Applications & Tools

The ProppFrexx ONAIR suite comes with various different applications and tools to enhance your daily broadcasting experiance.
They are all included when purchasing ProppFrexx ONAIR - some of them might be downloaded individually and are even free to use.

ProppFrexx ONAIR

The main application containing all mentioned features below incl. the playout, scheduling, mixing and streaming engine.

Media Library Server

An optional application which might be used in larger environments as a central repository for all your media tracks.

Advertising & News

The stand-alone tool to manage all advertising partners and plan their campaigns, as well as to handle any traffic and news items.

Meta Data Editor

A stand-alone file tagger to edit all meta data attributes for all supported audio formats (incl. WAV, MP2/3/4, AAC, OGG, WMA, FLAC, OPUS etc.).

GPIO Client

A client application to handle external remoting interfaces for ProppFrexx ONAIR, can be extended (by users or partners) to support further interfaces.

Remote CmdLnd

An independent command-line utility to (remote) control ProppFrexx ONAIR. Can be used by any other application not offering a dedicated interface by itself.

ProppFrexx Time

A stand-alone gorky inspired clock application. It down nothing more than showning the current date and time.

ProppFrexx Watcher

Small taskbar utility to monitor the state and restart ProppFrexx ONAIR in case of an unexpected shutdown.

Playlist Converter

A simple command-line utility to convert different external playlist formats to the ProppFrexx Playlist Format.

ProppFrexx RemoteView

An extra viewer application, which mirrors the current ONAIR playlist to any remote screen for a comprehensive secondary view (e.g. a guest desk).

ProppFrexx Statistics

An extra statistics and analytics application, which allows extensive data mining based on all your historic play out data. It includes a pivot and chart grid as well as a table based lookup.

Feature Overview

Below you can find a comprehensive list of the most important features of ProppFrexx ONAIR.

Playback Formats

MP3, MP2, MP1, WAV, AIFF, BWF, RF64, OGG, WMA, WMV, FLAC, APE, MPC, AAC, AAC+, MP4, M4A, ALAC, OPUS, CDA, HLS, MIDI, MOD or others by available BASS add-ons.

Recording Formats

MP3*, MP2, WAV, BWF, RF64, OGG, WMA, AAC*, AAC+*, MP4*, M4A*, FLAC, MPC, OPUS, ACM.

Streaming Formats

SHOUTcast v1 and v2 (MP3, AACplus), ICEcast v2 (MP3, OGG, AACplus, FLAC, OPUS), Windows Media Service push and pull (WMA, WMApro), Build-In Server (MP3, WMA).

Remoting

Ember+ (Lawo, DHD, Studer etc.), Livewire+ (Axia etc.), Wheatnet-IP (Wheatstone), AxelTech Oxygen, TCP/IP, MIDI, OSC, Keyboard Hotkeys, Serial-IO, GamePort, Velleman, IO-Warrior, D&R-Airence, D&R-Airlite, others might be add upon request.

Import/Export

Music 1, PowerGold, MusicMaster, Natural, Traffic 2000, UKI Media, Amily, RamComm, MaxRadio, Marketron, Jazler, Carmen, DRS2006, Rkom, DKBureau, M3U Generic, CSV/TSV Generic, Database ODBC Generic, others might be add upon request.

Playlist Formats

PFP, M3U, M3U8, PLS, XML, WPL, ASX, XSPF, SMIL, MLP, DBF, MDB, SQL, plain folder.

  Support for Windows 11 (64-bit)

ProppFrexx ONAIR runs on any modern Microsoft Windows® operating system supporting the .Net Framework 4.8. Starting with Windows 7, 10 and 11 up to Server 2022 or above, including either the 32-bit or the 64-bit versions.

  Designed to operate 24 by 7

ProppFrexx ONAIR is designed to operate 24 by 7. Stability was one of the major design goals to ensure glitch free daily operations.

  High Quality Audio Processing

ProppFrexx ONAIR is based on the best audio engine available on the market, which is BASS (see www.un4seen.com for details). Internal processing is performed in 32-bit floating point precision. The audio processing chain can be fully controlled by numerous options to guarantee an optimum in sound quality from input to output.

  Full ASIO and WASAPI Support

ProppFrexx ONAIR supports any modern single or multi-channel soundcard with either a WDM, WASAPI or ASIO 2.0 driver. Therefore you might use almost any professional soundcard (digital or analog) with ProppFrexx ONAIR. Even AoIP, AES67 is fully supported.

