Frequently asked questions

What are the unique advantages of SuperMAC and HyperMAC?

SuperMAC and HyperMAC offer the following unique set of advantages:-

• SuperMAC and HyperMAC are point-to-point digital audio connection systems, which can be networked in a star topology using specialist routers, giving better latency control, better reliability and finer routing granularity than distributed audio networks.
• SuperMAC and HyperMAC employ a frame-based method utilising the IEEE 802.3 Ethernet Physical Layer. This allows for simultaneously high channel counts and very low deterministic (fixed) latencies. At 96 kHz operation (as adopted by Klark Teknik and Midas to minimise the latency incurred in analogue-to-digital and digital-to-analogue conversion), SuperMAC and HyperMAC offer 24 and 192 bidirectional channels with individual link latencies of 62.50 μs and 41.66 μs respectively.
• SuperMAC and HyperMAC both provide accurate phase-aligned clock distribution. SuperMAC uses separate copper pairs in the Cat 5/Cat 5e cable for audio data and clock, and HyperMAC uses timing markers embedded in the data stream. In both cases this allows reliable, low-jitter clocks to be delivered to the end-points of the system.
• SuperMAC and HyperMAC feature simplicity of deployment and use. Clock distribution and synchronisation are very easy to configure, units equipped with SuperMAC and/or HyperMAC interfaces are either a master (internally clocked) or a slave (externally clocked). To set up a network, all that is required is to connect up the SuperMAC and/or HyperMAC interfaces and select the clock source.
• SuperMAC and HyperMAC feature error detection schemes that send a Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) checksum along with the associated Ethernet frame. HyperMAC additionally has a second CRC checksum for audio data.
• SuperMAC additionally features a robust Hamming Code lossless error correction scheme, which sends encoded extra data along with the audio, such that if a small amount of data is corrupted on the link (e.g. by external interference), the receiver is able to completely recover the transmitted data.
• SuperMAC also “scrambles” the audio data to allow burst errors to be fully corrected. This means that a poor quality link (due to a bad cable or external interference) can be detected by the receiver, while still passing perfect audio.
• SuperMAC and HyperMAC support both dual redundant and N+1 redundant networking. Error and Link status information such as CRC error detection, clock synchronization status, link status and so on makes it very easy to provide health reporting to the user, and to implement redundant links with manual or automatic change-over
• SuperMAC and HyperMAC also have the in-built capability to relay control data, including TCP/IP and similar IP-based data packets, at data rates of 5 Mbit/s and 200 Mbit/s respectively. In both cases, a fixed part of the transmission system is specifically allocated to carry control data, but is transparent in operation at the external Ethernet interfaces. As a fixed capacity is allocated to the control data, there is no risk of the audio streams being swamped by control data messages. The control data packet contents are irrelevant to the operation of the SuperMAC and HyperMAC audio streams, so any format of control message received can be relayed.

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