Carts: effects and liners

Carts let you trigger short sounds without occupying the music decks. Each bank has eight configurable slots or buttons.

The Effects bank can hold applause, signals or sound effects. The Liners bank can hold station identifications, phrases or short announcements, for example. Liners can lower music while they play.

Prepare a sound

  1. Open Carts > Effects center… or Liners center….
  2. Under Cart slot to configure, select the slot you want to prepare.
  3. Press Load sound… and select a file.
  4. Wait for loading to finish and check for errors.
  5. Enter an easily recognizable name, such as “Applause” or “Station ID”.
  6. Adjust Cart volume.
  7. Check Cart shortcut and choose the key you want to assign, if applicable.

Each key must have a unique assignment. If the combination conflicts with another action, the app rejects the change. Slot settings are kept between sessions, but sounds do not start playing when the program opens.

Check a sound privately

First configure the output under Audio > Headphones…. In the effects or liners center, select the slot and press Prelisten.

Prelisten uses headphone volume, is excluded from the program and does not change the broadcast title. Only one cart sound can be prelistened to at a time. You can prelisten to a deck and a cart simultaneously.

Trigger sounds during the program

Enable View > Show carts to see the buttons in the console. Press a sound's button or shortcut to play it in the mix.

The initial shortcuts are F1 through F8 for effects and the number keys 1 through 8 for liners. Holding down a key does not repeatedly trigger the sound. Pressing the same button or shortcut again restarts that sound; sounds from different slots can overlap.

When you type numbers in an editable field, they are entered in the field instead of triggering liners.

To stop sounds, use Stop all carts, the Carts menu or F12 if you have kept that shortcut. This stops both banks and their prelisten, but does not stop songs or disable the microphone.

Lower music with a liner

In the liners center, select the sound and check Lower music while playing. Music reduction (dB) determines how much the decks are attenuated; its initial value is -12 dB and its range is 0 to -30 dB.

This leaves the microphone voice and other cart sounds unaffected by that reduction. It does not activate when prelistening to the liner or when its volume is zero.

Change or remove sounds

Clear slot removes the slot's assignment. Loading a replacement stops and removes the previous sound from that slot. Other buttons are unaffected.

Carts are intended for short audio and have memory limits. A file that is too long may be rejected. Use the decks or queue for recorded programs, long interviews or full songs. Original files must remain available at their locations to load on future launches.