Question regarding Live setups and PAs

[Shreddy]

Every show I've played live I had used the venues direct box. Due to this there has been many times where I played mono due to their limitations.

I think its time that I get my own direct box(es), looking at them at musicians friend.com there are lots of them and some are really expesive and some are cheap.

I need info on these things all I thought they did was provide a 1/4" to Balanced jack conversion but it appears they do quite a bit more, ground lifts, transformers, and all kinds of other goodies.

What I would like is a stereo direct box so if the venue was capable of running as such they could.

[Spacehog]

I have a couple of dirt-cheap Behringer DI20 boxes, which will either work as stereo DI boxes, or as mono DI plus splitter boxes. They run off battery or phantom power, and have ground-lifts and a 20db pad. I remember reading some benefits one way or another about ones with transformers (I think it's that the ones with transformers give you completely isolated circuits so there's no chance of mains hum, but I could be mistaken) but I've never had any problem with any of the DI boxes I've used.

Martin

[ImaX]

I also use a DI20, it's cheap, small and stereo :-)

Most (or every?) DI-Box has a ground lift, which allows you to seperate ground in case of humming, so it's more than a goodie. I' not sure about the difference between transformer-boxes and those without, but if the DI20 has none it seems to alright also without one.

[Over The Edge]

Ed,

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Talk to Mark Johnson at the AH GC and tell him
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FL
www.franklucas.net

[ChrisMcCoy]

Do you actually have a sound company that runs stereo in a nightclub ?
Those are pretty hard to come by around here. I have been running mono for 18 years...why? because the stereo effects will never be fully realized in a bar, when the pa is running mono...besides, most bar goers really don't know the difference...
My live rig includes a rackmount behringer 16ch mixer so I can get the levels where I want them before I send a mix to house. From the mixer I go out to a simple whirwind IMP-2, and give the mix to front of house from there. 1 channel to the board with the instructions to the house engineer...keep it loud please ! I am competing with the guitarist and drummer :)
Hope this info is useful !

[hephiroth]

i've had some bars run me stereo, but most do mono. i typically don't complain because i don't use many stereo effects...but i do prefer to have it stereo. i think you get a richer sound that way even if you're not doing any stereo stuff at all. besides, most bars are just lazy--they probably could run you stereo, but a lot of bar sound guys are idiots who just do that as weekend job and they don't know a whole lot about what's happening w/ their equipment...or they just don't care. having your own DI boxes could help, but you're still at the mercy of the sound guy...and that can be...scary. haha

-jeff-

[Kurzweilfreak]

My bands have never played with the sound run by the "house" sound guy. We either run our own sound, or hire out someone specifically to do it. The guys that we've hired before do really good work because usually we hire the same guys, so they know how we're supposed to sound. Or we run our own sound from the stage. That's a little more difficult as it's hard to be performing and start changing the mix in the middle of a song, but at least you have the ultimate control over your sound.

We're using a Behringer MX3242X mixer (we use all 16 of the "main" channels) followed by a Behringer DSP9024 to really polish off the sound. The first gig we did with the mixer was nuts. No one really knew how to use the thing or set it up, so we ended up doing the first set with NO monitors. The drummer looked like he was gonna cry because he couldn't hear anything. *lol* Also, the building we were in apparently had some SEVERE grounding issues that caused all kinds of weirdness that we still can't explain.

I've never used a direct box with my keyboards in the few years I've been playing and have never really had a problem with it. I usually run my keyboards to my keyboard amp (for monitoring purposes) and then from the line out of the amp to the mixer. Never tried running in stereo, but I've understood that it doesn't really translate well in a live setting due to how far apart the mains usually are and creates some weird wide spacing effects.

[ImaX]

Togakurve: I had the same experiences with my band some years ago 8) we also used a Behringer Mixer, aned had to build up everything hours before the gig to have enough time to find all the problems in the PA...

I always play stereo - I once played mono at home and then plugged in the second channel. In my opinion it made a big differnece between mono and stereo.

[hephiroth]

I always play stereo - I once played mono at home and then plugged in the second channel. In my opinion it made a big differnece between mono and stereo.

i also think it makes a *huge* difference and i hate being plugged in mono...but sometimes you just have to live w/ it

-jeff-

[John]

There was a discussion on stereo versus mono in live gigs a few months ago. My conclussion from it was that when the mains were a pretty good distance apart you patch your left & right outs into two seperate mono channels on your mixing board then you use pan (not balance) to give a "slight" stereo image.

Must have been on the old forum, I couldn't find it.