EBS_freak Posted January 2, 2018 Share Posted January 2, 2018 @knicknack - this should give you a better idea... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
charic Posted January 2, 2018 Share Posted January 2, 2018 That looks incredible. In BC colours too! I'm guessing there's no way I could send audio to this via Bluetooth AND audio to my Bluetooth headphones via Bluetooth for a wireless at home Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 2, 2018 Share Posted January 2, 2018 11 minutes ago, charic said: That looks incredible. In BC colours too! I'm guessing there's no way I could send audio to this via Bluetooth AND audio to my Bluetooth headphones via Bluetooth for a wireless at home I was pleasantly surprised by the build quality when I opened it! I think BT is strictly one to one on the pairing. Funnily enough, I'd already questioned this - but for a different application where I want a large number of devices listening to just one transmitter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
charic Posted January 2, 2018 Share Posted January 2, 2018 1 hour ago, EBS_freak said: I was pleasantly surprised by the build quality when I opened it! I think BT is strictly one to one on the pairing. Funnily enough, I'd already questioned this - but for a different application where I want a large number of devices listening to just one transmitter. I know that my headphones can connect to my phone and my laptop simultaneously so it's definitely possible, it's just whether it's possible in this unit (different BT versions etc). Would love to give one a try as I was looking at a pleasureboard anyway Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 2, 2018 Share Posted January 2, 2018 20 minutes ago, charic said: I know that my headphones can connect to my phone and my laptop simultaneously so it's definitely possible, it's just whether it's possible in this unit (different BT versions etc). Would love to give one a try as I was looking at a pleasureboard anyway I think you are talking about Bluetooth multipoint - it seem to intelligently switch between devices but not allow concurrent connections to flow. Eg what happens when you try back audio from your laptop and phone at once? I suspect one device would win out over the other (probably the phone as the manufacturers assume you'll want to take a call?) Pleasureboards are great but I'm reluctant to replace the cab that I've got rid of with another sizeable thing to cart around. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
charic Posted January 2, 2018 Share Posted January 2, 2018 I expect you're probably right The thing that puts me off the pleasureboard is that I need an amp to drive it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 2, 2018 Share Posted January 2, 2018 1 hour ago, charic said: I expect you're probably right The thing that puts me off the pleasureboard is that I need an amp to drive it! Not cheap are they. Suspect you need a crossover at some point too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 5, 2018 Share Posted January 5, 2018 (edited) It's been a while since we had a good geek out in here and as a few people have asked what I am running from both here and various places outside of BC, I thought I would actually get around to getting it down on paper, so to speak... So here's a brief, high level overview. So, as I've mentioned in this thread, I run two desks and this seems to be my fave go to rig at the moment because it's so powerful and a really compact package to carry around. In reality, all of this weighs in at less than two decent wedges (12-15) and is about the same size. In this solution the backbone are the DL32Rs - the reason being is that they sound great, they support Dante and have all the I/O (that'32 channels in and plentiful amount of auxes!!) on board without having to buy a load of snakes or stage boxes. (For example, the X32 Rack is the same size but doesn't have all the I/O that it is capable of supporting without buying extra boxes/snakes). Front of house is used as you would any mixer... but I don't use any of the auxes for monitoring - this leaves all those auxes free for matrix mixes, delay lines, outboard fx etc. This means we can EQ, compress, use all the fx we would like to use as normal for FoH. Anything input into the Dante network, whether that be via a mic, line in, or another Dante device, is available to be used by any other device on the network. Just configure what channels you want to subscribe to and on which device. The Dante cards in the FoH and Monitor World mixers have two network outs - each of these go to a switch that in turn, provisions the two networks. These switches never share data between each other... although a replica set of packets is set to both set of mixers - meaning if any network is disrupted, there is no loss of transmission as the other network should be able to fill in any late or missing