how to get a good tone for a lead guitar on dynachord mixer

sorry the lograthmic scale has not come the way i have typed

linear scale 10k . can compare it to a speedo metre of a car as it doubles when u go up

1..2..3..4..5..6..7..8..9..10

lograthmic how it works on an amp -

1.....2......3....4.5678910

Shane

I am certainly no expert on amplifiers, I have a very BASIC understanding of electronics. Most of what I know is from studying sound on different sites like Peavey and Yorkville, and my own personal experience running a PA for my band.

As I said earlier, an amp always provides 100% power regardless of where the volume knob is set. And again, that is not a volume knob at all. That control determines your amp's sensitivity to an input signal. It is like the gain on your mixer.

You use gain on your mixer to get the strongest (but clean) signal from your mic or instrument. As mics and instruments are different, you need this control. I have some Shure mics. They do not have that strong an output. So I have to turn gain up a bit on these. I have some Behringer mics, they have stronger output than the Shures, so I do not have to turn gain up as much on these.

The recommended method for setting gain on a mic or instrument is to sing loudly through the mic. Turn gain up until clipping occurs (red light comes on steady). Now back gain off until you no longer experience clipping (occasional blinking is OK).

A soundman also taught me this trick: Hold your open palm in front of the mic and turn up gain. Listen for feedback, then back the gain off slightly.

This insures the most powerful and clear signal from your mic.

Now you use your individual channel faders to set your mix. You probably want vocals in front, then drums, then guitar and bass. So this is what your faders allow you to do, set your mix.

Now your Master is the output. You also want a strong signal here without clipping. Again turn up and listen for feedback, and watch your clip lights.

Now you go to the crossover. Just like the gain on the individual channels on your mixer, you want the strongest clean input signal. So again, go up until you get clipping, then back down.

Now adjust the output on your crossover, using the volume controls for bass, mids, and highs.

Now you get to the amp. You have already maximized your signal. Your amp is getting a strong clean signal. You will probably be surprised that you do not have to turn the amp up much at all to get good full volume.

Your amp is putting out 100% at any setting. It doesn't hurt your amp in anyway for the volume to be only 1/4 of the way up. Your sound will not suffer at all. In fact, you will probably get a more powerful and clearer sound from your speakers than ever. Try and see.

Really, for me, I like to turn gain about 1/2. I get a good strong signal, no clipping, and I have plenty of headroom to go up later if I need to.

There are many opinions on how to run sound systems, I have seen many that recommend cranking the amp 100%. But I simply do not agree. You will have to turn everything else way down before the amp.

It is really not much different than your guitar into your amp. You can turn your guitar pickups all the way up. You will find you may only be able to crank your amp to 5 to get the volume you need.

Or, you can crank your guitar amp all the way up. What is going to happen? Man, your amp is going to howl and make all sorts of noise, because the sensitivity to input is maxed out. You have to turn your guitar down to 2. No way you can turn your guitar all the way up.

Do you understand what I'm saying?? You are going to get the same volume either way. But I am going to get a good clean sound, you are going to get all sorts of noise and feedback.

Try this with your guitar and amp and see for yourself. Then ask yourself if you should really crank your PA amp to max. It is no different than your guitar amp.

Guitar players that crank their amp to max want distortion. You never want your PA to distort, you want the cleanest sound possible.

when u say guitar amp u mean the guitar amp speaker ? right?

maybe you have your views on the amps just like i did before and i use to drive them the same way u do till i got the actual knwledge of what is happening in an amp. please dont misunderstand me. your experience has helped me a lot .

i crank up my amps full now . i crank it down unless my speaker is not compatible to my amps. on my cp2200 ev manual says to get the best settings - set the controls between 0db and -6db

Wes do u knw of any good Vocal effects unit which has a good Reverb and delay ?

Shane

Yes, we have different views. No way I am gonna crank my guitar amps full. Just gonna blow the amp. Plus they make all sorts of noise and hum.

The reason guitar players crank an amp is to get tube saturation. This is a natural distortion. Guitar players want distortion. But you do not want this with a PA system. With a PA you want the clearest, cleanest sound possible.

Just going in circles here, but your amp is always producing 100% power. Your volume is simply a sensitivity control that adjusts your amps sensitivity to an input signal.

By turning your amps to full, you are going to have to turn something else down. This is not good in the case of a microphone for instance, you want the strongest (but clean) signal possible.

And even with a guitar amp, you end up having to turn your guitar down. So you are not getting the full signal from your pickups. You certainly wouldn't want this with high gain pickups meant for distortion.

