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Author Topic: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?  (Read 230706 times)

Dan Costello

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #290 on: February 23, 2014, 01:14:46 AM »

I found this thread, because I'm having a similar problem. I'm working on a musical with an X32 and 2 S16's (though only 1 S16 is actually being used) - 16 inputs @ FOH directly into the desk and 13 on stage into the S16. Monitor returns are also fed from the S16. Cabling is shielded Cat5e with ethercons (I don't know the brand of the cable).

I'm getting random pops -  typically 1-2 per show, but no dropouts. Previously, I'd been blaming it on either the wireless mics or other known electrical issues, but I've eliminated those and the problem still occurs. Once I started multitrack recording the shows, I've was able to narrow it down to the S16's. I switched all of my I/O from one S16 to the other and the problem didn't go away. There seems to be some consistency in when the problem happens, but not complete consistency. i.e. It'll sometimes happen in roughly the same spot for a couple shows in a row, then change.

I'm glad I found this thread, because now I can have the rental house just bring an analog snake and I can be done with it.

-Dan.
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Dan Mortensen

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #291 on: February 23, 2014, 03:10:00 AM »

Hi All,

As reported earlier ITT, a friend of mine got (for his work at a major theater here) a new Midas Pro3, and it came with a couple of 100meter reels of rugged Cat6 (I think, might be CAT5e) STP with Ethercons. He needed to put the CAT for his console in conduit from mix position to stage, so instead of chopping off an end of his cables, he got some raw cable, ran it through the conduit, and terminated it. All was well, and he kept the reels of terminated cable for future use.....
SNIP

Hi All,

A version of the post above was also posted in the other forum, and as a result I've had a back-and-forth with Jan Duwe, from Behringer's Assistant Manager for Conceptual Engineering. I'll post it here FYI, since there are a lot of people who post here but not there, and to ask your advice. (Antoon is another poster who commented.)

From Jan:

Dear Dan and Antoon,

it is important not to mix up ESD and RFI artifacts. Your assumptions may make sense from an RFI perspective (where problems can be confined to specific components or parts of a device), but ESD is affecting products in a totally different way. From basic electric laws, you may consider that the impact of any given electric charge will be largely depending on the device's mass and its grounding impedance.

There is an obvious disparity of typical MIDAS mixing environments (XL8 or Pro Series consoles with large and heavy chassis plus I/O racks, solidly grounded) and smaller BEHRINGER (X32 + S16) setups. This is the reason why from a BEHRINGER perspective we recommend using screened and grounded cables, while UTP may confidently be used in the MIDAS world.

Please also consider that the MIDAS PRO Series consoles allow for dual-redundant AES50 connectivity, which in this context may help to further reduce the screen and grounding impedance and distribute the impact of any ESD. Other than that, there is no technical difference between an AES50 port on MIDAS and BEHRINGER products.

The good news for our customers is, that we have just placed a large order for a high quality, ruggedized Neutrik etherFLEX cable that will be provided by KlarkTeknik on a 50 m Schill drum. We will announce this officially at PLS, Frankfurt, in a couple of weeks from now.

Hope that helps.
Best,
Jan


I replied:

Thanks for the reply, Jan.

While I'm not immediately persuaded that the X32 is smaller and lighter than all Midas products, and that that will make the difference between ESD problems and ESD no problems, I don't know them as well as you do and so will take what you say at face value. I guess the stage boxes are certainly smaller, S16 vs. whatever.

As was pointed out in another forum this morning, given the price point of the X32 family it would be much better if it were able to operate with cable that is cheaper and more importantly, more commonly available rather than a cable that you, Behringer, have to have made yourself to be sure to get the right one.

I'm happy to hear more specifics about the upcoming cable, though. Is it only available in 50 meter lengths, on a drum, and in single runs?

I have no use for drums, as I tape my snake cable together with an analog 4 or more pair, as well as the AC supply to FOH so that one pull gets it all. I also want to run multiple Ethercon runs to FOH, both as a backup and also because there are situations that need more than one Ethercon run.

Thanks again,
Dan

Edit: And if you're saying that mass is the only factor, why did the XL8 initially have problems and then not have problems? Its mass didn't change.

If more mass is better, why can't I just attach a chunk of aluminum to the bottom of an S16 chassis and have an immediate solution? Or enough S16's racked together to create an object the size of the Midas stage box?

The Pro 1 weighs 47.5 pounds, and the X32 is 45.4 pounds. Not much mass difference there, but one is OK with UTP and the other requires STP.

Sorry, need more explanation.


