Westlake Pro Builds Sound Stages

JMR Electronics, Inc. provides Westlake Pro, Inc. with integrated LightningThunderbolt rackmount workstations that combines the Apple Mac Pro, three Avid Pro Tools | HDX cards, RAID storage, and a FC HBA that networks the workstations into the studio’s high-speed SAN implementations.

These Thunderbolt certified rackmount workstations are utilized in Westlake Pro’s sound stage solution for re-recording, mixing, scoring, automated dialogue replacement (ADR), and Foley for film and TV.

Westlake Pro works with post production facilities that can support over 200 Pro Tools systems running on Mac Pros. The Mac Pros’ cylindrical design and Thunderbolt only interface create an operational challenge at many studios.

Hamid ‘Gadget’ Hopkins, Westlake Pro EVP said: “Our clients’ workstations are designed as semi-permanent installs so they can readily be reconfigured when the need arises. When the new Mac Pro came out, while it provided the performance and capability we needed, its design required expansion boxes, unique racking, and many exposed cables making it a challenging system to maintain and reconfigure. That led us to investigate JMR and their ability to encapsulate all our needs into one system just like the older Mac Pro towers.“

The JMR Lightning Thunderbolt (LTNG-XQ) product family is designed for Apple Mac Pro users needing to connect to PCIe peripherals. The products are storage systems featuring four full-bandwidth PCIe slots, using two independent Thunderbolt-2 20Gb/s bridge circuits: one Thunderbolt-2 bridge drives two slots, and a second internal Thunderbolt-2 bridge drives the other two slots. Connections, a host like the Mac Pro include using two of the three available Thunderbolt 2 bus connections to the Mac.

Continued Hopkins: “Sessions and movies continue to become more complex and that requires more tracks to handle the intricacies of sound. That complexity requires a system that can handle the speed, connectivity, and reliability requirements we have to drive 3 HDX’s and local RAID along with an extra slot for fiber access. JMR’s system uniquely offers a 4th PCIe slot that allows us to do that all in one high-performance, self-contained, integrated system. Because of the rack system design, even swapping cards in the Mac Pro is easier now.“

“JMR impressed us with their absolute willingness to come out to the studio, listen to what we wanted, and helped us to custom design and configure a system that met our needs and would work well for our clients,” concluded Hopkins. “It took 12 rack spaces to store and stack all the equipment we needed for a single system prior to implementing the JMR Lightning product. Now we have one JMR workstation that fits in a 4U rack space with everything neatly inside. The system is well thought out, rock solid, and tightly integrated. Bottom line is that we are very impressed.“