LawrenceH

Freak Pooer (sorry)

Oh that's a shame, was that with matched sensitivity on the horn to compensate? Might work better with the smaller cabs, assuming they use the same HF driver, might have more leeway. Stacking speakers in mirror when vertical seems less than ideal on a cramped stage because it takes the tweeters lower. Plus they still don't add entirely coherently. Splitting hairs on bass guitar I guess. But then that's what really good speakers are about!

It's that bottom-end reinforcement. I've wondered before with a good FR cab like the ones LFSys is building, whether rather than stacking two complete cabs and accepting lobing there's sense in having the pad on the compression driver variable, so you could switch that out to pair with a second, (cheaper) woofer-only model that just had the low-pass filter rom the crossover. Of course that depends on the tweeter using a pad and having the headroom, but they usually do. Even without a second cab model, you could potentially make the comp drivers switchable to achieve the same outcome.

On the other hand I've never seen a 'name' band toting a Dingwall, for example, and the only Warwick player on my radar ever is/was Zender. Before the inevitable deluge, yes I'm sure there are multiple examples to prove my ignorance but that's the point But Hofner is a brand I'd associate more with guitars, more with jazz, and more with players on the continent - not so much the Anglosphere.

Great info on this thread! From my own thread the other day on jazz bass component weight (which I'd encourage others to participate in): Jap 75RI jazz: 773g Jap Aerodyne Jazz: 703g Also from an eBay seller I enquired of, Jap 75RI jazz: 740g Reported on talkbass, 2 Fender replacement roasted maple jazz necks came in around 680g. I'd definitely aim for under 800 as the 773g one ain't particularly light to me. For tuners there's also the 35g Gotoh Carbon-o-lite but they are pretty spendy. I bought some of the Gotoh GRL510C (the slightly heavier 12mm version) via eBay and sucked it up on customs duty.

Don't take this as a dampener, but rather a way of avoiding disappointment due to unrealistic expectations - the ABRSM grades are not designed as a linear progression as far as hours put in per grade. The estimated Total Qualification Time for preparing for grade 5 is 3x that for grade 1, with 2x the Guided Learning Time (ie lessons). See page 6 of the piano syllabus if you want more details, or not, because the estimated are optimistic IMO and especially so for an adult learner once you hit the higher grades!

This came up in the Sky Arts thread (where I also mentioned Robbie Shakespeare to general blanks). For some reason they've got to be punk/new wave/prog to get the basschat radar pinging!

Being nice to sound techs is common sense I think. But I don't think that precludes me noting that, as it becomes more about driving complex software interfaces, a surprising number of them aren't actually very good at mixing music with their ears. One thing I have noticed, and which was corroborated chatting to a touring engineer for the band of an old friend at a gig this weekend, is that a lot of house systems appear to be EQ'ed for an empty room. He said once the audience turns up, he often ends up having to push a ton of mids through the mains to compensate system EQs. The perils of preset system design.

I believe there are some nuances that tend to get ignored or downplayed when it comes to people's subjective preferences, despite the subject being done to death in other ways. Especially when standing right next to a cab, dispersion matters, and related to that, comb filtering (from multiple drivers) matters. Multiple stacked 10s only sum to a coherent point source well below 1kHz. Above that you're going to start to get lobing. Everyone's heard this when adding a second cab. It doesn't just get universally louder, it gets bassier. Cab shape, especially height, matters. A generic single 15 mounted low down is going to sound smoother than a generic 410 (limited HF dispersal, no comb filtering). The filtering aspect isn't necessarily obvious in a single listening test - but put that cab into different acoustic spaces and you're going to get greater apparent inconsistencies between spaces. I suspect one of several reasons an 810 is favoured is that the comb filtering gets smeared out at a given listening position due to the complexity of the summing pattern. Add to that the use of similar/same drivers across multiple manufacturers and you could easily develop a 'sound' you associate with a particular speaker size. Especially drivers like Eminence with characteristic breakup peaks for particular models. TLDR I believe there are some practical differences in how different size drivers might be perceived standing up close.