  Support for almost any Audio Format

ProppFrexx ONAIR supports playback of almost any audio format (stereo or multi-channel, file based or internet streaming), this includes for example WAV, BWF/RF64, AIFF, MP1/2/3, WMA, OGG, FLAC, APE, OPUS, AAC, M4A etc.

  Full TAG Reading and Writing Support

ProppFrexx ONAIR supports almost any meta data format (TAGs), including RIFF, ID3v1, ID3v2, APE, OGG Vorbis, WMA, M4A (iTunes), BWF/RF64 etc. In addition any track meta data (like cue- and hook points, options, events etc.) can be written directly to the audio file TAGs or to a separate meta data file. An external meta data database table can also be integrated allowing you to leverage your existing library management tool.

  Support for almost any Recording Format

ProppFrexx ONAIR supports encoding or transcoding from and to almost any audio format via freely configurable command-line encoders. This also includes on-the-fly recording of any mixer channel, e.g. for immediate voice tracking, on-air checks or archival purposes.

  Full Replay Gain Support

ProppFrexx ONAIR fully supports automatic replay gain adjustments (either peak level normalization only and/or adjustment of the perceived psychoacoustic loudness).

  Full VST and DSP Support

ProppFrexx ONAIR fully supports almost any VST 2.0/2.4 DSP plug-ins (e.g. StereoTool is even natively supported incl. full RDS integration). Besides that, ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with an integrated 10-band EQ, Dynamic Amplifier and a Compressor/Limiter per single mixer channel.

  Automatic BPM Detection

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with an integrated BPM detection allowing you to synchronize and mix tracks with a perfect beat match.

  Modern, Skinnable User Interface

The ProppFrexx ONAIR user interface comes as a modern ribbon control with a multiple document interface and a flexible docking manager. This allows you to arrange any window to any location and of course also supports any multi monitor environment. Over 30 skins allow you to customize the look and feel to your needs. This also includes a high contrast skin and full high DPI support for color blind people. In addition TouchUI is fully supported!

  Integrated Chat for Talkback

The integrated chat function allows you to communicate with other ProppFrexx Users (even located outside your LAN somewhere remote on the internet). This might for example be useful to synchronize or handover concurrent broadcasting tasks in a remote networking or multi-studio environment.

  Integrated User Access Control

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with an integrated user access control management, allowing you to define any number of users and assign them to a user profile. To each user profile you can assign roles, rights and settings. This allows you tailor what a user can do with ProppFrexx ONAIR during his daily operations while still using a single windows operating user account.

  External Device Monitoring

ProppFrexx ONAIR allows you to monitor your external devices (soundcards), preventing unwanted changes (e.g. muting a device or changing the device volume) by other applications or manual user changes. An integrated silence detection allows you to automatically perform certain tasks if your station unexpectedly goes offline or is silent.

  3rd Party Sychronization

ProppFrexx ONAIR allows you to define control commands and synchronize events with played out streams or to other events happening in the system. This ensures full control not only over ProppFrexx ONAIR but also over any other application. Even any number of track events can be defined which might be triggered, if a specific position is reached (e.g. to insert tracks within tracks etc.).

  MOD Stream Watcher

ProppFrexx ONAIR allows you to monitor external streaming sources (Audio-URLs) in the background, and if alive any current program might be suspended/paused or overlaid. This allows you to easily integrate external live, moderator broadcasts into your standard program.

  And many More...

An ONAIR Time control informs you about the current time (incl. a quarter and hour countdown, an analog and digital clock). A customizable Station-Visual control (incl. your station logo as well as DJ pictures or live FFT visuals). A printing system to print your playlists or scheduler setup (incl. PDF, XML or HTML export). A weather control shows the current weather and a forcast for the next days. Full CD-Buring and -Ripping...

  Unlimited Media Library Support

ProppFrexx ONAIR supports almost any playlist format (e.g. .m3u, .pls, .wpl, .xspf, iTunes .xml, .smil etc.). Any playlist can serve as a media library representing a database of tracks, which can be used any time during operations. In addition ProppFrexx ONAIR fully supports embedded playlists (playlists treated as a single continous track). You can also define Folder based media libraries (incl. automatic synchronization) as well as database based media libraries, allowing you to integrate any existing content on-the-fly. For large setups a remote Media Library Server is available as well.

  Integrated Scripting

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with an integrated scripting engine (UI supported configuration without coding!). A script tells the system what tracks should be played in which order. This includes the use of rules, fix-time-elements as well as filters and options. Scripts can be used to define fully automated programs or to suggest pre-prepared playlists for voice tracking. History checks and most recently used/played statistics are fully supported.

