New to the board and a host of questions ;-)

[Wurst Werner]

Hello @ All,

I’m new to the board and obviously not an native speaker. Please apologize my „experimental english“.

I live and work in Germany as a „professional sound guy“, at least I can make a living with that;-) During the week I work in a recording studio and at the weekends I mix Top40 Bands, Festivals and do live-recordings. Since more than a decade I run my recordings with Nuendo on PCs. So I know the usual „Pittfalls“ when working with a PC and Windows, but that does not scares me off to build my own SAC System. I’m excited about the possibility to use some of my favorite VST Plug Ins in a Live Sound area.

I know, I will have tons of questions concering SAC and I hope, that I can ask some of them here in this forum.

Let's start: Till this day I’m not sure, which case/system I should buy for SAC. Should I go with an barebone, or a 19“ server case or better buy a decent Laptop?

I will use the SAC system mainly for one or two Bands, that I’m on the road with since more than 12 years. Therefore 24ins and maybe 12out will fit perfectly. I have an old RME 9652 Hammerfall PCI card, that I could use.

What I like on the 19“ Case is the solidity and that they are rack mountable. Sadly most of them are very deep and heavy as hell. I do have a ASUS Terminator3 Barebone with an Core2Duo Processor. It runs very stable, but the case is not very rugged. But maybe this is an alternative?

I planed to place the SAC PC with three Behringer ADA8000 on stage and remote the SAC Host with my netbook. In bigger venues I will use my old copper snake (24/12) and place the Host and the Preamps at the Foh Position.

What do you think is better? To put the preamps and the PC in one big rack, or separate them in two racks? If I put them in two racks, I have to rewire the complete ADAT Lightpipes connections on every gig. Besides that give me a little headache. The ADAT connections are not „lockable“, how do you cope with that?

Last question for today. I had good experiences with Asus Motherboards. What Motherboard and which Processor would you recommend for my SAC host? Given the fact, I will use the Hammerfall card, a handfull of plug ins and about 24ins and 12 Outs?

Best wishes
Christian

[quaizywabbit]

i use one of these:http://www.circotech.com/rm-4180-17-depth-rack-mount-case-rackmount-inch-inches.html

but since you're in Germany, perhaps you can find a distributor in your Country..

I also have one of these in it for hard drives:http://www.circotech.com/icydock-mb673spf-hot-swappable-trayless-hard-drive-cage-for-3-hard-drives.html

i have 1 x 500gig drive for OS/programs, and 2 x 1tb drives for playback and/or recording purposes...

fits even with a 550 watt standard power supply behind it...

its a tank.....probably weighs 45lbs +, but with my core2duo e8400, 4gig ram, intel mobo, and 2 rme digi9652's in it, i'm good for whatever i want to throw at it....

there are lighter weight solutions available, but they cost more...

as far as splitting things up, that depends on how much you like lifting big heavy things. keeping everything in one rack keeps it simple, but makes things heavier and bulkier. I have my system in a 12 space slant-top with a fold down 19inch monitor, a behringer bcf2000 fader pack, and a keyboard mounted flush between the monitor and the bcf.(no accidental keystrokes)
the rackmount pc, ada8000's and a furman powerstrip reside in the rack, with a 120v to 100v converter bolted to a plate underneath the keyboard. Its a darned good thing Im a strong guy......

im thinking about dividing it all up just to make it easier to get up and down stairs by myself....

[Wurst Werner]

Thanks quaizywabbit!
They have some very nice cases on their site and good prices too.
I did some research, but it seems that there is no german distributor around:-(
But I droped them a line, perhaps they would ship overseas.

[quaizywabbit]

http://de.kontron.com/products/systems+and+platforms/industrial+pc++rackmount/4u/

dont know if they have anything, but maybe they know who might?

EDIT: found another one..http://www.pcicase.de/

might be easier and cheaper

[Wurst Werner]

Besides the heavy 19" computer cases, has anyone tried a small barebone pc as SAC host? These two seem to be quite nice with a Core2Duo processor:

http://de.msi.com/index.php?func=proddesc&prod_no=1403&maincat_no=134

http://uk.shopping.com/xPO-ASUS-ASUS-PUNDIT-G31-X3100-NO-ODD-BAREBONE-PC-3YR-RTB

They are cheap, light weight and would fit easily in a standard 19" rack.
But I don't have a clue, if they are reliable enough. Any thoughts?

