Enhancing Conferencing with Designer Software

As a leading audio manufacturer, Shure has built a decades-long heritage in technical leadership that began way back in 1931 when the fledgling radio parts distributor company decided to launch its own line of microphones. Back then, mechanical engineers led the charge.

Fast forward about fifty years. The Digital Revolution signaled a 21st century breed of engineers challenged with creating software solutions that delivered on Shure’s worldwide reputation for sound quality, capable of powering products and systems adaptable for a wide range of customer environments.

The Evolution of Shure Enterprise Audio

Nowhere was this flexibility challenge more evident than in the development of Shure’s Microflex® Advance™ portfolio, including the MXA310 table array and MXA910 ceiling array. The company’s products, already well established on stages around the world, successfully entered boardrooms.

Featuring Steerable Coverage™ technology, MXA allows installers and users to manually or automatically aim the pickup of each of the microphone’s adjustable lobes to cover a variety of room configurations for great sound.

The P300 IntelliMix® audio conferencing processor came next, offering a simplified way, when paired with the MXA910 or MXA310 arrays, to achieve reliable and consistent sound quality across multiple rooms.

When using the MXA910 or MXA310 with the P300 or Shure’s ANI Audio Network Interfaces, users can enable Shure Network Audio encryption to protect networked audio connections between Shure products. In Designer, users can simply enable encryption for several devices at once, instead of having to set it up one device at a time.

The Evolution of Shure Designer Software

Over time, Designer has continued to simplify configuration of MXA devices. Version 3.0 reduced onsite set-up time and eliminated the repetition of multi-room projects. It enabled users to import and scale a floor plan image using virtual devices from anywhere.

The latest version of the software, Designer 3.1, takes this several steps further by supporting more devices, including the MXA910, MXA310, P300 and ANIUSB-Matrix. This expanded support means that Shure can offer a repeatable audio solution for conference rooms that can be used room after room without requiring hours of custom design work.

User Benefits in Designer

Let’s take a look at what Designer has to offer, feature by feature:

• Auto Configure – This feature automatically configures the DSP settings when the MXA310 or MXA910 microphones are routed to a P300. Similar to the Templates feature on the P300, this makes the process even simpler. Users no longer have to select specific mics. If the device is routed to the P300, Auto configure will optimize both the MXA and P300 devices.
• Off Network Set-Up – Users of Designer 3.0 are familiar with the advantages of designing off network, a timesaving feature that can reduce time at the client site. Version 3.1 expands on this by supporting multiple Shure products, making it possible to set up both microphones and DSP off network, ahead of a visit. All the functionality contained in the web UIs for the product, is now accessible from a wide range of virtual devices.
• Copy & Paste – When users access network, settings can be pushed to the device by room. That means one configuration, for example a desired room template, can be pushed simultaneously to the mic and the DSP before carrying out any necessary fine-tuning in real time.
• Simplified Dante Routing –Dante routes can be created between supported Shure products, off the network or in real time with Designer software.

With this latest update, Shure software developers have answered the corporate environment call for standardization and increased efficiencies, making Shure’s Designer software an essential addition to every installer’s Microflex® Advance ™ toolkit.

To learn more about Designer or to download the free software, please visit the Designer page.