  Integrated Scheduling

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with two integrated Outlook-like schedulers. Here you define when and how a script, advert, new, overlays, line-in etc. should run (with fixed or soft start time, as an overlay or new program, with or without a fixed end time etc.). In addition the scheduler allows you to also define general reminders, alerts or to simply execute any available control command. Just full control without limits.

  Full Automation and Live-Assist Support

The scripting engine combined with the scheduler allow you to run your station fully automated. In addition you can define when and if media libraries (playlists) should be automatically reloaded and if special folders should be monitored for new content in the background. However, you can of course always operate ProppFrexx ONAIR also in full manual mode or switch at any time between Live-Assist and automation mode. An AutoPlay feature also allows any operator to take a break and resume his live mode at any time later. This guarantees seamless operations in any day to day situation.

Integrated Cartwalls

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with two integrated and independent cartwalls. Each cartwall allows you to quickly play any kind of jingle, sweeper, sample, whatsoever. Jump buttons allow you to quickly change your cartwall playlist. Multiple carts can be played all together or even sequentially in a row. Fading and looping can also be fully controlled.

  Sophisticated DJ-Players

Each playlist window comes with up to four DJ Players. The size and features of these players can be defined from small/simple to medium/average to large/complex. A WaveForm visualization, Cue-Point, Gain/Pan/EQ, special FX, hot start, event editor and loop sampler section, as well as (master) tempo and pitching controls, reverse direction and backspin support round up the picture.

  Integrated Streaming Support

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with integrated streaming support for SHOUTcast (v1 and v2), ICEcast and Windows Media Server in either push or pull mode. Any number of (different) streaming servers can be configured and used in parallel.

  Flexible Mixer and Routing Setup

ProppFrexx ONAIR can be configured to work in any hardware environment. Any number of input and output mixer channels can be defined as well as virtual sub-busses for handing sum- or group channel strips (this includes freely definable speaker assignment). Any player control within ProppFrexx ONAIR can be freely routed to any of those channel strips. This gives you unmatched flexibility in your digital audio workstation setup and lets you integrate ProppFrexx ONAIR into any given studio environment.

  Mixer Presets and Profiles

ProppFrexx ONAIR allows you to define any number of mixer profiles with up to 5 mixer presets each. This allows you to change your entire mixer setup or only the definition of your mixer control (including effect, gain, pan or volume settings) with just a single click.

  Local, Harddisk or USB-Stick Registration

The ProppFrexx ONAIR registration is by default tied to your local machine (of course you can still use any resource within your local area network). However, a special hard disk or USB-Stick registration allows you bind your registration also to a local hard disk and/or a removable USB-Stick, so that you can carry ProppFrexx ONAIR with you on this single disk resp. single USB-Stick only (mobile DJ support).

  Track Information Moderator Support

ProppFrexx ONAIR supports the DJ with his voice over task by displaying all currently relevant track information together with any predefined moderator text and comment in a separate and legibly window.

  Full Timecode Control

ProppFrexx ONAIR not only shows you what time it is. You are also always informed about the current track position, elapsed track time, the remaining time until Cue-Out, until the next track, until Fade-Out as well as the remaining Ramp/Intro and Outro times, as well as the next program or overlay is due.

  Integrated Web-Browser

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with an integrated web browser. This web browser can be used to support ONAIR operations (e.g. to display station, artist, current track, moderation information etc.) or to display your custom web pages for interactive listener communication.

  Integrated Message Center with RSS

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with a central message center, which allows you to not only get informed by external events (like scheduler alerts or control room messages), but also to read any internet RSS feeds like current news, traffic control reports etc.

  Multiple Histories and Statistics

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with three playback history levels: media, script and global. In addition a playback statistic keeps track of the number of playouts and the last playback time of each track.

  Flexible Import and Export

Integration with external Schedulers is fully supported. The used Media-Libraries can easily be exported to a freely definable format (CSV, FixedWidth, Database or Playlist). In addition ProppFrexx ONAIR allows you to import external scheduler log-files (e.g. from Music1, PowerGold, MusicMaster, MaxRadio, Natural, Traffic 2000, Ramcomm etc.) and to create on-the-fly appropriate program and/or overlay scheduler entries accordingly. You might even mix external scheduler logs with the interbnal scripting/scheduler capabilities - freedom to your choice.

  Full synchronized PFL

ProppFrexx ONAIR allows you to monitor any playback or recording source at any time, fully synchronized. Beside real-time PFL (pre fade listening) an extra PFL player allows you to monitor any position of a playback control in advance resp. to change cue-points, timecodes or events on-the-fly up to a second before its playout.