packets in the data transmission. To be honest, I've never had any issues with running Dante on just a single network...but I've always had a dedicated network for running this setup. (For example, if you were somewhere where there is already a network, you can just plug into that and it'll work alongside any traffic that is on that network... however, you will be at the mercy of that network... and you would hope that there is some QoS configured so the Dante traffic gets priority. Anyway, I digress). Note - there is no reason to have big rack mount switches like I have... I just like rack stuff, and wanted the availability to plug lots of Dante stuff in (for example, at a recent gig I did, there were a number of Dante enabled recording devices - getting the multitrack recorded was a case of just simply plugging in a laptop, subscribing to the required channels and then hitting record in a DAW). Anyway, 1 or 2 Cat5e/6 cables are better than a 32 way analogue split! Whatever is presented to the FoH preamps, is presented to the Monitor World desk digitally via Dante (it's literally a duplicate of the audio signal post the analogue to digital conversion but before any processing has taken place on it at FoH). What this means, is that I can apply separate processing, completely independent of FoH. Additionally, it opens up a whole new set of FX engines that you can use for your inears... you don't need to be compromised by using the return from whatever the FoH is using. Guys that are taking just an aux off a FoH desk probably find an unprocessed bass quite clanky... in MW, I can EQ and compress so the inears users have a more studio-esque sound. Similarly, having the ability to control the bass drum is another great plus... if you are running with some big subwoofers, it's unlikely that you'll get away with boosting the lows to the point where you want it in your inears without killing everybody in the audience (and lets remember, most people wont have that sort of control anyway because most auxes (depending upon the desk in question and the routing) are sent preEQ and processing. (You can get around this by splitting channels digitally on the FoH desk and having an IEM channel and a FoH channel - but that eats into your channel count!). All the inears users are controlling their mixes (via iPhone/iPad) via the auxes on the MW desk - either to the IEM transmitters, or to a hardwired pack. There's a wireless router that is connected on the primary network - this provides the DHCP for the connecting clients and also passes the control data from the apps to either of the desks that you want to control. The top laptop is used to configure the Dante network (if its configuration needs to be change - e.g. if you are adding devices etc - but for the most, it's stays static for the setup you see here. This first laptop also has Dante Via installed - quite a clever piece of software - means you can put the output of a specific application on the Dante network and assign it to a channel/return on a desk. For example, if you run a DJ app, you can run that app and only the sound of that app will appear on the Dante network and nothing else. (Surf YouTube, watch Facebook and all the sound apart from the DJ app comes out the laptop speakers/headphone socket but not the PA!) The second laptop has Dante Virtual Soundcard and Waves Multirack on it. This means you can record the gig straight into a DAW (although to be fair, you can record straight to a USB hard disk on either of the desks). The later bit is the interesting bit - that enables you to use plugins, that you would in your DAW, on your PA... so all those nice compressors, modulations, SSL EQs... all there. There is one caveat however, the latency is maybe just a little too high for inears without the PCIe card and caddy - but for front of house, it certainly works well! The dotted line is to say I don't tend to use this as to be fair, the DL32R has it nailed unless you really want some special processing that it can't give you natively. What is really cool... if you run out of auxes in MW, you can add another monitor desk by plugging it into the Dante network and duplicating MW into another MW. No analogue snakes or splitters here. Just keep adding desks! Of course, if you wanted to, you can still use the auxes on FoH for monitoring as you would without a dedicated monitoring desk. Additionally, indicated by the dotted lines going to nowhere - you can keep plugging Dante devices into the switch... so for example, as mentioned in a previous post in this thread, I did a gig where Dante was feeding multiple desks - one for mixing for an online broadcast, one for IEM users, one for wedges where the players are just not interested in IEM and of course, didn't need all the processing, FoH... and then all the various laptops that we were using for recording, Waves etc. So there you go... good enough for stadiums yet still small