360 Systems DigiCart/II Plus - Manual (Page 13)

DigiCart/II Plus Owner's Manual Introduction • 1
Introduction
Congratulations! You have chosen DigiCart/II Plus, the most advanced hard disk/cart system in the
broadcast industry. Building on technology proven in the industry standard DigiCart/II, your new
DigiCart/II Plus delivers many significant enhancements. A few of these enhancements include the
use of low cost removable Iomega Zip™ disks, larger hard disks and the inclusion of the D-Net file
transfer network as standard.
Cuts are stored on an internal fixed hard disk drive (HDD) or removable Zip™ disks. Each
DigiCart/II Plus contains an internal hard drive and Zip drive.
Transportable recordings for archiving and backup are stored on Iomega Zip disks. These
economical, re-recordable compact magnetic disks are DigiCart/II Plus's "carts". Iomega, the
company that built the reliable Bernoulli™ drive used in the legendary DigiCart/II, has engineered
the Zip drive system to provide the speed, ease of use and reliability required in professional audio.
Each Zip disk can store 100mb of data - enough to record 8¾ minutes of 16-bit linear stereo at 48k,
and 9½ minutes at 44.1k.
A notable feature of DigiCart/II Plus is selectable recording formats. You may choose linear
sampling rates of 48, 44.1 or 32 kilosamples/second in mono or stereo. All formats can coexist, for
the machine is smart and plays them back automatically. Dolby AC-2 stereo data compression is
selectable at the 48k rate. AC-2 delivers more than five times as much stereo storage time with
subjectively excellent sound quality. Accurate compression and expansion of the digital
information accomplish this. AC-2 does not use "psycho-acoustic tricks" that discard parts of the
sound that might not be noticed.
DigiCart/II Plus's storage space is variable. By matching bandwidth and track needs to the material
(or limits of the downstream audio chain) you may maximize storage. These flexible rates provide
advantages for the broadest range of applications. For most applications, Dolby AC-2 delivers the
greatest broadband storage without regard to content. AC-2 uses less disk space than even 32k
mono recording while delivering full bandwidth stereo.
Because DigiCart/II Plus is a software-based device, supplementary information can be stored
along with each individual audio recording. This information is stored in a header containing:
Five-character ID for drive, directory and cut.
A name of up to fifteen alphanumeric characters