AccessCaster 3.0.0

AccessCaster 3.0.0

AccessCaster has its own window

AccessCaster 3 is a Windows app. The web page is replaced by a Windows window: a tree of categories on the left and the chosen page on the right. F6 moves between them, Alt and 1 to 9 jump to a category, and Ctrl and Tab move between pages, or between tabs on a page with tabs. F5 reads the category from the desk again. Remote access has gone with the web page, so nothing outside this computer can reach AccessCaster, and it no longer needs a firewall rule. Installing over an earlier version offers to remove the one it added.

Closing the window keeps AccessCaster running

Your shortcuts and announcements keep working from the notification area, and opening AccessCaster again brings the window back where you left it. To have closing the window quit instead, turn off Keep running in the system tray on the App settings General page. If the desk is part-way through something, such as a restore, Quit tells you and waits.

AccessCaster tells you when there is a new version

Once a day, or as often as you choose, AccessCaster checks for a newer version and shows a Windows notification if there is one. Nothing is installed until you choose. Press F12 in the window, or use the tray menu, to hear what changed, then choose Install now, Skip this version or Later. Installing closes AccessCaster for a moment, then starts it again on the new version and tells you so. It only contacts updates.slightperception.com, and refuses any version that is not signed as ours.

App settings, on Alt plus 8

Everything about AccessCaster itself, rather than the desk, is in one place: announcements, keyboard shortcuts, starting at sign-in, saving these settings to a file, and updates. Help moves to Alt plus 9.

Install the desk's firmware updates

When RODE has a new firmware version, the Device page's Hardware section offers to install it. AccessCaster backs the desk up first, then lets the desk download and install the update and restart, and tells you the version it comes back on. It takes about five minutes, and the desk's setup screens may then need someone sighted.

Wifi: scan, join and disconnect

Scan for networks lists what the desk can see, and choosing one asks only for its password. Disconnect leaves the network the desk is on; joining it again needs the password.

The desk's state in the status bar

The spoken summary at start-up is replaced by the window's status bar, which lists only what needs your attention, such as a mute, a pad left on or a card nearly full. Read it with NVDA and End, Insert and Page Down in JAWS, or Narrator and backslash.

One clip warning

The level warnings are replaced by one switch on the Announcements page, Warn when the main mix clips, which says Main mix clipping when the main mix reaches full scale.

Holding the encoder mutes what it controls

A long press of the encoder mutes the channel or monitor it is on, including a channel chosen with its channel button, and the announcer says so.

Announcements start sooner

A moving fader's levels are heard while it moves, not only where it stops. Restoring a backup no longer reads out every level it puts back. Recording's sound can be speech, a tone or nothing.

SMART pads: restore only the pads

Pad maintenance can put back just the pads from a backup, leaving every other setting alone. A factory reset now keeps a backup of the factory pads, so they can come back later.

Auto gain and the level check are quicker

Auto gain says each instruction before its start tone, and each take is 15 seconds instead of 30. The level check starts and stops without a delay, and says quiet when the channel goes quiet.

Troubleshooting in the help

A new help topic answers questions such as my desk has stopped responding, I can't hear a channel, and my screen reader has gone silent.

Changes made elsewhere are spoken

When something changes on the desk's touchscreen or in RODE's app, AccessCaster says what changed, in one sentence. While RODE's app is open, it saves them up and says them when you come back to AccessCaster or close RODE's app.

The window keeps up with the desk

Pages update by themselves when something changes on the desk, so you no longer need F5 to see it.

Using RODE's app at the same time

AccessCaster tells you when RODE's app opens, and keeps up with what it changes. A new help topic in Troubleshooting explains how the two work together.

When no desk is connected

The window's title says no desk connected, and pages that need a desk tell you why they are empty instead of showing controls that cannot work.

Bank shortcuts skip empty banks

The bank keys step only through banks with pads on them, and never into the system bank.

A failed shortcut is heard with announcements off

It plays the failed sound, so you know it did nothing.

The clip warning comes back after an audio drop

If Windows loses the desk's audio for a moment, Warn when the main mix clips starts working again on its own.

Wifi scanning on firmware 1.7.7

Scan for networks lists what the desk can see, instead of sometimes saying there are none.

Unit is now desk

Everything AccessCaster shows and says calls it the desk. Your saved settings and shortcuts are unchanged.