  WaveFrom, Cue-Points, Volume Envelope

ProppFrexx ONAIR can visualize any audio track in a WaveForm display which allows you to directly edit cue-points and define volume envelops. You can define standard cue-points (like In, Out, Next, FadeOut, Intro/Ramp, Outro etc.) as well as special hook cue-points for partial playback of track snippets. In addition track insert events will be fully visualized.

  Graphical Segue-Editor (Multi-Track-Editor)

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with a graphical Segue-Editor which allows you to define the segue/mix of two or three subsequent tracks in a visual fashion by simply dragging the tracks. This multi-track editor also allows you to directly align your track inserts (voice overs) and supports real-time tempo adjustments as well as instant voice over recording and automatic volume attenuation.

  Voice Tracking (Remote or Instant)

ProppFrexx ONAIR supports instant as well as remote voice over/tracking. This allows you to record takes on-the-fly (even from a remote home location) which can be used e.g. as track inserts or as completely new playlist entries. The voice tracking module supports direct cue-point editing, graphical segue editing, ReplayGain calculation as well as full TAG editing and volume attenuation of the overlapping segue audio tracks.

  Freely configurable (Automatic)Mixing

ProppFrexx ONAIR allows you to freely define manual and automatic mixing settings to control how tracks (or type of tracks) are mixed during automation or automatic playback. Cue-Points might be automatically calculated based on these settings for individual tracks (or type of tracks) to ensure non-stop and silence-free play out. In addition you can freely define your own volume curves above that.

  Support for Embedded Containers

ProppFrexx ONAIR not only allows you to use audio tracks within a playlist. In addition placeholders, document references and embedded (dynamic) containers are supported. An embedded container is a collection of entries (or a reference to a script or overlay entry), which is treated as one logical unit. An embedded container can be a list of audio tracks, an embedded playlist or even an embedded script, which allows you generate dynamic content. Even references to adverts or news are supported. You can create embedded containers on-the-fly and even define hook openers, separators and closers for individual media types.

  Flexible Remote Control Support

ProppFrexx ONAIR can be remotely controlled via several freely configurable interfaces, e.g. Ember+, Livewire+, Wheatnet-IP, AxelTech Oxygen, TCP/IP, MIDI, Serial-IO, GamePort, Keyboard Hotkeys, OSC, IO-Warrior, Velleman, D&R-Airence, D&R-Airlite etc. This allows you to operate ProppFrexx not only via the user interface, but also via almost any external device (perfect integration with your existing consoles or controllers should be guaranteed). Almost everything what you can do via the user interface you can also do via the remote control interfaces (e.g. you might use TouchOSC to convert your iPad into a full remote controller!). If an interface is currently not supported it can even be added by yourself or a partner via our extensible GPIO Client application API.

  Multi Studio Support

ProppFrexx ONAIR supports remoting in a multi studio environment. If you operate multiple studios ProppFrexx ONAIR allows you to fully control each studio remotely from any other studio. This includes scheduler and playlist control as well as controlling any remote mixer channel plus a special master and slave mode for direct take-over (e.g. in emergency situations).

  Full Reporting and Logging

Almost anything what ProppFrexx ONAIR is doing can be logged to freely configurable (text) log files. This should allow you to fulfill any internal or external reporting and regulatory requirements. In addition ProppFrexx ONAIR is capable to automatically record anything which is played out through any mixer channel; including various automatic sensing modes (e.g. to only record if a signal is detected or above a certain threshold). This enables you for example to record your entire program for archival purposes or to record the DJ voice talks only for later on-air checks.

  Standby-Player and Trackboard

Beside the playlist related DJ Players ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with any number of additional Standby Players. Each Standby Players has the same functionality as the DJ Player plus a track stack mode and can serve manual play out of any track, stream or embedded playlist at any time. In addition a multi audio trackboard allows you to hold up any number of addition tracks for quick access.

  Integrated Search, Find and Explore

ProppFrexx ONAIR comes with super fast search and retrieval tools. Beside scanning and/or monitoring your hard disk respective certain (network)folders all your defined media libraries can be quickly accessed to find relevant tracks on-the-fly. Depending on your quality of meta data this also includes searching for similar tracks. This allows you to find the right track at the right time (e.g. search by artist, album, title, BPM, genre, rating, mood etc.).

  Web-Integration

Various control-commands allow a perfect web-integration (e.g. to display your current tracks). This includes all meta data attributes incl. cover arts.

