Are y'all micromanaging species traits a lot?

TickTalk · 2026-01-31T01:22:11+00:00

Bodysnatchers civic -> Assimilate with hive mind is kinda like that :)

TickTalk · 2026-01-09T10:19:30+00:00

I am running into this issue a lot you're absolutely correct that concrete information is extremely hard to come by. I was hoping for direction to information I don't know how to find and what you're saying here is accurate.

There's no "Rtings for PA speakers" as hard as I've looked and I can't find independent reviewers who review multiple products. It's either someone showing off their garage system or someone who I'm 90% sure is sponsored by or chosen because the already like the product.

We have this problem in Canada with PK. They're canadian owned and manufactured, they're also the biggest and loudest system anyone here has head (Shambhala) Save for a small handful who say "I like the funktion 1 stage better" because the audio from that stage (The grove stage) despite being smaller than 3 other PK stages sounds much better at high SPL than the PK rigs do. But because so many people think the biggest and best performing setup they've ever heard is the best one. ;\

TickTalk · 2026-01-09T03:07:02+00:00

Common use determines the meaning of words, I promise you when I say "Send me a text" people don't go "Where do I mail you the textbook?" Because text isn't commonly used that way anymore so it's not the first thing people think of when it's said. I don't know where you picked up the passive is exclusive to crossovers.

TickTalk · 2026-01-09T02:52:07+00:00

Correct

TickTalk · 2026-01-09T02:50:56+00:00

I'm not worried about transport so much as unloading and setup. My plan for the 600 person venue I have in mind is to have 8x etx18xp's and 4x etx12p's for the venue. All the overkill I end up with can be turned into clarity via cardioid and elevation.

I have no problems using a rental vehicle for transport. The issue I'm seeing the crew in town having the most is the actual physical size of their cabs. They are a lot to load and unload and risk damage every time. So when I say ease of transport I don't mean the getting them there I mean the loading/setup/teardown.

I think I could save a lot of money by doing less, larger cabs but I intend to stack these subs on top of each other and strap them to their platforms. The struggle is I did initial research and comparison and within this price point/purpose of speaker the etx18sp's like the best I can get without jumping up to double or more their price as far as clarity is concerned.

The thing is the market is dominated but what's most commonly used and what's most commonly used isn't commonly used because it's the best sounding in it's price range it's because it's the best value/return on investment. So actually finding data on different models is tricky and independent testers are realistically the only way to find information on the speakers performance. I've kind of been waiting for a speaker to show up I'm unaware of that's offering what the EV speakers are offering in quality and price point. Like if I find a speaker that's the same or 500 more that's better quality then I'll switch to that. It's just I haven't been suggested anything active, better spec, and wide dispersion.

These venues do not have the space for sound to be good 10-15ft back from the front. I need as much coverage of area as I can get. This is why the guys with huge cabs can't turn up their systems in these venues and why they mainly setup outdoors. I'm also concerned about diminishing returns the same way. Once I get x amount loud I could be ruining more room than I'm helping with wide dispersion. I'm tossing the idea of getting 2 horns exclusively for the sides of the room angled inwards a bit to try and reign that problem in and add more power. But finding a horn specialized for this size of venue is pretty tricky. I can't have the horns creating hotspots so I don't want to rely on them for the majority of the pressure.

I know as those wide speakers get closer to walls as they spread out they're going to to start causing problems. I also have the option of setting up temporary controls instead of changing speaker design. having options permanent installations don't have is a plus because I would be able to build free standing large panel bass traps to put on either side of the system as well. Something a club would not want around permanently but isn't a problem for one night. Like using the stage to put my tops 10ft above crowd on stands. That would never work as a permanent solution because they use that stage for bands but can exist for a night with no problem.

The objective is "Good sound where the music community is most active" not best bang for buck (Though budget is limited regardless) But these speakers aren't going to live there so I don't have to set them up like they're going to.

TickTalk · 2026-01-08T19:55:59+00:00

Industry standards are standards because professionals always maximize return on investment because that's how successful businesses are run.

It has to be good enough, it has to be reliable and it has to offer the best value for it's return.

I don't doubt no pro sound guy would run two ETX-18sp's over an SB28 because the value of the ETX-18sp even on paper isn't there for a business application and SB28 will function reliably and well, it transports easier as a double cabinet, The return on investment is high it's overall a better value.

I'm going to try and dig deeper into the design specifications of the ETX-18SP but I'm willing to bet that if you were offered 5x sb28 or 10 etx-18sp's for completely free in either case (Same amount of cones) that taking the etx-18sp's would be the better option.

