Digigram ALP-Dante User manual

User Manual for ALP-DANTE
User Manual
ALP-Dante
Professional multi-channel sound card with
DANTE connectivity
November 2023
Author
Date
Status
SBT
20/11/2023
Release
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1 INTRODUCTION 3
2 IMPORTANT NOTICE 4
3 BOX CONTENTS 5
4 GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS 5
4.1 Main hardware characteristics 5
4.2 Main software characteristics 5
5 REQUIRED CONFIGURATION 6
5.1 Required hardware configuration 6
5.2 Necessary software configuration under Windows 8
5.3 Necessary software configuration under Linux 8
6 HARDWARE INSTALLATION 9
6.1 Preparing the card 9
6.2 Installing the card 10
6.3 Internal LEDs 10
7 SOFTWARE INSTALLATION UNDER WINDOWS 11
7.1 Very first installation 11
7.2 Updating the driver version 12
7.3 Updating the firmware 12
7.4 Verifying the card installation 12
7.5 Adjusting the internal latency of the card 15
7.6 Replacing a card 16
7.7 Changing the order of installed cards 16
8 UNINSTALLING THE DRIVER UNDER WINDOWS 17
9 CONFIGURING THE CARD UNDER WINDOWS VIA THE ALP-X MANAGER APPLICATION 18
9.1 Installed ALP cards 18
9.2 Sampling clock 18
9.3 Input and output vu-meters 20
9.4 Firmware update procedure 20
9.5 Keyboard shortcuts 22
10 ASIO CONTROL PANEL for Windows 23
11 SPECIFICATIONS 25
11.1 Configuration 25
11.2 Audio characteristics 25
11.3 Connectors 25
11.4 Development environment 25
12 APPENDICES 26
12.1 LED 26
12.2 Connectors 27
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
1 INTRODUCTION
This document describes the installation and use of the Digigram PCI Express ALP-Dante card under
Windows and Linux.
This card is part of the ALP-X professional sound cards range.
Copyright 2023 Digigram. All rights reserved.
No part of this manual may be reproduced without the prior consent of Digigram. This reservation includes
photocopying, translating and/or reformatting the information contained in this manual.
Everything possible has been done to ensure the greatest accuracy, however Diagram cannot be held liable
for any error or omission and reserves the right to make modifications and improvements without prior
notice.
Digigram and the Digigram logo, ALP-DANTE are trademarks or brand names of Digigram Digital. All other
marks are owned by their respective companies.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
2 IMPORTANT NOTICE
Certifications
The product is currently being certified.
This product has been designed in accordance with the following standards:
●EMC Directive 2014/30/EU.
●FCC Rules Part 15, Subpart B.
To ensure compliance with the standards listed above, the following rules must be followed:
●The cable supplied must not be modified.
●The additional cables used must have their respective shielding connected at each end.
Caution
An electrostatic discharge (ESD) can damage the card components. Take the
following precautions to avoid such damage when handling the card:
Connect the card and everything entering into contact with it to the earth potential by providing a
conductive surface and discharge paths. Take these precautions as a minimum:
●Unplug all power and signal sources.
●Place the card on an earthed conductive work surface.
●Connect to the earth potential using an anti-static strap or by holding an earthed object.
●Earth all the tools entering into contact with the card.
Given the shortened length of the PCI EXPRESSTM connector and the resulting lack of
mechanical stability, we strongly advise against transporting the cards installed in a
computer, unless its chassis or case has a device for holding the card firmly in place to avoid
material damage.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
3 BOX CONTENTS
Thank you for purchasing a DIGIGRAM sound card in the ALP-X range.
The box contains:
●The ALP-Dante sound card equipped with a low-profile bracket (79.2 mm),
●The expansion card for 2 Eth ports equipped with a low profile bracket
(the expansion card can be linked to the main board via the flat ribbon cable).
●a standard height bracket (full height: 120 mm) that can be fitted instead of the low profile
one, and that receives the four Eth ports
4 GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS
ALP-Dante is a low profile PCI EXPRESSTM x1 sound card. It can be inserted into and therefore
operate in PCIe® x1, x4, x8 or x16 slots.
4.1 Main hardware characteristics
●Low profile
●Two Gbps Eth ports of the main board (PCIe slot).
●Two additional ports on the expansion board.
●The main board and the expansion board can have their own low profile brackets.
●The main board and the expansion board can use the same standard height bracket.
