EBS_freak

Re: impressions - there shouldn’t be any difference between where you have your impressions taken but realistically there is. The main issues are that most ear impressions are taken for hearing aids and those impressions don’t don’t go past the second bend in the ear. There are instructions supplied by IEM manufacturers but overall, the quality of the impression depends upon how much care is take by the person taking the impression to insure that it is good. Additionally, it’s really, really important that a bite block is used. For standard IEM impression, a half open (that’s referring to your mouth) position should be used. For singers that belt it out, you may want to consider a fully open impression. The amount of clothed mouth impressions that I’ve seen pasted on Instagram makes me want to facepalm. I’ve even seen at shows that I’ve been working at, impressions taken whilst the person having those impressions taken is in full conversation with the person that is taken that impression. The chances of the resulting IEMs fitting properly is zero. I would always have impressions taken by somebody that deals with IEMs over a standard audiologist that doesn’t know a great deal specifically about IEMs - but that’s just me. With regard to Lugs quad, I don’t believe their standard offering is a dual low - Nick requested the dual low in his quad. I think their dual low comes in on their fiver driver model. OK driver count is an interesting subject - the more drivers you add to a design, the more difficult it is to get them sounding right due to the problems of getting the crossovers right and crucially the phase alignment right. In short, you will get added benefit from adding drivers because the headroom will increase significantly however, that is no good if the phase alignment and frequency curves all go to pot. Due to crossover designs in IEMs being largely physical (done by damping etc) it’s a notoriously difficult art to master - and as I mentioned before, the larger manufacturers buy themselves out of the problems of multidriver tuning issues by having balanced armatures designed to their spec to fit in with their crossover designs. Smaller companies can simply not afford to R and D costs associated with minimum orders required from the balanced armature manufacturers... let alone the resulting order quantities to make it financial viable. For example, the quad balanced armatures of 64 and JH are are single tubed quad armatures in a single case. That alone helps solve a lot of the phase problems that you would get if you start trying to combine 4 single drivers into one tube. Similarly, if you ditch the idea of a single tube, you’d have to ensure tube length is exactly equal and damped exactly the same (remember that these things are hand assembled and scoped for phase coherence - so this would be VERY labour intensive) for each ear and the of course, they would have to match left and right. Then there’s the problem of housing the tubes in the outlet that goes into your ears - there’s a finite amount of space there and again, due to the shape of your ear not being uniform, an extra source of introducing phase issues. In reality, you can’t do this successfully unless you are having those multidriver units made for you. Having said that, you can get dual housed balanced armatures off the shelf - and it would explain why a lot of custom IEM manufacturers stop at a 6 driver IEM. (Dual top, dual mid, dual low with 3 bores at the output). With regards to size, there is a difference in physical size with driver count but this is not as significant as you may think. My 12 driver Roxannes were quite big (but not so you would notice them particularly) - and that was down to the screw on cable fixing more than anything. My 12 driver 64 audios are actually pretty tiny in comparison - that are about 1mm thicker than my other half’s triple driver 64s that she uses for the gym. The biggest influence on an IEM driver size is actually your ear. If your concha (check out pic on google images if not sure) is small, then obviously, there is less space to cram in drivers, therefore the IEM will have to be built out more to fit in the drivers. In reality, it’s a non issue - most ears will accommodate high driver IEMs without you looking like Shrek. Even the 18 driver from 64 is physically pretty small - they certainly know how to cram them in.

I haven’t got direct experience of the the Lugs quads but based on other quads that I have experience of, I can tell you what the difference are likely to be based on the differences in the driver types. The UEs have a a balanced armature in the high and a dynamic driver in the mid and another in the low. The Lugs have 4 balanced armatures and Nick asked for his to be configured as one in the high, one in the mid and a dual low. In a nutshell, the following is generally true of balanced armatures - 1. Incredibly detailed 2. Moderate headroom 3. Not especially good at bass 4. Clinical sound signature 5. More expensive than dynamics and generally... for dynamics (although this depends on the spec/size of driver) - 1. Not as detailed as balanced armature (but still detailed!) 2. Greater headroom 3. Good at bass 4. Warmer sound signature 5. Cheaper than balanced armatures 6. Larger casing and earlier models needed porting So looking at a standard balanced armature quad with dual lows, the presence of two drivers in the lows gives increased bass response and crucially headroom. The bass is very tight and precise. Compare that to a UE6, there only needs to be one dynamic in the low to give a similar bass response and amount of headroom and the presence of a dynamic in the mids tends to make the UE6 have a notably warmer timbre than its balanced armature based counterparts. The trade off of is that the definition in the lows and mids may appear to be a bit more “smeared” - but unless you A/B the two together, I would wager most people wouldn’t even notice. The UE6 retains the balanced armature in the highs for all that lovely sparkle, detail and “air” which dynamics don’t produce nearly as well as a balanced armature. So why UE6 - they typically come in cheaper than the quads from the main manufacturers but offer similar performance in the lows - which is the attribute you spend most of your money on to achieve. The UE6 gives a performance to rival quads at a cheaper price. Lugs however, being a relatively newcomer to the scene - are producing very budget friendly high driver count IEMs that undercut the bigger names. After exchanging PMs with Robert on fb, I’m pretty confident he knows what he’s doing and has plenty of experience in the market in previous jobs... but as I say, I’ve no direct experience of having any Lugs in my own lugs. Worth noting, there’s a lot of newcomers to IEMs that are shoving many drivers in custom shells without any regard for damping, tuning or phase alignment... so be aware for looking for bargains... cos you could be buying tripe. One of the significant differences between the big boys and the smaller companies is that they have the buying power to spec drivers to manufacturer out deficiencies in the inherent problems you get when you start combining multiple drivers into an IEM design. For example, 64, UE and JH all have their own proprietary drivers whereas other manufacturers make do with whatever they can get “off the shelf” so to speak. Hope this helps!

