ProSoundWeb Community

Sound Reinforcement - Forums for Live Sound Professionals - Your Displayed Name Must Be Your Real Full Name To Post In The Live Sound Forums => LAB Lounge => Topic started by: David Parker on April 27, 2014, 04:15:29 PM

Title: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: David Parker on April 27, 2014, 04:15:29 PM
I thought I'd never see the day when a behringer mixer would be feeding a system of this caliber.

http://www.prosoundweb.com/article/church_on_the_rock_in_texas_engages_congregants_with_meyer_sound_mina/
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Tommy Peel on April 27, 2014, 05:51:40 PM
I thought I'd never see the day when a behringer mixer would be feeding a system of this caliber.

http://www.prosoundweb.com/article/church_on_the_rock_in_texas_engages_congregants_with_meyer_sound_mina/

Interesting. I guess they put the money they saved on the mixer towards nicer speakers. Probably a sound investment as it's much easier to swap out the mixer for a nicer one in the future if they need something more powerful.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Spenser Hamilton on April 27, 2014, 06:09:55 PM
I thought I'd never see the day when a behringer mixer would be feeding a system of this caliber.

http://www.prosoundweb.com/article/church_on_the_rock_in_texas_engages_congregants_with_meyer_sound_mina/

Obviously not the same, as this isn't an install. But here is an X32 driving a Turbosound Flex Array rig, for extra cool factor, we have six Jason Audio J31HP doing subs.

This festival is four stages, in the past the B, C and D stage were analog Soundcraft and A&H. Last year we replaced everything with X32 (Profiles on Main Stage).
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: David Parker on April 27, 2014, 08:59:47 PM
Interesting. I guess they put the money they saved on the mixer towards nicer speakers. Probably a sound investment as it's much easier to swap out the mixer for a nicer one in the future if they need something more powerful.
I have no doubt the behringer mixer does a fantastic job, but normally when such expensive speakers are spec'd, something in the same class gets assigned to mix duty!
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: John Chiara on April 27, 2014, 11:53:39 PM
I have no doubt the behringer mixer does a fantastic job, but normally when such expensive speakers are spec'd, something in the same class gets assigned to mix duty!

Same class meaning price?  We would be hard pressed in most live situations to hear how 'bad' the X32 sounds...
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Jeff Carter on April 28, 2014, 12:31:21 AM
With
Interesting. I guess they put the money they saved on the mixer towards nicer speakers. Probably a sound investment as it's much easier to swap out the mixer for a nicer one in the future if they need something more powerful.

There's also the personal monitoring system (11 PM boxes) that would probably need to be swapped at the same time as the console... Even so, the cost of the Behringer mixer/PM setup is probably a rounding error in the whole AVL budget for that room.

Looks to me like a temporary solution until they get budget for a more capable console. If they're actually putting 11 musicians on stage and close-micing all the drums inside that fishbowl, they must be close to maxing out the input count.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: David Parker on April 28, 2014, 07:28:02 AM
Same class meaning price?  We would be hard pressed in most live situations to hear how 'bad' the X32 sounds...
yes, price class. Normally when a package is spec'd similarly priced components are used. Never said the X32 sounds bad, from all reports they sound incredible.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Keith Broughton on April 28, 2014, 07:34:53 AM
Same class meaning price?  We would be hard pressed in most live situations to hear how 'bad' the X32 sounds...
True!
I toured with an X32 on a high end show connecting to a lot of great PA systems and the show sounded just fine. :)
IMHO...Spending the extra $$ on a properly designed and adjusted speaker system will give better audible results even with a "low end" mixer.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: duane massey on April 28, 2014, 11:01:19 AM
It is unusual, David, as most consultants who spec Meyer would never even mention Behringer in the same room. I would expect a Yamaha at the very least. Wonder who the consultant was?
Certainly nothing wrong with the X32.
 Oops, read the article, there wasn't a consultant. Makes more sense now.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: John Roberts {JR} on April 28, 2014, 11:25:40 AM
The speakers are the heavy lifting. I wouldn't expect audible sound quality issues from the X32. The mixer will be out of fashion sooner than the speakers.

Probably sounds good.