enough for pubs. Overkill? Maybe. But it's fun and the inears mixes never fail to bring a big smile to my face. Edited January 6, 2018 by EBS_freak Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burno70 Posted January 7, 2018 Share Posted January 7, 2018 After experimenting with a cheapo in ear monitoring system the band has decided that this is the way to go for us but we need to upgrade due the interference and hiss we are getting (you get what you pay for). Due to the expense of a decent wireless set up we've decided to go with a wired set up[ for the foreseeable future. I've been looking at the Behringer Powerplay PM1 but wouldn't this just send a signal to one ear? I also see that it's passive - would this have a noticeable effect on volume? Would the Behringer Powerplay P1 be a better option? Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bigwan Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 (edited) 16 hours ago, burno70 said: After experimenting with a cheapo in ear monitoring system the band has decided that this is the way to go for us but we need to upgrade due the interference and hiss we are getting (you get what you pay for). Due to the expense of a decent wireless set up we've decided to go with a wired set up[ for the foreseeable future. I've been looking at the Behringer Powerplay PM1 but wouldn't this just send a signal to one ear? I also see that it's passive - would this have a noticeable effect on volume? Would the Behringer Powerplay P1 be a better option? Thanks Doesn't the P1 need a headphone amp before it in the chain? I think mono in this instance means sends the same signal to both ears. EDIT: Actually reading up a bit on the PM1 it does stereo too, but it DOES need a headphone amp. I have the PM1 and it does just fine for what I've tried so far (not been outside the house yet! Only used it in mono). But I like the look of the P2 as it does stereo on a single cable - just need to figure out how to wire it up for 4 users from an X18 desk... Edited January 8, 2018 by Bigwan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 16 hours ago, burno70 said: After experimenting with a cheapo in ear monitoring system the band has decided that this is the way to go for us but we need to upgrade due the interference and hiss we are getting (you get what you pay for). Due to the expense of a decent wireless set up we've decided to go with a wired set up[ for the foreseeable future. I've been looking at the Behringer Powerplay PM1 but wouldn't this just send a signal to one ear? I also see that it's passive - would this have a noticeable effect on volume? Would the Behringer Powerplay P1 be a better option? Thanks As you've noticed - the PM1 is completely passive and all it does is do a cut of the volume. How loud it can go depends on roughly two things - the amount that the aux from your desk can put out and whether it's loud enough to drive a pair of in ear monitors in the first place... and secondly the impedances of your in ear monitors. The lower the impedance that your in ear monitors are the easier they are to drive and generally the louder they will be. (I say generally as other factors including things like speaker sensitivity come into play also). Strictly speaking, you shouldn't drive your headphones directly from an aux - an aux should drive an amp which in turn then powers your in ear monitors (this also enables you to use higher impedance headphones at (again) generally louder volumes. You are correct that it would be one ear only - the PM1 is designed to come from a headphone amp, either mono or stereo. So for stereo, you'd plug typically use a TRS jack into the amp and on the end of that cable, you'd have an unbalanced XLR that has pin outs of L/R and ground. If you are using two auxes, you can use a Y cable and achieve the same in terms of managing the signal. If you are using the aux, you'd have to wire a cable to split the single signal to the two pins to give you the LR... or alternatively, if you could just use a 3.5mm mono to stereo adapter jack on the end or your in ear monitors. The P1 on the other hand, does have an amp built in... and also has a button that will switch a mono source to stereo in the ear (although it will be just the same audio in both left and right ears). So could be easier without the faffing of custom wires or adapters. Finally, the P2 is effectively the P1 with an amp built in... and has a mono/stereo switch inside, so again, no adapters or faffing on that front. In reality, out the 3, the P2 is probably the best all round option for your case. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 16 minutes ago, Bigwan said: Doesn't the P1 need a headphone amp before it in the chain? The P1 and PM1 are both mono i.e. send same signal to both ears. I have the PM1 and it does just fine for what I've tried so far (not been outside the house yet!). But I like the look of the P2 as it does stereo - just need to figure out how to wire it up for 4 users from an X18 desk... Hi - I think I've answered most of your queries in the post above. With regards to the P2 and running stereo from the XR18 auxes, you are going to be a pair of auxes short... so two of you are going to be in mono. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 (edited) I remember us talking about the Mackie DX4 with @dood - I've revisited it following a conversation with a friend that is looking for a headphone amp but with some sort of decent compressor/limiter on it. I think we said that it was a little limited due to the lack of a pan function on each channel. Turns out that the line 3/4 on the DX4 (7/8 on the DX8) keeps the stereo input in stereo as far as I can see... so if you are using a mono mix, you can add ambient stereo mics, or if you are using a stereo mix, you can use one or two ambient mics but they would be summed to mono. I didn't really look into this before as soon as I saw the lack of pan controls, I kinda gave up on it. Should note that the DX stuff doesn't do phantom for condensers either. Anyway, with guys that are playing with other bands and all sorts of desks, I believe that this actually makes for quite a cool alternative to a headphone amp. As long as you get yourself a collection of connection cables... and a headphones extension cable, for circa 100 quid (assuming you already have the iPhone or android device needed to control it), this makes for quite a cool piece of kit. For example, plugging into an analogue desk aux is pretty naff - but this gives you the option of some EQ, some basic compression (compared to the other digital mixers out there) and some reverb to make things a little less dry. That's pretty cool in my book. As a backstory, the start of the investigation was actually doing the same with a UI12 or XR12 because believe it or not, there seems to be very little out there in terms of a headphone amp with some sort of compression/limiter (actually processing as opposed to a volume control limit). I think that if you can afford it, the UI12 or XR12 would be quite a cool addition to your arsenal... as it will give you some great options as opposed to doing your own processing and both are very portable... but again, a greater cost. Edited January 8, 2018 by EBS_freak Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bigwan Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 2 hours ago, EBS_freak said: Hi - I think I've answered most of your queries in the post above. With regards to the P2 and running stereo from the XR18 auxes, you are going to be a pair of auxes short... so two of you are going to be in mono. Since it's a rehearsal room setup and not for gigging I could use the 6 auxes as 3 stereo pairs and the main outs/desk headphone outs as the 4th though, couldn't I? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 4 minutes ago, Bigwan said: Since it's a rehearsal room setup and not for gigging I could use the 6 auxes as 3 stereo pairs and the main outs/desk headphone outs as the 4th though, couldn't I? Yup. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bigwan Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 Just now, EBS_freak said: Yup. Schweet! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burno70 Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 2 hours ago, EBS_freak said: As you've noticed - the PM1 is completely passive and all it does is do a cut of the volume. How loud it can go depends on roughly two things - the amount that the aux from your desk can put out and whether it's loud enough to drive a pair of in ear monitors in the first place... and secondly the impedances of your in ear monitors. The lower the impedance that your in ear monitors are the easier they are to drive and generally the louder they will be. (I say generally as other factors including things like speaker sensitivity come into play also). Strictly speaking, you shouldn't drive your headphones directly from an aux - an aux should drive an amp which in turn then powers your in ear monitors (this also enables you to use higher impedance headphones at (again) generally louder volumes. You are correct that it would be one ear only - the PM1 is designed to come from a headphone amp, either mono or stereo. So for stereo, you'd plug typically use a TRS jack into the amp and on the end of that cable, you'd have an unbalanced XLR that has pin outs of L/R and ground. If you are using two auxes, you can use a Y cable and achieve the same in terms of managing the signal. If you are using the aux, you'd have to wire a cable to split the single signal to the two pins to give you the LR... or alternatively, if you could just use a 3.5mm mono to stereo adapter jack on the end or your in ear monitors. The P1 on the other hand, does have an amp built in... and also has a button that will switch a mono source to stereo in the ear (although it will