As I said, the 15 minute turnaround ones are generally fine. The ones I'm complaining about I'm talking from the perspective of a punter as much as a player.

Nah 15 minutes is often how long it takes as an audience member to get served/go to the loo/go out for a quick cig in between bands! Tbh though those are rarely the gigs where I have had or heard the most egregious issues. Rough and ready is fine, it's when they have no interest in improving the sound as they go within the realms of the possible. The process seems to be (rant time): 1. Get the drums huge as f**k, especially subby reverberant kick with a beater click that sounds like clipping. Add Phil Collins snare. But it's a funk band? Doesn't matter. 2 Sit a thin, heavily compressed vocal firmly on top. 3. Get something else (who knows what?) rumbling indistinctly through the subs (and subs only) to destroy any semblance of rhythmic tightness. 4. Sit back and chat to the lighting guy, scroll on phone, or visibly do nothing for the remaining 45 mins even though the actual music is sounding awful and you can't hear the guitar, keys and bass that between them are providing all harmonic context and melodic counterpoint. 5. (Optional) log on to the livesound subreddit and establish dominance. 6a (Very optional) belatedly notice that two of the instruments you can't hear are trading solos on what turns out to be the second-last song. Turn up the mids your preset had previously carved out until they're actually audible, in time for the solos to end. 6b. Leave it like that for the last song just to tantalise the audience with what might have been. Once in a while though you get someone really good and it's an absolute joy to behold. Suddenly these compact line arrays sound fantastic, the instruments are all beautifully placed in the mix and the vocal is so perfectly balanced it makes you want to cry.

@agedhorse I think you haven't met a lot of the 'engineers' working the rough end of the circuit, at least in the UK. People skills not always in abundance. I've noticed both as a player and a punter that mixing skills aren't either. Even at medium venues I noticed heavy reliance on presets and RTAs, little use of ears or musical understanding of genres. Quite a lot of them come from AV/theatre backgrounds and do live bands as a top-up. Touring engineers that go with bands are generally a different proposition. Though IMO they still rely too much on presets.

Depends how rough you are on your gear but I think the Fender-type grill cloth served well enough for a lot of users. Lightweight, easy to apply, looks classic

It did for these guys

Just to update that I did another reset of the desk and reinstalled the latest version of MixPad, and this time all worked without a hitch. I've set the wireless to 5Ghz in case that was the issue, but really have no clue what was stopping it working previously. Just hoping it never recurs! Anyway, a test and play around with an SM58 and some good headphones leaves me very impressed, things sound good. I will definitely (over)use that double tracker effect. Channel compressors sound very good and versatile, lack of sidechain filtering notwithstanding. I think the app layout could be more versatile but the quick channel presets are good enough starting points that it's worth persevering with, just to build up some useful presets. Those who use Mixing Station, is there a way of straightforwardly transferring Mixpad-derived settings? I notice there are no hardware pads on the mic inputs, has anyone found this a problem in practice with e.g. kick drum mics?

No need, the resistance of even 1mm2 copper core is less than 0.02 ohms/meter. And as John says the amp rating for cable is based on continuous, sustained current. That means running it at that rating for long enough that it reaches temperature equilibrium, and failure mode is by melting the insulation. You just wouldn't ever reach anything near that in a speaker. Given that flexibility isn't that useful or desirable inside a speaker, I just use offcuts of T&E after tripping off the outer insulation

Peter's advice, and courteous patience, is worth a lot more than the price anyone here is paying for it. The only completely foolproof, stable, reliable MIDI I've used that involved a computer was in the days when Atari ST ruled the roost. Sadly I don't think it's feasible to expect ANY MIDI gear to work out of the box across multiple OS, interfaces, device hardware and updates thereof. Especially when you consider how important MIDI is to the OS manufacturer, ie not in the least. Meanwhile I'm having the devil of a time getting an Allen & Heath digital mixer to just talk to it's dedicated (and entirely mandatory) control app, and they are industry leaders with a relatively huge development team. The FI4 manual layout could be done several different ways, but FWIW seems fine to me. It can't be ordered in a way that anticipates every use-case scenario and it seems fair enough that it prioritises basic function for less technically ambitious users, with other info present but less prominent.

