WHAT IS THE BEST AUTOMATION SOFTWARE FOR MACS?

[KNSU Student GM]

I'm the student Station Manager of a small college radio station and we're looking to get new automation software. We have Macs at the station. Our current automation software is MegaSeg. Even though we have the "Pro Version" MegaSeg is still consumer grade quality. One of the most annoying things about the software is that it has no concept of station ids, and we have to program it to interrupt a song to play the station id. Which makes for some awkward moments on air. It also will slow down or stop playing a tracking when your adding music to the program. If anybody knows of any industry quality automation software for macs or any tips on how to get more from MegaSeg please reply!

 

[aaronread]

Take a look at RadioLogik from MacinMind.com I have not used it myself, but I have a friend and trusted colleague who LOVES it for his college station in Baltimore. It has a very iTunes-like interface so there's a short learning curve for most of today's students.

 

[aaronread]

BTW, I would also recommend signing up for the College Broadcasters Inc listserv at www.askcbi.org and posting the question there as well. There are many technically-inclined people on the list with more Mac experience than I have who I know will be happy to provide their experiences on the topic.

 

[PirateJohnny]

I just popped in this section to see what's going on and found this question. Take a look at AudioRack Suite. I'm an old (retired from radio) DJ but it's still in my blood. I found this free program that does an outstanding job. It's a little time consuming to set up but once it gets running it's awesome. I use it instead of iTunes. It was written for a commercial station to use and is the most stable program I've ever seen.

http://redmountainradio.com/arsuite/

 

[Kent T]

BootCamp on Intel Macs running XP Pro or Windows 7 running mainstream automation students need to know to be relevant in this industry. Mac is more relevant in broadcast production for radio than on air.

 

[PirateJohnny]

BootCamp on Intel Macs running XP Pro or Windows 7 running mainstream automation students need to know to be relevant in this industry. Mac is more relevant in broadcast production for radio than on air.

Point well taken. How many Windows automation programs are in use? Training received for using one program doesn't necessarily translate to using another program. Training received for programming and running "automation" (the thought process) would translate to any automation program.

 

[aaronread]

AudioVault, Enco, RCS NexGen, WideOrbit and (I think) Dalet all run on Windows. That's most of the "big" automation vendors for radio.

Mac-based automation is relatively uncommon in the professional broadcasting world. But conversely, Macs are much, much more common in the media editing world. Linux is "rarer" although there's Rivendell which was created for/by Salem Broadcasting and used at most (quite possibly all) their stations. Good software but it's dicey to depend on if you don't have a linux expert on staff. There's also BeOS, which is a FreeBSD variant designed specifically for radio broadcasting (TuneTracker) and if you have the time and inclination to learn it, is remarkably powerful with ridiculous low overhead needs for hardware.

 

[Kent T]

And also, BSI Simian and Arrakis what ever they want to call it also run on Windows. BSI WaveCart for live assist and Simian automation is a great solution for college radio use and many commercial stations also run it.