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AES AES<br />
New Gear<br />
Karl Kussmaul with the Sony ECM-322 Headset mic.<br />
AES also had the usual complement of mic announcements,<br />
too.<br />
Sony Electronics announced the expansion of the<br />
frequency availability for many of its WL-800 Series<br />
Wireless transmitter models with the introduction of<br />
two new channel blocks 30/32 and 42/44. The new<br />
channels were developed to aid end-users in configuring<br />
Sony wireless systems with increased flexibility in<br />
UHF-TV channel selection. That’s Karl Kussmaul holding<br />
the ECM-322 headset microphone, with the 822B transmitter<br />
in the background on the table.<br />
We also got to talk to the good folks over at Audio-<br />
Technica and ask them why they don’t include a spare<br />
dual XLR adapter for their ATM250DE dual-action microphone.<br />
Turns out they had considered it, but including an<br />
extra adapter would up the price by an additional $50,<br />
and they didn’t want to push the price point any higher.<br />
We don’t know which is more disturbing: manufacturers<br />
thinking like <strong>FOH</strong>, or <strong>FOH</strong> thinking like a manufacturer.<br />
Lastly, DPA was showing off their SMK mic kit, a<br />
5.4mm electret condenser capsule that they had mounted<br />
to the inside of a piano. With the help of a pianist for<br />
the San Francisco Opera and a little Mozart they showed<br />
off the incredible sound from this tiny package.<br />
Stop Answering<br />
Stupid Questions!<br />
Let the <strong>FOH</strong> FAQ T-Shirt do the answering for you.<br />
You may have already heard about these shirts designed by<br />
mixer-extraodinaire James Geddes that feature the answers to the Top 10<br />
stupid questions audience members ask. Now you can order one of these<br />
beauties and all of the net proceeds will benefit the music and arts programs<br />
of the Rogue River, Ore School District (Where James' kids go to school).<br />
THE NEWS MAGAZINE FOR LIVE SOUND<br />
"Making the world a better-sounding place one gig at a time."<br />
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If you had any doubt about digital<br />
migrating to the anklebiter level, all<br />
it took was a quick stop at the Mackie<br />
booth to put those doubts aside. Mackie<br />
is shipping a couple of add-ons for its<br />
very affordable TT24 digital mixer. One<br />
is a processor card that gives you the<br />
functionality of a Lake Mesa EQ, controllable<br />
from the console and the other is a<br />
— you guessed it — digital snake. Looks<br />
like it might be time to consider buying<br />
stock in companies that make good Cat5<br />
cable.<br />
Kevin Hill with the Variant 25A<br />
From JBL’s very large we go to the very small,<br />
as D.A.S. introduced their baby line array, the Variant<br />
25A. It’s designed for use as a multi-box array<br />
in small to mid-sized installations, but the ability to<br />
pole-mount a couple of self-powered boxes with<br />
an actual compression driver at a price point where<br />
others are offering soft-dome tweeters means you<br />
are going to see these used live along with the Variant<br />
18A sub. A pair of 25As and a sub will set you<br />
back about five grand a side. No wonder sales Jedi<br />
Kevin Hill is grinning…<br />
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18 November 2006 www.fohonline.com<br />
Gil Perales with the Mackie TT24 and add-ons<br />
That Lampy Show<br />
Is it just me, or is it terribly annoying that<br />
the only trade show where you can really<br />
hear concert-scale systems in their natural<br />
environment is a freaking LIGHTING show?<br />
Anyway the shootout-that-isn’t-really-ashootout<br />
of speaker systems made it worth<br />
spending an entire day at LDI. (Yeah, they call<br />
ET Live — whatever, it’s still a lighting show.)<br />
So what was what? Harman did a live<br />
surround demo featuring an interestingly<br />
dressed club singer. EAW showed off the<br />
greatly improved KF series line array. With<br />
new Gunness Focusing and the ability to fly<br />
the subs, it sounded like a whole new system.<br />
Unfortunately, the reflection off of the apartment<br />
building a block away made it hard to<br />
really hear from more than about 60 feet<br />
away. (And we’re sure the apartment residents<br />
were thrilled…) Stage “D” featured a turnkey<br />
d&b rig, and had other speaker makers singing<br />
its praises. Expensive or not, this is a very<br />
good sounding system — especially with the<br />
advantage of Robert Scovill running a Digidesign<br />
VENUE and using live Tom Petty tracks for<br />
the demo.<br />
Across the parking lot the Meyer system<br />
sounded great — as expected — but the sur-<br />
Jan-Al cases’ displays RockmountCity.com<br />
Jan-Al Cases, purveyors of custom cases, announced<br />
they will launch RackmountCity.com in the first quarter of<br />
2007. This one-stop shop site will provide engineers and<br />
rack-mounting professionals with a complete source for<br />
specifications, reference information, and point of purchase<br />
for racks, rack cases and rack accessories, whether<br />
for the road or permanent installation. It will allow users<br />
the ability to design racks by integrating product information<br />
and electronics manufacturers specifications on a<br />
searchable database. It will include extensive guidelines<br />
and “how to’s,” glossaries and explanations meant to standardize<br />
communications about rack mount products.<br />
Jeff Cox on the EAW stage at ET Live<br />
prises were A-Line, whose active system uses<br />
the amp in one box to power a second box,<br />
making it much more affordable. An unusual<br />
hang (no curve) made it hard to really judge<br />
on a sound level, but coverage was good,<br />
and you should expect to see a lot of smaller<br />
soundcos looking at this as their entrée into<br />
the line array game.<br />
The last system I heard was also greatly<br />
improved over previous outings. The QSC<br />
WideLine is true to its name with the widest<br />
image among the bunch, and the retuned<br />
boxes sounded very good. Like the EAW, the<br />
unexpected was how different it sounded<br />
from how we remembered it.<br />
Now if they could only get this kind of<br />
demo at an actual audio show we would<br />
have something to cheer about.