUT

21 dBu