[gdougherty]

Part of the reason rack cases tend to be heavy is the amount of material in them to help keep the case rigid. IMO, that's something you want in a case that will travel. You don't want items inside the case (motherboard especially) to be flexing as things are moved about. Mount it in a shockmount case to help protect the whole package from vibration damage.
Yes, you can use a standard non-rackmount case, but I wouldn't recommend it for a professional purposed mobile setup. My rackmount case was only about $40-50 more than a medium quality desktop case. Considering the total parts bill not including monitors came to about $500, it's worth the slight extra to me.

[quaizywabbit]

+1

[RBIngraham]

If easy to lug around is at the top of your list of concerns then I suggest looking into the Shuttle "lunchbox" computers. They are solid and well built and light and easy to lug around. Get a nice pelican case or something similar to transport them and you likely would have few issues with moving it a around. I don't think I would go that route if I was setting up and tearing down every day, but if you only do it a couple times a week or so I bet it would work well.

Slap in one of the MOTU 424 cards and with a single card slot used up you can put together a 72 Input SAC system fairly easily.

Build two or three modest sized racks that each house a 2408 MOTU rack piece and 3 ADA8000 units. So each rack gives you 24 I/O. Take out only the number of racks you need. Or you could split it up into 2 small systems one weekend and 1 large one the next weekend.

Only 1 or 2 Firewire cables between the PCI or PCIe card in the Shuttle and your rack. All the ADAT optical cables are never plugged and unplugged when you set up and tear down.

This is kind of the way I'm going with my SAC systems, but I don't move them around a ton. They are set up and left alone for a month or two at a time.

I'm definitely a fan of having more lighter things to lug around than a small number of heavy things. Preferably nothing that I can't pick up with 1 arm. :)

[gdougherty]

If easy to lug around is at the top of your list of concerns then I suggest looking into the Shuttle "lunchbox" computers. They are solid and well built and light and easy to lug around. Get a nice pelican case or something similar to transport them and you likely would have few issues with moving it a around. I don't think I would go that route if I was setting up and tearing down every day, but if you only do it a couple times a week or so I bet it would work well.

Slap in one of the MOTU 424 cards and with a single card slot used up you can put together a 72 Input SAC system fairly easily.

Build two or three modest sized racks that each house a 2408 MOTU rack piece and 3 ADA8000 units. So each rack gives you 24 I/O. Take out only the number of racks you need. Or you could split it up into 2 small systems one weekend and 1 large one the next weekend.

Only 1 or 2 Firewire cables between the PCI or PCIe card in the Shuttle and your rack. All the ADAT optical cables are never plugged and unplugged when you set up and tear down.

This is kind of the way I'm going with my SAC systems, but I don't move them around a ton. They are set up and left alone for a month or two at a time.

I'm definitely a fan of having more lighter things to lug around than a small number of heavy things. Preferably nothing that I can't pick up with 1 arm. :)

If I were willing to live without the multi-client drivers (or had the budget for SAW) this is the way I'd go. I have little interest in reconnecting everything all the time, but it sure would be nice to have such a modular system with simple 1 cable connections. The one thing that'd be super sweet is an Expresscard version of the 424 so you could use the same racks for a super-light laptop based system or a thoroughly expandable high-horsepower rackmount hosted system

[RBIngraham]

If I were willing to live without the multi-client drivers (or had the budget for SAW) this is the way I'd go. I have little interest in reconnecting everything all the time, but it sure would be nice to have such a modular system with simple 1 cable connections. The one thing that'd be super sweet is an Expresscard version of the 424 so you could use the same racks for a super-light laptop based system or a thoroughly expandable high-horsepower rackmount hosted system

Too bad you just missed out on the holiday special for SAW George. I took advantage of that so I could get into recording of shows and maybe at some point I'll take advantage of the audio and/or video playback stuff as well. Also I plan on using it so I can trigger SAC Scenes via MIDI, until Bob gets a chance to finish up the Scenes and Control stuff in SAC. :)

The multi-client thing isn't all that important to me. But obviously I understand why it's a very high selling point to some.

But I just thought about something... for the difference in price between some older used MOTU cards and a new RME card (I know... not a fair comparison, but still..) with similar channel counts, it would almost pay for a SAWLite license. (at least with the holiday pricing) Ok, OK... so that's a stretch... :)

[gdougherty]

Too bad you just missed out on the holiday special for SAW George. I took advantage of that so I could get into recording of shows and maybe at some point I'll take advantage of the audio and/or video playback stuff as well. Also I plan on using it so I can trigger SAC Scenes via MIDI, until Bob gets a chance to finish up the Scenes and Control stuff in SAC. :)

The multi-client thing isn't all that important to me. But obviously I understand why it's a very high selling point to some.

