Digidesign¿ Unveils Next Generation Pro Tools

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San Francisco, California - September 26, 1998 - Digidesign® introduces Pro Tools®|24 MIX, a single-card digital audio workstation core system that provides 64 tracks and extensive mixing and processing capabilities. Featuring six Motorola 56301-series DSP chips, Pro Tools|24 MIX offers two to three times more on-demand mixing and processing power from a basic system than Pro Tools|24, Digidesign's previous flagship system. Also available is the Pro Tools|24 MIXplus system, which provides an additional PCI card with six chips dedicated to effects processing. Costing only 25% more than a Pro Tools|24 MIX core, Pro Tools|24 MIXplus offers more than double the DSP processing power and supports up to 32 channels of I/O.

Addressing the 3-slot PCI limitation of Apple's current generation of G3 Power Macintosh computers, Pro Tools|24 MIX provides greatly expanded power, versatility and efficiency from a single PCI card for the same previous price as a Pro Tools|24 core system. In addition, the new Pro Tools|24 MIX and Pro Tools|24 MIXplus systems as well as the existing Pro Tools|24 system now support the Windows NT platform.

The MIX Core and MIX Farm cards offer more DSP power than ever before-up to over four times more Plug-In instances per DSP than the previous DSP Farm card. The newly added DSP Manager function optimizes DSP usage, and new MultiShell support offers even greater efficiency by allowing certain different types of Plug-Ins to share the same DSP chip on a MIX Core or MIX Farm card. Providing high quality versions of the basic DSP tools required for mixing and audio production, Pro Tools|24 MIX and Pro Tools|24 MIXplus systems are bundled with TC|Works MegaReverb (for a limited time only) and several great-sounding DigiRack Plug-Ins, including the new EQ II and Dynamics II.

Each Pro Tools|24 MIX Core and MIX Farm card provides support for 16 channels of I/O using optional Digidesign audio interfaces, including the 888|24 I/O, 882|20 I/O and ADAT Bridge I/O. Up to six MIX Farm cards can be added to the system as needed to provide vast quantities of DSP power and connection of up to 72 channels of I/O. For users requiring only more inputs and outputs but not more DSP, the affordable MIX I/O card provides support for an additional 16 channels of I/O.

Pro Tools|24 MIX functionality can be added to existing Pro Tools|24 systems simply by adding a MIX Farm card. Compatible with existing Pro Tools|24 systems (d24 Audio and DSP Farm cards) and all Digidesign Plug-Ins (new versions available concurrently with PT|24 MIX release required), the MIX Farm card increases track count capability to 64 tracks of 24- or 16-bit audio, and adds three times more DSP power and support for an additional 16 channels of I/O.

Pro Tools|24 MIX and Pro Tools|24 MIXplus with Macintosh-compatible software will both be shipping September 26, 1998. Support for the Windows NT platform will be available December 1, 1998. Pro Tools|24 MIX will sell for a suggested retail price of $7,995, the Pro Tools|24 MIXplus system is $9,995, the MIX Farm is $3,995 and the MIX I/O is $795. The retail price of Pro Tools|24 has been reduced to $5,995, and Windows NT-compatible software for the system will ship mid-October 1998.