Radio mics, which ones????

[timtheenchanteruk]

I work in a school, which is opening its new building in september.

 

I am the Performing Arts Tech, and working with the supplying company with regards to kitting out the new area, most of it is fine, but I am not familiar with the radio mics they have suggested.

 

Thye suggested mics are the Audio Technica 3000 series. does anyone have any experience of these? my first thoughts looking at the spec etc are, the bodypack appears to be plastic: longevity in a school?, Im also not sure on the slidy door covering the buttons, easily slid, access to control buttons, pervious experience with out senn E100s is kids like to play, even to the point of changing the frequencies during production even with the lock on. the lock unlocks if you remove and relace the batteries, no remote info feedback at all, only on the receiver.

The hand held features a 1/2 turn collar to slide the door down, how easy do these brea, I have some on some older trantec stuff, and some have broken by people trying to unscrew.

 

looking at the cost of the 3000 and finding comparable priced product brings me to:

 

Sennheiser E100:

metal body pack, buttons better hidden under flap, but still unlockable from belt pack, doesnt unlock if you remove batteries.

hand held unscrews as expected, known reliability, easy to replace with hire.

downside, antenna not easily replacable (ie not screwed in) screw jack mic connection (although I have not had any problems personally, they dont seem to stand up to use/abuse as well as HRS/XLRs etc.

 

Trantec S5.3

Metal body pack, only needs one battery, XLR on body pack, body pack controls lockable completly using the transmitter IR port, replacable antenna.

hand held unscrews.

remote monitoring via USB, not ideal, but means rack can be hidden a bit more, and more than others.

 

as it stands we will have one rack of 8, and 2 seperate systems, all pof these would be able to give this number in close proximity, there are no other wireless users in the area.

 

anything else I need to consider, all in all im not impressed with the AT on paper for our use, but please feel free to add as required, I have till the morning to feedback (yes, I know, loads of time...)

[Bobbsy]

There was a rumour on the Theatre Sound list a few days ago that Sennheiser are about to make a version of the EW100 with Hirose connector. I know nothing more than that but it might be worth a phone call to the friendly folk at Sennheiser.

 

Beyond that, my choice from your shortlist would still be the EW100 even with the mini jack. Trantec would be number two and "all the others" number 3.

 

Bob

[cedd]

I've just made the jump towards Trantec s5.3's, having taken receipt of my first 2 systems. Eventually I'll have 2 racks of 6.

 

The decision was made based upon a few things;

 

Price - doesn't mean everything, but I got some really good pricing on them when compared to the Sennheiser equivelant.

 

Feature set - To get remote monitoring on the Sennheisers, you need to go to the EW300, which is a fair bit more money.

 

Battery - 1 AA for 8 hours! These systems are bought for the long run and this really will add up!

 

Robust pack - it really does feel chunky, but is still very small. I don't like the belt clip, but probably won't use it ever.

 

I feel I have to mention, I had a problem with one of the receivers - showing self-generated RF. Apparently due to a fault with the setting of the 1st RF stage's bias. This was very promptly sorted by Trantec at no cost to me.

 

I think in time I may also look to own a rack of 6 Sennheiser ew100's in channel 70 - I can get 6 in the space compared to 4 of my existing ones. remote monitoring isn't a huge issue for me, especially for the price difference.

I also dislike the 3.5mm locking jacks immensely! 4 pin mini XLR's are an awful lot better.

[Bobbsy]

What frequencies are you using to get six channels into Ch70? I've never come close to more than 4 without crashing the guard band.

[paulears]

I noted John Willett advising somebody on another forum that 4 was the max in ch 70 - and I suspect he would be the man who would know if more were possible.

 

I had a look at the Audio Technica packs the other day, and they were 'ok'. Didn't really set me on fire, they just felt a little less solid then the Sennheisers.

 

I'd discount the kids fiddling, because the systems with a lock, also have the unlock feature available on the net - so they'd find out far too easily.

 

I suspect, when I've actually got the government cash in my hands that I will go back to Sennheiser, but Trantec would be on the cards if I was looking for lav packs rather than handhelds. I was going to go with the Line 6s - but their unwillingness to provide any units for demo (to any of the people on here who expressed an interest) and the somewhat fudged specs and promises have put me off. Seems rather a lost opportunity as many people will be in the same boat as me, and this is an ideal time for any radio microphone firm to actively seek our vote. The fact that like many, I'm considering Sennheiser with the price hike that's happened post G2, is a good indication the product is a sound one.