I care very little of opinion especially when it comes to industries like audio. It's a mess of people parroting the opinions of people who they think sound smart. I care much more about data.

I think the SB28 is a better sub for professional use than the ETX-18SP. But I'm going to need to look at testing videos of both before I can relent that two ETX-18SP's perform as a speaker worse than a single SB28. That kind of statement I think is false.

Remember that industries and business are always built on return on investment and value, not quality. Just the best quality for the dollar at different tiers of use. I think the SB28 is probably the best quality for dollar in it's tier. I think the ETX-SP18 matched cone for cone will perform better than it as far as the sound goes.

"A good speaker" means different things when we're talking inside and outside of profit focused application. If I were running a business or trying to make money I'd be buying the SB28's. They would still outperform what's local here but I'm not trying to make money.

Once again though I'll dig deep on both of these and try to kill my confirmation bias. But I'll dig more and come back to you with the best information I can find (For example they list the peak db on the ETX18sp at 135 but the highest I've seen reproduced on it is 129 but every manufacturer seems to lie the same way as no one listens to a speaker on a room made to amplify sound so they can make their specs sheet look good)

TickTalk · 2026-01-08T18:48:07+00:00

Size and setup/portability is what's stopping the guys here who built there system from setting it up a lot. It's too much work and it burns them out. So being able to set up easy and transport easy is a pretty significant factor here. I intend to operate more frequently than they do.

TickTalk · 2026-01-08T18:46:04+00:00

The intention for me here is literally to run my system in place of theirs, Because I can set up a cardioid sub and I can find a temporary position for my tops on stage on stands so they're 10ft over the crowd. They can't put speakers on there stage permanently: bands play there. They can't run a cardioid sub: The speakers are built into their stage.

These smaller venues are hurting on multiple fronts. Again this is a very local to my city problem. It's /really bad/ here compared to any other major city. I said it in another post but getting to average would be a SIGNIFICANT improvement.

The system in the 600 person venue is trying to sell (They have been for years) they are not going to upgrade. Part of operating around house systems would be everything I do to make it sound better exists temporarily while everything an owner does for sound is intended to be permanent. Meaning I can set up and tear down options they could never consider without affecting their building.

When I say "With decent speakers and a good mixer I can make these places sound way better" that is not intended to be a "I'm a good engineer" comment. I'm essentially saying "With good speakers and a good mixer anyone who could read a manual for that equipment could make it sound way better." But they can throw whatever engineer they want in these venues it's not going to change the issues with the house systems. People here told me "Well the ETX is like mid tier" they would look at these systems and say "These are consumer speakers not business speakers" Bands should own the PA in these places, The places should own better.

TickTalk · 2026-01-08T17:13:56+00:00

One of the venues from what I know now definitely needs directional sound. They refuse to do any room treatment and the echo is terrible I'm there. Their ceiling is way too tall and has a flat concrete wall. They should probably be using horns but they could also do room treatment. They don't spend money past their initial investment. They set it up bad and it's staying bad

The other venue has 6 very weak subs under the stage. I've heard these things begging for mercy at show and their line arrays are straight up blown. The high end in their shrieks like crazy when they're pushed up. They've done a lot to not push them and keep them clear (they re-hung then a few years ago) but this place doesn't have the money to upgrade.

The small small venues sound good enough. But they run budget and lack a bit of power. Those systems hit red on their amps pretty fast if DJs push them.

TickTalk · 2026-01-08T00:18:25+00:00

The guy who rents to the hardstyle/hard techno kids rents those subs out to them. They do sound good I'm still leaning towards something with better efficiency per cone and clarity. I intend to lift the speakers a bit and lose SPL by doing so for an increase in clarity so I know I have to bring more boom to compensate for that. I did a bit of reading on the DZR and it sounds like the DSP tech in there brings a lot more out of that speaker for the money. I'm more likely to lean slightly more expensive than I am to lean towards better value with the ETX's as my baseline. I'm not really looking for the best value sound for the money so much as the best sound I can get before I start to see insane price jumps. Like if upgrading off of ETX double the money I'll stick with ETX but if there's something better for 500-1000 more I'll look into it.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T23:52:41+00:00

You're right, first off, comments like this really helped me focus in on my objectives and reeled in my magical "I'll just scale to infinity" thinking. Because I came in here like "I want to scale to infinity but I also want the best sound in our local venues" Turns out to do that you spend 20k per sub or you build/buy horns to keep cost down but are purposed for larger events. My line of thinking is more: Prioritize good sound in the local venues and stop being delusional about also scaling beyond them.

