DJ Vintage
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DJ Vintage
ModeratorIf my HD1221 (totally different breed of speakers from the Thumps btw – http://www.mackie.com/products/hd1221) can handle it, I am sure the 15″ EON can too.
The HD-series has a set of 15″ too, which pack an ever bigger punch than my 12″s.
I am (clearly lol) a big Mackie fan. I never was, but since they hooked up with EAW … what a difference!!. I don’t get paid or sponsored or anything. It is just that I was totally blown away by their sound. A model that might just fill your needs, is the HD1531 (http://www.mackie.com/products/hd1531/). Because the midrange horn picks up the higher mids, the 15″ gets more room to boom :-), almost like a built-in sub (not quite though lol).
As I said, I only bring my single! 18″ sub when it is 80+ people and I know I need lots of low end and normally turn it down 3dB because it easily becomes too much. For the first year I played entirely on my 12″s. That was sometimes a little thin in the lows for larger audiences, hence the purchase of the sub.
Good luck with your choice & greetinx,
C.ModeratorI would comfortably play 50-80 people with just my 12″ Mackie HD1221s and leave my 18″ Mackie HD1801 at home. Especially with a wooden floor that brings potential of audible resonance (rumbling kind of sound). A long, narrow room can contribute to a lot of standing waves in the low end. The amount of energy in the low end becomes an issue (i.e. more low energy = bigger problem). Unless you really want gut-wrenching low end, I’d say you are ok without the sub.
On a side note, I listened to the EON set when I was looking for new speakers, but they really disappointed me next to the Mackies (and the TurboSounds). Might wanna give the Mackies and the Turbo’s a listen before you buy.
Greetinx,
C.Moderatorsoftcore, post: 39964, member: 243 wrote: The Shure SM58 is also a “classic”…
😉
You mean the worlds worst microphone? LOL …
In my opinion the only real three advantages of the SM58 are:
- They are unbreakable, dip them in beer, run a truck over them and they will still perform
- They can withstand the most incredible sound levels
- Because sooooo many are out there, no artist ever dares complain if you stick him/her behind a 58, after all, they are the “defacto standard”.
And that concludes the nice things I have to say about them. They can withstand loud levels, but really need a fair bit of input to really start working properly (therefor totally unsuited for speech only applications in my opinion). The sound characteristics are not very nice, especially female singers benefit from having ANY OTHER microphone than a 58 :-p.
In all fairness, dynamic mics are, as a result of the physics of their design, not the best suitable for low level voice application. (Large Diaphragm) Condensers rule that world.
But hey, there is an awful lot of second-hand 58s out there. So buying one to test should be relatively cheap and you can almost certainly resell it for the same price you got it for if you don’t like it (which I predict you won’t).
Greetinx,
C.April 30, 2013 at 4:56 am in reply to: Need help setting my laptop up with my mixer/CD players. #39793ModeratorI can only say, RTFM = Read The F*cking Manual :-). The manual in this case being the unmatched Controller Buyer Guide on the blog by prof.dr. Phil Morse himself.
Jam-packed with all the info about all the controller you could ever want.
Asking here will get you as many opinions as there are reactions :-). I have a post somewhere were I made a checklist kinda thingie for choosing a controller.
I believe you should write down what you want to accomplish with your controller (do you want to DJ in your bedroom, do you want to scratch, do you want to be a wedding DJ, etx.), next translate that into what features you want, then look at what is in your budget, then start checking which ones come closest to your wishlist and finally try to get your hands on the 2 or 3 in your shortlist to actually feel and try them (perhaps a trip to a DJ store?).
In the end buying a controller is a highly personal choice.
Greetinx,
C.ModeratorDJ? Spiral, post: 39945, member: 9543 wrote: Check out the electro voice re20. Standard in radio broadcast. And doubles as a killer kick drum/instrument mic
I’ll second that thought, but you must have missed the “under 150” bit in his original post :-).
And as far as I know, second hand ones are few and far between. Needless to say I would propably not buy a second hand condenser mic unless I was totally sure about the source.
Greetinx,
C.April 29, 2013 at 8:29 am in reply to: any good (preferably free) WAV to MP3 converters out there? #39764ModeratorSince I am an avid opponent of iTunes (in my opinion it may just be the most user UNfriendly piece of software ever to come out of Apple), I have gone with dBPowerAmp, not free but it does true multiprocessor batch conversion. On my 6-core PC that means 6 songs get converted simultaneously. Not free, but loads of quality. The free software of choice would be Audacity.
