Congo Kid - thoughts?

[boardingbob]

Hi all

 

This is one for those familar with the ETC Congo family and the new Congo Kid in particular.

 

Really interested to know what you think it's negative (and positive) points are. We are a 300 seat theatre/dance/lecture/rock and roll type venue about to replace our wheezy old Strand 300 with something compact and flexible and at the moment the Congo Kid is out in front of the field,with the Pearl Tiger Touch a respectible second choice. It seems to be a good combo of live busking & recorded cue elements, well suited to our low number of movers and at a great price (aprox £4K).

 

There just has to be something wrong with it....

[neild]

We have Congo and Congo JR at work, and I use the Tiger Touch regularly when freelancing, so I hope I can offer you some thoughts. They're both great desks, and the newer versions of the Congo software have sorted out most of the issues that they had previously. Im a not so secret convert to Congo...

 

The avo is great for busking, and the touch screen makes it so easy to use palettes and groups. That said, although it can handle cue stacks much better than ever before, I still wouldn't pick an avo to plot a theatre show on.

 

The congo is very easy to plot a full cue stack into, you can also do stacks onto subs. Busking now uses a similar format to the avo kit with 'direct selects' as the palettes, although to be fair on the smaller congo stuff there aren't always really enough buttons directly accessible to have an easy time busking with lots of different kit.

 

The big downside to congo is that the whole programming style is completely backward to everything else. Once you accept that though, it is a really powerful desk, and I have to say, I think I would now recommend it. (2 years ago, I honestly never thought I'd say that!)

 

Please feel free to PM me if you want to ask anything specific.

 

Neil

[tommulliner]

I have programmed the congo before and my training was as such: Here are groups, here are presets, this is how you record, ask me if you need help. I managed to plot an entire show, including using 10 Movers (4 Mac 250 Kryptons, 4 250 washes and 2 500s) with around 150 cues in under 3 hours without any further help. This did include using such tools as palletes, gel finder, labels, independants and effects which shows that the desk is fairly easy to pick up, even when using the advanced features. I haven't busked with the desk, but have seen others do it and it seemed fairly easy and minimal to set up and generally nice to work with.

 

Hopefully my short example shows the ease that the congo is to pick up first time out with minimal training.

All the best, Tom.

[Andrew Edwards]

We have Jnr with the 40ch master fader wing. This is pretty much what the Kid is.

We went from a 300 too.

 

Congo is a great all rounder.

The custom channel layouts are very useful.

Traditional cue stacks are a breeze.

Quick and easy to set up chases.

Devices are handled well and you can get them doing something interesting pretty quickly.

Cheap remote (with an iPod touch and a wireless router).

Fantastic product support.

Frequent updates.

 

The syntax can take some getting used to, but it is less button presses than the 300.

It does run on embedded windows and can take some time to start up. I've never had any probs so far but then I haven't taxed it that much.

 

Not had a play with the Tiger Touch, looks nice. Seems more a of a busker...

 

I'd demo them both.

 

HTH,

 

Andrew.

[richard_cooper]

I'll echo the sentiments above regarding the Congo platform. There is opne thing I have noticed on the Kid as opposed to a Jnr with a master playback wing. I can't be certain about this, but I don't think you can use the playbacks (submasters, or whatever) as direct select, the buttons found on the playback wing for this have been removed. The data sheet also speaks of "14 direct select keys".

 

Richard

[richard_cooper]

Also, and more obviously there is no screen with the masters so direct selects would be tricky anyway!

[boardingbob]

The avo is great for busking, and the touch screen makes it so easy to use palettes and groups. That said, although it can handle cue stacks much better than ever before, I still wouldn't pick an avo to plot a theatre show on.

 

This was my concern. It can dotheatre cues, but that's not the same as doing them well. The way the info is layed out on the cue stack is pretty poor.

And with only 4 Mac 250 Entours and 5 LED floods the beautiful & powerful ml palettes would be woefully underused.

 

The congo is very easy to plot a full cue stack into, you can also do stacks onto subs. Busking now uses a similar format to the avo kit with 'direct selects' as the palettes, although to be fair on the smaller congo stuff there aren't always really enough buttons directly accessible to have an easy time busking with lots of different kit.

 

This is where the Congo Kid hopefully fits in - it has a 40 fader wing with 2 assignable 'bump' buttons to each sub. Just have to work out exactly what they can and can not do...

 

I'll echo the sentiments above regarding the Congo platform. There is opne thing I have noticed on the Kid as opposed to a Jnr with a master playback wing. I can't be certain about this, but I don't think you can use the playbacks (submasters, or whatever) as direct select, the buttons found on the playback wing for this have been removed. The data sheet also speaks of "14 direct select keys"

 

I'll have to look into this one, thanks for bringing it up.

