The IEM (in ear monitors) Bible thread

[acidbass]

39 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

look forward to getting your thoughts on them

Yes me too, looking forward to hearing them.  For the cost it's worth the risk.  I'm buying on a recommendation and they appear to have one extra balanced armature (5) compared to the ZS10 Pro X (4) so maybe that might be good for us low enders!

[Al Krow]

16 minutes ago, acidbass said:

Yes me too, looking forward to hearing them.  For the cost it's worth the risk.  I'm buying on a recommendation and they appear to have one extra balanced armature (5) compared to the ZS10 Pro X (4) so maybe that might be good for us low enders!

 

It's an interesting one. Not sure more armatures necessarily equates to better performance though, or what the optimum number is! The consensus seems to be the KZs outperform (and are considerably better value) than Shure IEMs, which have fewer armatures but not necessarily the Sennheiser's which also have fewer 😊

Edited April 8 by Al Krow

[dave_bass5]

4 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

 

It's an interesting one. Not sure more armatures necessarily equates to better performance though, or what the optimum number is! The consensus seems to be the KZs outperform (and are considerably better value) than Shure IEMs, which have fewer armatures but not necessarily the Sennheiser's which also have fewer 😊

Yep, the Sens only have one but seem more balanced than the 3 driver MEE’s i have, and also the KZ’s I’ve had. 
I’d guess there is only so much bass and low end your ear can take at higher levels, but having an extended harsh top end at high levels would be very uncomfortable. 

[dave_bass5]

43 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

 

Interesting you're picking up on the volume point, too, Dave. My key starting point is being able to hear myself clearly i.e. cutting through the mix on my IEMs for bass, I guess in the same way that a vocalist is primarily concerned about hearing themselves sing. It's complicated slightly by using mid priced Xvive U4 wireless with our IEMs, and if I am having to max the volume then other interference issues can creep in, so having a set of IEMs that cut through well without being pushed is very helpful.

Should add, Dawn uses the IE100 and Xvive and has never needed to max the volume out on the receiver. She has a full band mix in them. 
Maybe one thing you could try is to EQ a bit of low end out? Sometimes all that low energy can cloud things.

Also, the fit is everything IME. Get a good isolation and you can hear things much clearer. Only now am i happy with how things are, and couldn’t get by without the memory foam tips. 

Edited April 8 by dave_bass5

[Al Krow]

4 minutes ago, dave_bass5 said:

Should add, Dawn uses the IE100 and Xvive and has never needed to max the volume out on the receiver. She has a full band mix in them. 
Maybe one thing you could try is to EQ a bit of low end out? Sometimes all that low energy can cloud things. 

 

Thanks Dave, the IEM aux feed is the same as the FoH feed (which we are very happy with) ie it's post EQ so not an option to tweak the EQ on the IEMs unfortunately on our desk.

 

[warwickhunt]

With regards to maxing volumes - Will you not have various stages where you can adjust the gain to get the volume right?  I have the desk, my 'Rolls' mini-mixer and my P2 or Lekato wireless at which I can set levels; I seem to have headroom on all of these points and never lack for volume.  I realise we all use different gear but I thought the sensitivity of the Sennheiser IE100 were comparable... I maybe need to research. 

 

[acidbass]

24 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

The consensus seems to be the KZs outperform (and are considerably better value) than Shure IEMs

 

I can confirm this.  I used the SE215s in the past and much prefer the KZs for less half the cost.

[dave_bass5]

9 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

 

Thanks Dave, the IEM aux feed is the same as the FoH feed (which we are very happy with) ie it's post EQ so not an option to tweak the EQ on the IEMs unfortunately on our desk.

 

Could you put a small EQ unit between the Aux and the Xvive transmitter? 
Maybe not an option if they are headphone outs though. 

[Al Krow]

28 minutes ago, dave_bass5 said:

Could you put a small EQ unit between the Aux and the Xvive transmitter? 
Maybe not an option if they are headphone outs 

 

Maybe getting a bit too complicated particularly, when the KZs already work pretty well. Am really just after folks thoughts on some alternative KZ options.

 

Besides it's not EQ per se that's the issue. Cutting bass on the IEMs is not going to make the bass stand out better in my ear pieces, I wouldn't have thought?

 

[dave_bass5]

5 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

 

Besides it's not EQ per se that's the issue. Cutting bass on the IEMs is not going to make the bass stand out better in my ear pieces, I wouldn't have thought?

 

Well the clarity comes mostly from the mid range, so having a cleaner low end could  allow that through. Low end uses a lot of power, I’d imagine even in IEM’s, so taming that could help you hear the bass a bit better and get louder. 
All our monitor mixes have a HPF applied and the clarity improvement is quite noticeable to me. Don’t forget all your mics will also be picking up the on stage sound and feeding that back to your IEM’s. 
 