And Jan replied:

Dear Dan,
don't get me wrong, I am not inclined persuading you of anything, and I do have a lot of respect for your inquisitiveness. I can only contribute our considerations since we are observing the phenomena. When a lightning strikes your house there may be some technical precautions you could take, even though you will never know precisely what will be happening. Personally, if I can, I would try to shunt out the discharge outside the house with the lowest possible impedance to ground, rather than opening all windows. There is no True or False, but rather a fairly low or a very low risk of interference. And I'd apply the same, even if it was a Midas console.

You can find specifications about Neutrik etherFLEX cable here and here. We will start with 50 m drums, and the cable can be completely unspooled and used independently from the drum. Extension to 100 m is easy using Neutrik's NE8FF coupler, or using the KT DN9610 Extender box, when you need to use more than 100 m. And yes, we will keep it affordable.

Btw,
we are just now celebrating our 25th anniversary taking place in the Music Group factory in China, with invitees coming from all over the world. Our partners, distributors, press people, specialists and colleagues are gathering here for four unforgettable days. And I am personally very grateful and have to bring out a big THANK YOU TO ULI, for making this an extremely memorable experience. Stay tuned to our websites for some footage of the event that will be up, soon.

Best,
Jan


My request to you, and particularly to those who know more than me about how electricity/static/RFI/ESD works:

1) Does the mass of the object really make any difference? He didn't reply to my comment about the Pro1 and X32 being about the same size.

2) Is the Pin1 phenomenon at all relevant here?

As you'll recall, Neil Muncy showed that using a circuit board trace to conduct induced voltage on the shield to ground resulted in hums and buzzes, because the circuit trace didn't have enough mass (maybe this was what Jan was talking about?) to get large voltages to ground quickly, and instead acted like a resistor, whereas an actual wire was enough to immediately route that voltage to ground.

Fixing that, which was trivial in the design process, solved a lot of hum problems for us.

I am able to easily imagine something similar in a budget digital product, which results in the need for the band-aid of STP. Does this make any sense?

3) Could he be saying that the grounding impedance of the Midas is low, and that of the X32 is high? ("From basic electric laws, you may consider that the impact of any given electric charge will be largely depending on the device's mass and its grounding impedance." The Midas console and the X32 have virtually the same mass, so is the grounding impedance the difference that requires one to use STP while the other is fine with UTP?)

Oh, and I see that the links didn't come through to the new Behringer cable. They are: 

http://www.neutrik.co.uk/en-uk/data/etherflex/cable-assembly-drum-spooled

http://www.contrik.ch/zoolu-website/media/download/10107/ZNK+CT2672601

Regarding that cable, the second link  is a spec sheet for the cable, which includes a cross-section.

Given that there is NO padding/isolation inside the cable between pairs, I'll be very interested to see if any early adopters have problems with loss of sync due to pinching/pulling/stomping on the cable, like I had a year ago and which prompted me to put together a workshop to look at the phenomenon. In it we found that almost every cable could be made to lose sync by pinching/pulling/stomping, EXCEPT one which was very well internally isolated. We didn't test any STP, though.

Sorry for the length of this, but I feel like we are getting somewhere, or starting to move at least.
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Dan Mortensen

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #292 on: February 23, 2014, 03:13:38 AM »

I found this thread, because I'm having a similar problem. I'm working on a musical with an X32 and 2 S16's (though only 1 S16 is actually being used) - 16 inputs @ FOH directly into the desk and 13 on stage into the S16. Monitor returns are also fed from the S16. Cabling is shielded Cat5e with ethercons (I don't know the brand of the cable).

I'm getting random pops -  typically 1-2 per show, but no dropouts. Previously, I'd been blaming it on either the wireless mics or other known electrical issues, but I've eliminated those and the problem still occurs. Once I started multitrack recording the shows, I've was able to narrow it down to the S16's. I switched all of my I/O from one S16 to the other and the problem didn't go away. There seems to be some consistency in when the problem happens, but not complete consistency. i.e. It'll sometimes happen in roughly the same spot for a couple shows in a row, then change.

I'm glad I found this thread, because now I can have the rental house just bring an analog snake and I can be done with it.

-Dan.

Hi Dan,

Weird problems, not quite the same as what's been reported.

It'll be good for you to go to an analog snake and see if the problem persists. It almost sounds like someone hitting a mic with a bow or something, but I presume you've ruled that out, too.

Please come back and report if the analog snake fixed it.

Thanks,
Dan
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Dan Costello

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #293 on: February 23, 2014, 09:20:52 AM »

Hi Dan,

Weird problems, not quite the same as what's been reported.

It'll be good for you to go to an analog snake and see if the problem persists. It almost sounds like someone hitting a mic with a bow or something, but I presume you've ruled that out, too.

Yeah, it's not that. They'd have to throw the mic on the ground to get this kind of impact - but more significantly, it's happening across multiple inputs including some which are DI'd.

