The Hamer of In-Ear Wireless Systems...

[veatch]

Trying to put a bullet into the on stage monitors. For both space reasons and being able to hear ourselves. We are using a Mackie DL1601 or whatever board, so we have access to our own mix (so anyone getting an earful of feedback only has himself to blame...)

Looking for something that is reasonably priced (we don't gig enough to pay off anything we buy any time soon. ...still paying off the Mackie board... :/ ) but sounds good and is (hopefully) frequency flexible.

Tnx.

[hamerhead]

Don't do it.

[veatch]

I've been trying to avoid this for a number of years. I like monitors...

But our last few gigs, i might as well not have a monitor - coverage sucks and i simply can't hear the vocals. We push the amps across the stage, so the only thing in the monitors are vox, sax, and acoustic guitar (which is rare - only 2 or 3 songs with acoustic...)

I'm sure if a dropped $6k on EAW microwedges, all would be fine, but that ain't happening, unless i fake my own death and cash in on the life insurance. (and now i can't even do that since i joked about it...)

[geoff_hartwell]

Wait, so you have wireless control over your floor monitor and not digging it?

I have experience with the mackie app and that same mixer and have been very happy.

One of the Irish bands I play with insisted on in ears for a while with the presonus mixer and the personal monitoring was not great. After lots of frustration the bandleader went with the mackie dl and we went back to monitors. Go glad! Especially with a low stage volume and personal control I love it long time. There's usually QSC k12s as monitor and I have the sound guy put me on aux 6, I fire up the iPhone or ipad and we're good to go. For smaller gigs a jbl eon 10 is killer as a floor monitor. Honestly anything will work. One of the keys players uses a little lunchbox like the mackie srm150 and that's it. I prefer to have more on the floor. In any case, Happy happy, joy, joy!

Now, that being said, the corporate band I play with (typically 15 or more pieces) uses the aviom system on stage with wireless in ears and it's basically the same principal but with miles of cabling and individual monitor controller units. It's awesome, but there's a lot that always needs to be re-cabled or switched around physically, power supply problems etc. And then you either have to have a physical cable for your in ears or a wireless system for each mix. Ugh. In this case there's a sound crew to set up and tear down but I wouldn't want to have to move it around and troubleshoot that shit. Much better suited to a super flexible studio setup with headphone stations.

As far as wireless in-ears my experiences with both shure and sennheiser have been stellar. But I really prefer not to use them.

I would say if you can keep the stage volume reasonable, you can have a great vocal and monitor mix with your mackie setup!

[scottcald]

Is it an overall thing or is there one person whose volume is necessitating this? Is everyone having a problem hearing things? Maybe take 2 of your speakers and place them as sidefills so they cover more area.

And like geoff says, Shures are good if you're going that route. Haven't used Sennheisers.

[veatch]

Stage volume is very manageable. Drummer has good control over his dynamics. The drummer uses in-ears (wired, not wireless), and hears the vocals fine. The sax player and I have monitors, and generally can't hear jack. The sax player s looking at a galaxy audio unit, which are very affordable. Hopefully that doesn't translate to cheap...

[tomteriffic]

Galaxy has historically been the top of the pile for mini monitors. Takes a crapload of power to wake them up, though. Look into something like the Mackie Freeplay. Floor or stand, loads of power and pretty hi-fi.

[scottcald]

I haven't used Galaxy, though they get good reviews. I think bang for buck they're probably good. Dedicate a rehearsal just to tweaking them so you don't have to try to do that on the fly at a gig. And if you feel too confined, try pulling one ear out to get better room feel or put up a mic for ambience if you have a spare mic and channel.