Road Tests

A continued resurgence in the popularity of passive loudspeaker columns has encouraged manufacturers to improve the art by providing more than just a straight column of closely spaced mid-range drivers. The ability of columns to project sound with wide horizontal and narrow vertical coverage can outperform traditional point-source enclosures, especially in large, reverberant spaces. At the same time, their tall, slim profile helps them blend into the architecture and virtually disappear.

Lectrosonics offers one capsule for their HH transmitter: the HHC cardioid condenser. It is a warm and crisp, open-sounding element that can be best compared to a C-535 without its HPF engaged. However, OEM wireless capsules with the same thread diameter and pitch can be used, including those from EV, Blue, Earthworks, Heil, Telefunken and many from Shure. Audix, Neumann and Sennheiser capsules can be used with adaptors.

My best Christmas present this year arrived a little late, shortly after New Year’s Day. Radial Engineering president, Peter Janis, contacted me by email and asked if I would be interested in testing a new Radial product. He hoped I could relate my opinions to him before the NAMM Show convened in Anaheim, where he planned to roll out the unit. Upon further reading, the email described a new Radial tube DI box called “Firefly” that was being readied for production. As a devoted user of Radial products including the JDV, J48, and JDI direct boxes plus the Tonebone PZ-Pre, I was definitely intrigued and immediately agreed to take part in the evaluation process.

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.

When I first discovered beyerdynamic microphones in the late 1990s I had no idea that the German company founded by Eugen Beyer has been around since 1924.  I was also clueless to the fact that, by 1937, the beyerdynamic company had been designing and manufacturing microphones, headsets and other audio products. All I can say is that learning this information certainly sharpened my interest in the new Touring Gear mics I received and was about to field test. It just fascinates me that a company can survive and thrive for such a long time. They must be doing something right. That said, let’s take a look at the microphones themselves.

Kaltman Creations has been selling German handheld RF (and EMC) spectrum analyzers from Aaronia for several years now, as well a previous version of Invisible Waves, a Windows-based RF spectrum scanner. The new version, Invisibles Waves X is again comprised of hardware and Windows-based software components, but now the software’s user interface has been improved to provide a better RF command center.

Both the XP and XD have an industry-standard choice of Bessel, Butterworth or Linkewitz-Riley crossovers with slopes from 6 to 48 dB-per-octave. Under General Settings, the EQ and crossover settings can be made in either 1 Hz increments or 36 steps per octave.

If the RE320 from Electro-Voice looks familiar, there's good reason: the RE320 derives its body style and incorporates technology used in E-V's popular RE20 and RE27N/D microphones. The RE320 features the humbucking coil used in the RE20 for reduced susceptibility to RF. It also uses the high-output Neodymium-magnet capsule used in the RE27N/D – but with a new low-mass diaphragm for improved transient and high-frequency response.

When I first got the email to review the new Sanken COS-11D microphone, I was pretty excited. I use a couple of different headset mics in my business, and was very interested in trying out this Sanken mic. In general, headset mics are very handy. The user has both of their hands free to play an instrument, give a presentation, draw on a whiteboard or just use two-hand gestures (if they are Italian). Plus, they have the freedom to move about the stage or audience. The downside of these mics is that they don't really sound very natural, and they can be prone to feedback.

In the last few years, Milford, NH-based Earthworks Inc. has produced several products that have resulted in a transformation of the company's image within the audio engineering community. Earthworks originally built its reputation on its impeccable omnidirectional measurement microphones, and subsequently ventured into the studio recording market with their high definition omni and cardioid small diaphragm music microphones.

My first Countryman DIs were the ones I loaded into the workbox for my first tour in 1985 with Crystal Gayle: brand new black anodized Countryman Type 85 direct boxes, which have since become a ubiquitous staple in live sound and asked for by brand – the ‘Scotch Tape' of DIs. I'm sure most of you have used them.