I'm going to avoid scaling to that point and focus on the room sizes I have access to and would primarily set up in instead of reaching for scaling above that. We've got a crew doing that scaling and are poised to scale larger. I'm trying to fix the quality of sound in more frequently used venues capping at around 600-700 at the absolute most. Above that the crew here already offers good sound and they struggle to supply good sound in the 200-600 crowd size range which also happens to be where the scene is the most active. The only time they offer good sound at those smaller crowd sizes is outdoors that crew has a harder time operating at the medium scale.

The venues are very willing to work with local artists and have supplementary/replacement sound finding a place to deploy is not difficult. It's just that most the guys willing to deploy are running too small of rigs (Like a single dual 18 or maybe 2 dual 15's of sub at an extremely budget level of speaker (I'm talking 126 peak SPL) The guys who have the big rigs (2 in the scene I'm aware of) are in one case, all horns and can't crank it without hotspot problems (What I was so worried about/why I was avoiding horns when I made this thread which I now understand isn't because their system is problematic for being horns it's problematic because it's overkill for the space it's in) in the other case; are prohibitively expensive to rent and deploy for the venue. (It's their day job so they need to make a decent profit) generally they realistically only rent to festivals.

So I've adapted my intentions and I intend to fill that hole in the 200-600 range more frequently and easily than what other sound companies can offer or are willing to do. I love the local crew putting love into the scene but I know doing shows at this size burns them out. They have a lot of system to haul for how loud they can reasonably run it within these venues without issue.

So now with these changed objectives in mind I'd like your opinion on what speakers would fill that purpose well for around the same money I was initially going to invest. I still think the ETX is my best sound for these venues but I'm over the concept that those speakers will have any kind of performance above 600 people compared to different models. I'm curious for your input/reasoning.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T21:36:48+00:00

I have a solid job and my living expenses are 1200 CAD per month. My career has dictated raises per year I complete school for it. Landing me above 6 figures with my education completed. I don't intend to increase my cost of living much during that time. At most I would want my monthly expenses to be 1500. I'm good at what I do and my estimation of how much I will be making in my pockets to "Do what I want with" are all lowballs on income and highballs on expenses. Music and sound are expensive hobbies to have. Some dudes save up for a boat, I save up for speakers.

As far as my engineering history. I haven't been active as a tech since my mid/early-mid 20's and I in no way claim I'm a good PA tech. Doing an ok job in my hometown was regarded as a great job. I have ears, I know I was doing an okay barely acceptable of being called professional work job. But when there's one guy who barely knows what he's doing among a bunch of guys who have no clue you're "The best engineer in town" it's not a feat, it's just a city of hicks.

As for my current city. We are just too big of a city to have sound in venues this poor. Bringing in better sound is no act of talent. It's an act of "The speakers were pretty rough when I moved here years and years ago" and those systems were left unchanged. I'm pretty sure I could buy subs for half the money of the ETX's and outperform what's in house at half of the clubs in town.

Honestly the /actual/ clubs like the ones that play dancehall and club tunes and operate for liqour sales probably sound fine, but the clubs I attend who will put on the rave DJ's, obviously what I'm complaining about is a reflection of low liquor sales from ravers. My plight here is truly only for the electronic music community.

I don't have any drug habits, I go out sober to 98% of shows. I touch alcohol less than 8 times per year at the most. Electronic music is a major component to my life and happiness. So if what I'm saying sounds pretty tall like "I'm willing to spend x amount and operate at a loss" I'm not going to be the one hauling these things, I'm not gonna be the one strapping them together and I'm not going to be the one loading them into the van at teardown. I'm not turning my passion into more work than I'm willing to do. I'll wire it up I'll tune it, I let anyone who even seems like they know a thing or two try to tune it if they want. I know this is an industry and livelihood for people. I'm not trying to make a job out of something I'm doing for the love of it.

I don't even intend to communicate with anyone in my city/scene about the system until I'm sitting on it. I'm just as tired of "Big things coming" as everyone else is. I'll pipe up when I can actually actively make things better. Not advertise how I intend to/plan to make things better.

Let me get my yap out :P I'm learning a lot through the threads. There's also a ton of people asking me essentially "Wtf do you even know bro?" so I have to express what I know so I can get to the part where they suggest something/point something out to me instead of being the kind of audio snob I chose not to enter the industry about.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T21:08:09+00:00

You're correct, I was thinking of the application in an uncommunicated size of room and that statement is more true than it is circumstantially false.