●Inter-card synchronisation
4.2 Main software characteristics
●Low latency multi-card drivers
- Wasapi/DirectSound, and ASIO under Windows
- Alsa driver under Linux
●64 playback channels & 64 recording channels at 44.1 and 48 kHz
32 playback channels & 32 recording channels at 88.2 and 96 kHz
16 playback channels & 16 recording channels at 176.4 and 192 kHz.
Simultaneous acquisition and playback in PCM (8, 16 and 24 bit)
●The available Eth ports can be used in switch or redundant mode
●"ALP-X Manager" application installed with the driver
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
5 REQUIRED CONFIGURATION
5.1 Required hardware configuration
There are no particular hardware restrictions in terms of PC on using the ALP card and its driver. The
PC can have standard height or low profile PCIe card slots.
A PCI EXPRESSTM (PCIe®) x1, x4, x8 or x16 slot must be available to plug in the card.
The processing power and memory required depend mainly on the operating system and the
applications used on the PC.
Note: The driver of the card reports to the OS that it does not manage the Sleep mode. As a
consequence, the PC should not go to sleep mode.
In case the PC goes to sleep mode under Windows, please proceed as follows to disable the sleep
mode.
The windows sleep mode for the PCIe bus must be disabled.
Go to Windows Settings, System, and select “Power & sleep”.
Select Never” for the option “Put the computer to sleep”.
On the same window, click on “Additional power settings”.
Click on “Change plan
settings” in front of
“Balanced (recommended)”
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
Select “Change advanced
power settings”.
Select “PCI Express”, “Link
State Power Management”,
and select “Off” for the
setting.
Click on Ok to validate
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
5.2 Necessary software configuration under Windows
ALP cards operate under Windows from 64-bit versions of Windows 10 from version 20H2.
To use your ALP-X card, you must install the driver included in the installation kit “ALP-X Kit”.
Download the latest version from the digigram website from the ALP-Dante card support page.
This driver supports all the ALP cards.
The "ALP-X Kit" installer is used to install the following components:
●a 64-bit WDM driver offering the WASAPI and DirectSound application interfaces,
●an ASIO driver (32 bits and 64 bits), with its "ALP-X ASIO Settings" configuration interface.
Installing this component is optional,
●the "ALP-X Manager" application, which serves to adjust/view the ALP-X cards settings..
Installing this component is optional.
In your Windows system, It may be necessary to allow the applications to access the input
audio devices of the sound cards.
Please proceed as follows:
●Go to the Windows Settings, and select Privacy.
●Select “Microphone”
●Activate the option “Allow apps to access your microphone” as shown here-after:
It is also necessary to have the “Windows Audio Endpoint Builder” running under Windows
so that the WASAPI audio devices can be used.. On some Windows setups, this service may
not be activated by default.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
To check this, go to the Computer Management panel, Services, and browse to the line
Windows Audio Endpoint Builder.
Double click on Windows Audio Endpoint Builder to display its properties.
From the “Service status” section, if the displayed status is not running, click on Start and
then OK. Click on Cancel otherwise.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
5.3 Necessary software configuration under Linux
ALP cards operate under Linux from the 64-bit Kernel 4.1x onwards (according to kernel.org).
The Alsa driver for Linux is available for download. It is supplied as a DKMS package, which can
therefore be used to compile the driver for the target Linux distribution used.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
6 HARDWARE INSTALLATION
Given the shortened length of the PCI EXPRESSTM connector and the resulting lack of mechanical
stability, we strongly advise against transporting the cards installed in a computer, unless it features
a specific device for holding the card firmly in place to avoid material damage.
The card must be inserted in the computer before installing its driver.
6.1 Preparing the card
Before attaching the card in the computer, make sure the card has the right bracket (low profile or
standard profile).
Low profile configurations
The card can be used with or without the expansion board. The expansion card does not need a
PCIe connector, but occupies the slot of a PCIe card, and it can be installed on either side of the
ALP-DANTE board.
ALP-DANTE board Expansion board
Standard profile configuration
To install the card in a standard height PCIe slot, remove the low profile bracket from the ALP board
and from the expansion board by loosening the two screws as shown on the pictures above.
Position the standard height bracket and retighten the two screws of the ALP board, and the two
screws of the expansion board (See the four screws in the picture below).
