1990s
digital audio distribution becomes practical
Audio Network / Tech History
From Copper Multicores to Audio-over-IP
Audio-over-IP answers the problem of heavy multicores, rigid stageboxes and growing channel counts.
The Problem
Analog multicores carried every channel as its own electrical connection. Large productions meant weight, cost, interference risks and little flexibility.
The Story
Digital stageboxes and proprietary digital snakes reduced cabling. Later, systems such as CobraNet, EtherSound, AVB, Dante and AES67 increasingly used Ethernet and IP infrastructure.
The Technical Idea
Audio signals are digitized, packetized, time-synchronized and distributed through switches. Bandwidth, latency, clocking and packet loss become critical.
What Survived Until Today?
Stagebox, snake, clock, stream, subscription and redundancy are old and new terms in one workflow.
Why Event Technicians Still Care
Event audio is often network operation today. That makes setups more flexible, but requires network understanding around switches, VLANs and time.
Eventhacker Field Example
A stagebox no longer connects through an analog 48-channel multicore, but through fiber to a switch. This saves weight, but moves failure modes into the network.
Timeline
2000s
Ethernet-based audio systems spread
2010s
Audio-over-IP becomes common in touring and installation markets