Radios and Coms

[Orchytech]

I am looking to buy some radios for my venue. These would be used to connect the duty manager with the stage manager during performances and for general staff contacting during the day.

 

I like the idea of integrating the radios with a house comms system and am presently looking at the Tecpro system from Canford.

 

Does anyone have any experience of this system or any other?

[NickLee]

I've used TecPro, and like it - it's hard-wearing, functional, and not over-fussy. I think it's worth the money for something solid for something like cans, and TecPro, when I've used it, does the job admirably.

Having said this, not got a vast experience of other systems - so I'm not the best person to ask for a comparative analysis.

 

-- Nick.

[Peter Russell]

We have some of the Digital-Talkback radio comms unit in our hire stock, these are licenced to Canford by Digital Talkback and sold for use with Tecpro systems, they work in the 2.4Ghz band of frequencies that are commonly used by Dect phone systems and when they work are quite a good unit for the money, However ours have adaptor boxes (Supplied by Digital Talkback) to enable us to use them with RTS comms and I think this is the source of our problems with them as I have been using them on a theatre show with a Tecpro sytem for the last few weeks without any problems. Telex also make a really nice system which will work with any comms system (See the link below) but is quite expensive and needs to be licenced for use at a venue. Another option is the Tecpro AD913 adaptor which interfaces a standard motorola radio into the comms ring, although these can be a bit fiddly in operation, only one person can talk from a radio to the comms system at a time and I think you have to press the call light on your wired beltpack to talk to a radio, as I said a bit fiddly, Peter

 

Telex Radio Comms

Tecpro AD913 Interface

[Tom]

Do you really want the house manager (bar manager, box office manager, security etc) on the same system you are using to run the show? I would prefer to keep the two separate.

[themadhippy]

we use a moterrola handsset that scans 2 channels,channel 1 is FOH channel 2 is technical,intend to try the tecpro adaptor once ive got our custom :) comms system to talk nicely to tecpro,got the bits but not the time.

the radios have been very usefull a number of times ,would recomend them to anyone wanting a flexible comms system,(apart from the occasional tripping of elcb's if your too close and buzz through the sound system if you use it on top of the mixing desk) ,just make sure people are told how to use the system properly and no making rude noises as the duty managers walking up the aditorium :huh:

[Peter Russell]

(apart from the occasional tripping of elcb's if your too close and buzz through the sound system if you use it on top of the mixing desk)

And don't forget that pressing transmit on a motorola next to your cd player can make it stop playing, very useful when you want to operate a show hands free!, Peter

[Fleeting]

And don't forget that pressing transmit on a motorola next to your cd player can make it stop playing

 

 

Putting a mobile phone on top of a Strand 500 series Lighting desk has much the same effect, especially on top of the disk drive......

[Tom]

Must remember that for next time the LD is pissing me off.