Hello Everyone..
We're all having a headache here at Liberty 1680..just trying to figure
something out here. So here is the deal. At our station we're setting up
Hello Everyone..
We're all having a headache here at Liberty 1680..just trying to figure
something out here. So here is the deal. At our station we're setting up
and testing ZaraRadio, which seems to be very good radio automation software. First, let me say this..all of our sound files are WMA Format.
Now here comes the problem. We have these Liner/Promo files which have a
playing time of about 5 to 10 seconds. They're something like..."You're listening to Liberty 1680, a Part 15 station."
Now if one of these Liner/Promos comes on at the end of a song..the next song on the playlist just starts playing right in the middle of the Liner/Promo, really, and the Liner/Promo immediately fades out. This is
just driving us all nuts here because we've done everything we can to fix it. So what do you say, guys? How can we correct this?
Jack
This is going to be caused by your overlap and fade settings under the "Tools --> Options" menu. I have a similar issue that I have to balance what works better for our music and our text-to-speech tracks for news and weather. The music works best with more fade+overlap, but that clobbers text-to-speech tracks when there are multiple back-to-back. I'm about ready to throw in some 5 second blank tracks into the playlists to see how that works out. If I had a feature request for Zara, one item would be the ability to specify fade and overlap on a per-track basis.
I find Zara works much better with mp3files. But you have what you have. I dont overlap anything with the clunky timers,instead,append your filename with this to trigger the next file to overlap it,ex: promo12~5.mp3 will give you a 5 second overlap. I also edit all my files so there is no silence at the beginning or end and I dont use the silence detector either.
Up until now I have thought WMA was a video format, as I did not know it could be an audio format.
Although I use Winamp's Playlist, I use .mp3 audio files. They seem to blend together very nicely, I don't use any kind of overlapping features (if they exist for Winamp) to place voices over music or any such thing.
About a year ago I tested Zara but had troubles that I decided not to explore, so I abandoned it.
Zara is still the most awesome software I have ever used. I think a lot of features were left unknown to us who speak english because I found out how to do all the little things by scouring their help sites before they disappeared. I can see how someone with little patience would scoff at Zara due to the lack of a good manual with all the tricks and tips in it. It does everything I need for 24/7 solid,tight,reliable automation and has been for 7 years now. I just love it.
What I do for certain ID's and commercials is a neat little trick.
just add a ~time to the end of the file.
ex. BallardAd2~0.mp3 = no overlap.
BallardAd2~1.mp3 = 1 second overlap.
That should (and will) fix your problem.
I love SAM. Seems to have none of the issues mentioned and I don't have to fiddle with files or put special instructions into them or on their tags or anything. Oh and the website integration is second to none and does it all by default. Even the default fades work perfectly for just about every format out there. I've never changed any of it since the day it fired up and began running my stations.
Comes with it's own set of encoders for every stream format out there, including AAC and AAC+ and can run different stream formats at different bit rates at the same time. Internal audio buss routing to allow for plug in's and even mixing internal audio paths with external audio paths and back. 2 main on air decks with 2 aux decks and a bunch of other stuff I have yet to even dig into because for my stations format they are not needed, but there nonetheless.
It's been running for 4 years 24/7/365 with the exception of maintenance time. Heck the computer it's running on is still chugging along after 4 years of continuous operation.
I've actually tested Zara out and it's a really good piece of software no doubt. Although the secondary automation system which runs my terrestrial stations is using SAM, a copy of Zara is on that system as a backup. From time to time on the AM and FM stations when I want to run a different program from what is airing on the net streams I will fire up the Zara to play long duration programs that run over 2 hours. Zara can handle long duration program files where as SAM limits the duration it can see to about 2 hours and 5 minutes.
Zara has some unique features onto its own that makes it a great alternative to what is available.
RFB
Thanks for your reply but you did not say anything about fixing my problem with Zara.
Thanks a lot guy...we are definitely going to give this a try.
Agreed. Use the "tilde-zero trick" (~0) at the end of the filename.
Isnt that what I said 5 or 6 posts ago? add a ~T where T=time in seconds and it will overlap at that time from the end of the file or if zero,at the true end of file. You simply cant beat Zara for the price,its free! I actually use v1.4 because I dont overlap anything,my files are that tight! Then I can use the plugins feature.
"Isnt that what I said 5 or 6 posts ago?"
LOL! Op obviously missed 2 or 3 of em right off...it happens! 😀
The rush to find an answer often causes seeing right over it!
Murphy 101
RFB