 

on a lighter note, I loved Tim's bit here

pervious experience with out senn E100s

 

Brought a smile to my face!

[cedd]

To clarify, I'm just reffering to the G3 kit from Sennheiser. They seem to have done a bit of work on their RF stages since the G2's. Whilst I now can't find anything from Sennheiser on this, I remember it being a marketing ploy when they first came out and found this from studiospares;

http://www.studiospares.com/page/senng3productfinder/

 

So frequencies 863.100 MHz, ,863.400 MHz, 863.750 MHz, 864.225 MHz, 864.550 MHz, 864.975 MHz appear to work alongside each other for G3's only.

 

A PM from another blue roomer asking pretty much the same thing may well have highlighted something I'd previously ignored - intermods from channel 38 may well fall in channel 70 and affect any hope of using these 2 bands alongside each other (or at least, 18 systems across the 2 bands). Will wait and see....

[timtheenchanteruk]

cheers for the input so far.

 

I also discounted the Line 6 for the same reasons as you,

 

Re the 6 sen G3s in Ch 70

 

Sennheiser G3 Wireless Microphone Systems 6 Frequency Set on License Free Channel 70.

 

Ch 01: 863.100 mhz

 

Ch 02: 863.400 mhz

 

Ch 03: 863.750 mhz

 

Ch 04: 864.225 mhz

 

Ch 05: 864.550 mhz

 

Ch 06: 864.975 mhz

 

these only work for the G3s, not previous versions.

 

Im still going back questioning the AT radio mics, not sure if they are an AT distributer hence their push towards them, the rest of the mics are all AT or Shure.

 

damn, beaten to it...

[Bobbsy]

One thought on those six frequencies...the G3 lists its peak FM deviation as +/-48kHz. This would take the upper frequency out of the legal band (unless my maths have left me...which might be possible as it's 1AM here and I have the flu).

[paulears]

The selectivity on the G3 is better than the G2 - but selectivity wasn't an issue I'm aware of on G2 and before.

[Lamplighter]

I had planned to run 16 channels with 12 in channel 38 and four in channel 70 using Trantec S series kit. In an idle moment I ran the numbers and found several inter mods. I spent a while running various channel permutations for the 8 x Ch and 4 x ch 70 that I currently have. It is possible to run these using channels 1,2,4,5,7,8,8 and 10 of the MFG suggested 10 channel plan for ch 38 along with the standard 4 channels in ch 70. I did a practical test and found that with the first 8 channels of the MFG set plus 4 in Chan 70 I had 3 high level intermods. A change to the predicted clear set gave no intermods. I will be running some additional permutations shortly to see if I can find a clear 14 channel setup. The Trantec 12 channel set for channel 38 also is clear but only if the bandwidth is reduced to 24 Khz which is fairly tight. I will come back when I have more facts.

 

Brian

 

Edit A further look at my printouts reveals that the Trantec 12 channel set plus 863.150 and 864.150 is useable though I have not actually tried it for real.

[david.elsbury]

An ex church I went to, plus one of the guys I work for sometimes has a bunch of the AT3000 series radios. I quite like them, didn't think they were too plasticy, that said I don't know how well they would hold out in a school... normally schools get the JTS kit for hires because it's quite a bit cheaper, the AT's are at a higher price point (well, they are here anyway). Handheld is actually pretty solid, the sliding part will come right off as well as just sliding down midway to get the batteries out, and it goes back on fine.

 

Hope this helps some!

[paulears]

You just prodded my memory. One of the clairvoyants who come to my venue has some JTS handhelds, and the struck me as quite nice sounding, now you've reminded me. I might have a look at those to see if they've got ready for the change. Cheers

[Lamplighter]

As promised some more information. The Trantec set of 12 frequencies in channel 38 works with various combinations of three of the 6 channel Sennheiser set in channel 70. 863.100 + 863.750 + 864.225 is a good bet for 15 channels of Trantec S5000 series. I will be in a position to test this properly at the end of the month if no one else beats me to it.

Brian

[addicted to sound]

Line 6 Radios haven't got Pro Audio distribution sorted out in the UK yet, which is why it has been hard to get demo systems, I have heard that this will be resolved soon. I had a play with the lapel system XD-V70 and it is robust affordable and sounds great! The only issue is 12 channels at once. If you don't need more than this then it could be a good route to go down.

[J Pearce]

SFL Group in Reading stock them for both hire and sales.