In Ear monitor systems

[T_Gowan]

Hello All
I had the most rewarding experience at fun performance day running my in ears. I split all the mics and sent them to my Mackie DL1608 so I had 6 monitor sends.
I have pretty significant hearing loss so I was compensating for this. Limiting , eq and individual balance. I can say I seldom have had this good a monitor.
I run an old Shure psm200 I think its called, works, mono, 9volt powered belt pack.
The setup I used was great but pretty cumbersome to set up. Looking to streamline it a bit but keep as much functionality as possible. Been looking at the new compact XVIVE U45 5.8 GHz. Recharge able. Any thoughts or suggestions would be appreciated.

[Bruce Weldy]

Hello All
I had the most rewarding experience at fun performance day running my in ears. I split all the mics and sent them to my Mackie DL1608 so I had 6 monitor sends.
I have pretty significant hearing loss so I was compensating for this. Limiting , eq and individual balance. I can say I seldom have had this good a monitor.
I run an old Shure psm200 I think its called, works, mono, 9volt powered belt pack.
The setup I used was great but pretty cumbersome to set up. Looking to streamline it a bit but keep as much functionality as possible. Been looking at the new compact XVIVE U45 5.8 GHz. Recharge able. Any thoughts or suggestions would be appreciated.

Only thing I'd tell you is that a soundman friend of mine said that 5GH Xvive ear cause problems with 5GH Wireless routers. Soon after I heard this, I encountered it with a friend's band. He bought an Xvive 5GH for his drummer and they had all kinds of problems keeping the other player's monitor mixes up and running with the router when the Xvive was near the system router. They used it the other night with the Xvive back at the drummer's location that was away from the system router and it worked fine.

So, just beware. Or, get the 2.4 version.

[Zippie]

If you’re not completely sold on wireless you can get a similar quality mix in ears with wired belt pack style headphone amp. Behringer P1 runs $60 for a mono or stereo mix, about the size of your wireless pack, runs on 9v. P2 runs $40 mono very small about the size of an SM57 inline, powered by a couple AAA batteries. I currently have six of these and the band loves them. Both have plenty of headroom and seem to be acceptable quality. You’ll just have a signal line, which isn’t much to deal with if you play guitar and have a cable hanging already. In my experience the ear buds have way more control over the quality than the amp.

[T_Gowan]

Yes the buds are critical to the sound. I made my own custom ear moulds with Radians diy ear plug. I was looking at the Behringer units. Though it would be a no brainer for the drummer and keyboard player. Problem is convincing these old dogs (my self included in that category) that they should try it out. I have a Rolls wired head phone amp that I could let them try with their own head set.
I found the limiting and eq were very important as I said to my hearing impairment. The ability to run my independent mix was fantastic. I'm a bit above average vocalist, took some formal vocal training years ago. And I really enjoy having good monitors. Not just for pitch but expression. You feel inspired !

[Bruce Weldy]

Since we're talking in-ears.....

I work with a lot of players on ears with no problem. However, my friend's band (referenced above) were having trouble with their ears being distorted. So, they asked me to come to their practice to check it out. One guys aux mix was just dimed with the faders almost all the way up and the master fader at unity. Should have been blowing his head off. The signal was so hot that it was overdriving the ears transmitter.

So, I said where do you have your belt pack volume set? Oh.....about a quarter of the way.....

All of 'em were barely cracking the volume open. Had 'em all turn 'em all the way up then back off a hair. Then I pulled back all of the faders, stopped the signal from overdriving the transmitter, and fixed the problem. The whole band was blown away at how good their ears sounded now.....

Moral of the story is - no matter how much you troubleshoot an issue, don't overlook the obvious.

So, my first question from now on when troubleshooting in-ears will be - Is the belt pack turned up all the way?

[Bruce Weldy]

Yes the buds are critical to the sound. I made my own custom ear moulds with Radians diy ear plug. I was looking at the Behringer units. Though it would be a no brainer for the drummer and keyboard player. Problem is convincing these old dogs (my self included in that category) that they should try it out. I have a Rolls wired head phone amp that I could let them try with their own head set.
I found the limiting and eq were very important as I said to my hearing impairment. The ability to run my independent mix was fantastic. I'm a bit above average vocalist, took some formal vocal training years ago. And I really enjoy having good monitors. Not just for pitch but expression. You feel inspired !

One of the pluses of in-ears is that you can set your mixer to run the aux out after processing (something you should never do with a wedge). This will give them a more hi-fi sound as any EQ, compression, etc from the channel will be part of their sound. Plus, you can add reverb and delay.

Also, an ambient mic located at the front of the drum kit pointed to the crowd lets you dial a little of that sound into your ears, and it serves as a talkback mic to inform the band what's coming up, etc. Just be sure and don't bring up the FOH fader on that channel.

[T_Gowan]

Excellent advice. Always concerned about on stage communication.

[Zippie]

Talkback sent to in ears is really helpful if you do any amount of improv or flowing musically. To have someone as a music director of a sort with quick short tips on the next part of the song can be very helpful. The band I mix for rotates members for a monthly event and it’s never the same crew. With an MD onstage talking them through transitions they always execute well, even in on the fly situations. A lot of young players. I know it can go unsaid for seasoned musicians that can flow effortlessly. Our team has found it very helpful. Even if just a song change on set list or some simple communication between songs, it’s nice to be able to do it subtly and not make it an obvious thing onstage to take away from the event. Waiting for the band to talk about the next thing to happen with backs to the crowd can be disengaging.

[Bruce Weldy]

Talkback sent to in ears is really helpful if you do any amount of improv or flowing musically. To have someone as a music director of a sort with quick short tips on the next part of the song can be very helpful. The band I mix for rotates members for a monthly event and it’s never the same crew. With an MD onstage talking them through transitions they always execute well, even in on the fly situations. A lot of young players. I know it can go unsaid for seasoned musicians that can flow effortlessly. Our team has found it very helpful. Even if just a song change on set list or some simple communication between songs, it’s nice to be able to do it subtly and not make it an obvious thing onstage to take away from the event. Waiting for the band to talk about the next thing to happen with backs to the crowd can be disengaging.

If you have just one person talking to the band, you can use a talkback switch made just for this purpose. One output goes to the regular channel for FOH, the other to the talkback channel. You just push and hold the button to talk to the band. When you let up, you're back to FOH.

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail ... mic-toggle

[Zippie]

That’s sweet. So you can use the same mic. I like that.