Yes, I've installed first v1.2.2 and then uninstalled and installed 1.1.3 on my Windows 11 laptop. However just heard back from the seller that it had the latest firmware so that becomes less likely as an issue. Have put a query on the A&H forum, when I get the chance to be next to it during office hours I'll call their support line, I've read they're generally helpful

I didn't mention but I have also tried v1.1 as I did spot the firmware version might be a potential issue. No luck. Network is not set to connect automatically

Regarding reliability... Received the mixer, did a factory reset and attempted to connect using the MixPad app on an Android device. Error message 'failed to connect'. Repeated with a Windows 11 laptop. Nothing, can't even see the device in the MixPad menu (and using IP address doesn't work). Both apparently connect to the CQ wireless network but that's as far as it goes. Not a great start and exactly what I was afraid of using computers for live work!

I've not had to deal with double-action rods before, but with a single-action with bullet adjustment, I've found clamping the neck up to a slight backbow useful. That way the clamps take up the tension and the nut moves easily to take up the slack. Would that work here?

Thank you - hoping that works regardless of which OS are running the app. Looking forward to getting hold of it and having a fiddle - I've downloaded the app but a lot of features can't be accessed on the demo. Notably, there are no libraries so no presets/quick channels or ability to change FX. The quick channel feature looks fairly essential when trying to throw together a mix in a hurry - what do people do who are using Mixing Station, which I assume isn't able to use those?

Yup absolutely right Lozz, though the bass doesn't exhibit obvious neck dive when worn. But those tuners are unnecessarily chunky. Annoyingly there doesn't seem to be an ultralight version of the 70s style tuners so changing them involves drilling new holes. I do have some Gotoh Resolite GRL510C12 - hard to get in the UK - and they're only 180g for the complete set. So I can lose an impressive 265g off the headstock. Worth noting though that the Gotoh clover isn't quite the same as the Fender one, and the shaft is a little shorter

I can definitely see an obsession building. Scratch plate? Pah! That's 100g of dead weight with the screws! If I bought a lathe I could mill up a titanium string tree and save 3 grams.

I've been investigating lightening the load of my main player. I measured weights of various components and since I've put in the work thought I may as well share, it might be a useful resource for anyone else thinking about weight reduction on a jazz bass or looking to put together a bitsa. Haven't fully dismantled it so don't have separate weights for control plate components or pickups, but I'll try and revisit at a later date next time I restring. Cheap-o Ikea digital scales so expect a small %age inaccuracy, though it did test ok on some kitchen weights . Also taken a few measurements from an Aerodyne jazz for comparison, less than 300g lighter but strangely feels like a bigger difference. If anyone else has some components to add please chip in! Different tuner designs, original BBOT/high mass bridges, pickups, covers etc. Also neck and bodies as it's useful to see where the weight comes from and what the variance is. Will try and add some pics at some point too Japanese Fender 75RI: Neck (maple board) 773g String tree 7g Tuners (Fender 70s style) 445g (111g each) 3-bolt neck plate plus bolts 66g Pickguard 94g Pickguard screws 6g Control plate 148g Fender Deluxe Bass Bridge 106g Body (ash) plus DiMarzio Model J pickups 2682g Strings 75g Total: 4402g (9.70lb) Fender Aerodyne Jazz: Neck (defretted, epoxied rosewood board) 703g Tuners 370g (92.5g each) String tree 7g 4 bolt neck plate plus bolts 64g Body (basswood) fully loaded (pots, bridge, P/J pickups) 2899g Strings 75g Total: 4118g (9.08lb) CTS 250k pots solid shaft from my spares drawer 14g Hope this is useful info to someone!