If the ribbon from the expansion board is not connected to the main board, lift the brown cover of
the connector on the main board to insert the ribbon cable as shown by the red arrow below.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
6.2 Installing the card
Insert the card in the available PCIe slot and press to position it firmly.
Tighten the screw fixing the bracket to the chassis or lock the card using the device provided for this
purpose on your computer.
6.3 Internal LEDs
The ALP card features two internal LEDs on the edge of its mother board, as shown below. The state
of these LEDs can be seen when the PC cover is open.
If the card and its on-board firmware are initialised correctly, LED 1 must be lit solid green, and LED
2 must flash every second (1 Hz).
If LED 2 flashes faster (twice per second - 2 Hz), this means that the firmware version that has been
uploaded to the card is corrupted, and the card is running the backup factory firmware version. It is
then necessary to re-install the appropriate firmware version.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
7 SOFTWARE INSTALLATION UNDER WINDOWS
IMPORTANT
To install the software, you must have administrator rights on the computer.
Please visit the Digigram website at www.digigram.com to obtain the most recent driver.
Should you use a specific application developed or installed by a Digigram partner, this may mean
using a specific driver version. In this case, confirm with your application supplier which driver
version to use.
Any driver downloaded from our website has to be unpacked before installing it. Double click on the
downloaded file to start the auto-extraction utility. You can choose the default destination
(temporary Windows folder) or select another one.
7.1 Very first installation
●Switch off the computer and insert the ALP card(s) in an available PCIe slot.
●Restart the computer.
●Click on Cancel if the "New device detected" wizard appears.
●Double click on the ALP driver installation file "ALP-X Kit vxx.exe"
Click on Next to continue with the
installation.
Click on "I agree” to continue with the
installation.
In this window, select the components to be
installed in addition to the card driver.
●ALP-X Manager: application used to
configure the settings of the ALP card(s)
installed.
Some software programs may have been
designed with the ALP card settings
controls built in. In this case, it may be
recommended not to install the ALP-X
Manager application.
●ALP-X ASIO Settings: this application is
used to configure the ASIO driver
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
settings. There is no need to install it if
no application reliant on the ASIO
interface is used.
The driver is installed by default in the folder
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Digigram\ALP-X".
To change this folder, click on Browse and
select a new destination.
Click on Install to continue with the
installation.
The driver and selected components are
being installed.
7.2 Updating the driver version
If you want to install a new driver version, double click on the new driver installation file "ALP-X Kit
vxx.exe" (see the detailed procedure in the hereinabove chapter “Very first installation”).
7.3 Updating the firmware
The ALP card features two on-board firmware: the “Dante” dedicated firmware, and the board
firmware. Updating the firmware can be done from the AVS-Monitor application (see chapter
Firmware update procedure). Both firmware can be updated from this application.
-
7.4 Verifying the card installation
Once the driver and card have been installed as per the process described hereinabove, you can
verify that the card is installed correctly and working properly.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
7.4.1 Presence of playback and recording devices
The audio devices exposed by the card driver are visible on the Windows Sound panel. To open it,
right click on the loudspeaker icon in the Windows taskbar and select "Sounds":
.
The audio devices exposed by the card driver are visible from the "Play" and "Record" tabs.
If the card devices are not listed in the Windows Sound control panel:
●Make sure that the card is inserted correctly in the PCI slot and screwed to the computer
chassis.
●Try to uninstall the ALP-X Kit (from the Windows control panel, Applications) and re-install it.
Playback to an output device of the ALP-DANTE can be tested by right clicking on it and selecting
"Test". The VU-meter must then show modulation and the sound must be heard on the card
output(s) according to the routing and levels configured in the ALP-X Manager application.
If several cards are installed, their devices have the same names (ALP PLAY and ALP REC), but
the name of the card associated with each device differs (different card name, no index for the
first card, and index starting from 2 for the following cards of the same model).
In the example below, the first card in the PCIe slot enumeration order is an ALP-DANTE, the
second card is an ALP442e, and the third card is an ALP882e.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
First card: ALP-DANTE
Second card: ALP442e
Third card: ALP882e
ALP PLAY 1-2
Digigram ALP-DANTE
ALP PLAY 3-4
Digigram ALP-DANTE
...
ALP PLAY 63-64
Digigram ALP-DANTE
ALP PLAY 1-2
Digigram ALP442e
ALP PLAY 3-4
Digigram ALP442e
...
