Dynacord Speakers

[Bobbsy]

SWMBO and I showed our respective ages tonight and went to see Suzi Quatro at the local 1700 seat receiving house. Considering most people her age are contemplating their first hip or knee replacement (I've already had mine) Suzi put on a great show and is still very easy on the eyes.

 

However, being fussy, the sound somewhat marred an otherwise pleasant evening....I'dgive them no more than 5 out of 10 for quality, maybe a bit less. Three cardinal sins (in my book) were that there was an annoying buzz on the system throughout the whole show, they were slow to deal with feedback on a number of occasions and the mixer (touring with Suzi, NOT a local) took most of the first song to "dial in" the lead vocal so you could hear her properly.

 

Knowing a bit about the venue (I've mixed a few things there) I know that they used the venue mixer (a Midas Heritage 2000) but brought in their own cabs and monitors. I didn't recognise the speakers so, at the interval, I crept down front to find that they were by Dynacord--I'm guess from the "Forumline" after looking at the web site but could be mistaken.

 

Anyway, I was far from impressed. The bass was "moving a lot of air" but was woolly and indistinct--not what you want when the main performer is a bass player. The overall sound was just a bit loud for my taste but the SPL would probably have been acceptable if the system hadn't seemed a bit edgy and over-driven.

 

This was my first time hearing Dynacord speakers so my question has to be...are they always this bad or did I just have the misfortune of hearing a badly set up/operated system? Frankly, from my limited time mixing at the venue, I'm pretty sure the intalled EV X-Array kit could have generated similar SPLs with a much cleaner, nicer sound.

 

Bob

[KevinE]

Well I know Dynacord and EV are (or at least used to be?) pretty much the same company if that helps? They are subsidiaries of Bosch and make various products for each other in the group.

[mervaka]

like power drills? :P

 

from my experiences, EV aren't badfor the price, but there's better stuff out there. however my local guitar shop swears by them.

[soundiesam]

I heard some dynacord speakers at plasa last year and has a demo from dynacord them selves and checked over all there eq settings which were all set at flat and I was amazed at the bass response had a really tight bass and was nice kick to it

sam

[Rob_Beech]

EV now tends to be a love or hate brand. There were large gaps in the boxes for a few years, with the sx stuff being a run of the mill (far from special) box on stick and the larger line array stuff being very good (but again nothing special) with a few things coming and going inbetween which you hardly see used anywhere. In this country anyway.

 

The people that love it, love it, and often can't bear to think about using any other brand. This often gets in the way of what they actually hear, its EV therefore its good. Which on many occasions is simply not the case.

 

Dynacord who have some company relations with EV if they are not the same company overall (can't quite remember how it works) use EV drivers in most if not all of their boxes. I had a demo of some of the stuff at Plasa last year and like Bobbsy, I was far from impressed with what was a very expensive system.

 

I know things are likely to be different in different areas of the country, and different countries around the world.

 

How many of these systems are out there? that often says quite alot about a product.

[KevinE]

like power drills?

 

:P Well It's Bosch Communications GmbH but these days they may well make fridges as well..

[johndenim]

Interesting you should talk about Dynacord Bob as I have been considering having a listen with regard to replacing my current cabs.

 

I have heard good things about Dynacord cabs but have yet to hear them, you'd have thought an engineer for Suzi would know a little bit about what he was doing?

 

Reading you review I doubt if he(or she) does.

 

You say they brought in there own cabs,

What was the set up please?

I would love to see roadies stacking up enough speakers to fill a 1500 seater hall!!!

 

P.s I don't think this is a dig at Dynacord, I think really you doubted the skills of the engineer, I think sometimes its a shame that us sound enthusiasts

concentrate more on the sound, bass, feedback, spl, etc etc, than your average Joe.

 

John Demin.

 

P.ss how was the show? ;)

[Bobbsy]

You guess right, John. While I wasn't impressed by the sound that night, my suspicions are more with the tech than the Dynacords. Our seats were not too far from the mix position and he seemed to be a "stand back and listen" type, reacting pretty slowly to things that sounded to me to be glaring problems. (Of course, I tend to be the "contantly fussing" type, rarely without my hands off some control or other, probably fixing problems that don't exist!).

 

As for the stacks, I'm glad I didn't have to lift them, but (for the size of venue) they weren't immense. Each side had two subs and (from memory) five tops, the tops being two different varieties. This makes sense as (from the Dynacord site) they have short and long throw variants and the venue would certainly need a mix of these. Interestingly, there were sidefill stacks behind the mains that were almost as big as the mains. This struck me as a bit excessive! Certainly there was more feedback from monitorland than I would consider acceptable.

 

Anyhow, my objections to the sound (besides obvious operator things) was that the bass, while moving a gut-thumping amount of air, was muddy and indistinct most of the time and the tops had an over-driven "edgy" sound throughout. I couldn't quite see the venue SPL meter but my guess is that much of the concert was mixed at 105-110dB(SPL). Considering that the average age of the audience was, like me, not far off Suzi's, they could possibly have backed everything off a bit and still had oodles of level...and a much cleaner sound.

 

As for the show itself, very good indeed. Considering Ms. Quatro is a couple of years older than I, it's amazing to see her bop around the stage while I stand there contemplating my arthritis and my second knee replacement! (Maybe the lesson is that performing is easier than lifting PA stacks "from the knees"!)

 

Bob

[6th Order]

Ah, so was it a Cobra system?

 

I've had a play with this stuff and I thought it was very usable. The top boxes (short throw) have a great full range sound and the subs are Ok.

 

I'd expect more, so user error/preference would seem like the issue here.

 

Don't give up on Dynacord.

[Bobbsy]

Ah, so was it a Cobra system?

 

Hmmm...possibly. My first quick look at the Dynacord site had me thinking Forumline, but it could well have been a Cobra. If so, I have to say the stacking was, to say the least rather "eccentric" for the room. There were two subs per side, next to each other, one with three tops on top, the other with two tops. From an admittedly quick read of the Cobra brochure, this would have been very wrong for the relatively long, thin room. I may have a partial answer to some of my criticism!

 

I also think I should apply to do sound for Quatro's next Aussie tour!

 

Bob