But I just thought about something... for the difference in price between some older used MOTU cards and a new RME card (I know... not a fair comparison, but still..) with similar channel counts, it would almost pay for a SAWLite license. (at least with the holiday pricing) Ok, OK... so that's a stretch... :)

Good point and probably worth noting for others. One major upside is the easier scalability of the MOTU solution without worrying about available PCI/PCIe slots. I can go to 64 channels in my system but I know I'll have to possibly jump through hoops or make sure I've got good cooling to push the hot air away from my fanless GPU and the open PCIe slot another RayDAT would have to occupy. Having a single 424e card and being able to expand out to a full sized SAC system for not much more is certainly appealing.

[Brent Evans]

Besides the heavy 19" computer cases, has anyone tried a small barebone pc as SAC host? These two seem to be quite nice with a Core2Duo processor:

http://de.msi.com/index.php?func=proddesc&prod_no=1403&maincat_no=134

http://uk.shopping.com/xPO-ASUS-ASUS-PUNDIT-G31-X3100-NO-ODD-BAREBONE-PC-3YR-RTB

They are cheap, light weight and would fit easily in a standard 19" rack.
But I don't have a clue, if they are reliable enough. Any thoughts?

Only problem with some of those systems is that the PCI / PCIe slots aren't full height, so your interfaces might not fit. If you're going that route, make sure the slots are appropriately sized.

[hclague]

What do you think is better? To put the preamps and the PC in one big rack, or separate them in two racks? If I put them in two racks, I have to rewire the complete ADAT Lightpipes connections on every gig. Besides that give me a little headache. The ADAT connections are not „lockable“, how do you cope with that?
Christian

Christian

Here is a picture of how I did my rack. It is a 12 space. Originally I had two 6 space racks but I didn't like plugging the ADAT cables in and out each time. The System is 24 Ch x 24 outs

I will be upgrading the ADA8000's to the Presonus DigimaxFS and Presonus Digimax D8 soon. There is a significant weight difference between the Presonus units and the ADA8000's.(Presonus is much lighter)

697

Here is the rear view

698
699

Hal

[RBIngraham]

Christian

I will be upgrading the ADA8000's to the Presonus DigimaxFS and Presonus Digimax D8 soon. There is a significant weight difference between the Presonus units and the ADA8000's.(Presonus is much lighter)



Just curious are you taking into account the weight of the power supplies? The supplies on the Presonus are external to the units. I'll have to look at that the next time I work in one of the venues where I have some of each.

You'll have to secure them in the rack as well, just so you're aware. Not trying to talk you out of the swap, I would go with the Presonus as well if the funds allowed.

[Wurst Werner]

Very good contributions gentleman! Made me think the whole day.
I have big problems to find a affordable 19" PC case here in Germany, that is not too deep, so that it will fit in a "normal" rack. I think, I skip the "barebone" idea as well. Like Brent Evans said, my old RME Hammerfall card will probably not fit (to big).

I have a old laptop available, that I use with Smaart and WinAudioMLS doing audio measurements. Perhaps it will work with SAC too. It's this one-->
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Asus-A6Ja.1306.0.html

Unfortunately it is no Core2Duo, only a centrino duo:(
Is there a chance, that this notebook will do 24ins, 12outs and a handfull of Plug ins with SAC???
It has a pcmcia slot that works really good with a RME digiface. I had two of them but sold quite a while ago. Guess I have to buy it again. I thought, I could put the notebook, the digiface and 3xADA8000 in this rack and I'm ready to go-->
http://www.thomann.de/de/skb_19rsf4u.htm

What do you think guys?

Thanks for your help!
Christian

@hclague: Do you use the Saffire Pro40 in your rack with SAC? I think it has the common DICE II Firewire Chipset, can you achieve decent latency results with that?

[hclague]

Just curious are you taking into account the weight of the power supplies? The supplies on the Presonus are external to the units. I'll have to look at that the next time I work in one of the venues where I have some of each.

You'll have to secure them in the rack as well, just so you're aware. Not trying to talk you out of the swap, I would go with the Presonus as well if the funds allowed.