Absolutely - I use them in all kinds of situations.

Just how many ways are you trying to kill rock n roll?

If you’d like yeah!

In which case, don’t bother with a pre... get a digital mixing desk... that’ll give you a very powerful EQ section and dynamics processor to use with your FRFR.... and gear you up ready for IEMs...

And PS - I’ll get you on IEMs yet

That setup with the Alix, I would take that rig over 99.9% of other rigs that I see out there. Will be an astonishingly good setup - as you’ll no doubt hear. Do give them an A/B though because that Fishman is also a great pre - so let your ears rule you, not the price tag!

Sorry guys. Done it again in Keytar thread. 🤦‍♂️

Ooh. Handbags. Done it again it would seem.

“A dash” ?

I would imagine that the blocks in the Helix are more than configurable enough for you to cop pretty much any tone you are looking for within reason. Yes there’s a community for sharing profiles but there’s lots of opportunity for you to go alone to get your own unique tone - perhaps some of the diehard Helix fans here will be able to offer you some hands on experience or be able to get together with you to show you the art of the possible. The trouble is that if you go into a shop, the probability of finding somebody that could do a decent job of showing the unit off, especially from a bass centric point of view, is likely to be very low. Have a dig in the helix thread and see who pops up.

Don’t buy an amp just cos it says his name on the amp. Copping a tone is more than buying signature gear.

We are doing well so far... no “Guest” being added to the front of anybody’s names yet...

No - the Kemper is unique in that respect. It’s the only thing I know of that has mastered the DIY “profiling” element of modelling. If you know what flavour of preamp you are into, then that may steer you towards certain channel strips or remakes of (eg Tech 21 and JHS are just two folks that have put “famous” channel strips in a pedal type enclosure). Before you get too overboard about it though, the audience won’t be able to tell/care the difference between the two. Half the fun is seeing the subtle nuances between pres but on the gig, well it can get a little lost. If you are an IEM user however, that’s where you can really begin to appreciate the subtlety.

It all depends, some channel strips have very few things to tweak on them and have an inherent sound baked in. The reason that a lot of high end desks are so in demand is because of this. “Transparent” pres is actually a bit of weird thing to say when selling a pre - because it’s usually the colouration that is the appealing thing about a pre. On desks, it’s usually the saturation, either derived from FET or valves that gives the sound and perceived “warmth” and “fatness”. Anyway, if you want to have some options without spending on channel pres and things like Kempers, the cut down baby Helix is where I would be probably looking as a starting point. It will give you flexibility if you want to play with different tones and timbres.

It wouldn’t be a basschat thread without the following... so I’ll say it now. ”Barefaced” oh crumbs. That’s gone and done it.

Since when is gigging every weekend a measure of coolness?

Make sure you gain things properly so you don’t get distortion. Take your time to get your mix right, little changes at a time. Have fun - and feed back how you got on tomorrow!

Shall not

A channel strip is a piece of hardware in its own right. https://www.studiocare.com/ssl-xlogic-alpha-channel.html?___store=default&utm_source=GoogleShopping&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI5t6k3fTW3wIVBJ7VCh2vRgnCEAQYBiABEgKpIfD_BwE It’s an either or thing.

God damn you. I coined RickenTractor!

Wouldn’t suggest you go Kemper as that was to do guitar duties and everything. Just saying go along and try channel strips as opposed to looking at just an eq that is marketed towards bass. Of course, the form factor may also be a factor in your decisions.

Like duck it is.

I like API but personally don’t like for bass.