Maintenance revision to AES67
Published: WORLD
WORLD: There has been a maintenance revision to the AES67-2013 standard for high-performance streaming audio-over-IP interoperability. The revision, called AES67-2015, clarifies some of the interoperability requirements, based on general implementation and plugfest experience. AES67-2015 includes updated references to RFC 7273 and clarifications in 6.3, 8.1, and 8.5.
The possibility to incorporate these revisions was identified during the AES Plugfest testing, carried out in cooperation with the European Broadcast Union (EBU), in October 2014, and held at the Institut für Rundfunktechnik (IRT), in Munich. During these tests, 10 companies tested 16 currently available networked-audio products with AES67-specific extensions against each other to confirm interoperability. The participating manufacturers were ALC NetworX GmbH, Archwave AG, Axia Audio, Digigram SA, DirectOut GmbH, Georg Neumann GmbH, Lawo AG, Merging Technologies S.A., Sound4 and Telos Systems Inc. Technical personnel from IRT, Swedish Radio and the BBC assisted in the tests and observed the outcomes on behalf of the EBU. The tests have been described as a resounding success, and reportedly proved the proposed functionality of AES67 to be both real and robust.
‘The limited scope of these revisions is testimony to the robust and stable nature of AES67 as originally published and successfully implemented by numerous audio manufacturers,’ stated Kevin Gross, technical chairman of the Media Networking Alliance, the industry alliance established to promote awareness and uptake of AES67. ‘As proven in the plugfest testing, AES67 functional compatibility performs as described and these revisions further complement that functionality.’