Wireless Microphones

[Dan C.]

What is the sound quality of the ew112p , how does it compare to those that are used on TV for talk shows and news?

[Nathan Gifford]

The ew112p has excellent sound, after all it uses the MKE2 lav mic. I doubt you could tell the difference and I have seen some of the reporters using Sennheiser in the field.

If you have doubts, most retailers will let you try and return the product if it does not work out for you. If they do not, I would reconsider using them.

Nathan Gifford

[Dan C.]

Thanks Nathan.
Thing is, in the UK these type of stores are few and far between, so I might have to travel a fair way to get one in the first place.

Anyway, I've got plenty of time to consider.

[Nathan Gifford]

I did not realize you were in the UK. You should also look at the range of frequencies you plan to use and whether it is legal to use them. Some frequency bands that are legal in the US are not legal elsewhere.

Nathan Gifford

[Dan C.]

I've seen the ew112p for sale in UK stores so I think it must be legal to use their frequencies.

It can't intefere much anyway where I want to use it, as most of the time I will be using it in a relatively rural area.

[Rick Smith]

I'm sitting here looking at my book for the Sennheiser G2 (p.89).

It says "The EM100 G2 receiver operates on the "true diversity" principle....
In true diversity, instead of one antenna and one receiver there are now two antennas and two receiver sections."

It goes on to elaborate on diversity, but it makes me think these really are UHF diversity systems, despite the fact that there is only one visible antenna.

I just thought I'd let people know this.

Rick

[Stephen M. Crawford]

<<<-- Originally posted by Nathan Gifford : The ew112p has excellent sound, after all it uses the MKE2 lav mic. -->>>

Actually the 100 series comes with the ME-2 lavellier in the kit, not the MKE-2 which costs about 5 or 6 times as much. I know because I just ordered two 500 series with MKE-2's. You have to buy all the bits seperately with the 500 series, they don't come as kits.

Depends on the quality you want but the 500 Series is much more expensive but is all balanced and is apparently much better than the 100. When you see the news crews from the BBC etc. with Sennheiser it is the 500 series.

[Oleg Kaizerman]

<<<-- Originally posted by Bill Ravens : Diversity is the buzz word for a system that transmits simultaneously on two frequencies. This way if there's a signal drop-out on one frequency, the other will provide a backup. This way, there's no lost audio signal. It's rare for both frequencies to drop out at the same time. -->>>
wrong !! divercity reception is always one freqwency which had been pick up by 2 or more recievers , those could be 2 recievers or 2 antenas (thats call antenna dyvercity systems -the lectrosonics work this way) ,the cirquet just check where is the better signal is and deliver it to the output

[Oleg Kaizerman]

<<<-- Originally posted by Nathan Gifford : After hours of use with the ew112p I never had a dropout except at extreme range. Mine works around 740MHz.

From other diversity users they suggest that these UHF units have less problems with dropouts than the lower frequency units.

Nathan Gifford -->>>

there is nothing to do with carier fq , your fq block would be usless in place i live , the different blocks are made for different arias where you have aditional rf users (tv stations , ellar phones ..ets)

[Oleg Kaizerman]

<<<-- Originally posted by Rick Smith : I'm sitting here looking at my book for the Sennheiser G2 (p.89).

It says "The EM100 G2 receiver operates on the "true diversity" principle....
In true diversity, instead of one antenna and one receiver there are now two antennas and two receiver sections."

It goes on to elaborate on diversity, but it makes me think these really are UHF diversity systems, despite the fact that there is only one visible antenna.

I just thought I'd let people know this.

Rick -->>>
the eng reciever is not divercity , the rack mount is , probably the swnheiser to cheap make separate manuals or looking for "intelegent people":-)

[Oleg Kaizerman]

<<<-- Originally posted by Stephen M. Crawford : <<<-- Originally posted by Nathan Gifford : The ew112p has excellent sound, after all it uses the MKE2 lav mic. -->>>

Actually the 100 series comes with the ME-2 lavellier in the kit, not the MKE-2 which costs about 5 or 6 times as much. I know because I just ordered two 500 series with MKE-2's. You have to buy all the bits seperately with the 500 series, they don't come as kits.