AccessCaster 2.62

AccessCaster 2.62

CallMe: take guests' calls without the touchscreen

RODE's CallMe lets a guest join your show from another RODECaster or from a web browser, over the unit's own internet connection, and until now every part of it was on the touchscreen. It has its own page now, CallMe, on Alt plus 5. Switch on Accept incoming calls and the page gives you the unit's code, which another RODECaster dials, and a guest link with a copy button, which anyone else opens in a browser. When someone calls, you hear who it is wherever you are, followed by a ringtone until you answer or it stops ringing, and Answer takes the call. The second button is Decline while a call is ringing and Hang up once you are talking, and the details of a connected call, how long it has been going, how fast the sound is arriving and how much is lost, are listed below them. You can also call another RODECaster by typing its code. The page shows your plan and the minutes left. The ringtone plays wherever announcements play, and Ring for incoming calls turns it off.

CallMe tells you when calls cannot work

A guest's call never reaches the unit while it is offline or while CallMe 1 is on no fader, and neither the unit nor the guest is told why. While either is the case, the CallMe page shows only what is wrong, with the fix beside it: a link to the wifi settings, or a list of faders to put CallMe 1 on, each saying what it carries now. The full page comes back as soon as both are fixed.

Answer, hang up and extend from any program

Control, Alt and Shift with C answers a call, and with D declines a ringing call or hangs up the one you are on, from any program. A new install has them already. If you have set up your own shortcuts, add them on the Device page under Keyboard shortcuts, from the CallMe kind.

Extend a call past the hour

A call on RODE's free and standard plans ends after an hour unless it is extended. AccessCaster tells you five minutes before, and then Extend the call on the CallMe page gives it another hour, and so does the answer shortcut when nothing is ringing. Switch on Extend calls automatically and AccessCaster does it for you at the five-minute warning.

CallMe contacts

Give a CallMe code a name and it becomes a contact, with its own Call, Edit and Delete buttons. Each contact can have its own keyboard shortcut, and a call to a contact is spoken by name. If a contact's code has changed, which happens when they switch incoming calls off and on, the app says so. Contacts are saved with the app's own settings, so they travel with a settings export.

The caller is a channel like any other

CallMe 1 has its own Level, mute and processing on the Channels page while it is on a fader, and on a RODECaster Pro II its own row in the output mixes on the Routing page, so a caller's voice can be kept out of a headphone mix or the recording.

Four more inputs from this computer, each on its own fader

Normally your computer looks to the unit like one stereo input, so everything Windows plays arrives on a single channel already mixed together. RODE's Expanded mode splits it into four separate inputs instead, named Game, Music, A and B, and AccessCaster can now switch it on and put each of them on a fader. Music, a call, a game and your screen reader then arrive as four channels rather than one, so you can fade or mute any of them on its own, keep one out of what a caller hears, or record them apart. It is on the Routing page under Master Mix, as "What this computer sends". One thing to know, and it is the unit's own rule rather than ours: each of the four appears in Windows only while that channel is sitting on a fader, so turning Expanded on is half the job. Switching back to Standard takes the four off their faders, as the unit's own screen does, with their processing kept for when you switch back.

Why your sound moves for a few seconds

RODE's Virtual Devices driver fails to connect if anything is playing through the unit's Main output when Expanded comes on, your screen reader included. So while the unit reconnects, AccessCaster moves Windows' sound to another output, such as your computer's own speakers, for a few seconds, then on to System (RODECaster) once the driver has connected.

Nine separate inputs for recording and streaming

Expanded together with "Every channel, post-fader" gives this computer nine separate inputs: your microphones, the pads, the call channels and the four from this computer, each its own device in Windows and pickable in anything that lets you choose a microphone. That is the setup for recording everything apart and fixing the balance afterwards, rather than having to get it right on the night.

AccessCaster can fetch RODE's driver for you

Expanded needs RODE's Virtual Devices driver on this computer. If it is missing, a button appears on the Routing page that downloads RODE's own file, checks it really is signed by RODE, and runs their installer, which asks Windows for permission in the usual way. There is a second button beside it that just opens RODE's software page if you would rather do it by hand, and that one stays once the driver is in, because it is also how you repair or reinstall it. This download is the only thing AccessCaster does that connects to the internet, and it only ever happens when you press that button: never when the app starts, never on a timer, and never to check for a newer version.

