When DiGiCo introduced the SD9 – a complete, integrated system, which includes the mixing surface, a D-Rack digital stage interface and CAT 5E digital multicore, with the additional ability to simultaneously record 56 channels – we were immediately interested.

After reviewing many other digital mixing solutions we quickly found that the DiGiCo SD9 ticked all the boxes.

It’s functionality and feature’s gave us everything we needed for the continued pursuit of delivering the highest quality audio to our clients. The audio quality surpassed that of any other console we tested. The excellent sound quality of the SD9 was the main reason for us purchasing this desk. It’s ease of use let our engineers get straight to what they do best – mixing your show – rather than fighting through pages and menu’s. It’s small frame size and portability ensures that we do not need to increase prices to our customers in the form of extra staff or transport costs.

The excellent sound quality of the SD9 was the main reason for us purchasing this desk.

It is planned that the SD9 will primarily go out to our musical theatre events as it is perfectly suited to the job. The neatness and aesthetics of the board lets it fit into your theatre without making too much of a visual impact or taking out too many audience seats. The well thought out snapshot features also help with complicated shows. However, this will not be it’s sole purpose. The board will be attending many other events and we also look forward to taking it out on a rock ‘n’ roll tour early next year.

AMP Sound Systems would like to sincerely thank James Lawford of DiGiCo for taking the hours of phone calls to ensure any question we may have had were answered. We would also like to thank Michael, Sean and Gerry from Rea Sound (the Irish distributors for DiGiCo) for allowing us to take the SD9 out for a demo and ensuring our purchase went without a hiccup.

Yeah it's pretty!

The budget has been set aside for the new console – but the search continues to try to find the best performing mixing platform that will add to our already impressive inventory of pro audio equipment. We need something with the highest audio quality, 100% reliability, and a small footprint to keep staff costs down for our customers.

And no more tape!!

So we decided to take the Avid (formerly Digidesign) VENUE SC48 out for a test drive. It ticked all the boxes we were looking for – except one. The console was beautifully simple to use. 2 of our engineers who had never seen the desk before took to it like a duck to water. The audio quality blew the Yamaha’s out of the water. And to keep with the H20 references, we sank like a stone when we tried to lift it! The desk was beautiful, but just too heavy! It immediately added a bill for another staff member for the day, and we were not happy with passing this cost onto the customer.

Easy to love!

We will certainly take it out as much as we can on shows where we have the staff anyway, but for the moment, the search for a compact, small/medium size digital desk continues!

But on the bright side, it does have an awesome Vegas mode! Check out all the flashing lights and buttons in the video below!

Enjoy!

The rig consisted of a groundstacked array of 4 D&B Q7′s on top of 2 QSubs on either side of the stage, with a centre cluster of Meyer HP600′s. FoH was mixed on a Yamaha M7CL. Wedges were a combination of D&B Max12′s and EV sxA250′s.

Click on an image below to enlarge!

Guess what I am going to say now… Yep – lets use an example!!!!

First you select your desk...

I was booked for a gig with the Dublin Glee Choir. The spec was 9 choir mics, one solo mic, keyboard, guitar and drum machine. 3 monitor mixes. The LS9 was the perfect choice for this gig. Due to venue restrictions, I was aware that it would be a tight get-in. I needed to get as much done as I possibly could before the gig. But the LS9 wasn’t going to be back untill Saturday morning – the day of the gig. In comes Studio Manager – the offline editing software for the family of Yamaha digital mixing consoles.

...then start working on your show...

All you need to do is download the specific editor for whatever type of desk you have. I frequently use the 01V, the LS9, the M7CL and the PM5D, so I have these editors installed. As I was going to be using the LS9, I just selected that. You then arrive at an overview page showing the mixer on your screen. Here you can click rather than hunt through pages on the actual board. Silly things like turning on phantom power can be achieved in seconds on all the channels that need it.

A blank show file also starts with all the dynamics turned off. I like to have the compressors on, but with the threshold at -8dB so I can bring the compressor in when I need it, without having to flick over to the ON button, so I just click DYN2 on all the channels and this is done for me!

It is also very easy to set your mute groups and channel links. I wanted the choir on one mute group, the band on another, and the effects on a different group. This is achieved very easily and quickly on the “Mute Group” page. It would take considerable time to do this on the console, and if under a lot of pressure, you may just not have time to do it.

Input Patch List

Input and Output routing is much easier in Studio Manager rather than on the desk. You get a visual view of it in Studio Manager and can change your patch with a few clicks.

