You may know that NDI exists in two main versions - Full NDI and NDI|HX. There are certain differences between these two versions - for example, NDI|HX sends compressed data and uses far less bandwidth. The differences make the two versions incompatible and typically devices would only support one version of NDI. AREC Media Stations with NDI support, including LS-860N and LS-US2N, were built to support NDI|HX, and so typically devices using standard NDI cannot be connected to them. However, there is a way to convert them via NDI Bridge, an essential tool that is included in the NDI package. To use it, simply download and install the latest version of NDI Tools from https://www.newtek.com/
Open the NDI Tools and select Bridge. It will open with a page similar to this:
While in this guide we focus on using the NDI Bridge to convert standard NDI to NDI|HX, the app can also be used to make your NDI sources available over the Internet and to connect NDI sources from other networks. To convert NDI signals, however, click on ‘Local’. Start by adjusting the name of your bridged connections in the ‘Bridge Name’ field. Next, click on ‘Encoder Settings’ and change the output mode to ‘NDI|HX’. All AREC stations, except the upcoming LS-410, use only h.264 video compression, so make sure to select it. You must also select the stream’s bitrate in ‘Quality’. Since 4Mbit is sufficient for Full HD, you can select ‘Low’. After adjusting these settings, press ‘Start’, and you will be able to see a list of bridged connections appear in your network. To use these bridged connections on AREC stations, open the ‘Administrator’ web page of your station, click on ‘Media I/O’ -> ‘Network Device Manager’ and scan for new devices. If your station is in the same network as your computer running NDI Bridge, you will be able to see the NDI|HX bridged connections appear in the list.
One important thing to note is that bridged connections use the computer running the app as a tunnel. Whenever another device is trying to pull an NDI source from it, its network traffic load will grow. You can monitor how much bandwidth the computer is consuming in the field called ‘Bandwidth’.
If you would like to know more about how you can use NDI or other technologies with AREC, please contact us at www.a-dena.com and we will be happy to assist you.