Glensound Styx is a versatile, configurable 47 x 45 mixer with 32 x 32 network audio inputs and outputs with the added benefit of 5 x 5 analogue line level circuits, 2 x 2 AES3 circuits, three microphone/line inputs, two line up tone inputs and three stereo headphone outputs. The front panel features twenty-four assignable rotary encoders and twenty-four assignable switches which illuminate. A mono, assignable PPM and LED graph is also included to indicate positioning of the encoders when they are used. When used with the Windows 10 application the user can adjust any of the 2115 mixer cross point levels in real time, provide and amend many setup options, and importantly, store and recall user presets.
The front facing panel hosts twenty-four shaft encoders that act as rotary level controls. When one is rotated a row of LEDs above the front panel PPM illuminate to indicate the current position. These shaft encoders can also pan the associated circuits, achieved by pushing them in while rotating. The mixer cross point circuits that these controls adjust can be configured in GlenController. One shaft encoder can be set to control many cross points, however individual cross points can only ever be controlled by one shaft encoder.
There are 24 illuminated push switches on the front panel. These can be set to turn any or multiple mixer cross points on/off. They can also be set to route outputs to the headphones and meter circuits. The interaction between switches is fully configurable.
There are five balanced line level analogue inputs and outputs presented on D25 type plugs wired to the AES59 (Tascam) standard. Three low noise, large dynamic range, microphone inputs are provided on 3-pin XLR connectors mounted on the rear panel. Gain is set via the App, and 48 Volt phantom power can also be turned on/off in the same way. The outputs of the microphone amplifiers are routed in the DSP to individual compressor/limiter circuits. Both compressed and uncompressed signals are presented as inputs to the mixer with the inputs also programable to receive a line level circuit.
Thirty-two AoIP inputs and outputs to the network are provided. As standard these use Dante network protocol, however they can also be set to AES67. They are fixed at 48kHz and there is a fully redundant physical connection of two copper network circuits (EtherCON) and two SFP slots normally used for fibre. The rear facing panel also provides a 9-way D connector that is shared with the GPIO. There is an AES3 input and output circuit. Being AES3 this provides 2 audio channels in and out.
For monitoring purposes three 6.35mm stereo headphone output connections are provided. These utilise Glensound’s ‘unique’ amplifier circuit that is suitable for both low and high impedance headphones.