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This topic comprises 4 pages: 1 2 3 4
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Author
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Topic: Barco alchemy ICMP server or Dolby IMS3000?
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 02-08-2019 02:02 PM
I agree completely and utterly that DCP-izing files, DVDs and BDs is the most end user-proof way to present them in a cinema. However, doing that requires an investment in hardware, software, and some technical knowledge. In some jurisdictions (including in the United States, where, per the DMCA, the act of defeating a copy protection system is a federal offense, even if you have the permission of the copyright owner to do so to their material), doing so is also illegal. OK, I have never even heard of one instance of that law actually being enforced in cases where no actual copyright violation took place, but it's still a consideration.
If it's a factory-pressed disc, DCP-o-Matic alone won't do it - you need ripping software that will deal with the copy protection on the source disc (which, due to legal considerations mentioned above, might not be that easy to get hold of), and the ability to create distribution media that a DCP server can ingest from.
An end user who does not want to get involved in all of this has the option of hiring a third party to make the DCP, and in the case of a theater that only wants to play a feature from an alternative content source, say, once or twice a year, that option is viable. But for venues that play lots of it, the cost and lead time considerations are nontrivial. In my last theater job we did lots of festivals and one-off shows from such sources. I wanted to DCP-ize as many of these as possible, for exactly the reasons you give; but on some occasions there wasn't the lead time and/or the money to pay for the staff hours to do the DCP-izing. So we had to play the shows from discs, files residing on Macbooks, etc. etc. For that reason, a need for reliable, end user-proof integration of alternative content and DCI playback will, IMHO, exist for the foreseeable future.
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Marcel Birgelen
Film God
Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 02-08-2019 06:11 PM
Yep, thanks to the DMCA, making a copy of a DVD or Blu-Ray is a federal crime. Even if I would put ROT13 "encryption" on a file as a way of copy protection and you would "hack" it, you could go to prison for it. (It actually happened...)
Well, thanks to your current president, here in Europe we're still allowed to make as many backup copies we want from the content we actually own. ![[Wink]](wink.gif)
There are a few exemptions in the law though (if I remember correctly, they need to be reviewed and renewed every 10 years or so), if you're doing it for educational purposes, you can still legally rip it. Even for archival purposes, it should be legal. So, the easiest way for any cinema would be to either become a school or a film archive. ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
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Carsten Kurz
Film God
Posts: 4340
From: Cologne, NRW, Germany
Registered: Aug 2009
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posted 02-09-2019 06:02 PM
Again, the bitstream-to-LPCM only works if your processor can do HDMI (or your IMB/IMS feeds through HDMI audio to it's AES outputs). Most CPs with HDMI capability will decode at least one of the necessary formats anyway. There are so many installations with e.g. a CP750 where only TOSLINK/S/P-DIF is possible, thus no multichannel PCM.
Another benefit of converting with e.g. DCP-o-matic is that you can shift subtitles into the visible display area. On most DVDs or Blurays in flat or scope format, subtitles are shown within the letterbox bars, which are usually masked out on 'proper' cinema screens. There are some few players able to relocate subtitles into the visible image area, but all in all, its fiddly, and e.g. on the Panasonic we use, it's not a sticky setting. So it's useless for ordinary staff to try, they simply get lost.
It's hard to believe there was not enough market for OPPO...
I have a couple of features converted that we show regularly, and showing them in proper scope, with the subtitles, audio levels, etc. adjusted makes it much easier. Also we do not have to care for player or disc menu becoming visible before or after the movie, automation, etc being useless for DVD/Bluray showings, etc.
We also quite frequently have a need to show subtitles in the same language as the disc audio for schools. These DCPs are not available, but usually DVDs and Blurays offer this.
- Carsten
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Peter Hall
Master Film Handler
Posts: 314
From: London, UK
Registered: Dec 2000
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posted 02-10-2019 06:47 AM
Talking about audio only, if you are looking for 5.1 or 7.1 DCP only then any of the processors / IMBs on the market will give you pretty much the same result - Dolby CP750, 850, IMS3000 - Datasat Ap20/25, Trinnov (arguably better alignment ?) QSC or the USL JSD60 or 100.