ALP PLAY 7-8
Digigram ALP442e
ALP PLAY 1-2
Digigram ALP882e
ALP PLAY 3-4
Digigram ALP882e
...
ALP PLAY 15-16
Digigram ALP882e
7.4.2 Card detected by the Digigram ALP-X Manager
application
The ALP-X Manager application, installed with the driver, is used to control and/or view the ALP card
settings via a graphic interface. This application can be launched from the shortcut created on the
desktop or from the start menu, Digigram group. The card must appear as below if it and its driver
are installed correctly. Note that a maximum of eight ALP cards can be displayed and handled in
ALP-X Manager.
7.4.3 Card availability under ASIO
If the ASIO driver for the card has been installed (option to be selected during the installation
procedure), then the card must be detected and displayed in the ASIO control panel.
The control panel can be open from the ASIO-based software application.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
All the present ALP cards must be listed in the "ACTIVE CARDS GROUP" selection list.
7.5 Adjusting the internal latency of the card
The internal latency of the card is determined by the duration of sample buffers the card exchanges
with the PC for playback and recording audio streams. By default, this duration is 32 sampling clock
periods (0.67ms at 48 kHz).
The lower the internal latency, the lower the global latency of the card. However, a very low latency
may lead to “choppy” audio on slow PCs. In this case it is necessary to increase the internal latency.
The internal latency of the card can be changed by electing the properties of the card, from the
Windows Device Manager:
Right click on the ALP card, and select Properties, Advanced. The following window is displayed:
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
Internal buffer: size of the buffers
exchanged between the card and the driver.
The size is expressed in samples (ex: at 48
kHz, a value of 48 corresponds to 1ms buffer).
Samples / Position update: This parameter
should not be modified without prior
technical advice from Digigram. It serves for
cases where audio dropouts are experienced
whatever is the internal buffer setting.
Sampling rate: Select the sampling rate of
the ALP-DANTE card. The ALP-X Manager
application must be closed before selecting a
new sampling rate value.
Select the new value, and click on “Ok”.
The PC must be restarted.
7.6 Replacing a card
If an ALP card has to be replaced by another one, it is strongly recommended to proceed as follows:
●Turn off the PC.
●Remove the card to be replaced.
●Restart the PC.
●Go to the Windows Device Manager, and select “Sound, video and game controllers”.
From the “View” menu, select “Show Hidden devices”.
Select the ALP card that was hidden and select “Uninstall”.
●Turn off the PC.
●Insert the new card.
●Restart the PC.
7.7 Changing the order of installed cards
If several ALP cards are installed, and you want to move cards from a slot to another, it is strongly
recommended to proceed as follows:
●Turn off the PC.
●Remove the cards to be moved.
●Restart the PC.
●Go to the Windows Device Manager, and select “Sound, video and game controllers”.
From the “View” menu, select “Show Hidden devices”.
Select the ALP cards that were hidden and select “Uninstall”.
●Turn off the PC.
●Insert the cards in the appropriate slots.
●Restart the PC.
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
8 UNINSTALLING THE DRIVER UNDER
WINDOWS
Proceed as follows to uninstall an ALP driver version.
Please note that uninstalling a version must be done prior to the installation of another version.
From Windows Start menu, open the ”Settings” panel
Click on the “Apps” icon.
From the list of installed Apps & features, select ALP-X Kit.
Click on Uninstall.
This will remove all the ALP-X ... components
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User Manual for ALP-DANTE
9 CONFIGURING THE CARD UNDER WINDOWS
VIA THE ALP-X MANAGER APPLICATION
This application can be launched from the shortcut created on the desktop or from the start menu,
Digigram group.
9.1 Installed ALP cards
When the application is launched, the window below is displayed and shows all the ALP cards
installed in the PC.
If another view is displayed, click on the icon to display the list of ALP cards present and
detected.
The following settings are displayed for each ALP card detected:
●its name: this is the name of the card on the ante network. This name can be modified from
the Dante Controller application.
●its serial number,
●the on-board firmware version,
●the size of buffers exchanged between the driver and the card (see Adjusting the internal
latency of the card).
9.2 Sampling clock
The sampling clock of the card is configurable from the Device Manager. The ALP-X Manager
application must be closed before changing the sampling clock value.
Open the Windows device Manager, select the item “Sound, video and game controllers”, and right
click on your ALP-DANTE card to open its “Properties” control panel. Select the appropriate sampling
frequency values.
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