 Advertising and News Management  

As a stand-alone application, this tool manages all your advertising partners and their campaigns (incl. support for multiple regions with automatic length adjustment). You can plan and organize your advert slots, give the advert campaigns priorities, distribute them over time automatically or assign them manually to your slots, define splitters, keys as well as opener and closer tracks. This also includes full reconciliation and billing of your advert partners. In addition this tool can manage any number of traffic or news categories and automtically pick the latest items to create an automatically scheduled playlist. News and Adverts are basically planned using the overlay scheduler. However, you can also reference any overlay playout directly from within your main playlist or via your external scheduler. As such you are always free to use the build-in functionalities or to use external planning tools - you can even mix both - you define the workflow!

Installation Requirements


  • Microsoft Windows® 7 SP1 (x64 or x86)
  • Microsoft Windows® Server 2008 R2 SP1 (x64)
  • Microsoft Windows® 8.1 (x64 or x86)
  • Microsoft Windows® Server 2012 (x64)
  • Microsoft Windows® Server 2012 R2 (x64)
  • Microsoft Windows® 10 (x64 or x86)
  • Microsoft Windows® Server 2016 64-bit
  • Microsoft Windows® 11 (x64 or x86)
  • Microsoft Windows® Server 2019 64-bit
  • Microsoft Windows® Server 2022 64-bit

To run ProppFrexx on a MAC/OSX you might use Bootcamp or even better, you might use Parallels Desktop for Mac to run ProppFrexx ONAIR on Apple hardware without rebooting side-to-side with your OSX applications - MAC/OSX is however not oficially supported!

Any single or multi-channel soundcard with one of the following drivers is supported:
 
  • ProppFrexx ONAIR supports WDM (DirectSound) DirectSound (WDM) driver
     
  • ProppFrexx ONAIR supports WASAPI (CoreAudio) Core Audio (WASAPI) driver
     
  • ProppFrexx ONAIR supports ASIO Steinberg Audio Stream Input/Output (ASIO) driver (recommended)
     

For best quality we recommend to use a professional audio soundcard which supports full 32-bit or 24-bit processing. Note that you can use any number of soundcards in your system. However, you should try to avoid mixing the type of driver between multiple soundcards (i.e. if available use only ASIO drivers, then use only WASAPI drivers and finally use only WDM drivers). When using multiple soundcard in parallel in a chained way, make sure to get them synchronized to the same clock (e.g. using a common world clock signal).

Category         Minimum Recommended
CPU: Dual-Core 2.0 GHz       Quad-Core 2 GHz or higher
RAM: 4 GB 8 GB or higher
Diskspace: 100 MB 500 MB or higher
Monitor: 1024x768, 32-bit 1680x1050 or higher, 32-bit


The hardware requirements might depend on the type of use and the final deployment scenario. However, the system is able to fully scale with your environment, e.g. leveraging multiple CPUs, disk arrays etc. Multi-Core Systems with dual-displays are recommended.
When using a NAS or server mapped disk volumes make sure to attach them using a highspeed gigabit network (or better) and use server grade hardware, as consumer NAS tend to enter into sleep mode which might result in disconnected/unavailable drives.

ProppFrexx ONAIR requires the latest Microsoft .NET Framework in version 4.6.2 or above. The latest .NET Framework will normally be installed with your Windows Operating System.

Furthermore the Microsoft Windows Media Audio Codec resp. the Microsoft Windows Media Foundation is required if you intend to playback WMA or MP3 files. The Windows Media Audio Codec will normally be installed with your Windows Operating System, however, you might also install the latest Windows Media Player.

For certain functionalities it is also recommended to install the latest DirectX version.
There should normally be no need to install any of the above mentioned 3rd party software, as this typically already comes installed with your operating system.

ProppFrexx might leverage the QuickTime runtime for AAC support. (Note: installing iTunes will also install the latest QuickTime version, however iTunes is not required to be installed for AAC support)

For streaming AAC+ content (e.g. to a SHOUTcast server) ProppFrexx will use the Winamp Media Player libraries. So make sure to install Winamp if you plan to stream in the AAC+ format.

Life on earth may be expensive, but it does include an annual free trip around the sun.

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* ProppFrexx might leverage the decoding/encoding audio codes as installed on your operating system (e.g. using the Windows Media Foundation libraries respectively the QuickTime libraries). When installed and available with your OS no additional decoding/encoding license is required. Due to license issues we are not allowed to provide certain command-line encoders (e.g. for AAC encoding) directly with the product. So it is your responsibility to download/install those encoders manually (e.g. from here). Please make sure, that you do not infringe any license or patent issues - make sure, that you obtain and own the right to use such formats!