Remember how everyone was jumping on the HPF fad a few years ago? Same principle applies here. 
 

Anyway, apologies for derailing things. 
 

[Al Krow]

27 minutes ago, dave_bass5 said:

Well the clarity comes mostly from the mid range, so having a cleaner low end could  allow that through. Low end uses a lot of power, I’d imagine even in IEM’s, so taming that could help you hear the bass a bit better and get louder. 
All our monitor mixes have a HPF applied and the clarity improvement is quite noticeable to me. Don’t forget all your mics will also be picking up the on stage sound and feeding that back to your IEM’s. 
 

Remember how everyone was jumping on the HPF fad a few years ago? Same principle applies here. 
 

Anyway, apologies for derailing things. 
 

Yeah agree in part. We apply HPF on the desk to everything already, including bass, apart from the kick: and as I think I mentioned, we're pretty happy with our FoH mix.

I think the IEM issue I'm thinking about...is just an IEM issue.

Edited April 8 by Al Krow

[dave_bass5]

21 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

Yeah agree in part. We apply HPF on the desk to everything already, including bass, apart from the kick: and as I think I mentioned, we're pretty happy with our FoH mix.

I think the IEM issue I'm thinking about...is just an IEM issue.

Yeah, i was mainly addressing the volume issue you mentioned rather than the IEMs themselves. 
 

 

[Greg Edwards69]

4 hours ago, dave_bass5 said:

I find that as well with my IE400 (and 100 before them). 
What i noticed is they are more balanced and so smoother sounding. Sometimes i wonder if they are loud enough as i do still hear they band a little. 
When i had the KZ’s briefly they did sound louder and more in your face (or ear). More noticeable i guess, but with too much high end to make them sound comfortable for me. I felt they were making their presence known more and not really blending in. 

+1. I'm really enjoying the sound of my IE400's - much smoother than the KZ ZS10 Pro X I was using before (and the original ZS10 non-pro before that). The KZs always sounded a little too harsh at the top end, which became fatiguing and uncomfortable to listen to after a while. I can comfortably listen to the IE400 all evening. I read here how you can tame the piercing treble with a piece of medical tape stuck over the grille. I bought some but didn't get around to trying it as I bought the IE400 instead.

 

The KZ's definitely sounded louder, than my IE400's, but I think that's a KZ thing more than a Sennheiser thing.  Perhaps it's the aggressive tuning, or sensitivity... or both.

[EBS_freak]

4 hours ago, Al Krow said:

Yeah agree in part. We apply HPF on the desk to everything already, including bass, apart from the kick: and as I think I mentioned, we're pretty happy with our FoH mix.

I think the IEM issue I'm thinking about...is just an IEM issue.

HPF your kick drum and have a sine wave on a gate... Thumps like mad with none of the mud.

[dave_bass5]

3 hours ago, Greg Edwards69 said:

.

 

The KZ's definitely sounded louder, than my IE400's, but I think that's a KZ thing more than a Sennheiser thing.  Perhaps it's the aggressive tuning, or sensitivity... or both.

Yeah, when my singer got her IE100’s (well, had mine), she commented that there was a slight drop in volume, but also that it was a more even sound so just turned up a bit. After a few rehearsals she said that she actually had them louder than her KZ’s, but could do so because it wasn't as painful. 

[Al Krow]

On 07/04/2024 at 23:33, Al Krow said:

Looking to get a replacement pair for my KZ ZS10 Pro set (which seem to have gone absent without leave perhaps at a recent gig venue!)

 

In the KZ IEM range there seem to be the following upgrade options (current prices on Amazon):

KZ ZS 10 Pro X (£49)

KZ AS 16 Pro X (£70)

KZ ZAR  (£95)

 

Been a fair bit of discussion about the KZ ZS 10 Pro X and some on the AS 16, but I've not seen anything much on here about the ZAR and just wondering if anyone has gone for them or the AS 16 Pro and felt they've been worth the money, particularly if you've previously had either the ZS 10s or Pro/X models.

 

Coming back to my query, if I may...

 

Has anyone tried the KZ AS 16 Pro or KZ ZAR IEMs and had positive or negative views about them?

[Al Krow]

 

 

Just found this, which is a very decent review and dealing with some helpful comparisons. For KZ fans he rates the ZAR above the AS 16 Pro due to the ZAR having a more rounded high. I know a number of folk have commented on the harsher treble of the ZS10s so this sounds positive.

 

For those who want something that delivers a strong bass, they're a good alternative to the PR1 Pro which he says are overall more rounded / hifi. 