be just the same audio in both left and right ears). So could be easier without the faffing of custom wires or adapters. Finally, the P2 is effectively the P1 with an amp built in... and has a mono/stereo switch inside, so again, no adapters or faffing on that front. In reality, out the 3, the P2 is probably the best all round option for your case. Thanks for your comprehensive response mate - it's greatly appreciated. It looks like the P2 isn't available just yet so I'll have to decide whether to hang on for this or get an alternative. I'm using sure SE215 in ears, so I'm pretty sure they are low impedance but I'm unsure of the output of the mixing desks aux so I think I'd be better off with a headphone amp to boost the signal if required. I'm a completely noob to all this and learning steadily but I can't get my head around the DX4 or UI12 enough to recognize the benefits. Incidentally, looking again at wireless systems - what would be the cheapest you could get away with that you could get a respectable sound from with minimal hiss and interference? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 @burno70 - I think the P2 drops Feb 2018... so not long now. It may be the case that wider Europe and US get it first though as that always seems to be the case - It may be worth watching the German shops... actually, https://www.musicstore.de/en_GB/GBP/Behringer-P2/art-PAH0019374-000 looks to be landing 1st week of Feb. I'd be temped to wait - or at least contact the above link and try and get one reserved. Yeah - the 215s will drive off an aux no problem I would have thought. If my 17ohm ACS will work off an aux, I'm sure that the 17Ohm 215s will be OK. Wireless - I would always recommend the Sennheiser EW300 G3 as the entry point into wireless IEM. I know others will disagree - but that's the cheapest radio system that I am happy with that I have experience of. I know others may disagree with that... but as I say, thats where my benchmark is. May be worth watching out for what Line 6 do at Namm... I've seen a couple of things mentioned but I don't think Line6 will open up that can of worms for themselves.... but I could be proven wrong. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burno70 Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 ^^^ brill. Thank you so much - you've been most helpful! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Owen Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 Sorry, no time to trawl through the thread - I am writing reports :(. Reccomomends for moulds for UE900s doobries please. TIA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 17 minutes ago, owen said: Sorry, no time to trawl through the thread - I am writing reports :(. Reccomomends for moulds for UE900s doobries please. TIA http://www.custom-inearmonitors.co.uk/reshells-remoulds/reshelling-remoulding-service-for-in-ear-monitors.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 11, 2018 Share Posted January 11, 2018 Been talking with a friend that is desperately wanting a belt pack with a decent limiter. Came across this from whirlwind - which certainly looks pretty good... but a belt pack that requires an adapter? I suppose you could stick something like this in your pocket... and look like you are pleased to see somebody. I dunno. May work for somebody.. https://www.ebay.co.uk/p/24v-DC-Rechargeable-Li-ion-Battery-Pack-3000mah-Lithium-ion-With-UK-Charger/1939452313?iid=172104407748 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 (edited) Continuing on the quest to help my friend sort his ears rig out and having musings around @dood's field recorder experiments, I looked at the H6. I swear, for a piece of kit for IEM use, it's absolutely brilliant. Stereo ambient mics and a 4 way mixer with pans on each channel. Phantom too. Battery powered... And a limiter on each input... And that gorgeous display with the meters. Absolute killer for a dep setup. Ambient, stereo monitor send from desk... and with a couple of XLR/jack splitters, two easy to access "more me" controls for say vocals and bass. I googled to see if anybody else has caught on... Found this cool video of it in action. I don't even need one... but I want one!! Edited January 13, 2018 by EBS_freak Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
knicknack Posted January 15, 2018 Share Posted January 15, 2018 @EBS_freak A woojer arrived at my door today...enjoying playing around with it! Looking forward to seeing how it translates to a live environment! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EBS_freak Posted January 15, 2018 Share Posted January 15, 2018 1 minute ago, knicknack said: @EBS_freak A woojer arrived at my door today...enjoying playing around with it! Looking forward to seeing how it translates to a live environment! Enjoy! Let us know how you get on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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