Yes. I have already used both of these pieces in a SAC Install system. The FS power supply is external and its weight is negligible. The D8 has an internal power supply.

Hal

[hclague]

@hclague: Do you use the Saffire Pro40 in your rack with SAC? I think it has the common DICE II Firewire Chipset, can you achieve decent latency results with that?

Christian

Yes, I use the Saffire Pro40 for my Vocal pre's. I do not use it through Firewire. It has ADAT in/out as well. The firewire does have to be connected though, in order for the unit to operate. I have not had any latency issue's. I recently moved to 2x32 buffer settings using a RME RayDAT card. CPU load is at 70-80%, 24 Ch, 5 mon mixes, 2 convolution reverb Plugs, Sawstudio Delay plug, and the TC M30 reverb plug. I'm also using a Drumagog plug.

Hal

[gdougherty]

Yes. I have already used both of these pieces in a SAC Install system. The FS power supply is external and its weight is negligible. The D8 has an internal power supply.

Hal

Hal, have you compared them side-by-side to the ADA8000? Is there an appreciable difference in sound quality for your mixes? Is it a $1200 difference for the semi-budget minded? Seems like a few shortcomings to live with, like rear panel phatom switches on the FS and all TRS outputs (not so bad with a custom output panel converting to XLR, but still)

[AntonZ]

Christian, tomorrow I will try to post a pic of what I came up with (too late here now). I have a 6u case SKB style with a Dell desktop computer stripped to bare metal. Once the plastic was removed, the pc measured exactly 2u high, bolted to the bottom of a 6u case (45cm deep). DIGI 9652 PCI card (max 3 ADAT in/out). On top of the pc a pair of ADA8000. Two more units free. For now it also holds a DEQ. All cheap gear none of it bought new. The best I can afford to spend at this time. It works for me. Do not copy it, but just for inspiration.

16 channels with dynamics, EQ and some effects on about half of them plus 5 monitor mixes, SAC shows load around 50%. I will not need that many monitor mixes, so I think I will be well within reasonable limits for my needs. Considering the XP install is not a clean one yet, it did get most of the recommended tweaks but also still has a virus scanner running in the background and a ton of software installed on the system that has nothing to do with SAC. Once I put a fresh XP and nothing but SAC related stuff, this will run my needs fine, can upgrade to 24ch by just adding another ADA unit.

[AntonZ]

http://www.thomann.de/de/skb_19rsf4u.htm

That's a nice case, thanks for the link. If the latches on the cover had been on the long side, it would be perfect to bold a TFT widescreen inside that cover. Open up, support or chain to keep it upright, I could live with that.

[hclague]

Hal, have you compared them side-by-side to the ADA8000? Is there an appreciable difference in sound quality for your mixes? Is it a $1200 difference for the semi-budget minded? Seems like a few shortcomings to live with, like rear panel phatom switches on the FS and all TRS outputs (not so bad with a custom output panel converting to XLR, but still)

Hi George

Haven't been able to do a side by side comparison to date. Sound quality is not my sole basis for the upgrade.

The weight savings, reliability ?'s, and, As has been discussed here and elsewhere on the web many times, the perception of Behringer in a Pro audio system "for Hire" are some of my other reasons. Whether we like it or not, Uli has dug himself perception "hole" that he has not been able to dig out of. This was the main reason i used the presonus pre's in the install system. I do not want SAC to receive negative connotations just because Behringer is being used.

I will trade global Phantom swtich on the front of the unit for individual Phantom switches on the back any day. (I have had problems with some bass amp direct outs receiving phantom )

The TRS outs have not been a problem in the intall system rack ( which does move after every gig ). I am planning on a patch panel to XLR as seen in the photo's

Hal

[RBIngraham]

Hal, have you compared them side-by-side to the ADA8000? Is there an appreciable difference in sound quality for your mixes? Is it a $1200 difference for the semi-budget minded? Seems like a few shortcomings to live with, like rear panel phatom switches on the FS and all TRS outputs (not so bad with a custom output panel converting to XLR, but still)

I used Digimx FS next to a ADA8000 on a show this past fall. I didn't really notice all that much difference in audio quality between the two. However it's not like I did any real side by side comparison with all other variables being equal either. (like the same mic on the same instrument, split to two different preamps, etc, etc, etc.... I just have better things to do with my time.. LOL)

I do think the self noise is lower at higher gain settings on the Presonus than the ADA8000s. But that's about the only difference I've noticed over all.