But the growth in the industry seems to be in smaller, more flexible venues running alternative content and event screenings. Sadly the current processors from Dolby are a step down from past offerings, with the CP850 offering no 5.1 input (a real pain for mixed use venues) and the IMS3000 unwilling to talk to the "house" non-sync or mic. Datasat has 4 HDMIs, 2 LtRt inputs, mics and 5.1 audio and even the more basic JSD60 has half of these options. Well done Trinnov for listening to your customers and adding HDMI. In my book, you still cant go past a CP200, a pile of diodes and a soldering iron
For an average cinema these days you cant go past a factory IMB (Alchemys are great) and a JSD60, CP750, Datasat Ap25 or Trinnov (listed in rough price order) depending on budget and features you need.
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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!
Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 02-10-2019 12:00 PM
The JSD60 remains a crippled piece in that it can't do 7.1 and HI/VI without external assistance. It also put the pro logic decoder on pair-4 instead of pair-1, also a colossal blunder, in my opinion.
I hadn't heard that Trinnov added HDMI decoding to the Ovation. I just checked their website and it would appear that DTS decoding is now an option, which is great news.
I'd say that Peter's list omits the QSC's QSYS system. If you believe QSC, the DCP line remains the most popular cinema processor in the world...it doesn't decode Dolby or DTS but can take 2-channel PCM on its S/PDIF input (Which is wired backwards...pin is to ground, case is to +...go figure.
Christie has dropped out of the IMB market on their S2 projectors so Barco is the only one of the DLPs that has their own solution. The ICMP has its ups and downs. At the moment, it is our most problematic server per-capita. The IMS2000, oddly enough, is our most stable (No IMS3000s, at the moment nor SR1000s but both are about to change on that).
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 02-10-2019 01:46 PM
quote: Peter Hall
But the growth in the industry seems to be in smaller, more flexible venues running alternative content and event screenings.
Amen to that. With the exception of the chain 'plexes (and even some of those want one or two screens in each site "fully loaded"), most of the installs we do have to cope with both DCI and a number of alternative content options in a way that just works when the button is pressed, with minimal techie knowledge needed from the end user.
DVD/BD playback is now less of an issue, but various types of streaming receiver are now becoming more and more common. So far, I haven't come across one (Crapple TV, Broku, Dire Stick, etc.) that outputs DTS through its HDMI output, but I'm sure that one is out there somewhere, and Sod's law will dictate that we'll end up installing it hooked to a processor that can't decode it, and get a panic call or email when the customer finds him- or herself watching a silent movie.
From this thread, it seems that the only absolutely bullet- and idiotproof options for achieving this are the AP20/25 and Q-Sys. We're drifting more in the direction of Q-Sys, so much so that I'm currently working on our first in-house design for a totally Q-Sys 12-plex, in which it'll handle the audio, some of the automation, and the GUI for the end user. But if film capability is needed as well, the AP20/25 is an attractive option, because of the analog input card option, and the fact that its automation features enable you to set up a DA20, DTS and/or SDDS player to fault to SR and come back in again, without the need for a CP65/200/500/650 in the system as well.
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 02-10-2019 10:09 PM
The 10 basic screens are on one core, and the two "fully loaded" ones, plus all the non-auditorium stuff (bar, lobby, bathrooms, etc.) are on another. Both cores and the Q-LAN are redundant, with backups.
It wasn't my decision to do it that way (I was just tasked with doing the designs), but it's one I would defend. I take your point that all it would take is for two machines to go out and that would take ten screens with them. But if the primary and backup cores are powered on separate circuits and through UPSes, how likely, realistically, is that to happen? I know that the power supplies in early Q-Sys power amps can sometimes go bad, but I've never heard of any reports of that happening in a core or other Q-Sys component.
It's a bit like ETOPS: when twinjets started to fly the Atlantic and the Pacific in the 1980s, jokes about "engines turning or passengers swimming" did the rounds, and one airline even promoted its use of 747s and A340s with the slogan "4 engines 4 long haul." But the reality is that in three decades of ETOPS operation, there has never been an accident in which both engines failed for unrelated reasons, and only one double engine failure during an ETOPS flight over water (caused by a fuel leak and the plane consequently running out of gas). In short, ETOPS is so statistically safe that almost no passengers worry about it any more. I'm going to Hawaii on a 737 tomorrow for a planned maintenance trip, and the prospect doesn't worry me in the slightest.
