Looking for free automation software

[LibertyNT]

I do!
Of course my setup is a tad unusual.

Because I'm AM/FM/Online, I needed a way for the audio to get to the stream.
Zara does not stream, So what I did was run Zara on one Computer, and Winamp on another computer. It sounded great, especially since the station could have actual audio processing.

In my case, Zara paired with Winamp can sound truely amazing.
I even got a program that pulls the song titles from Zara and sends them to the stream (separate from the actual Audio Encoder)

[musiconradio.com]

If you have invested this much time and effort in your project. Spend a little bit of money and go with stationplaylist or some full featured program you and your listeners will be happy.

[Kent T]

Winamp is clunky and not professional. Get something better which can stream. Do it the right way.

[WPHA]

Zara is fully capable of sounding excellent on a very limited budget. (Like if you already have the PC, then the cost is $0. Hard to compete against THAT!)

Some of us, $0 is all we can afford.

[APinDC]

A roomful o' thumbs-up for Rivendell Radio Automation. I use it at my day job at a radio network and I use it in my wacky basement workshop.

It doesn't come up to speed in an instant like Winamp and it does take some preparation to get it ready for online use, but it is drop-dead stable (how about over 1,000 days without a reboot?), totally free, and works on a $90 Craigslist computer. Put in a second soundcard and you can have multiple outputs feeding your console (1 fader for the main log, another fader for the "cart wall"). *And* it streams.

It is Linux-based, which may scare some folks off. But the company that manages the Rivendell project has a downloadable "appliance DVD" that installs both the Centos operating system *and* the Rivendell suite onto a blank hard drive (http://paravelsystems.com/appliance.html). Only a minimum amount of configuration is needed, which can be obtained from a Wiki and from a community of users. But note that this disc will erase whatever is on that drive, so do not install it on a machine you want or need.

There are a bunch of YouTube videos produced by Rivendell users that are pretty informative. Search them out and see what it does.

-AP

[musiconradio.com]

Is Salem still using Rivendell on their stations.

[APinDC]

Is Salem still using Rivendell on their stations?

Yes; here in DC, Salem is using it to drive three stations that I know first-hand. The rest likely are also.
Check this list of stations and webcasters currently using RD: http://rivendell.tryphon.org/wiki/Stations_using_Rivendell