The output mixes cover the new inputs, and so do your mix presets

Game, Music, A and B are sources in the routing matrix and the monitor mix like any other, so you can include or exclude them per output and set how loud each one is in your own headphones. Mix presets save and restore them too, whichever mode the unit happened to be in when you saved. "Chat = my mic only" leaves them out as well, which matters more than it sounds: in Expanded your screen reader arrives on one of those four, so without this it would go down the line to a caller.

Dropdowns apply on Enter

Every dropdown that changes the unit now works the same way: arrowing through it only browses, Enter applies the choice you are on, and moving away without Enter puts it back and says so. The Apply buttons beside the fader, output mix, headphone, USB, recording, mic type and mic preset dropdowns are gone, and the pad and Unit settings dropdowns no longer change anything just because you paused on an option. With a mouse, picking an option applies it straight away. The mic preset list now shows the preset the channel is on, and deleting a preset has its own dialog.

A simpler Keyboard shortcuts tab

Your shortcuts are now one list. Arrow through it, press Enter to change a shortcut's key, Delete to delete it, or the Applications key for a menu that also turns it off or silences it. Every shortcut is held on the same keys, Control, Alt and Shift unless you change them with Change the keys to hold, so adding a shortcut only asks what it does and which key. Use the SMART pad keys adds or removes the pad keys as a set, and Restore default shortcuts puts the list back as a new install has it.

The page shortcuts moved up by one

CallMe took Alt plus 5, so Backups is now Alt plus 6, Device Alt plus 7, and Help and About Alt plus 8.

Pan on stereo channels

Pan on a stereo channel, such as USB, Chat, Bluetooth or CallMe, did nothing, because the unit pans those differently. A stereo channel now has two sliders, one for where each side sits, and a switch that links them into a single Pan control. A mic keeps its one Pan slider, which now says left or right as you move it.

Turning announcements off now silences all of them

About half the app's speech did not come from the announcer's own reading of the unit, so switching announcements off left those still talking: a USB mode change would speak to you with announcements turned off. The switch is now enforced in the one place every spoken phrase passes through, so off means off.

Announcements can stay off after a restart

Announcements now always come back on when AccessCaster starts, so it never opens in silence. If you would rather they stayed off, tick Start with announcements the way I left them, on the Announcements tab, and the app starts the way you left it, whether you switched them from the page, the tray or the keyboard shortcut. If you had already switched them off from the tray, that is kept and the box comes ticked.

Announcements speak while a recording is paused

If announcements are switched off while recording, they now speak while the recording is paused, since nothing is being recorded, starting with Recording paused. They go quiet again when it resumes. Resuming from the app or the shortcut says Resuming and waits until it has finished, so the word does not end up in the recording.

A Back Channel pad no longer narrates what you just asked for

One press of a mixer pad moves four channel states at once, both members' mute and their listen, and a momentary pad brings a second burst when you let go. The announcer spoke all eight, so a two second talkback push became eight announcements describing the state you had just chosen. A mixer pad now quietens the mute and listen lines for a moment around its own press. Censor and Ducking pads get it too.

The pad editor had Momentary and Latching the wrong way round

Choosing Latching for a mixer pad set it to Momentary and the other way about, so a pad you set up in the app behaved as the opposite when you pressed it. If you have a mixer pad that never felt right, set its trigger mode again.

Eject and erase the card or drive

The Recording page has a new section, The card and drive. Eject one before you pull it out, and reconnect it from the same button without unplugging it. Erase deletes everything on it, after asking you first. The unit's own storage, where your pad sounds l...

AccessCaster 2.53

AccessCaster 2.53

The routing screen works again after the unit's 1.7.6 update

RODE's firmware 1.7.6 broke the Routing page. It stopped showing your mix and said the matrix had changed shape, as though a caller were connected, and the fader levels lost their reference points with it. Nothing was actually wrong with your unit or your settings. AccessCaster was counting the unit's cross-points in a way that also swept up a second, unrelated grid belonging to RODECaster Sync, and 1.7.6 made that grid bigger to support the RODECaster Video. AccessCaster now counts only the grid it means, so the page reads correctly and will not be thrown by RODE adding another Sync device later. This affects the Duo the same way, so take this update before you take 1.7.6.