And I promise you get lots more noise and hum from your amp.

No, better to sock up the front end and come down on the back end. You'll get all the clean power you need without noise and hum.

But heh, it's a free world, do as you wish. But I sincerely think you've got it backwards.

the controls between 0db and -6db

This means: get the input signal in to a maximum of 0dB (highest possible without clipping) but never below 6dB (due to noise issues etc). So as Wes said: get the signals in as loud and clear as you can, mix the entire mix close to odB (I personally always use a -3dB as that leaves some room for uncompressed tracks). As soon as you've got to this point the volume of the poweramp should be set to whatever volume you need. Proper PA amps have little to no harmonic distortortion and as a result they don't color the sound much, if at all. If you pump the amp and want to control the volume going down on the mixer will result in a weak signal being send, which means more chance of interference and noise.

But heh, it's a free world, do as you wish. But I sincerely think you've got it backwards.

That pretty much sums it up.

hi wes

have u heard of these speakers

JBl SR 4735
Jbl SR 4731
Mpx 1100 jbl amps
mpx 1200 jbl amps
crossover m552 jbl

we are going to rent this stuff from a rental company for an outside function in a basket ball campus . i m just not able to find it on the net as i guess these models r discontinued
wes need your help

I am familiar with JBL speakers, but not those specific speakers. I was able to find various articles on the web on them. Even found specs.

JBL makes great speakers, I'm sure they will sound great.

thanks

any site in particular when i could check for the specs

Shane

Just type in the speaker names in Yahoo or Google, many sites will pop up, some with specs.

I had a very interesting experience last night that goes right along with what I've been talking about.

I went down to a local club last night, hoping to see a band. I was surprised to see the band hurrying into the club as I arrived as it was already 9:30, the time most bands start. My band always shows up around 8:00 so we have lots of time to set up our gear and do a soundcheck.

These were very young players, I later found out they were all underage. But the singer's father was there acting as their manager and chaperone.

The set up quickly but the singer was having lots of trouble with the PA. He was not getting much volume, but lots of squeaks, feedback howls, and pops. A couple of feedbacks were super loud and got reactions from the customers.

So, being the pest that I am :D , I went over and introduced myself to the singer and asked if I could look at his PA. They had a Mackie 808M powered mixer into a BBE Sonic Maximizer into a set of dual 15 Peaveys and two Nady floor monitors.

The singer had the PA set up much like you. He had both Masters (Mains and Monitors) maxed out. He had the individual channel gains at about 9 o'clock position. He had the individual channel volumes at about 10 o'clock. Like I said, this thing was making terrible noises. The drummer had a wireless headset, when he sang it sounded like a distortion box. I am not making this up.

So I told the singer I think I can get better volume without all the noise. He was nice enough to let me play with it. First, I turned the Masters all the way down. Then I turned up the channel gains as each singer spoke into the mic until the clip light came on. Then I backed off slightly. The singers gain ended up around 12 o'clock position, the drummer with the headsets around 2 o'clock. That is what gain is for. Different mics have different output. The drummers mic was weaker and needed more gain.

Then I turned the channel volumes up to 1/2. Then I slowly turned up the Masters. The singer was amazed. Before I even got to 10 o'clock position I was getting more volume than he had with the Masters maxed. It was quiet too with no feedback.

I also noticed the singer had Highs, Mids, and Lows EQ cut on both vocal channels, obviously to try to deal with the terrible feedback problems he normally gets. His vocals sounded very muffled. I turned both channels flat, now his voice had clarity.

I also turned both the Highs and Lows on the Sonic Maximizer down from about 2 o'clock position to about 10 o'clock. This cleaned up the sound even more, and took out a lot of low rumble you could hear.

Anyway, I ended up running the PA all night. I had a few problems as the singer was constantly walking all around including in front of his mains which caused a little feedback. So I had to watch him and come down a little at times. At other times I had to boost his volume a little. But really I was having a blast, I've run sound before and always enjoy it.

The singer came up later and thanked me, he said for once he was able to hear his own vocals clearly. This was a very loud band that played all Modern heavy rock like Tool, Godsmack, Staind and bands like that.

Anyway, not trying to be mean or anything like that, but these guys were maxing their amps out and it wasn't working well at all.