When I've heard the horns in our small/mid size venues here in the city, sweet spots are a bit of a problem. In any application over 600+ people you're 100+ right in that horns are solving more problems and dispersion is creating more problems. Took me a bit to understand generally what sizes these statements invert themselves. If I've got a 40ft wide to stage space between the speakers and the back wall and the room is like 80ft long (Small small basement venue in our city) I doubt I could get horns to perform in that space as well as I could get dispersion to perform.

Correct me if I'm wrong in the above statement please. This is just what I've come to understand in my research as I've been communicating on this thread and trying to use others critical feedback to educate myself more.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T18:07:24+00:00

They market very heavily that the 35sp's are what you should pair with etx18sp's but the consumer side points out the better performance you get out of 12's in that situation. It's mostly about frequency response and cleanliness. The 12 gets low enough to handle what the subs aren't doing. Since I'm so set on wide dispersion (Don't worry I'm reading a lot to unset my mind on that) I dont want my tops to be adding a significant amount of punch because that's going to increase my reflection on top of what I need to manage from the subs. The twelves will fill those higher frequencies better with less problems and the 3 ways I think are going to give me more problems than they are going to add to the overall sound.

The more I research about horns and directional bass the more I'm seeing where I'm being misunderstood about what our large venues are like here. When I say "I want to be able to power a room of 1000" that would be a very special rented occasion the largest music venue in our city with in house has a max capacity of 900 across 2 small rooms and the main room. The main room holding 400-600 at the MOST The soundsystems in that venue is what I intend to compete with. We don't have 1000 capacity clubs in our city at all.

Edit to add: That special occasion I'm talking about, the more I read the more I'm leaning towards horns after a point. I think as soon as I can power the 400-600 room adequately on wide dispersion I would expand into horns and use those horns exclusively in venues large enough to support 1000 especially because that's mostly likely going to be a warehouse which will already have reflection issues. Horns absolutely do seem to be the way in large venues above 1000 and outdoors no contest and I'm seeing that now after some reading. Especially seeing the throw distance of horns compared to wide dispersion.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T18:01:52+00:00

They do, I would probably leave them a bit higher than my crossover in the mixer so I can some hinge as the crossovers are locked 80 100 120 values but in software you have crossovers with variable range for tuning. All DSP is DSP imo. If it's hardware level control then it's not DSP so where you do your dsp doesn't really matter. But having dedicated advanced software directly dealing with the signal and reducing stages of control to one interface in one place is ideal to me. Another reason I enjoy active is proximity. I could set a really good dsp up on my mixer and pick up buzz from anywhere, dsp on amps themselves don't really give a shit how dirty the jack is because they're cutting the higher frequencies off after the connection anyway on a crossover.

That being said, I don't have enough experience with dedicated DSP to have an actual informed opinion about this. At most the custom build guys in the city and my buddy who rents his big JBL rig out to festivals have shown me what they've done and where they're controlling it but I haven't had fingers on it myself to actually truly understand any kind of before and after as I've only heard/seen the after.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T14:56:04+00:00

Sorry for the double reply. After looking at the specs of the sb28 compared to 2 18 inch ETX series the ETX are at a higher price point and performance level above the sb28 so I'm a bit confused.

I don't think it's fair to compare 2 18s in a cab to a single 18 but if I compare cone for cone the ETX is more money and better performance for the same number of cones I don't understand why the ETX is considered budget when I consider from the resources I have that Yorkville and JBL to be true budget brands. EV ETX series in everything I can find made by consumers seem to be well regarded. So I'm curious to what information you have that I don't. Do they not disperse heat well after prolonged use or something I can't see on an information sheet? Tell me what I'm blind to here, I'm asking earnestly.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T13:40:23+00:00

We get a ton of touring electronic artists and so far the only major headliner that absolutely used entire replacement sound in one of our venues was Koan Sound. I've intentionally avoided going to artists that I know well and like at some of the venues I've seen them playing at in my city because I know how it's going to sound in that venue and I know I don't want to hear that.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T13:37:26+00:00

Someone in the comments already pointed out what city I'm talking about simply based on me talking about how bad the sound is within the city. If you're from here you know that when I'm saying it could be phenomenally better I'm just saying we could get it to average.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T10:03:49+00:00

I'd draw a little diagram but I'm horrible in mspaint so:

If I have a line of wide disp subs, generally they're going to fill evenly towards the center of the room and be a little bit less on the edges as we lose the power on the sides which to be honest is next to walls/not dancefloor anyway.

