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[Kevin Callery]

Hey all I recently acquired a Mackie Quad EQ for my monitors but I have found it has a lot of high end hiss on the output. Has anyone else encountered this problem? On a noisy stage it's not really a concern but on a quiet stage it's very hard to balance the signal to noise ratio. Any help would be appreciated.

[Dick Rees]

Kevin Callery wrote on Wed, 27 May 2009 10:05

Hey all I recently acquired a Mackie Quad EQ for my monitors but I have found it has a lot of high end hiss on the output. Has anyone else encountered this problem? On a noisy stage it's not really a concern but on a quiet stage it's very hard to balance the signal to noise ratio. Any help would be appreciated.

Is the hiss present without anything connected to the unit?  If so, then you've got yourself a noisy unit.  If not, then the problem is most likely the system gain structure.  If that's the case you are picking up noise where the gain is close to the noise floor and then brought back up to an unacceptable level further down the line.

[Steve Hurt]

I had Quad EQ for a while and they're pretty darn quiet.  If the EQ is making the noise, then it has service issues.  How do you have it patched in?

[Jay Barracato]

Does the unit have a bypass?

I would be interested if the hiss is present when the unit is bypassed. I have a GEQ that just seems to have its own noise that is only noticeable when there is no other signal. The hiss goes away in bypass.

Jay

[Kevin Callery]

I've routed it with the signal directly fed through the xlr's and also inserted it into the aux out and it seems to be the same either way. I can live with the signal to noise ratio on the monitors with a  bit of a balancing act but there's no way I could use it on FOH. Just a bit of a pity cos it's such a neat unit....

[Tom Reid]

Kevin Callery wrote on Thu, 28 May 2009 10:24

I've routed it with the signal directly fed through the xlr's and also inserted it into the aux out and it seems to be the same either way. I can live with the signal to noise ratio on the monitors with a  bit of a balancing act but there's no way I could use it on FOH. Just a bit of a pity cos it's such a neat unit....

Yes a very neat piece of gear.
I use mine to do 4 way monitors from FOH.
No hiss.
I run aux 1-4 xlr in to xlr out to snake, to 2 crown xs1200.
Even with hi gain on the amps it is dead quiet.

[Art Welter]

Kevin,

Are you sure you are not boosting gain with the EQ, 10 dB is available.
Boosting above 5K would also increase hiss.
What happens when you hit bypass?
What happens when you use the same two XLR plugs that went through the unit and connect them together?

[Alan Roberts]

I've noticed hiss only when the EQ is hooked up to powered speakers with digital amps.

[Kevin Callery]

I've a festival coming up this weekend and the rack is currently packed for moving so I'll have to have a good run through it before sound checks begin to see how I can get the most out of it.
I'll have 4 monitor mixes so I'll be running all 4 channels so I'll see how it behaves

[jake hedlund]

I am having an identical problem with the same equipment. Bypass does nothing and the hiss is there even if there are no inputs plugged in. I am using shielded XLR cables for everything. Any ideas of what could be wrong?