User:Kgb123/Ensoniq PARIS Digital Audio Workstation

The Ensoniq PARIS Digital Audio Workstation was an integrated 128-channel digital audio workstation (DAW) that was developed as a cooperative venture between Emu/Ensoniq and software manufacturers Intelligent Devices.

PARIS is an acronym for Professional Audio Recording Integrated System. The term "Integrated" referred to PARIS' integrated hardware and software, which avoided permitted low latency performance

DESCRIPTION

Each PARIS system was a combination of PARIS software, one to eight EDS cards, one to eight proprietary audio interfaces, and (optionally) between one to eight C16 hardware control surfaces.

SOFTWARE PARIS

HARDWARE: EDS CARDS

The heart of a PARIS system was a proprietary PCI card known as an EDS card, which were made available in three different configurations:

EDS500 - sixteen channels of digital audio EDS 1000 - similar to an EDS500 but with the addition of an onboard DSP FX "daughterboard" containing six proprietary ESP2 DSP chips. An EDS500 could be upgraded to an EDS1000 by adding the FX daughterboard. EDS1000x - an EDS1000 sold with an interconnect cable kit to permit joint operation of two (or more, up to a total of eight) EDS cards.

Each EDS card handled a 16-channel "submix", and up to eight EDS cards could be joined together via interconnect cables to create a 128 channel system, although it was not until many years after release that computers able to handle an eight-card system became available. Each EDS card also provided 64 channels of EQ (16 x 4 bands).

HARDWARE In contrast to "native" DAW solutions, PARIS integration of hardware and software provided a notably low latency (56 samples input to output, roughly equivalent to RADAR systems) even on Pentium 166 computers.

HISTORY

Intelligent Devices principals engineer Stephen St Croix (Stephen Marshall, inventor of the Marshall Time Modulator) and software coder Edmund Pirali.

TECHNICAL

SATURATION/"MOJO"