By $1200 difference, I assume you're talking about a rack of the preamps? While there are price differences the lower end Presonus are fairly reasonable. A Digimax FS is around $600, or less if you buy more than 3 and/or shop around. A D8 is more like $400, although obviously that's Inputs only. But most of us need more inputs than outputs I would suspect. The ADA8000s seem to go for around $200 new.

Someday I'd love to have the budgets for some of the nicer Presonus like the Digimax LT or something even nicer. But I've yet to have the budgets that allow for that or when I have the external preamps were something that was going to get used once a year and I wasn't about to waste a large chunk of the budget on something they'll use once a year and it sits and collects dust most days.

Just for the record the Phantom switches on the FS are on the front panel and you can turn it on and off in banks of 4 channels. Which I think is a nice feature rather than the all or nothing of the ADA units. Yes the D8 units have the Phantom switches on the rear for some reason, but it also has 4 buttons so it's only done in stereo pairs, even more handy.

But the main reason I would go with Presonus over Behringer when budgets allow is because I trust the Presonus units more to not die at some inconvenient time and they don't run hot to the touch. Yes, I know... for $200 you keep a spare and all that... but if it's in the middle of a show, well unless you have a completely redundant rig all patched and on line, there will be a noticeably failure. Or heck even if it's happens just prior to a show. Still a hassle. And/Or you have to play games dropping the line voltage. For a client that might have $100K to $250K invested in their sound system, I'm just not going to put in any Behringer gear. :)

When I have $500 to spend on a show... well, you'll see a lot of Behringer gear. :)

Then there is the fact that I really prefer to not support Uli Behringer and his type of business ethics, to me it's much like shopping at WalMart. Just don't do it unless I need floral wire and clear medical tape at 3 AM. :)

I'm not trying to argue here or look down my nose at the many users here that use the ADA8000s all the time. I use them all the time myself. But first and foremost the reason I use them is cost... or bang for the buck as I like to put it. :D

[gdougherty]

Fair enough. Noise was the biggest difference I heard between mine and my Profire as well. Still far more quiet doing mix and speaker processor duties than my analog mixer and DCX2496 ever were.
Sounds like probably not a $1200 difference (yes for 32 channels, sorry) as long as I've aleady got them on a step down transformer to improve reliability.

[hclague]

By $1200 difference, I assume you're talking about a rack of the preamps? While there are price differences the lower end Presonus are fairly reasonable. A Digimax FS is around $600, or less if you buy more than 3 and/or shop around. A D8 is more like $400, although obviously that's Inputs only. But most of us need more inputs than outputs I would suspect. The ADA8000s seem to go for around $200 new.


For me, the upgrade cost will be less. I already own a D8 left over from a Yamaha o1V96 rig I had. The FS should cost me $435 max ( B-Stock on ebay all the time ). If I can sell the ADA8000's for $100 ea minimum. That will only be $235 additional cost.

Hal

[RBIngraham]

Well I think we could all agree that either one is a resonablly good, affordable solution for putting together the front end for a SAC rig. And which you choose will be somewhat personal preference, somewhat budget, and somewhat client expectations or client perference. :D

[Craig Allen]

I had a Digimax FS and ADA8k next to each other in a studio setting a while back and found that the FS' outputs were noticably more noisy than the Behringer. I tried several outputs, clocked it different ways, and even unhooked it from everything, and it always made an audible hiss. The Behringer (to my surprise) was much quieter on the outputs. The pres seemed to be a little cleaner on the FS, however, but I never did a real detailed comparison between the two.

[Brent Evans]

But the main reason I would go with Presonus over Behringer when budgets allow is because I trust the Presonus units more to not die at some inconvenient time and they don't run hot to the touch. Yes, I know... for $200 you keep a spare and all that... but if it's in the middle of a show, well unless you have a completely redundant rig all patched and on line, there will be a noticeably failure. Or heck even if it's happens just prior to a show. Still a hassle. And/Or you have to play games dropping the line voltage. For a client that might have $100K to $250K invested in their sound system, I'm just not going to put in any Behringer gear.


Has anyone around here actually had an ADA fail like this? It's been mentioned time and time again, but I've never seen a report of a failure because of heat, or anything else really.