Dear Wes , guess u dint understand me . first of all i m not an amateur at sound . just like you r not . secondly the quality of stuff i use is no where compared to this tin pots.
i do my sound check the same way u do . put the masters down . and then check the individuals peaks of each channel using gain. definetly if i m playing for so many years i must be doing something right ,the reason y i m in demand . and i understand what mics should be used for drums. or any other related equipments

u dont have to drive the amps fully always . i have performed a gig using two T252 ev which is 800 watts . i bi amped the speaker runnin it two way with two seperate amps . EV2200 which is 800 at 4 ohms . i turned the knobs a little more than half and between 3/4 on the amp . to drive the two way at 400watt each way

i used a 4 core cable , the Nl4fc went to the speaker bi amp. +1,-1 went to the lows and +2/-2 went to the , mid/ highs accordingly

guess u will not understand me when i say the out put of the amps is directly propotionate to the output of the speakers.

my sound is always been clean n crystal never distorted for your information . n also started a sound rental businees here where i use only EV stuff. i dont bargain on quality .

as wes what you r sayin abt the amplifiers was the same thing i used to do earlier not crank them up fully .

but after studying whats actually happenin in the amps i have started to crank them up fully , guess it also depends on the quality of amps . i use Cp2200 ev amps
Could you explain what exactly it is, that is happening in the amp, that makes you crank them up fully? Are you talking about tube or solid state amps?

Shane

I am not calling you an amateur. You sound like you have lots of experience, and much better gear than me.

We simply disagree on how to get the most clean power to the speakers. I have seen opinions go both ways on this.

I simply agree with those that say you have to structure your gain starting from the pre-amp to the final amp.

Here is an interesting forum article where someone asked about this very subject. Yeah, this article agrees with my viewpoint. But that is not the point. It is the explanation I want you to see, much better than I could explain myself. Read the 4 or 5 responses.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/printthread.php?t=603269

You don't have to agree with this, you could probably find many articles supporting your opinion. And that is a good thing. :D

Not trying to argue with you, but I am trying to show some good information supporting my position.

dear wes , its good to learn from each other as we all want what is best for our performance . i def agree that you r more experienced then me in this field.

regarding amps , like i said i use Cp2200 Ev amps, in this amps u have

limit signal , odb singnal, protect signal, ( so u can always control your amps if u r reaching the clipping limit or generally at its maximum capicity . ( i assume that u knw how the limit signal works) . the amps also justifies that to prevent distortion in the mixing consoles , the controls should be set to a value between 0db and -6db. i follow this basic rules when i set my sound

maybe i m nt good at explaining . ok lets try n work on this topic ( i want u to be cool wes)

you are using CP2200 Ev amps which gives 800watts at 4ohms
and you r driving a speaker T252 Ev speaker . how would u drive your amp? i would like to knw the exact position of your amp.

u have to understand what i meant when i say sound in the amps is lograthmic.

waiting for your answer

hi grey,

to knw whats happening exactly , just read the corresponding mails between wes n myself .

cheeeers!

hi grey,

to knw whats happening exactly , just read the corresponding mails between wes n myself .

cheeeers!
I've read it all and find no explanation (other than "therefore inorder to use the full power of the speakers turn the amp fully. if the amp is not full the total power is not utilized and can also result in clipping of the speakers whic can damage the amplifiers") to explain why you turn the amp up fully.
I'm no expert, but your comment does not make complete sense. Clipping is caused by the amplifier or some other device, prior to the signal reaching the speaker. Any damage, caused by clipping, is to the speaker, not to the amplifier - at the point of outputting the clipped signal the speaker driver is stationary and converts the energy to heat, rather than motion.
I believe that a damaged speaker can, in turn, cause damage to the amp.

Here's a quote from "GoodSound":
"However, it's just as rare to drive an amplifier to full output as it is to push a car to full redline. Besides, if you did drive your amplifier to full output, you'd know it -– it would audibly clip and you'd hear distortion."

By driving your amp at full power, you have no headroom for loud peaks (i.e. dynamics) - they clip and, therefore, distort. You're creating exactly what you want to avoid.
Furthermore, if you have the power amp running full-bore, you are having to compensate by reducing the gain from the input source and from the pre-amp. It is possible that you'd have to compensate so much that the Fletcher-Munson effect could leave you with a thin, but loud sound.
guess u will not understand me when i say the out put of the amps is directly propotionate to the output of the speakers.
I think that's the wrong way round. It is the amp that drives the speaker, therefore, the speaker output is dependent upon the amp output. Being an electric current, it will, of course, be directly proportional - we are all bound by what good old Georg discovered.

As I say, I'm no expert, but it all seems common-sense to me. That, and the fact that, all the sites, I've found on the web, agree. :lol: :lol:
I'm sure that, if not you, someone will come along and shoot me down in flames.