[Ali2580]

Hi

 

Just to add in here to what has been previously said.. (My experience - programmed and operated the Congo at a few venues - the desk I use the most everyday at work and have been on the Congo training at ETC in London.)

 

Congo has come a long way in the software updates that it now runs and the support from ETC really is great on anything with the console. Avo is the better console for busking but as said, the cue stack on it compared to the Congo is not the best however - I've done many a music gig, busking and theatre cue stacking on the Congo both very easily. Yes, maybe not as easy as other consoles in certain area's but it has worked and worked well. As said, ETC made the Congo so that the syntax programming is totally different however, if you don't get the hang of it you can simply change it.

 

ETC design: You enter what you want, what it is and what you want to do. (e.g. 41, Channel, @ 50%)

You can change it to: 41 @100%

 

If you keep it the ETC way, it can take a bit of getting used to but if you don't like it you can very easily change it - something which I think is carrying onto the Congo Kid. As Tom said, you don't need to spend hours getting the hang of it - I was able to do my first show on it within a few hours. It is very simple and if the Congo Kid is anything like it's older siblings, it will be a very good small desk. But, I'd get demo's and see which you / your crew prefer but from personal experience, the Congo can handle a lot from both theatrical operation and live busking.

 

If you've got any questions, just give me a buzz.

 

A

[EmmaThompson]

Have a feeling I spoke to a lady from your establishment at ABTT, and I will echo what I said to her - feel free to come down for some training and have a demo of the console for a week. it's the same with any desk - you'll only find out if you like it and if it works for you when you actually start using it.

 

If you want to come down, drop me an email: emma@avolites.com

[Tomo]

I'll echo the sentiments above regarding the Congo platform. There is opne thing I have noticed on the Kid as opposed to a Jnr with a master playback wing. I can't be certain about this, but I don't think you can use the playbacks (submasters, or whatever) as direct select, the buttons found on the playback wing for this have been removed. The data sheet also speaks of "14 direct select keys"

 

I'll have to look into this one, thanks for bringing it up.

On Congo Kid the Direct Select buttons share with the softkeys above the encoders, with the four buttons to the left of the LCD toggling between Direct Select pages and Softkey mode.

 

The Master Playbacks can also be used as direct content - the difference is that these don't auto-populate, instead you put the 'stuff' (Palettes/Groups etc) you want in the places you want, so you can mix'n'match as required.

 

As Emma said above - you should try the consoles out.

[alabamaman]

Hi

 

Just to add in here to what has been previously said.. (My experience - programmed and operated the Congo at a few venues - the desk I use the most everyday at work and have been on the Congo training at ETC in London.)

 

Congo has come a long way in the software updates that it now runs and the support from ETC really is great on anything with the console. Avo is the better console for busking but as said, the cue stack on it compared to the Congo is not the best however - I've done many a music gig, busking and theatre cue stacking on the Congo both very easily. Yes, maybe not as easy as other consoles in certain area's but it has worked and worked well. As said, ETC made the Congo so that the syntax programming is totally different however, if you don't get the hang of it you can simply change it.

 

ETC design: You enter what you want, what it is and what you want to do. (e.g. 41, Channel, @ 50%)

You can change it to: 41 @100%

 

If you keep it the ETC way, it can take a bit of getting used to but if you don't like it you can very easily change it - something which I think is carrying onto the Congo Kid. As Tom said, you don't need to spend hours getting the hang of it - I was able to do my first show on it within a few hours. It is very simple and if the Congo Kid is anything like it's older siblings, it will be a very good small desk. But, I'd get demo's and see which you / your crew prefer but from personal experience, the Congo can handle a lot from both theatrical operation and live busking.

 

If you've got any questions, just give me a buzz.

 

A

 

Hi,

I'm gonna use a Congo Jr. this summer, and this thing of changing commands really interests me. How can you do that?

[Albatross]

Hi,

We have a Congo Full size here and have had it for about 4 years now. We also upgraded from a Strand 300. The RPN command line way of driving the desk is definately backwards to the way the old Strand boards operated, but if you take the time to learn it you'll be flying along. It's not that tricky at all.

 

I've not yet seen the 'Kid' but the functionality of the Senior is far superior to the Strand 300. In my opinion it is a great system for both Theatre and busking; we do both here. :-)

[Tomo]

Hi,

I'm gonna use a Congo Jr. this summer, and this thing of changing commands really interests me. How can you do that?

Browser > File > Exit to System Settings, General tab, "At Mode" option.

 

Turning on At Mode flips Channel, Group and Effects around to [CH] 1 [@Level] 50. (Double-digit entry.)

 

There is a further option of "At Mode Point Mode", which gives you single-digit level entry:

Eg: For 50%, you type [5], and for 57%, you'd type [5][.][7]