Greetinx,
C.ModeratorI hear you Terry, being a sound guy too, we like our mics without any controls. That is why you have engineers :-). I can see how volume control on the mic could be practical in a one-person broadcasting situation.
Haven’t had the pleasure of working with any blues yet. I did work with a few Rode’s, hence i know they offer a pretty good bang for the buck too. Whichever he choses, I don’t think he can go wrong with our advice :-p.
Greetinx,
C.Moderatoratom12v, post: 39878, member: 1423 wrote: No it’s not there anymore, it been replace by the EQ knobs
You REALLY want to blame loudness or EQ don’t you 😉
Unfortunately EQ hasn’t replaced loudness, it was never there in the first place. Frankly, the amp/speaker part of a serious PA will usually not have EQs. Pro PA amps are easily the most boring boxes ever, on/off and volume is about all the controls you’ll get. I have worked with ones that had NO controls. Plug in the power to turn it on and regulate the volume through the input level lol.
PAs are not designed/intended to be used at sound levels low enough for loudness to play a part, hence no loudness on them (nor replacement by EQs). The reason EQ is used in PA is to allow for room acoustic compensations, not to “repair” flaws in the PA itself.
Have you made your choice yet is what I’d like know though.
Greetinx,
C.ModeratorQuestion: are you a gifted person by any chance?
Vocals mixing: the obvious advice to NOT mix vocals is solid. If for some reason the vocals get in the way, a trick I use on occassion is mid EQ. Since vocals happen around 2-4 kHz, turning down the mids on the incoming tune will give it a karaoke feel. If you do this on a singlee song it sounds awful, but in the mix the effect gets masked because you still have the full mid range of the outgoing song, including … it”s vocals. If all else is going well, you quickly bring over the lows (down eq on outgoing up eq on incoming), then start with the vocals. Depending on the vocalsyou can do it quickly or play with it for a longer mix. It’ll be a knob turning mix but can be done.
Big BPM difference: the first question to ask is, WHY do I want to switch tempo so dramatically. More often than not those transitions break the flow you have the audience in. cause no matter how smooth you transitioned, ghe crowd needs to start dancing to a totally different beat! Mobile DJs are forced to make some crazy moves like that and will use mic techniques to prepare the crowd for what is coming, effectively slowing the crowd down before getting them moving in a different direction again. Ifyou really want/must do it, tap delay could offer a helping hand. Make sure that you have a tapped in delay ready that is long enough to give you a few seconds of echo. Then bring the new song in (maybe from a filtered position bringing in the lows first). What you have accomplished is that the dying out echo will signal to the crowd that something is coming to an end and you bring in something new ” through the mist” so to speak.
Tip: in the old days, you just had records and a flat mixer. DJs managed to get crowds moving then. Sure the crowds have gotten more demanding, but in the end it is still musical selection that will make or break a night, no matter how skillfully mixed. I have seen trainwrecks at great nights and I have had flawless nights that were dead as a doornail.
Others said it already, but allow me to drill the point home: don’t focus on the technology too much, enjoy and use what you can with confidence. I have 35 years of DJ-ing on me and have never made a serious mashup ( well not consciously anyway :-)) But I have made my audiences happy most of the time and sent people home after a night of enjoying themselves. What they’ll remember is having danced all night to great music in a flow. Very few will remenber the transitions, the effects and yes even the occassional trainwreck.
Good luck buddie, your in school for life. Just make sure you enjoy the journey not just the destination.
Greetinx,
C.ModeratorThat was a rant allright lol. The discussion is not new, it happened when the first CDJs came out and turntable DJs disclaimed the “fad” and eventually CDJs became the accepted standard and vinyl jocks a minority. There is no doubt digital DJ-ing is here to stay. It is in it’s mid to late teens and rapidly coming of age. It adds loads of creative possibilities to the process. It has automation features that were unheard of. Automatic beatgridding, syncing, FX, hot cues, automatic rescue loops, key detection, energy level detection, elastic audio, you name it. Unfortunately lots of people now think every piece of software with any kind of hardware should be able to do anything without requiring any knowledge from the user. I am sure there is a solution or workaround to make what you want happen, but it might take some time in learning how. And if you want to concentrate on what is important to you, which I totally dig btw, then find and pay someone to fix it for you.
Greetinx,
C.Moderatordjgenesis23, post: 39870, member: 10345 wrote: Great work all & thanks for all your friendly advise at the moment i’m looking at the Denon MC6000 reason is its small perfect for mobile djing can be used as a stand alone mixer has mic out puts & lots of inputs.
now someone has said that the sound card you get with the Denon MC6000 is not that great anyone that has one please tell me your thoughts ???