By the same token, the redundancy arrangements in Q-Sys are almost certainly reliable enough that we don't need to worry about them. Furthermore, Q-Sys offers other reliability gains, for example, the ability to reroute the center channel to left and right (mixed in with the L and R signal) at the touch of a button if the power amp or a speaker driver for the center channel goes bad, thereby saving a show.
BTW, agreed entirely with your earlier comment that the IMS2000 has proven very reliable. They can be a bit finicky to set up, especially integrating it with a Screenvision player for preshow, but once they're up and running to the customer's satisfaction, we almost never receive any breakdown calls. My only worry is how long the cert battery is going to last, and whether we're going to start seeing lots of them needing to be re-certed because the batteries have gone flat, as has been the case with the GDC SX-3000. Again, I'm not too concerned, because Dolby offers a reasonably priced one-time repair service for users who choose not to extend their warranties.
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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!
Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 02-11-2019 02:06 AM
In terms of failure theory, if you double the number of COREs, you've doubled your chances of a failure too...BUT you've cut the risk of all auditoriums in half.
I'm not so worried about two CORE failures at once but what if a CORE fails in a manner that the redundant core doesn't "see" the failure. How long would you go without sound on 10-screens until someone killed the primary CORE so the redundant core came on line? That is my fear.
If the primary CORE fails in a manner that the redundant core sees and takes over, you still have dumped sound on all 10-screens for at least 15-seconds until the redundant core is running the show and the amps/ I/O stuff are responding to the redundant core. 15-second is "forever" when something happens and a manager could be faced with an entire complex of readmits!
I'm working on a similar design for 10-screens and gave the customer the option of all screens on a pair of cores or to split it up with two sets of redundant cores or separate smaller cores for each screen (no redundancy but would keep a core on-site plus one could cut/paste one core's design into another core and get a single 110 to handle two 7.1 systems very easily.
The customer opted for splitting the complex in 2 and running 5-screens per core. Each with a redundant backup. Two QLANs so those are backed up too. I'm not too worried as I have not had issues with COREs crapping out, at all and having 4 on site pretty much ensures that nothing is going to go down easily!
It would be cool if QSC added the ability to put a USB-> Ethernet adapter on a CORE 110. With that one could use the CORE 110c for up to 8 screens with full redundancy (though 8 screens would be its absolute max, I'd probably restrict it to 6 or 7 screens. It would be VERY cost effective.
And yes, I've built speaker/amp bypasses into my designs for Center or Left/Right (and LC/RC in Atmos). There are a lot of benefits to QSYS, for sure and there is another post that shows just how cool some have made it.
QSYS isn't the most popular, but QSC's DCP line of processors, they claim, is the most installed cinema processor in the world (using the DCP100, 200, 300, combined, no doubt).
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Marcel Birgelen
Film God
Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 02-11-2019 03:00 AM
After some years of experience with complex systems, I've come to the conclusion that "automatic failover" in redundant systems often simply doesn't work. It's surely not a bad idea to have redundancy, but don't expect it to be a hands-off thing.
It's often a budget decision obviously, but I do prefer "containerized" designs, where each "container" is in itself self-contained and not dependent on other systems for its core functionality. That's the way multi-screen cinemas have mostly operated for ages now, but stuff is starting to change.
Obviously, a fully "containerized design" is somewhat of an utopia, you still need to get your power from somewhere, for example. TMSes will still operate cross rooms and you want to generally be able to access some centralized resources.
But going into the example of the redundant QSys COREs. I haven't had a QSys CORE fail in full production yet, but it's just another piece of complex IT hardware, chances are, that when it fails, it fails in such a mode, that the other CORE will not notice or is unable to take over the functionality of the first core. Maybe the reason why the first core failed was a software bug, due to a specific configuration, so chances are, the second core also fails once it's deemed to take over the workload.
The failure might also be beyond the QSys COREs. What if the network fails? Sure, you should put in two "core switches" to make that part of the network redundant. But switches also run some complex software and their failure modes also aren't always graceful and this is something I've witnessed a lot already.
There are also other possible failure modes, like someone creating a loop in the network and you having a hard time to figure out where it went wrong, for example.
Some network failures are very hard to debug. Having no techs on site for a quick relief, a downtime of an hour is easily 10 shows lost in a 10-plex.
On the other hand, common failures can occur anywhere... Yesterday I watched Alita: Battle Angel in an almost empty room, because the ticket sales system (both on-line and on-site) went down for the better part of the day...
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