JR
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: David Parker on April 28, 2014, 11:38:31 AM
It is unusual, David, as most consultants who spec Meyer would never even mention Behringer in the same room. I would expect a Yamaha at the very least. Wonder who the consultant was?
Certainly nothing wrong with the X32.
 Oops, read the article, there wasn't a consultant. Makes more sense now.
soundbrokers had some mina for sale, $3950 per box. The church in question has 9 mina on each side. $36,000 for main speakers only and $3000 for the mixer!
 That right there tells you that the mixer choice is not matched to the speaker choice!
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: John Roberts {JR} on April 28, 2014, 11:44:04 AM
soundbrokers had some mina for sale, $3950 per box. The church in question has 9 mina on each side. $36,000 for main speakers only and $3000 for the mixer!
 That right there tells you that the mixer choice is not matched to the speaker choice!

Why does a mixer need to cost more than that? Maybe those speakers are over priced.

Modern technology advances, mostly driven by consumer electronics and finally hitting a high volume price point have dramatically dropped the cost for decent sounding  digital mixer. If big dog speakers enjoyed a similar economy of manufacturing scale maybe they wouldn't cost so much.

You might need to spend more to satisfy eyeballs, but the ears are probably OK.

JR
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: David Parker on April 28, 2014, 11:47:38 AM
Why does a mixer need to cost more than that? Maybe those speakers are over priced.

Modern technology advances, mostly driven by consumer electronics and finally hitting a high volume price point have dramatically dropped the cost for decent sounding  digital mixer. If big dog speakers enjoyed a similar economy of manufacturing scale maybe they wouldn't cost so much.

You might need to spend more to satisfy eyeballs, but the ears are probably OK.

JR
Oh, I agree completely, but you have to admit that this is unusual in the audio world! I find it strange that someone who "needed" top of the line speakers would settle for bargain basement mixer. When you look at the budget for the entire install, the mixer's cost barely shows up!
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Renard Hurtado on April 28, 2014, 11:58:42 AM
Hi all,
I completely agree with JR, if Meyer had sold (and is still selling) as many of these speakers as Behringer has sold this X-32 console, probably the price of these speakers woul come down to 1/5 of their actual price !

Renard from Curacao
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Bob Leonard on April 28, 2014, 02:27:01 PM
Why does a mixer need to cost more than that? Maybe those speakers are over priced.

Modern technology advances, mostly driven by consumer electronics and finally hitting a high volume price point have dramatically dropped the cost for decent sounding  digital mixer. If big dog speakers enjoyed a similar economy of manufacturing scale maybe they wouldn't cost so much.

You might need to spend more to satisfy eyeballs, but the ears are probably OK.

JR

Agreed John Boy. Not to mention those cabinets should be able make any mixer sound good if properly deployed.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Dan Mortensen on April 28, 2014, 05:11:33 PM

Agreed John Boy. Not to mention those cabinets should be able make any mixer sound good if properly deployed.

Sorry, Bob, have to disagree. These speakers will let you hear the flaws in a mixer/amplification chain, while other speakers can mask chain shortcomings with their own flaws which are generally of higher magnitude than mixer flaws. High resolution speakers don't automatically "make things sound good", in my experience; they allow you to hear the nuances of what you are feeding them so you can then achieve something that sounds good. I think you know that already, though.

Actually haven't heard the Minas, but my X32's sound fantastic through multiple models of Meyer boxes.

Good point about "properly deployed". That will mess things up, too. Also, a poor mix will sound bad through any system.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: John Roberts {JR} on April 28, 2014, 06:02:35 PM
Sorry, Bob, have to disagree. These speakers will let you hear the flaws in a mixer/amplification chain, while other speakers can mask chain shortcomings with their own flaws which are generally of higher magnitude than mixer flaws. High resolution speakers don't automatically "make things sound good", in my experience; they allow you to hear the nuances of what you are feeding them so you can then achieve something that sounds good. I think you know that already, though.

Actually haven't heard the Minas, but my X32's sound fantastic through multiple models of Meyer boxes.

Good point about "properly deployed". That will mess things up, too. Also, a poor mix will sound bad through any system.

I'm not sure that you are disagreeing... or are you suggesting that these speakers will reveal flaws in the X32 that normally are concealed by lesser loudspeakers?

