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 live, is never offered. With no recordings on the unit the delete controls are hidden, and with no card or drive in, the section is a single line, so there is less to tab past.

Find out when there is new firmware

The Device page, under Hardware, can ask RODE whether there is newer firmware for your unit, and tells you plainly when you already have the latest. The summary at start-up says so when there is an update. Installing it is still done on the unit's screen or with RODE's app, because an update restarts the unit and your computer's sound may be going through it.

Wifi says when it has connected

Switching the unit's wifi on now waits until it has joined your network and says so, rather than leaving you to check back. With wifi off, its settings show only the switch. The Current state report on the Device page now includes the unit's network, and the summary spoken at start-up says when the unit is offline while incoming calls are on.

Your wifi password stays out of the log

The diagnostic log records what the app sends to the unit, and that included your wifi password when you joined a network. Passwords are now left out, so the log is safe to send to somebody.

Restoring a backup is quicker with voice effect pads

A restore no longer rebuilds voice effect pads that already match the backup, which saves about a minute and a half on a unit with the factory pads.

The page notices when the app restarts

If AccessCaster stops while its window is open, the window now tells you, and says when it is back. After an update the window reloads itself, so you are never left using the old page with the new app.

Daylight saving is off the Device page

The unit stores the setting but only its own touchscreen ever applies it, so the switch here did nothing. It still comes back with a backup.