Avenged Sevenfold
Getting Better
Just in time for the New Year’s upcoming presidential elections, the latest economic report has the annual rate of growth for the U.S. during the last quarter at 2.8%, in part due to new car sales and inventory replenishing, and though we’re still on a long slow climb out of 2008’s recession, modest sustained growth is not only possible, it’s likely. To quote Kevin Costner in the film adaptation of David Brin’s post-apocalyptic The Postman, “Stuff’s getting better. Stuff’s getting better every day.”
Read More »
NAMM 2012 Show Report
To download the FRONT of HOUSE 2012 NAMM Show Report, CLICK HERE
A week that began with clear but cool blue skies in Anaheim, CA ended with Pineapple Express showers, dramatic NFL conference championships and a record number of attendees for the Winter NAMM Show, the annual kick-off trade show for both pro audio and musical instrument manufacturers.
Read More »
JBL Professional’s Revolutionary D2 Dual Driver
The Heart of the New VTX Series’ V25 Line Array
To download the Feb. 2012 Tech Preview on JBL’s D2 Dual Driver, CLICK HERE
JBL Professional’s VTX Line Array Series, the next generation of VerTec, was announced at Winter NAMM with the release of the large-format V25 line array that incorporates all-new transducers. At its core is JBL’s D2 Dual Driver — a revolutionary compression driver that provides dramatic improvements in high-frequency sound and performance.
Read More »
DiGiCo Celebrates with SD Series Upgrades
This year, DiGiCo is marking three major milestones — 40 years as a company, 20 years of digital development and 10 years for the DiGiCo brand. To celebrate — and reward its customers — DiGiCo has announced free upgrades for owners of its SD Series of consoles: the SD8, SD9, SD10 and SD11 models.
Read More »
Green Amps
To download the Feb. 2012 Tech Feature, CLICK HERE
Last February, when the Libyan civil war began, my wife and I began discussing how a sharp rise in the price of gasoline would make buying a Prius logical, as the money saved on fuel would cover the payments on the car loan. My wife is amused that I turn most life situations into math problems, but both my father’s parents were math teachers, and pro audio is nothing without numbers. Since the average American drives 12,000 miles annually, switching from a 20 mpg Honda to a 45 mpg Prius saves 333 gallons of gas, which is $1,000 annually at $3 per gallon and $1,333 at $4 per gallon. Trading in her 2006 Element left us with $6,000 to finance. At $4 per gallon, the payback becomes 4 ½ years.
Read More »
Cat5 Digital Snake Stage Boxes
To download the Feb. 2012 Buyers Guide, CLICK HERE
While digital consoles have become widely adopted, many still employ copper analog snakes with XLR connectors at the ends of 100-meter multi-core “snakes,” allowing various makes and models to be easily paired in Front of House/monitor combinations, especially for live concert sound applications. While an analog split is still considered a universal solution for gain-sharing between consoles, especially those of different makes, digital snakes can replace a long, heavy run of multi-core between a digital console’s pre-amps and the microphones on stage — especially for front-of-house, improving sound quality and RF immunity while reducing the mass of cable required to connect them from inch-thick cables to a couple of ruggedized Cat5 cables the width of a mic cable, simplifying set-up and reducing infrastructure. Now that digital consoles have been widely adopted, it’s time to take full advantage of digital snakes’ benefits.
Read More »
Delicate Productions San Francisco
One of this year’s ubiquitous expressions has been bounced around the zeitgeist a lot, but it has real meaning in regard to Delicate Sound’s recent history: “Go Big or Go Home.” The opening of a second office is always a Most Serious decision for a small business operator, but owner Smoother Smyth did it when his business was so down its very existence was in question.
Read More »
PMK and AAD Tackle Uneven Coverage at Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium
The University of Louisville’s Papa John’s stadium, home of the Cardinals football team, had a problem with uneven coverage, and it had nothing to do with defensive cornerbacks leaving the opposing team’s wide receivers open for a “Hail Mary” touchdown pass.
Read More »
Martin Audio DD6 Adapted Fill Speaker
Martin Audio’s DD6 is an ultra-compact passive two-way speaker, uniquely adapted for a wide variety of specialized fill applications with a multi-angle enclosure and several specialized features. It employs a 6.5-inch neodymium woofer with a 1.75-inch voice coil, passively crossed over at 3700 Hz to a half-inch exit neodymium compression driver mounted on a unique Differential Dispersion horn (hence the name, DD6) with 60° of vertical coverage, transitioning from 120° at the bottom for a wide near throw, to 90° at the top for a gradually-narrowing further throw to minimize overlap and combing (or wall bounce) from its neighbor. The unique horn was designed using Martin’s proprietary Boundary Element Method (BEM) modeling tool, and the DD6 is just the first and smallest in a range of models that will offer Differential Dispersion and multi-angled enclosures.
Read More »