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Sound Reinforcement - Forums for Live Sound Professionals - Your Displayed Name Must Be Your Real Full Name To Post In The Live Sound Forums => LAB: The Classic Live Audio Board => Topic started by: Guy Morris on January 26, 2014, 07:30:06 AM

Title: IEM idea
Post by: Guy Morris on January 26, 2014, 07:30:06 AM
Hi

Getting a lot of IEM  requests for our sector of work which is great as it's less kit to carry! My other recent post subject is about a suspected headphone amp fail on the LS 9 which brought me to this idea so thoughts please.

I experienced the other night an interesting flag up with the iem (6 running) on set up all was fine along with 6 radio mics in another room but on sound check one band member was getting issues with frequency (quick freq change sorted it). The point is that on the desk mix I would not here this so ideally I need to here the tx mix. Idea is to take the headphone amps on each sennheiser iem and put them into a switcher mixer 123456 then if desired feed the output to a stereo desk channel so I can here any mix as its tx'd just by switching through also could just use the hp out on the sub mixer if as the other day I lost my monitor hp amp on desk.

What does everyone else do I am assuming of course the hp out on the tx unit would not just be the input monitor so if there is RF issues it would be heard?

Title: Re: IEM idea
Post by: Jelmer de Jong on January 26, 2014, 08:25:49 AM
Hi

Getting a lot of IEM  requests for our sector of work which is great as it's less kit to carry! My other recent post subject is about a suspected headphone amp fail on the LS 9 which brought me to this idea so thoughts please.

I experienced the other night an interesting flag up with the iem (6 running) on set up all was fine along with 6 radio mics in another room but on sound check one band member was getting issues with frequency (quick freq change sorted it). The point is that on the desk mix I would not here this so ideally I need to here the tx mix. Idea is to take the headphone amps on each sennheiser iem and put them into a switcher mixer 123456 then if desired feed the output to a stereo desk channel so I can here any mix as its tx'd just by switching through also could just use the hp out on the sub mixer if as the other day I lost my monitor hp amp on desk.

What does everyone else do I am assuming of course the hp out on the tx unit would not just be the input monitor so if there is RF issues it would be heard?
The jack-ouput on the transmitter is an amplified version of the analog inputs. If you want to hear RF-issues on your cue-mix you're doing it wrong. To hear RF dropouts you have to be on a wireless beltpack yourself. Shure has 'cue-mode' on their newest systems which lets you program all used frequenties on a single beltpack. You can switch through them with the buttons on the beltpack. This works, but switching mixes takes a lot of pressing on buttons and looking at the display to make sure you have the correct mix selected.

While this lets you hear some problems, it's impossible to recreate what the artist is hearing(or not hearing). The difference of a foot or carrying the beltpack on the other side of your body can give you very different results. To hear the dropouts the artist is experencing you would have to be at the excact spot he/she is standing.

Carefull planning and testing before soundcheck will give you a good start, then use a RF-scanner during the show to identify problems. If nothing weird comes up you should cross your fingers and pray to the RF-gods will be easy on you tonight.  ;D
Getting as much people as possible on wired inears is what I would do. Drummers/keyboard players and (bass)players who do not move more than five feet in either direction do not have to be wireless. Wired is cheaper, more reliable and sounds better!

http://forums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/topic,147770.0.html
This could be a good reason to use wireless cue-mix, but everyone has to be on wireless, otherwise you keep replugging your headphone.
Title: Re: IEM idea
Post by: Guy Morris on January 28, 2014, 01:46:47 PM
Hi Jelmer

Thank you for confirming what I thought maybe the case regarding the headphone on the Sennheiser G3 TX unit just being the line input monitor and not offering the actual TX audio. I had heard that the Shure allowed you to switch through channels on their belt pack but the Senny does not have this facility. I have an engineers BP but its a pain having to reset the frequency to hear what any perceived issue on a channel is hence the query on whether that HP out would give me what I thought might be the TX audio. I take your point about position of musician and other factors which makes good sense. I did check all frequencies ahead of the S/c it only became spurious once they started (of course it would) I agree keys and drums do not really need wireless but they all insist (and it was both drums and keyboards with issues) however these are corporate bands who taste the big moment and start asking for stuff they do not really need! :D

Thanks for your answer and advice appreciated.

Guy



The jack-ouput on the transmitter is an amplified version of the analog inputs. If you want to hear RF-issues on your cue-mix you're doing it wrong. To hear RF dropouts you have to be on a wireless beltpack yourself. Shure has 'cue-mode' on their newest systems which lets you program all used frequenties on a single beltpack. You can switch through them with the buttons on the beltpack. This works, but switching mixes takes a lot of pressing on buttons and looking at the display to make sure you have the correct mix selected.

While this lets you hear some problems, it's impossible to recreate what the artist is hearing(or not hearing). The difference of a foot or carrying the beltpack on the other side of your body can give you very different results. To hear the dropouts the artist is experencing you would have to be at the excact spot he/she is standing.

Carefull planning and testing before soundcheck will give you a good start, then use a RF-scanner during the show to identify problems. If nothing weird comes up you should cross your fingers and pray to the RF-gods will be easy on you tonight.  ;D
Getting as much people as possible on wired inears is what I would do. Drummers/keyboard players and (bass)players who do not move more than five feet in either direction do not have to be wireless. Wired is cheaper, more reliable and sounds better!

http://forums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/topic,147770.0.html
This could be a good reason to use wireless cue-mix, but everyone has to be on wireless, otherwise you keep replugging your headphone.
Title: Re: IEM idea
Post by: Joakim Hammar on January 28, 2014, 04:42:53 PM
The sennheiser G3 IEM's have engineer mode that lets you toggle through frequencies if you have firmware 1.4.4 or higher.

/J

Hi Jelmer

Thank you for confirming what I thought maybe the case regarding the headphone on the Sennheiser G3 TX unit just being the line input monitor and not offering the actual TX audio. I had heard that the Shure allowed you to switch through channels on their belt pack but the Senny does not have this facility. I have an engineers BP but its a pain having to reset the frequency to hear what any perceived issue on a channel is hence the query on whether that HP out would give me what I thought might be the TX audio. I take your point about position of musician and other factors which makes good sense. I did check all frequencies ahead of the S/c it only became spurious once they started (of course it would) I agree keys and drums do not really need wireless but they all insist (and it was both drums and keyboards with issues) however these are corporate bands who taste the big moment and start asking for stuff they do not really need! :D

Thanks for your answer and advice appreciated.

Guy
Title: Re: IEM idea
Post by: Guy Morris on January 29, 2014, 01:20:09 PM
Thanks Joakim

Also just got this in from my Sennheiser supplier

You can use "engineer" mode on the engineers pack which can have the profile and freq programmed in.  The engineer simply uses the up and down keys on the pack to flick through the mixes.  This allows the engineer to hear the transmitter and any problems that are arising."

I did see Engineer mode but did not delve deeper at the time as it just came up as profile. Obviously the answer!  I did wonder if Shure were ahead of the game on this feature so will have a mess around. Still fiddly in some ways but then problems should really only crop up in the early part of soundcheck when its all running (In theory ho hum!)

Thanks

Guy




The sennheiser G3 IEM's have engineer mode that lets you toggle through frequencies if you have firmware 1.4.4 or higher.

/J