Hello everyone,
I recently purchased a Sennheiser G3 100 series wireless lav mic, and just recorded with it for the first time. I'm not familiar at all with wireless mics, so I'd appreciate any advice on this problem. I was recording with a Sony PD170. There was a slight amount of interference on the recording, a kind of pulsating buzz that I just couldn't shake, even by adjusting sensitivity and trying different channels. It only occurred while the speaker was talking, not at rest.

Also, upon playing back the tape I found that the audio is not properly synced, it lags from the picture. Does anyone know what this would happen? I've never heard of having unsynced audio from using wireless lavs? I'd appreciate any thoughts people have on how I could troubleshoot this. The manual yielded no advice for this specific problem.

Thanks!

Does the G3 system work normally in other locations?

Could it have been clothing noise? (a common problem ... can you post an audio clip on-line?)

Did you try another channel bank and perform a frequency scan? (which should be done in the first place)

Where there any strong electrical or magnetic fields around? (close proximity high voltage AC or large speaker cabs)

Was the receiver plugged into the camera's mic input with a short cable? ( for instance the cable that came with the unit)
Was the camera's Phantom Power switched on? (though this should not make any difference w/ a properly wired cable.

Did you notice the delay on location (in E-E mode) or in post?
...The only 'wireless delay' I've ever encountered was less than 3 milliseconds, which is normal the particular digital system I was using, but not noticeable.

You were not by any chance watching the video directly from the camera and hearing the sound through a Firewire import to a computer? That would generate a delay.

Thanks, Colin and Rick, for your responses. I apologize for the delay in my response, I've been trying a number of different things to troubleshoot these problems, and thanks to your suggestions, I think I have it worked out.

I think the audio lag happened due to some problem in the capture process. The sync problem happened when I captured from my deck, but did not happen when I captured directly from the camera. Though I prefer not to capture from the camera, at least that addresses that aspect of the sync problems - no fault of the G3s.

Yes, Rick, the phantom power was switched on for that input. Since I turned it off, I have not been able to replicate the buzz sound, so I'm crossing my fingers that that was the problem and it won't pop up again at an inopportune time... Thanks for your help solving this!