The 2000 Olympic games offered the perfect opportunity for Klotz Digital AG to showcase its fiber optic-based Vadis platform. "We had this great big infrastructure of sound from various sources and locations that had to come up to our mix position," says Bruce Jackson, Audio Director of Ceremonies. Thirteen Vadis mainframes were distributed throughout Stadium Australia and the International Broadcast Center located approximately one mile away. The mainframes served as a collection distribution, routing and format conversion network for audio signals distributed to or sent from the Ceremonies Audio Control Room (CAR).

Multiple ceremonies incorporating multiple stages meant having to reconfigure the system to comply with the demands of each show. Recall presets, a standard control feature of the VADIS platform, enabled operators to switch effortlessly from one set of configurations to the next, allowing signals to be interfaced through the platform and routed anywhere else on the network through the touch of one button.

For ultimate safety, two transmit and two receive fiber rings were installed between all locations and the CAR. Fitting each fiber transmit and receive card with two transmit and receive diodes enabled each Vadis frame to provide for fiber core redundancy. Frames could seamlessly switch to receive signals from a clockwise and counterclockwise direction.

Using the Vadis fiber optic based platform offered all users digital and analog format conversion as well as digital sample rate conversion. Vadis also distributes the master digital audio sync, the single most important feature of any digital system. Multiple Fairlight digital audio playout channels were connected digitally via AES.

"As Bruce understands, and broadcasters are realizing, the global VADIS platform is key to the technical side of a consolidated broadcast facility, whether it's a large, technically advanced project such as the Olympics or a typical radio station," says Thomas Klotz, President of Klotz Digital. "Our broadcast customers see that fitting their facility with a media platform rather than traditional stand-alone mixing consoles, routers and such, will be required for success in the near future."