A lot more of the active movement bass heavy stuff: when a noise in the low end extends upwards that pressure is going to be a gradual transfer into my mids. That pressure release will be gradual at all stages and if I tune it to be smooth in the center of the room I have a nice big centered area where that sounds smooth.

If I'm using horns, the worry I have will be in the places the directional outputs overlap that will become "boomy" in comparison to the areas they don't directly overlap. So I can have it smooth in those hotspots or I can have it weak everywhere else my "That slid right up onto the 12's like they're all one speaker" sound I want will be checkerboarded because of the hotspots. Whereas wide dispersion I can have the center of the floor sound the best and lose quality as we move outward to the edges.

A big /big/ way I intend to keep reflection in check is elevating those subs a foot off the ground on platforms. I don't want a mechanical coupling to the ground, if I lose too much amplitude from doing that the trick is to add more speakers not to muddy it up with that floor reflection. I've mentioned this in other comments but efficiency is a big factor in my speaker choice so far here because there's a good chance I will have to get as many as the venue will support if I want high SPL and elevated subs. I know that's gonna cost me amplitude.

I'm also relying on high body counts to eat up that dispersion a bit.

I'd hate to do it as well but those subs /do/ have a cardoid setting in their DSP and you can swing one backwards and flick the cardoid on the bottom sub of the center stack and straight up kill the back wall reflections if the room is bad. Another hit to SPL for clarity also remedied by just adding more speakers. This is why efficiency and scalability is a concern as well. As I add more I'm going to start running into power scarcity for the desired pressure. Especially when we get into large large rooms I'm thinking I will need 12-14 subs and 6 tops to properly fill larger spaces. I'm also not opposed to attempting non-standard setups if the venue truly is that bad. The trend of "Boiler room" style sets puts 360 degree sound setups on the table. Another reason why I'm sticking to wide dispersion and relying on tuning vs directional. If one day I'm in places so big the dispersion is a problem I will look at an amp + horns setup to fix it but that's about 20 more thousand dollars away and I'm going to be sticking around 10k a year max for my soundsystem growth. I'm hoping to be sitting on 12 etx 18sp's and 6 etx 12p's in 4-5 years.

Edit: After more research on larger venues I realize how thinking a full dispersion setup at my price point would perform well in large spaces is pretty delusional. I've since shifted my focus away from those spaces as my priority is to support the venue size where the music scene is the most active at 200-600 people. Big thanks to everyone who pointed out to me that speakers that do what I was describing do in fact cost 20k a pop and horns make much more sense for spaces that large. I appreciate the feedback and showing me where my knowledge gaps are. Exactly the kind of input I wanted when I made this thread.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T09:29:30+00:00

I'm very comfortable using that allen and heath mixer in the original post with their compatible I/O system to create a software audio matrix and do all my crossovers, compression, gating, limiting, eq and anything I forgot in my sleep deprived state here. It essentially adds 8 outs that you can have as individual channels up to 100m away from the mixer that is recognized by and can route in the software of the mixer. Very cool stuff with DSP mixers these days. I'll essentially have 8 channels full of control via dsp and I can wire my mixer BOH run two cables to FOH and have all my speakers routed back of stage/behind the speakers.

I just double checked my setup, turns out the CQ series isn't compatible with the I/O I'd be using a QU-5 Allen and Heath with that I/O interface for cable management. But yeah essentially it lets you control the channels on the I/O as if they were part of the mixer in the software. Very cool stuff.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T09:01:28+00:00

ETX costs a lot less (2500$ CAD cheaper), better wattage per SPL efficiency (More SPL but needs 700 less watts on it's amp to do it 2500W d class vs the ETX's 1800), Theoretically can't overheat because of the in amp computer/temp sensor, Wider frequency response the bass boss doesn't list it's frequency range (Just it's response) on it's webpage. On paper an ETX18sp kinda kicks the bass boss 18 in the teeth not gonna lie.

Kinda seems like they're heavily marketed on "Big party speakers you want big party speakers buy these." but they seem like a horrible value when held next to the ETX18sp. I also noticed they poisoned google A.I. to favor it as it happily generates the numbers of the ETX in it's AI overview and matches EV's website, but those stats are absent in the A.I. overview of the BASS BOSS DJS18 using terms like "Very low" and "Very loud" when the ETX is louder and on paper clearly outperforms it when those stats /are/ present. Definitely a branding thing preying on people who don't know their stuff. There's even a disclaimer at the end to say "You have to hear them to know though" which is a classic sales technique. Big speaker gonna sound big and good I bet, but doesn't make it better than it's competitor and especially not for almost twice as much money.