 

He thinks the ZAR's are a little over priced as his main criticism, which I  guess would be dealt with if there's availability on Ali Express (I'm only seeing on Amazon currently). But at sub £100 they still sound pretty decent value.

[MichaelDean]

@Al Krow - Here's an AliExpress link for the ZAR! 

 

https://a.aliexpress.com/_EJb41o7

[cetera]

Even cheaper.... https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005612389922.html?spm=a2g0o.detail.pcDetailTopMoreOtherSeller.1.37d4h3Bvh3BvIl&gps-id=pcDetailTopMoreOtherSeller&scm=1007.40050.354490.0&scm_id=1007.40050.354490.0&scm-url=1007.40050.354490.0&pvid=98338c90-5595-4843-9af9-0b0850cff6f7&_t=gps-id:pcDetailTopMoreOtherSeller,scm-url:1007.40050.354490.0,pvid:98338c90-5595-4843-9af9-0b0850cff6f7,tpp_buckets:668%232846%238114%231999&pdp_npi=4%40dis!GBP!83.55!41.77!!!102.68!51.34!%40211b441e17126756066084081e654c!12000033747356820!rec!UK!2681817010!&utparam-url=scene%3ApcDetailTopMoreOtherSeller|query_from%3A

[Al Krow]

Ah, just missed your suggestion @cetera, but thanks a bunch for digging that out and maybe someone else will benefit. When I was looking yesterday I kept getting "not available in your territory"!

 

Have just ordered on the link Michael kindly provided (for which many thanks). £54 delivered including 20% VAT. Definitely worth a punt, at that price, for the current flagship KZ I reckon?

[Al Krow]

On 08/04/2024 at 17:26, EBS_freak said:

HPF your kick drum and have a sine wave on a gate... Thumps like mad with none of the mud.

 

Will defo try out applying hpf to the kick, which may reduce boominess we sometimes get, although our desk hpf kicks in at 100Hz and up till now the view has been to leave the 50Hz+ region for the kick and just hpf my bass? 

 

Can you talk us through your thinking and how you would go about applying "a sine wave on a gate" please? I'm not familiar with what you have in mind here! 

[EBS_freak]

On 11/04/2024 at 12:34, Al Krow said:

 

Will defo try out applying hpf to the kick, which may reduce boominess we sometimes get, although our desk hpf kicks in at 100Hz and up till now the view has been to leave the 50Hz+ region for the kick and just hpf my bass? 

 

 

There is an easy response to this. For each venue, try and listen for what works best. If you are running an analogue desk without outboard, your options are more limited in terms of processing (compression, gates etc) but it worth remembering a HPF, at say 100Hz, is not literally cutting everything (e.g. hard cutting) below 100Hz. There will be a slope associated with that drop off and that drop off may not be behaving as you think. Let me try and explain how even with an analogue desk, and without the flash toys, you can make your kick drum thud at that fundamental.

 

For the benefit of this example I'll tell you that kick drum fundamentals (depending upon kick drum) are typically somewhere in the 50, 60, 70 Hz zone. (Depends upon type and size of drum, tightness of skins etc)

 

So... I've googled generic analogue desk and the Allen and Heath ZED something or other came up. Quite a common mixer the ZED... so I downloaded the manual to find out what the channel strip looks like -

 

 

So we've got (at the top) a HPF which is 100 Hz. I've looked at the specs of the roll off and it's 12dB/Octave. I'm not sure of the Q on the HPF as it's not stated in the manual - but I'll show that for the roll off, it's not that important anyway, especially when we're using the eq in the manner in which I'm going to show you.

 

So... here's our EQ with no gains applied on any of the EQ filters and no HPF applied.

 

 

As you can see, totally flat. If you feed in anything in the lows, it will get pushed to your output bus. First things first, let's push in the HPF button and see what that does to our frequency curve.

 

 

As you can see, with a 12db/Oct cut, it actually starts cutting above 100Hz and tapers down as the frequency lowers in accordance with that 12db/Octave gradient. Now let me show you what is actually happening at that 100Hz point on the HPF...

 

 

Before we move on too much, lets come back to the Q. In the above example, the Q (shape) is at 0.71... is we lessen it to 0.1, we can see how it impacts the roll off -

 

 

And if we boost the Q we can influence the eq quite dramatically...

 

 

But... it's worth noting, the last thing you want on a PA, is a huge bump like this when putting on a HPF (I'm just showing you for your understanding). In reality I would wager Q is probably around 0.75 or 0.71 so there is cut only (e.g. nothing going above the horizontal line in our graphs).

 

So just to get us back on path, as stated before, with the HPF button depressed, your EQ is going to look something like this.