AccessCaster 2.52

AccessCaster 2.52

AccessCaster is public

AccessCaster version 2.52 released to public. Thanks to Michael Babcock and Steven Scott for testing and feedback.

The headphone knobs tell you where they are

The headphone level knobs on the unit have no notch or marker, so there is no way to tell by touch how far up one is set. AccessCaster now reads the level out as you turn one, the same way it does a fader. It follows your level announcement setting, so if you have those switched off the knobs stay quiet too.

One Backups page, and one list instead of two

The Profiles page is now the Backups page, and it has one list instead of two. Before, your own saved profiles and the unit's own backups sat in separate sections with separate buttons, and nothing told you which of them would actually put your desk back. Now one button backs the unit up and one list holds everything you can restore from. Underneath, the unit keeps its own complete copy on its card or drive whenever there is one, and this computer always keeps a copy of your settings and pads, so a backup survives the drive being pulled, erased or filled. Restoring uses this computer's copy, for the reason in the next note.

Restoring no longer asks the unit to load its own backup

The unit can crash when it restores its own copy of a backup. I measured it over a full day on my own Pro 2, with the app recording every command it sent: restoring the unit's own copy crashed it five times in thirty-one attempts, across three different backups. Restoring from this computer's copy did not fail once in nine. When it crashes, audio stops, every control stops answering, and unplugging the USB cable is not enough - the power lead has to come out, because the unit itself has stopped rather than the connection. If your screen reader plays through the RODECaster, you lose your speech until it is back, which is why this was worth changing rather than warning about. So the Restore button now always uses this computer's copy. It takes about two minutes instead of a few seconds and restores a little less. Backing up has not changed: the unit still makes its own copy alongside, because backing up has never caused this. Everything points to the unit rather than anything the app does wrong, though so far that is one desk on one computer, so I am not claiming it as settled. I am still working on it; if a safe way is found, the faster route will come back. Two places can still reach it, and you have to choose them deliberately: resetting the unit to factory settings, and restoring a backup the unit made on its own with no copy on this computer beside it. The dialog tells you when that is the case.

Backups the unit made itself are in the same list

Backups made on the unit itself, at its touchscreen or in RODE's software, appear in the same list marked as made on the unit. They cannot be renamed, because the unit names its own and offers no way to change that. There is no copy of one on this computer, so restoring it has to ask the unit to load it - the one case that can still crash it, and the dialog says so before you press anything.

Deleting a backup clears it from the unit too

Deleting a backup now removes both copies, this computer's and the unit's, so you are no longer left with a large file on the drive you believed you had deleted. The as-found backup still asks twice before it goes, since it is the only record of how your desk was before this app touched it.

Nothing you have saved needs converting

Everything you have already saved is still there and still works. Your profiles appear in the new list without anything needing to be converted or saved again.

Mix presets now say which outputs they change

A mix preset, on the Routing page, remembers where every sound is going: which sources each output carries, whether each one follows its fader, and the level of any you have set by hand. Applying one puts those mixes back in a single press. The problem was that some presets rewrite every output on the desk and others touch a single one, and nothing in the list told you which you were about to press. Now every preset ends with its answer. "Every output" means the whole desk goes back to what that preset holds, including any mix you have set by hand somewhere else. A named output, such as "Chat only", means that one mix changes and nothing else is touched. Thanks to Michael Babcock, who reported that there was no way to tell them apart.

You can save a preset for one output on its own

Until now, saving a preset always captured the whole desk. There is a second save button on the Routing page which saves just the output you have chosen at the top of the tab, and its label names that output so you can hear what it will do before you press it. A single-output preset is the only kind that cannot disturb a mix you are currently listening to, which makes it the one worth putting on a keyboard shortcut for use mid-show. Presets you saved before this still cover every output, because that is what they have always done, and they now say so in the list.

A log of what the app has done

The tray menu has a Diagnostic log entry. It opens a plain text record of what AccessCaster has sent to the unit and what came back. You do not need it day to day; it is there for when something goes wrong and you want to say what actually happened rather than describe it from memory.

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Download AccessCasterSetup-v2.52.exe below. Setup asks whether to install just for you or for all users; either is fine.

Requires Windows 10 or 11 and a RODECaster Pro II or Duo connected by USB, in the socket nearest the power inlet.