And aside from all the wonders it can do before the show, it also comes in very handy during the gig. You can leave any screen open in studio manager, while you work on a separate screen on the desk. For example, you could have the EQ screen open on the console, while monitoring all the input meters on the computer screen!

I am very impressed with Studio Manager, and am looking forward to using software from other manufacturers for their boards!

The video below shows the terrible effects of a bored sound engineer:

I replaced the audio on this video, as I have not yet got permission from the bands to use it, but the video should give you a quick overview of the buzz at the festival this year.

Monitors were D&B Max 12′s and the console was the Yamaha M7CL.

The rig consisted of a Funktion One PA for FoH, a M7CL-32 at mix, and EV sxA250′s for wedges.

View the video below to see the place from our perspective!

Enjoy! And don’t forget to click the Share button below if you know others who underestimate the work involved!!

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On the 5th of May 2010, AMP Sound Systems was booked to provide the PA system and crew for a show by the Dublin Glee Choir in The Bank, Newry. I knew this would be a great gig, so decided to engineer it myself. My day went like this:

It all starts the night before at the warehouse...

...cases are picked and loaded...

...the D&B Max12's will be used as monitors...

17:22 – All the equipment is pushed into the venue

17:46 - Speakers are positioned

17:52 - The backbone of the wiring is installed

18:21 - A rough layout of the stage is created

18:21 - Mic stands placed on stage

18:22 - Stage coming together

18:28 - Mix position is set up

18:33 - Things start to get patched in

18:50 - Studio Manager is connected...

...and the show is loaded

20:15 - Wiring on the stage is complete

20:15 - Connected. Now to start tidying up.

21:20 - Leads tidied up and taped where required

21:20 - The band arrives...

21:25 - ...and sort out their positions

21:29 - Souncheck starts

21:41 - Rough levels are set and a song is run

21:56 - Final adjustments before the doors are opened

22:22 - Mix position tidied

22:23 - And show is saved as a backup

22:23 - Then lots of muted channels as we wait...

23:13 - Time to check out the controls of those rather cool screens!!!

23:13 - And say hello to the DJ who was playing music dangerously loud

00:23 - Quick check that I am receiving signal on all channels

00:25 - And the place starts filling up

01:05 - The choir arrives on stage

02:17 - Starting to get loud now!

The last photo of the stage, as we were too busy packing up the gear to take photo's!

04:03 - Yes, that does say I will be home at 5:59 AM!

04:17 - On the A1 just about to leave the North of Ireland

04:18 - How depressing - the sat nav says turn left in 92.1 km!

04:41 - The fact that the sun is coming up just makes you realise that it is in fact the next day...

...so its Red Bull time!!!

05:47 - The sun is fully up now, so I just want to go to bed!

06:16 - Does this really need an explanation???

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A good friend of mine, Pat Nolan (Barry in Fair City) is joining a team of over 100 (motorcyclists, pillion passengers & support) to tackle the infamous / historic “mother of all roads” – ROUTE 66.

2,448 miles of unforgiving highway crossing Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.

The gig was to help them raise funds for Temple Street Children’s University Hospital in Dublin. It was held in The Mill Theatre, Dundrum and it was a night of music, magic, comedy, acting, and much more! Phil Cauly was the MC, and welcomed guests such as Pat Fallon, Dana Davis, Brendan Burke, Dave Duffy and many more! Was a fantastic show.

Unfortunately though, the theatre only had an analogue mixing desk – the Allen & Heath GL2400. Nice desk, but an analogue desk! Although it is like riding a bike, I would obviously never forget how to mix on one of these bad boys. But I did miss the features. I missed having everything I could possibly need at my finger tips. I missed having a screen telling me exactly what is going on with my system. I missed having an EQ section that would do what I wanted it to do, rather than be confined to the bandwidth and frequencies that the EQ on the board had.

The show still sounded great, but it made me realize that investing so much in digital consoles was worth every penny.

If you made it along to the show, thank you very much for your support. However, if you could not make it – you can still support Pat by donating to this very good cause at http://www.mycharity.ie/event/patnolansevent/

I am a very big fan of the Yamaha M7CL for its ease of use. In fact I have lots of experience on most of the Yamaha digital range – from the 01V to the LS9 to the M7 and all the way up to the PM5D. You can go back and forward on any of those desks and have a very small learning curve. I love them…

But then along comes the DiGiCo SD8, and a lot of my favoritism for Yamaha boards gets sucked away. I have never mixed on a DiGiCo board, but from talking to other engineers it seems that you can take to it like a duck to water. The desk seems very well laid out, and is very very cheap for what you get. Its only £31,539 excluding the VAT. Thats only €44,600 including the VAT!

Take a peek at its overview video, and let me know what you think!