Another Wireless Question

[stewblack]

Anyone here entirely cable free? Including pedal board? 

Effectively two wireless transmitters/receivers in the same chain. 

Is it even doable, or does the latency make it unusable?

I suppose I'm after the views of the average user here. Not those who can happily play a mile down the road from the rest of the band and not care about latency, nor those who are put off by the tiniest fraction, undectable to the unwashed herd. Of which I count myself as one. 

[Dan Dare]

Doesn't seem any point in being entirely cable free. Going wireless from your instrument to your rig, pedal board or even the PA if going direct has an obvious purpose, but how often would you need to cart your pedal/effect board around whilst playing?

[Nail Soup]

I'm pretty keen on not having cables on the floor - thats why I use rechargable power supply for my pedals (no mains lead). Wireless from pedalboard to amp would help with that.... but like OP I'm worried about the dual latency.

However, I more often go from pedalboard straight to PA nowadays..... so I think there may not be much to gain by losing the cable to the PA.

[milford59]

Yes - I am wireless.

I have an Xvive Transmitter on my bass guitar and an Xvive receiver on my pedal board..... and the output from my pedal board goes through an AKG wireless transmitter to my bass combo on the other side of the room..... It’s a 2 channel system and the other channel is attached to an output socket on my patchbay, so I can play another source through my combo if I want to.

i cannot detect any latency.... that doesn’t mean there isn’t any.... but I can’t detect it....

 

Edited September 16, 2020 by milford59

[stewblack]

4 hours ago, Dan Dare said:

Doesn't seem any point in being entirely cable free. Going wireless from your instrument to your rig, pedal board or even the PA if going direct has an obvious purpose, but how often would you need to cart your pedal/effect board around whilst playing?

I fear i have misled you with my poorly written post! I meant to use wireles transmitter/receiver between bass and board and another between board and amp.

[stewblack]

2 hours ago, milford59 said:

Yes - I am wireless.

I have an Xvive Transmitter on my bass guitar and an Xvive receiver on my pedal board..... and the output from my pedal board goes through an AKG wireless transmitter to my bass combo on the other side of the room..... It’s a 2 channel system and the other channel is attached to an output socket on my patchbay, so I can play another source through my combo if I want to.

i cannot detect any latency.... that doesn’t mean there isn’t any.... but I can’t detect it....

 

 

Nice set up - thank you.

[fretmeister]

I've tried it at home with a G70 and a G75.

They are among the lowest latency units available at 1.5ms each.

 

Most wireless units have a fair bit more than that, but ultimately most latency is not really any different than standing a couple of metres further from the amp. If there is a modelling unit as well (Helix etc) then the ADA process in those units also increases latency a little.

 

My main concern is that using 2 units means 2 separate freqs in use and a bigger chance of interference.

 

Overall though, I didn't see the point. Bass to board - yup. But board to amp as well? It worked with my 2 units but it was more faff, more batteries, more charging, more risk of something going wrong than a simple cable.

[stewblack]

1 minute ago, fretmeister said:

I didn't see the point. Bass to board - yup. But board to amp as well? It worked with my 2 units but it was more faff, more batteries, more charging, more risk of something going wrong than a simple cable.

Very good points, thank you.

I have been using two long cables to/from effects loop and the wireless receiver at the amp. I suppose I was a bit irked having gone wireless to still have these blimmin' great loops of cable to lug around, and then cluttering the stage (pub floor). Instead I am looking at the possibility of a clean set up. As you say it's more to go wrong, and I'll still carry the cables as a 'just in case' so really it does seem a bit pointless.

But it gives me something to think about while twiddling my thumbs in this gig free world, and who knows, one day I might get to try it.

[Nail Soup]

3 hours ago, milford59 said:

Yes - I am wireless.

I have an Xvive Transmitter on my bass guitar and an Xvive receiver on my pedal board..... and the output from my pedal board goes through an AKG wireless transmitter to my bass combo on the other side of the room...

Interesting and nice pedalboard!

Just out of interest - why did you go for the 'totally wireless' solution?

... to keep the area tidy of cables?... or is there some other advantage?

[pete.young]

3 hours ago, stewblack said:

Very good points, thank you.

I have been using two long cables to/from effects loop and the wireless receiver at the amp. I suppose I was a bit irked having gone wireless to still have these blimmin' great loops of cable to lug around, and then cluttering the stage (pub floor). Instead I am looking at the possibility of a clean set up. As you say it's more to go wrong, and I'll still carry the cables as a 'just in case' so really it does seem a bit pointless.