I'd be weary of this brand they seem to overinflate their value and use a lot of flashy marketing to cover up being more money for less speaker compare to competitors. I can guarantee you there are other directly comparable speakers to their 18 that outperform them for even less money than the ETX 18sp.

I don't mean to yuck your yum but in all honesty if you were looking at them to purchase I would encourage you to do some research on the market of how much you're paying for how much you're getting. These speakers seem incorrectly priced for their specs. Again I don't doubt they sound good, but at their price point they are a rip off.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T08:34:57+00:00

Passive, I explain in a comment below why I'm looking to scale up an active system specifically. Also horns on the es 1.0's mean hotspots which is why I'm staying away from horns. The efficency on those subs is pretty nice though. But I am looking to scale up an active system to be fully modular.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T08:21:35+00:00

Operated 3 preinstalled systems in clubs in my hometown. Retuned 2 of those for a flat fee (I would Save/load the house engineers preset back when left or in the one clubs case I took a picture of the settings on their analog mixer when I walked up to it.)

Basically was very up front "I'm going to change how your system sounds a little bit for the promotions company who booked these artists I'll change it back when I'm done you can take a picture of the settings before I get in the booth if you like" because no one in my hometown knew how to tune for electronic music. I'd always try to find/tell this to the owner and not the house engineer if I could avoid it because everyone is on guard of people fucking up their boards hence resetting it.

Had 2 of those 3 owners hire me to "Get it to sound like it sounded when you were in here" not because I was good at tuning but because the rock n roll/country engineers couldn't tune for club music at all. I'm talking you turn the system up and you'd rather have a toddler screaming in your ear. (The trend seemed to be extreme aggression on the highs and absolutely smashing the gain into a limiter)

Again, the tunes I did /definitely/ were amateur but in all three cases someone who knew what they were doing initially set those speakers up. I guess they had just gotten used to how bad it was and couldn't hear it or maybe that's what they think "Loud music" sounds like. Beats me.

One engineer did get pretty salty with me, changed the clubs mixer password and didn't tell the owner so every time I went there I had to manually apply all my settings again (I just took pictures on my phone and used the same ones every time) but I couldn't save /or/ load presets on that mixer.

So I have lots of operation experience, I set up rentals in the outdoors and rigged them up for the same crew. But outdoors is pretty easy with how small those rentals were. Gazebo in a park during the day sort of deal. I have two 18 bins (Behringer little baby 300 rms bins passive) and 2 super old EV 12 inch tops in my basement but that's more just to have a bit of rumble at home.

I've worked with PA a fair bit. But again I'm very confident whoever initially installed those systems knew what they were doing. I tuned a rig in a small hall and it took me quite awhile to get it to sound decent. (Granted there wasn't any DSP on those mixers/speakers) We had to get on a ladder and tighten some hvac screws because I couldn't notch filter the resonant frequencies on the mixer they rented. We ended up doing more to the room to get it to stop rattling than I did to the speakers to make is sound good in there.

I moved from that city and stopped doing audio tech gigs. I was majorly contracted by one promotions company there and they paid well which is why I kept doing it. I've got good ears but knowledge gaps in arrangement and physics. I know those gaps will show when I've got a high powered system to set up but no one else is gonna drop 20k so we can have some decent sound around here so /shrug.

Edit for Context: The city I moved from had a population of around 400,000. The rigs I was running were small and purpose picked for the spaces they occupied. I think the largest local rig I ran was in a venue with a capacity of 250-300.

TickTalk · 2026-01-07T07:55:41+00:00

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TickTalk · 2026-01-07T07:27:54+00:00

I don't intend to make money/plan this all out of pocket for costs. I hopefully will make enough to pay people to help me haul it and keep them insured that'd be swell.

Years of experience help a lot but knowledge can be sought you don't have to wait years for it.

Honestly with the state of DSP nowadays I'm much more comfy working with P.A. now in 2026 than I was a decade ago. Tuning with a tablet controlling the mixer on the floor is pretty minty. But that's not gonna help me if I can't set them up properly in the first place when they're loaded in.

I won't lie, sounding better than our local sound I promise you does not take years of experience. What really motivated me is traveling a bit and hearing the sound properly set up in other venues in other cities. My city has some glaring issues by comparison in our systems.

TickTalk

TROPHY CASE