To Kamurah: Thanks for chiming in. I also plan to connect via Ethernet. 

I would like to know what’s involved with setting up a Dante system, particularly what hardware (if any) is necessary in addition to a Dante card. Can you or anyone else can point me in the right direction?

Hey…I am happy to give you an idea of how my system is set up…but with Dante there are no limits to the ways your system can be configured…so it will be up to you to decide what your needs are.

I run a Focusrite Rednet PCIe card in my PC…think of this as the traffic cop for all the Dante connections, into and out of your computer and allows for you to freely route 128 channels of audio.  While you can forego the PCIe card and run a Dante Virtual Soundcard using your built in Ethernet, the latency will be much higher than with the PCIe card.  Obviously you will need the Dante expansion card for the H9000…which will give you 32 channels within the H9000.  These can be configured any way you wish…as direct I/O via analog or digital…or as sends…and these configurations can be recalled.  The Dante card inside the H9000 adds those channels to the existing I/O…so using 32 channels of Dante does not affect your analog or digital I/O.  The H9000 is clocked via Dante.

I use a Focusrite REDNET AM2 for monitoring and headphones….but Audinate has released various 2 channel I/O options so you can use your own DAC, or route audio out of the H9000 via analog or digital.  I route additional headphone feeds to AES / EBU Audinate I/O connected to another headphone DAC.  I also feed audio into the system via AES / EBU from other digital gear (for me, a Fractal Audio AXE FX3…but you could use other outboard).  All clocking is handled by DANTE and is automatic, so once configured there is very little to adjust.

All the physical connections are via a Cisco Ethernet switch, which also provides PoE for the AM2.

The entire setup is configured by the Dante Controller software…which allows any signal to be routed anywhere…and setups can be saved and recalled.

The final piece for me was to purchase the Dante Virtual Soundcard (DVS).  This software allows WDM / system audio in Windows to be routed within the Dante network.  I use this for playback of YouTube or Spotify…and all that is required is for me to add an audio track in Cubase with the DVS channels assigned.  Since there are no WDM drivers for the REDNET PCIe card (only ASIO), this allows the system audio to function alongside ASIO audio.

It seems complicated but really is not once you wrap your head around the way Dante handles the routing of audio signals.  If you have specific questions please feel free to ask and I will try to answer.

Best of luck.