OK, so I have a live DJ performance in about 7 hours and I am getting into it with the sound guy about a few things. First of all, I was wanting to couple my two JBL 18's in the center of the stage and stacked (mostly for dispersion reasons). He wants to lay it side by side and shove it under the stage. He said that laying them down side by side is better for the bass and reflecting them off the ground, but I was actually wanting to put it up on the stage and have it leaning down at an angle towards the center of where the crowd will be standing. I will admit that I don't know much about subwoofers outside, so i'll go with whatever you guys think is better. Next, I was wanting to put the crossover on my first pair of subwoofers at 60hz since this is an edm show. The subs are rated at +/- 10dB 29hz (and I've tested it, it's true. They're $2,000 subs). I was then wanting to have my other 18's which are only rated down to 40hz (crossed over at 60hz-120hz), then have my first pair of monitors act as low-mid, and the 2nd pair act as high-mid.

The first sub is 2000watts, the 2nd is 800watts, the two monitors are i believe peavey pr-15s (powered).

Now, I wanted to trust what the guy was saying until he said that he was going to hook up my laptop with an auxillary cord through my audio jack. I said I had an audio interface, and he said "audio interfaces make laptops sound terrible." He was then going to run that stereo cable into "two mono tracks and pan them".

What I've usually done is run my audio interface to the mixer with balanced cables. I run it through my stereo 5/6 on my mixer, not mono, and then I output it into my powered subwoofer, and then chain it out to the other speakers, and then adjust the crossovers. He told me that balanced cables cause distortion, and then handed me unbalanced cables and said they were balanced, but I'm like 98% sure they weren't.

He decided to use two passive subwoofers to mix in with all of the other powered speakers, do amplifiers add any latency? because he said that he was running the crossover on the monitors all the way down to 68hz, which will be causing phase issues with the sub if they are out of phase at all.

Honestly, this is a big show, and this guy was hired to save money. I just want some advice from someone with some experience with "EDM" style of music at outdoor venues.

How do I make my subwoofer loud enough to hit the brown note? Where should I set my crossovers (I wanted my sub on the low-low, and then the 2nd sub handling the kicks and snares... but whatever you guys think works best i'll do.)

im looking for help... not: "you're an amatuer" because let's be honest, there was a day when we all used to sh*t in an underwear shaped pillow, and then continued to sit in it... so... No matter how smart you are now, you still used to sh*t yourself. The best you could do is give me a hand like the old you that needed it then like i do now... (the show is now 6 hours away now lol)

 

Ist off, good luck tonight. I have zero experience doing EDM shows, but the advice that an audio interface makes a laptop sound terrible is laughable. Also, all the cabling in my studio are balanced cables as well as every show that I set up because...
if the cable picks up noise along the way, the noise added to both of those cables is not reversed in polarity. So when the cold signal flips in polarity to match the polarity of the hot signal, the noise carried along the cold signal cancels out with noise in the hot signal. This "canceling out" process is called "common-mode rejection," with the noise being the "common" signal between the two.

Because balanced signals send two “in-phase” signals, they’re also louder (roughly 6 to 10db) than what unbalanced signals can provide.

A little copy/paste cause I am on my phone...this person is 100% tripping and wrong about a few things. Don't go with his advice.

 

punch his face and tie him on a tree till Tuesday!


use a hammer to get him "in-phase"



ask locals for help/opinion



if he insists



use the hammer again!



im sure you will do a better job than him, but if there is no way you have to accept it.
don't overcomplicate things, just chill.
there is always something, make the best you can out of the situation and avoid drama


good luck

 

Can't really give you much technical advice sorry but I do wish you the best and hope the gig is really great for you !!!
Let us all know how it goes

 

I'm pretty sure the interface doesn't bother if it's connected to a desktop computer or a laptop.
In other words

I'd like to say again

I'm sory that I can't help you with your monitor setup, but you seem to know more about it than the other guy and to me your approach makes more sense.

Good luck and have fun

 

Quick reply:
- The guy is right with putting the subs on the floor. Only direct the full range speakers towards "the middle of the crowd"
- Don't operate the subs down to 29Hz. Cut them high-pass steep (48dB rolloff +) at around 40..45Hz if you want more subjective bass power without destroying them
- Use your audio infertace, no prob, but make sure all cables are safe and don't lose contact when slightly moving them
- No, amplifiers add NO LATENCY unless you have any digital processing in between or built-in, then it depends...
- Balanced cables are almost always better, given that you operate the signal source and destination in balanced mode too!
- I would set the crossover between subs and fullrange at the location. It depends on the speakers and on the room too.

 

Oh my... but always remember, there are idiots in every part of the society. Let's just hope all surgeons you'll ever need are better at their job than that bloke.

 

Never had this problem.
When I go to perform (Clubs, Bar, Festivals or Open Air) my DJ ride is there, and the catering too.

 

i agree with all of this. i'll never forget the first time i was doing the sound for a 10,000 sq ft ballroom, and i put the subs even with the front of the stage and angled towards the middle of the dance floor. big mistake. first off, bass sound waves take several feet to develop their full intensity, so the farther back from the crowd you can get them (within reason) the better. second, having them pointed towards the center created cancellation. i had people from the dance floor coming to me and saying "can't you turn up the bass?" meanwhile from my vantage point near the back of the room, the riser i was on was shaking from the bass.

 

My first advice is to have a good working relationship with the soundtechnician. If things fry, you need that guy to fix it.
You should focus on your show, technical stuff is for the PA tech.
I agree that his idea of the interface is odd, but I wouldn't argue too much..
18 inch Subwoofers will do their thing anywhere, sub frequencies have no direction.
Have fun, have a good show!

 

Careful about positioning your subs.If put in wrong distance you might end up with serious phase cancellations.That is more important than your crossover freq.

 

Thank you for all the replies. I'm going to leave the sub on the ground as you all mentioned, as well as other advice mentioned. I'm on my way to be apart of the sound check. This is a great forum, so i'll leave you with a few pics of all of the automation I drew in just for my lights and lasers (as well as a few screenshots taken from a video on my phone) lol, worst case scenario, it's going to be a bad*ss light show.

 

a few more screenshots. Doesn't do it justice tho

 

Good luck with your set!

 

It's a real challenge to get the sound good enough everywhere on the venue, no matter if it's inside a building or open-air. It helps to walk around a bit and listen (if possible) to what you've done so far

 

...or have trusted ears walk around the house if you cannot get away.

 

So, how was your gig and what setup did you choose?

 

@OP how did it pan out?

 

Well,I didn't know that!

 

Absolutly stupid!
This guy should be the barman instead of acoustician.