Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Peter Morris]

Funny, for me it's the exact opposite. I've always felt that UHF-R was sub-par compared to all other professional top class systems. But ULX-D sounds like a wire, only with considerably LESS (!) noise than the wired handheld counterparts.

Same here. A/B the digital with the wired version and it sound the same.

The UHF-R is excellent but has companding, the digital does not. I suspect thats the difference people are hearing. 

http://forums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/topic,1373.10.html

https://soundforums.net/forum/pro-audio/product-reviews/4302-shure-ulx-d

[David Sturzenbecher]

I use the ulxd/QLXD all the time and think they sound good, just side by side you could see why the UHFR is twice the money imho.

You should probably check your pricing.  They are almost identical for me. 2 Channel System vs 2 Channel System

[Ray Aberle]

You should probably check your pricing.  They are almost identical for me. 2 Channel System vs 2 Channel System

ULXD/2ch (2 single units) with SM58s - $2698
UHF-R/2ch (dual receiver 1U) with SM58s - $4747

The difference is even more pronounced with QLX-D vs UHF-R. (2ch QLX-D with SM58s would be $1998.)
If you change out the 2 single ULX-D to a 1U 2-channel receiver-- $3453.

(this is all MAP pricing; naturally any of us Shure dealers are paying less then that-- and even if we weren't, a good dealer would give us a package deal less then MAP.)

[Brian Adams]

I have ULXD with quad receivers, as do many of the venues and sound companies in my area. I've never seen QLXD around here, but they might be out there.

One big advantage of ULXD over QLXD (for me), is that I don't need so many distros, and I can run a lot more channels on a single distro. I could run 40 channels of ULXD on a single UA845. I'm not made of money, so I don't have 40 channels of ULXD, but I run 4 quad receivers on a single UA844 with 2 spare outputs to feed another wireless rack or two. It's really nice.

For 16 channels, that's 5RU for ULXD (4 quad receivers and 1 UA844) vs 13RU for QLXD (8RU of receivers and 5 UA844's). You can minimize the space that QLXD takes up by using larger (more expensive) distros, but you can do 8 channels of ULXD without a distro at all. That makes a big difference for me, not to mention the cabling is far easier with ULXD.

I just did some math on systems with SM58's, and it looks like ULXD quad receivers is somewhere around 50% more money than QLXD with UA844's, give or take 5% depending on quantities. That much more money might be a tough sell, but if you're short on rack space, or if you ever plan on adding more channels, it would probably be worth it in the long run.

Other than Dante, the rest of the features are nearly identical, including the rechargeable batteries and chargers (which are amazing). Whichever system you decide on, you should plan on getting the rechargeables. I'm sure you won't regret it.

[Brian Jojade]

ULXD/2ch (2 single units) with SM58s - $2698
UHF-R/2ch (dual receiver 1U) with SM58s - $4747

The difference is even more pronounced with QLX-D vs UHF-R. (2ch QLX-D with SM58s would be $1998.)
If you change out the 2 single ULX-D to a 1U 2-channel receiver-- $3453.

(this is all MAP pricing; naturally any of us Shure dealers are paying less then that-- and even if we weren't, a good dealer would give us a package deal less then MAP.)

MAP pricing is different, as there is much higher margin on the MAP pricing of the UHF-R systems. If you look at dealer cost of a dual receiver ULX-D unit vs a dual receiver UHF-R unit, they are within a couple hundred bucks, before any incentive.

The single separate units are more expensive on the UHF-R system, whereas going single units on the ULX-D are cheaper. However, you lose the failover functionality by going single units on the ULX-D systems.

The QLX-D brings us an even lower price point, but does remove the features as listed by the OP. It also removes the failover option in the dual and quad channel receivers.  You're paying extra for that feature, more than you're paying to eliminate a single rack space.  If that's the only reason you are looking at the quad ULX-D receiver over a QLX-D system, it's money wasted.  Spend the $$ on a larger vehicle instead.

The neat thing is that the QLX-D and ULX-D equipment is interchangeable. If you need higher transmit power, you can simply get the ULX-D transmitter and use that.  If you want Dante, you can buy the ULX receiver, and still use the cheaper QLX transmitters.  Pretty neat how SHURE made the devices play nice together.

For corporate events, I've found that the keyword 'encryption' has been helpful in sales.  If you are doing events containing proprietary information, selling the fact that nobody can intercept the transmission can be a huge positive for you.

[Ray Aberle]

Oh, I totally get that MAP of different products doesn't have the same percentage as our Dealer Cost of the different lines. Trust me, I LOVE it when someone on eBay "Buy It Now" a UHF-R rig. I know that Dealer Cost of a 2-channel UHF-R is a bit cheaper then a 2-channel/1U ULX-D system, and that the MAP of the former is higher then the latter...

-Ray

[Mike Pyle]

I would choose ULXD simply for the ability to cascade receivers without antenna distro, plus they have power built in to drive amplified antennas, which I believe the QLXD lacks.

[Keith Broughton]

I would choose ULXD simply for the ability to cascade receivers without antenna distro, plus they have power built in to drive amplified antennas, which I believe the QLXD lacks.

Keep in mind that Shure claims only 1 cascade of RF signal, no matter what ULXD receiver is used.
Tim, from Shure, has done 2 cascades and claims it works fine.
The high density mode of the ULXD is going to come in handy with the impending congestion of the RF bands.

[Samuel Rees]

Thanks so much for the great advice. A few thoughts:

IMHO ULX-D definitely sounds more like a wire than UHF-R. UHF-R sounds great against all sorts of other stuff and I like it fine.

From the dealer pricing I've received UHF-R and ULX-D are about the same. QLX-D is 30% less.

I am in Washington DC so maybe I should take the high density mode seriously. Not for having a large number of channels myself but for squeezing my channels into smaller frequency space.

Are the transmitters really cross compatible? The QLX-D transmitters are about 30% less. What features would I lose? I'm sure transmitter power would still be limmited like QLX, but could I still do high density mode?

Does anyone here use the 20mw high power setting on ULX-D? I imagine if anything I'll be wanting to use lower power settings here in busy RF DC. I've always used the 10mw power on UHF-R as far as I'm aware.

[Ray Aberle]

Yes, the transmitters and receivers are really cross compatible. I had a customer last fall order a ULX-D receiver (I'm a small business so I drop ship most of the higher-ticket items) -- and they were back ordered through Shure. Since he had a show he NEEDED one more receiver on, I shipped him one of my QLX-D receivers so he could get through the show before his new ULX-D receiver showed up. No problems.

-Ray

[ProSoundWeb Community]