Quote
Please come back and report if the analog snake fixed it.

Will do.

-Dan.
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Mark McFarlane

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #294 on: February 23, 2014, 09:32:43 AM »

... It almost sounds like someone hitting a mic with a bow or something, but I presume you've ruled that out, too.
[size=78%]....[/size]
Thanks,
Dan


I had the bow-on-mic problem happen to me a few years ago with a very aggressive jazz bassist who used a bow. Every time it happened a dozen people would turn around and glare at me.  I had a chat with the bassist during the break, problem fixed... 


Yet another of a thousand rare learning experiences in this business.
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Mark McFarlane

Jani Koivisto

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #295 on: March 30, 2014, 04:17:27 PM »

Hi all,

From what i've read, could the whole ethercon/STP thing be just that it grounds the connection board with the chassis.
It came to mind cause using just STP cable doesn't work, and electrically using UTP with ethercons doesn't actually make a difference, and if grounding the two with wire doesn't help it would sound reasonable.

The reason you need both is that the stp ethernet cable connects to the ethernet (or RJ45) ground, and the ethercon chassis ground (probably) to ground chassis? (ethercon chassis and stp ground are connected on the connector as far as i know)

Sorry if this has already been tried, don't have my own x32 just building infrastructure cabling.
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Tim McCulloch

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #296 on: March 30, 2014, 04:49:21 PM »

Hi all,

From what i've read, could the whole ethercon/STP thing be just that it grounds the connection board with the chassis.
It came to mind cause using just STP cable doesn't work, and electrically using UTP with ethercons doesn't actually make a difference, and if grounding the two with wire doesn't help it would sound reasonable.

The reason you need both is that the stp ethernet cable connects to the ethernet (or RJ45) ground, and the ethercon chassis ground (probably) to ground chassis? (ethercon chassis and stp ground are connected on the connector as far as i know)

Sorry if this has already been tried, don't have my own x32 just building infrastructure cabling.

Additional external grounding has been tried, and failed.  You MUST use STP, and the drain wire must have continuity to the Ethercon shell.

Perhaps that reality will change with some future design upgrade or modification, but for right now the STP/Ethercon is what works.
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Dan Mortensen

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #297 on: March 30, 2014, 08:05:01 PM »

Additional external grounding has been tried, and failed.  You MUST use STP, and the drain wire must have continuity to the Ethercon shell.

Perhaps that reality will change with some future design upgrade or modification, but for right now the STP/Ethercon is what works.

Tim is right, and thanks to Jani for reviving this thread.

Looking higher up the page reminds me that the Midas vs Behringer UTP vs. STP discussion took place here, too, and I posted further news in the Mega-thread about this just last week.

The short version is that I took my sparker to my friend's Pro 3 console, and he temporarily changed his STP to UTP and we zapped it. Signal WAS disrupted by the spark with UTP, and was not disrupted if only STP was used (both with Ethercons --- the Pro3 has two CAT runs; if UTP was in the picture either as primary or backup, there was disruption).

Also, I'm still curious about Dan Costello's situation, and just now sent him a PM in hope he will report back on the cause of his problem with random pops, since it's more than a month and you'd think he knows more about it than he did then.
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Scott Tranchitella

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #298 on: March 30, 2014, 08:40:15 PM »

I don't know why so many people bitch and complain about the x32 and Behringer like its a bad word. Behringer like everyone else has made a few mistakes but to act like everyone else is perfect is a joke. I would use my x32 in a billion dollar company event. I would also never call my x32 a toy. That makes me laugh. What the hell are you using that's not a toy? An x32 can easily do almost everything your "professional" board can do. Don't like the x32? Don't cry about it, just move on. That's just more x32's for us. Never had yours presonus, yamaha, or soundcraft give you issues? I call bs. A professional sound engineer can make almost anything work.
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g'bye, Dick Rees

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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #299 on: March 30, 2014, 09:09:52 PM »

I don't know why so many people bitch and complain about the x32 and Behringer like its a bad word. Behringer like everyone else has made a few mistakes but to act like everyone else is perfect is a joke. I would use my x32 in a billion dollar company event. I would also never call my x32 a toy. That makes me laugh. What the hell are you using that's not a toy? An x32 can easily do almost everything your "professional" board can do. Don't like the x32? Don't cry about it, just move on. That's just more x32's for us. Never had yours presonus, yamaha, or soundcraft give you issues? I call bs. A professional sound engineer can make almost anything work.

Welcome to the Forums. 

Please enlighten us poor sound folk regarding what loudspeaker system you'd recommend to go with the X32 for "billion dollar" corporate events.
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Re: behringer x32 cracking and popping with 2x S16 connected?
« Reply #299 on: March 30, 2014, 09:09:52 PM »


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