 

 

OK. Now lets look at the LF filter on the channel strip...

 

 

As you can see, this is at 80Hz and is a low shelving filter (as shown by the logo under LF)

 

So lets whack that up to +15dB and see what we get...

 

 

You can see that shelf curve in action (curves upwards and then flattens out (the orange section). Our resulting EQ curve shows we are still getting a boost of low end from around 50Hz and above. So thats our target kick drum zone right there... however... it's also probably including a lot of unwanted mush because of the breadth of frequencies being boosted.

 

So what can we do...?

 

Lets set the LF back to 0 to get back to just our HPF being applied.

 

 

... and now lets draw our attention to those lower mids on the channel strip.

 

 

 

So bearing in mind I told you a kick drum fundamental could be typically found around 60Hz, lets apply a boost of 15dB with a Q of say, 2. (Obviously you'd be using your ears to determine how much you want to boost that frequency so it sounds right - and remember, the volume of kick controlled via this channel (for the overall mix) would be controlled via the fader)

 

 

Well, would you look at that! A kick drum fundamental which is poking out like mad but with some significant cut between 70 and 100 where all your mush resides. And on the other side of the equation, you have mega cut from just above 50 which is getting rid of all the sub mush and unwanted energy sapping, speaker punishing frequencies.

 

So there you go, you have EQed your fundamental on your kick drum channel... and you still have the upper mid to address any 200-400 boxiness. You've also freed up a bit of space in your mix for your bass guitar to reside! (although you may want to be EQing your bass channel with a different approach based on what you've just learned - e.g. still using the HPF albeit with maybe some LF and LM with different frequency centre points and Q.

 

Granted, it all depends upon how feature rich your filters are on your analogue desk... but hopefully this has demystified HPF somewhat!

 

 

 

Edited April 12 by EBS_freak

[Al Krow]

Nice one, thanks Russ! 

[EBS_freak]

On 11/04/2024 at 12:34, Al Krow said:

Can you talk us through your thinking and how you would go about applying "a sine wave on a gate" please? I'm not familiar with what you have in mind here! 

This one will need a quite feature rich digital desk or outboard (however, I will drop in an easy alternative once I've talked you through it)

 

Basically, kick drums on mics can be quite a pita in the live environment because they tend to pick up not only the kick drum but all the low end rumble crap on stage.

 

So theres a number of things you can do to address this. The common one, is to use two mics. One which is getting the all the beater frequencies and the other which is getting the lows - but the gain can be a lot lower as you don't need to boost the gain on that mic to capture the beater frequencies. Lower the gain and closer proximity to the drum means higher signal to noise ratio without all the bleed.

 

OK what else? You can also apply a gate. The gate stops any signal from the mic getting onto your mix bus. Once a threshold is exceeded (e.g. a kick drum is kicked), the gate opens and lets the sound of the drum through... before closing again. All this means is that you get the sound of the drum but the ambient mush which is present whilst the drum isn't being kicked doesn't go into your mix. However, the low end you are getting may be that fundamental plus still quite a lot of mush. So how can you get all the low end fundamental without the mush?

 

Answer? Fake it.

 

So you use a mic to capture the beater and roll off all the low end and associated mush. So how do you get that low end thump of the kick? Easy - that's where the sine wave comes in. So lets choose say 60Hz. Set up a sine wave (some desks have sine generators (usually labelled oscillators) - other desks without the functionality, you'll need to plug in a sine generator onto another channel - however, if you haven't got an oscillator, it's unlikely it will support the next bit).

 

Of course, what you have now is a permanent sine wave present on your mix bus. What you need to do is configure it to be side chained and triggered when the gate on the kick drum channel opens. When you've done that, you'll end up with the kick drum with the inferior low end being augmented with the pure sine wave. That will give you purest bottom end - and with some big subs, you'll be pinning people to the wall with the most precise sounding kick drum you've ever heard.

 

BUT>>>>> as I said, not every desk can support this. Whats the alternative?

 

Drum trigger. I always carry around a Roland TM-2 with a RT30K trigger. This gives you the opportunity trigger a sine... but if you are going to do that... you may want to trigger the complete kick drum sound completely. Whats not to like about a lovingly crafted studio quality kick drum sample in a live setting?

 

And that's it!

 

PS this is a cheat which is also used on more studio recordings than you would think. Gives you that low end precision which a mic simply can't deliver.

Edited April 12 by EBS_freak

[EBS_freak]

Also worth saying, cleaning up the bottom end and using a sine wave, or a trigger kick sounds freaking amazing in IEMs. (With the added bonus of not having to worry as much about processing and EQ)

Edited April 12 by EBS_freak