But it gives me something to think about while twiddling my thumbs in this gig free world, and who knows, one day I might get to try it.

Think about not putting them into the effects loop. That'll save one cable.

[milford59]

15 hours ago, Nail Soup said:

Interesting and nice pedalboard!

Just out of interest - why did you go for the 'totally wireless' solution?

... to keep the area tidy of cables?... or is there some other advantage?

Yes - it’s really just to keep it tidier... but as I said, I really don’t notice any latency at all, so apart from the additional expense, I don’t see any downside..

[dudewheresmybass]

As I recall @tayste_2000 did this a while back 

forgive me if I’m mistaken 😉

 

[DaytonaRik]

I must be one of the rare individuals that just doesn't use pedals?  Even back in my guitar playing days everything was rack mounted and run from a single MIDI controller but I can see why the idea has appeal to those with pedal-boards.  There is, as always, an alternative solution by mounting non-midi enabled or analogue pedals on a rack tray, safely away from punters/beer etc and using a MIDI controlled loop switcher such as this by Morning Star - https://www.morningstarfx.com/ml5 - one MIDI cable and an appropriate foot switch lives on stage whilst this lovely gadget lives in the rack with the pedals and can be programmed to engage/disengaged as many/few of your devices as you wish so no more tap-dancing either!  Just a thought for those FX pedal users out there seeking a more elegant on-stage solution.

Edited September 17, 2020 by DaytonaRik

[dave_bass5]

23 hours ago, stewblack said:

I fear i have misled you with my poorly written post! I meant to use wireles transmitter/receiver between bass and board and another between board and amp.

I did it twice at rehearsals only. Not a board, by my Helix Stomp. Xvive between bass and Helix, Boss WL20 between Helix and amp. I did it that way around as the Boss has the lower latency. 

Reason for doing it?, because I could. Not much point as the Helix still needed to be powered, so not entirely cable free. It worked ok though, at least to my ears. 

[milford59]

5 hours ago, DaytonaRik said:

I must be one of the rare individuals that just doesn't use pedals?  Even back in my guitar playing days everything was rack mounted and run from a single MIDI controller but I can see why the idea has appeal to those with pedal-boards.  There is, as always, an alternative solution by mounting non-midi enabled or analogue pedals on a rack tray, safely away from punters/beer etc and using a MIDI controlled loop switcher such as this by Morning Star - https://www.morningstarfx.com/ml5 - one MIDI cable and an appropriate foot switch lives on stage whilst this lovely gadget lives in the rack with the pedals and can be programmed to engage/disengaged as many/few of your devices as you wish so no more tap-dancing either!  Just a thought for those FX pedal users out there seeking a more elegant on-stage solution.

Can you clarify.... you don’t use pedals.... or you don’t use pedals that are located on the floor... it’s not clear to me...or maybe you mean you don’t use stuff that you press with your foot to change the tone of your bass, but you do use stuff located elsewhere...?

Edited September 17, 2020 by milford59

[EBS_freak]

On 16/09/2020 at 13:38, milford59 said:

Yes - I am wireless.

I have an Xvive Transmitter on my bass guitar and an Xvive receiver on my pedal board..... and the output from my pedal board goes through an AKG wireless transmitter to my bass combo on the other side of the room..... It’s a 2 channel system and the other channel is attached to an output socket on my patchbay, so I can play another source through my combo if I want to.

i cannot detect any latency.... that doesn’t mean there isn’t any.... but I can’t detect it....

 

The AKG is analogue - so the latency from that will be negligible. All latency is gonna be coming from your other wireless and the latency of the Helix.

Of course, the downside of the analogue wireless system is that it has a compander - which can colour your tone and impact your dynamics somewhat.

[DaytonaRik]

19 hours ago, milford59 said:

Can you clarify.... you don’t use pedals.... or you don’t use pedals that are located on the floor... it’s not clear to me...or maybe you mean you don’t use stuff that you press with your foot to change the tone of your bass, but you do use stuff located elsewhere...?

As a bass player I use zero FX of any description.  The above solutions works well for using a midi foot switch onstage to engage/disengage multiple non-midi enabled foot switches located elsewhere, eg in a tray in a rack case via a midi footswitch.

As a guitarist I did some thing similar but with rack FX (Rocktron Intellifex  Ltd) and a tack mount pre-amp (Marshall JMP-1) 

The midi loop switcher allows you to remotely control your FX by assigning different combinations of pedals to midi patch change commands - each combination is a patch and activated by selecting the appropriate patch change via the footswitch

Edited September 18, 2020 by DaytonaRik