Depends on the quality you want but the 500 Series is much more expensive but is all balanced and is apparently much better than the 100. When you see the news crews from the BBC etc. with Sennheiser it is the 500 series. -->>>
the old 100 and 500 were complitly indentical systems with only few exeptions , monitor out and few aditional presets , ph power on abattt plug .audio wise and range wise they are the same

[Richard Lewis]

Hi Dan, if your looking for any video equipment in the UK, visit

www.creativevideo.co.uk

I use them all the time. Their after sales service is amazing (they had my radio mics sorted out within days , when I was having problems) and everyone there knows what there talking about.

Plus there prices are very reasonable.

Just thought that I would give them a quick plug..

Hope this helps with your search for shops that stock prosumer / professional kit.

[Richard Lewis]

WOW, just realised how old this post is, lol

I guess you'll be all sorted out by now.....

[Alex Filacchione]

When looking at wireless solutions in music (wireless mics, wireless guitars, etc.) I found that Azden were overpriced and under performed.

Look at wireless solutions from the following companies:

Samson
AKG
Shure
Nady

I am not shure who has lavaliers or not. If you can get a lavalier that has the mic on one end and an XLR jack (or maybe a 1/4" male plug which can be converted to an XLR for about $10 with an adapter), then get that, and get a wireless system that actually doesn't have a mic attached, but plugs into the XLR of the mic of your choice. A Lot of singers do that because they prefer something like a Shure SM58 mic to the wireless mics because they just sound better. They get the wireless XLR adapter and plug it into their vocal mic of choice.

when they say 32 channels, it means that you can select from 32 different channels on the unit. This is for 2 reasons:

1) You have another wireless unit operating in the same frequency range, and you don't want cross talk between them

2) You are using one channel and getting some sort of radio interference on it, so you switch channels.

The difference (as someone described here) between "True Diversity" and regular wireless systems, is that a "True Diversity" system has 2 antennas on the base unit. Incase there is drop out on one, the other will still be there to pick up the signal. Whether this is an issue for you depends on the environment where you will be using the mic. I think better safe than sorry, but in most cases you'll be fine with a simple 1 antenna system, unless you are looking for ranges of over 100 feet or more.

You can get these in VHF or UHF. Originally they were made to use the VHF spectrum. However that spectrum had a lot of interference, so the systems switched to using UHF, which is a higher frequency range. These days it really is a crapshoot as to which is better because there is a LOT more stuff in the UHF spectrum these days than there used to be. UHF over VHF is not as great an issue as it used to be. VHF systems are a lot cheaper, but the UHF systems are generally more feature rich, and will have more channels, etc.

Look online at places like

www.musicianfriend.com
www.sweetwater.com
www.music123.com
www.zzounds.com
www.samash.com

etc.

You should be able to find better quality wireless stuff for cheaper prices than the Azden stuff. I must say that the last time that I looked at Azden stuff was over 5 years ago, so they may have improved and gotten cheaper over time.

Once you pick a system that you like (or several) google for some reviews. For example, say you were looking at the AirLine Handheld and the AKG SO Snap on transmitter

google for

samson airline review
akg wireless review

and read the reviews.

It used to be basically "you get what you pay for, and DONT go cheap on wireless", but I think things have changed a bit. You can now get nice wireless systems for fairly cheap, when it used to be that to get a decent one for guitar you had to spend in the $600+ range. Granted, the overall sound quality demanded by guitarists as far as wireless goes is MUCH higher than anyone else (including vocalists). For speaking parts, etc. you can go cheaper and won't notice any difference at all. However, for guitarists that can tell the difference in sound between different lengths of instrument cables, it's a whole different world. So, if the review is for the guitar system (AirLine guitar wireless system) give yourself some leeway and take the review with a grain of salt. Guitarists are MUCH more demanding. If a guitarist says that it was decent and didn't suck his tone, than you can bet it will be MORE than enough for any kind of vocal parts!

Alex F

[Stephen M. Crawford]

Whilst I realise that there will probably be a problem if you use two transmitters with microphones on the same frequency and one reciever ( on camera lets say) tuned to the same frequency to pick them up, what would the outcome be? Would they simply 'interrupt' each other?

What about if you use one microphone transmitter and two recievers, that would be ok wouldnt it?

I'm envisaging using a two camera configuration where the sound from a lavellier is picked up on one channel on both cameras. This would ensure continuous sound even if I had to stop one camera (for a battery change or re-positioning of tripod for example). I don't want to have to use two mics for obvious reasons.