Ignoring microphones, the deviation from ideal for even cheaper mixers than the X32 are hard to measure without serious bench equipment.

Loudspeakers, even tens of thousands of dollars worth of loudspeakers are fairly easy to find measurable sound performance faults in (loudspeakers are hard).

I submit you could probably connect a mackie 1202 or cheap peavey mixer to a system like that and it would sound good.

With mixers the sound performance issue was pretty much settled by IC technology advances decades ago. The rubber meets the road for mixers in their feature sets.

JR
 
Title: Strange Bedfellows
Post by: Russ Davis on April 28, 2014, 07:44:55 PM
I submit you could probably connect a mackie 1202 or cheap peavey mixer to a system like that and it would sound good...  the sound performance issue was pretty much settled by IC technology advances decades ago. The rubber meets the road for mixers in their feature sets.

True.  To that, I would add reliability and user support.
Title: Re: Strange Bedfellows
Post by: Tom Bourke on April 29, 2014, 03:25:33 AM
True.  To that, I would add reliability and user support.
It is not the gear, it is the person mixing.  In the last couple of months I did a couple gigs where a VERY low end system with 16 ch of crap karaoke grade wireless and a set of the lowest cost powered speakers I have ever seen in person sounded better than a high end system at another gig.  I am talking a system where the wls units cost more per channel than the entire low end rig mentioned above.  10" powered plastic box on a stick vs a D&B rig with avid console.

I was thinking "WTF, pan to the far stack and notch out 800 Hz." "can't you hear the fucking feedback!"
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Scott Bolt on April 29, 2014, 08:01:43 AM
Speakers are the 2nd biggest contributer to good sound (the operator being the first). The mixer is a distant 3rd.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Steve M Smith on April 29, 2014, 08:14:58 AM
A few years ago at the opening ceremony for an international sporting event, we had hired in some top of the range D & B Audiotechnic speakers and amp racks and connected them up to an old Mix Wizard.

It was more than we needed as the only inputs were a DJ type CD player and a radio microphone.  We only used the mixer to give a TV company an aux. send.  If that wasn't needed we could have just connected the CD player directly as that had its own mixer built in with a microphone input!


Steve.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: David Parker on April 29, 2014, 08:42:04 AM
A few years ago at the opening ceremony for an international sporting event, we had hired in some top of the range D & B Audiotechnic speakers and amp racks and connected them up to an old Mix Wizard.

It was more than we needed as the only inputs were a DJ type CD player and a radio microphone.  We only used the mixer to give a TV company an aux. send.  If that wasn't needed we could have just connected the CD player directly as that had its own mixer built in with a microphone input!


Steve.
on the flip side, I heard about a Christian artist who was touring with a Peavey endorsed rig. he showed up at a youth camp to do a show with pre-recorded tracks, and set up a 40 channel mixer, using 3 channels.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Scott Helmke on April 29, 2014, 10:22:46 AM
Speakers are the 2nd biggest contributer to good sound (the operator being the first). The mixer is a distant 3rd.

+1. Though I'd put microphones at 3rd and the mixer at 4th.

Though in a situation with Meyer speakers I'd at least expect a console of better reliability and with better repair support than Behringer.  Meyer service is expensive but very fast and very thorough.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: James A. Griffin on April 29, 2014, 10:22:20 PM
Oh, I agree completely, but you have to admit that this is unusual in the audio world! I find it strange that someone who "needed" top of the line speakers would settle for bargain basement mixer. When you look at the budget for the entire install, the mixer's cost barely shows up!

It's silly to think that each component of the system should have a price comparable to other components.  The biggest and most expensive line array rigs out there today are using $100 SM58's, just like the rest of us.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Frederik Rosenkjær on April 30, 2014, 01:38:51 AM
Speakers are the 2nd biggest contributer to good sound (the operator being the first). The mixer is a distant 3rd.

I'd put acoustics AT LEAST on a shared 2nd place with speakers and microphones 4th - then perhaps mixer on a VERY distant (comparatively) 5th place.
Title: Re: behringer married to Meyer
Post by: Doug Maye on April 30, 2014, 08:00:47 AM
My guess would be that the mixer choice had to do with recording. I've been toying with an X32 for about a month, and I have to say that it's a pretty good recording mixer. Churchs record almost everything they do anymore.