Also how long has the Denon MC6000 been out does anyone know if Denon is going to be bringing out a MC8000 or something like that id hate to purchase this MC6000 & then they bring out a new ones in the coming weeks.
Thanks againThe 6000 has been out since late 2010, so younger than the S4 for example. I haven’t heard about an 8000, but I am sure if there was anything new coming shortly Phil and crew would have uncovered it at the fair in Frankfurt. No buzz on internet either.
As far as the soundcqrd goes, I have two years experience that says it is completely and utterly up to the task. Unfortunately a good many (aspiring) DJs have become what I would call spec-junkies. They look at specs and decide what is good and what is not based on paper data. One thing sems to be bit depth. 24-bit is better than 16-bit sound card. I say rubbish. Dynamic range is important, component quality is important, overall design is important, driver quality is important and at the end of the day a good 16-bit card can sound better than a poor 24-bit. All those guys have forgotten that 16-bit/44.100 is CD standard! So, now CD quality isn’t good enough?
I can vouch for the sound quality of the 6000, I have listened to it for 2 years on many gigs up to a 3,500 people ceremony in the olympic stadium. I get mighty tired of would be techies who bash stuff without knowing what they are talking about. A bit like the kind of people that don’t take anyone seriously if their gear doesn’t say Pioneer on it.
As far as I am concerned the 6000 is a solid, road worthy, professional piece of equipment from a manufacturer that was innovating DJ equipment when lots of the readership here was still running around in diapers :-).
It’s been said before about it being a personal choice, but if the features match up with your wishlist, you won’t go wrong with it.
Greetinx,
C.ModeratorCouple of options:
• Rode ProCaster. Very good cardoid dynamic mic, geared towards speech/broadcast work. With a shockmount (highly advisable) about 200 euro. Should be within your budget if I get the conversion right.
• Any large diaphragm condenser really. Rode NT1A being an excellent exame within your price range.I have a preference for condenser mics for broadcast. You do need it shockmounted and preferably hanging.
Greetinx,
C.ModeratorAmen to that !
Moderatoratom12v, post: 39836, member: 1423 wrote:
Nah, I didn’t mean loudness.
For one, no serious PA system has a loudness button, so pretty hard to switch something on that isn’t there.
It has to do (and I didn’t want to get into that earlier because we have to get all into physics and such) with the inertia of a moving object. In a subwoofer the membrane makes a relatively large and slow motion. It will travel to the end of it’s physical reach and then settle back in neutral before the next push comes. Clearly this happens between 35-125 times per second (Hz). Now as the membranes get bigger, they have to contend with more air to overcome both pushing and retreating and the overal weight of the membrane (and yes the attached voicecoil and it’s resistance within the magnet) moving become a bigger factor. The whole thing is just a tad slower switching from forward to backward movement, or vice versa.
At lower energy levels (lower volume) it can still do it pretty accurately since it doesn’t travel to its edges. But once it really has to work hard, the problem becomes audible. The membrane is a bit confused and can’t keep up.
The other bit is that when it finished a “push->return to neutral”-cycle, it won’t stop immediately but will swing backwards PAST neutral and then back to neutral. Depending on the amount of energy put into the original movement this may even happen more than once. If a new impuls to move in the other direction comes as it is actually behind the neutral point going backward and it now needs to go forward again, it has a disadvantage. Instead of going from stand still forward, it has to stop the backward motion, turn around and THEN start moving forward.
While all of this happens really quickly, at high energy sound levels, with lots of different information in that 40-100Hz area, the membrane really does get a bit confused and you can hear that.
High frequency speakers have it MUCH easier. The travel is very short (very little air needs to be moved, even if it is up to 20.000 times per second) and the membrane/voicecoil mass is very very low.
For the purist amongst us: I know there is intentional backward travel of the membrame past neutral too, since an audiowave has a positive and a negative half, but for the intent of the above explanation, I figured it was enough to just consider one half of the equation, the neutral-forward-neutral (or push) travel of the membrane.
I hope I have confused some of you completely, but that most of you get the idea of what I mean.
With audio reproduction, in all of it’s apparent physical simplicity = a driver in a wooden or plastic cabinet going boom boom boom, the actual physics behind it can become pretty complicated.
Greetinx,
C.ModeratorWell … you might just be the one exception among us who can pull it off then. Mind you, having the gear doesn’t necessarily mean you can work it well enough to get a professional end product. I know quite a few DJs with very professional gear (which they didn’t get from someone who knew how to use it) that aren’t quite able to be a professional with it … 🙂
Greetinx,
C.p.s. Yes, I am slightly envious of that computer-controlled laser cutter.
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