[RBIngraham]

I had a Digimax FS and ADA8k next to each other in a studio setting a while back and found that the FS' outputs were noticably more noisy than the Behringer. I tried several outputs, clocked it different ways, and even unhooked it from everything, and it always made an audible hiss. The Behringer (to my surprise) was much quieter on the outputs. The pres seemed to be a little cleaner on the FS noticeably, however, but I never did a real detailed comparison between the two.

Good to know. I was just comparing inputs only, just to be clear and fair about my observations.

Although the noisy outputs does surprise me a bit because in the system I was refering to a FS unit is used to feed all the onstage effects speakers. (the 15 outputs to the fixed house system come off the LS9's Analog Outputs) I have never noticed any noise in the outputs myself. But then I never really went looking for it either and typically the onstage speakers are hidden behind scenery or something so any hiss issues could just be masked as well. Plus doing theatre, it's not like I have the gain on my amps fully open either. In fact most amp gains are not even half way up, except maybe the sub.

It surprises me because after we installed this system in this particular venue, we were all very happy about the fact that you can not tell when the sound system is on or off, even with all the noisy lighting instruments turned off and with the air handler shut down. It's a pretty darn quiet system. Makes it fun to play a really loud thunder cue and scare the P**s out of some poor unsuspecting sole. :p

Of course the system that is replaced was so bad with system noise that a 90 year old could tell you when the system was on or off. :)

[RBIngraham]

Has anyone around here actually had an ADA fail like this? It's been mentioned time and time again, but I've never seen a report of a failure because of heat, or anything else really.

Total failure? No.

Get very hot and get noise (almost like static) on all the inputs? Yes.

Ever since then I've left a rack space in between each one and have never had any problems since.

I've also seen them tightly packed in a rack and with the heat build up the DSP box that was racked just above them all failed in pretty short fashion. (within a week) I told the person that I saw do this that it was probably a bad idea (knowing full well how warm the ADA units got and the Allen and Heath DSP wasn't exactly a cool running piece of gear either) but they didn't listen. :)

[Andy Follett]

My experience(s) with a presonus firestudio and two digimax fx's vs. three ADA8000s:

The presonus units were noticably "noisier" than the ADAs. For the price difference I would have thought it would go the other way. I sold the presonus units. The only plus I saw to the presonus units was they would record at 88 something vs. the 44.1 ADAs. For recording a live band at a noisey gig (my usage) the was no point in having that ability.

[Trackzilla]

Two years, 9 ada8000s, one failure.
I pack them solidly in the rack, no airspace between.
I don't have a step down transformer in the rig.
Power transformer on a fairly new unit bellied up.
Replacement transformer was $58 from Full Compass, took 3 days to get here & 15 minutes to fix, now I have 9 again...

Since I rarely need more than 40 inputs, I am pretty darned redundant.

Side note, the MOTU 2408 like most interfaces is pretty darned sensitive, I have yet to actually ever need a channel on an ADA8K to be turned up more than around 9 o'clock, many inputs are almost too hot turned all the way down, how is noise in the upper reaches of a preamp even relevant? May be for those doing theater work or the like, but at this point I feel pretty safe in saying no band is ever going to have a signal source that is that soft...even the mongolian traditional folk band I ran didn't need more gain on their instrumentation...

[905shmick]

We've found the ADA8000s only run hot when phantom power was enabled, so we've made sure to place all mics that require phantom power to be placed on a single or 2 units total.

We were also getting a noisy buzz / humming sound from a unit that we thought was acting up, but then it started happening to another unit. The problem turned out to be the step down transformer we were using due to the house power being low at 105 volts which caused the transformer to only be giving around 80-85 volts to the units. Once we bypassed the step down transformer, all the buzz and hum went away.

We also space the units so that there are only 2 units stacked on top of each other with 1U of space between the next 2.

[83Cordoba]

I've been running three ADA8000s for three years in an eight space rack with the computer on the bottom. The ADA8000s are sandwiched together at the top with no step down transformer. One was brand new and two were used off of Ebay. Two run phantom power continuously and so far absolutely no complaints.:) They do get hot however.

[gdougherty]

With phantom on all units and everything on a step down transformer mine all run only slightly warm to the touch.

I can certainly see Hal's point in the upgrade though. For paying clients who don't want to see Behringer stuff in the rig, makes good sense. Few will turn up and request that the Presonus stuff be ditched. Given that I don't have any paying clients, I'm a bit more fortunate.

[RBIngraham]

Side note, the MOTU 2408 like most interfaces is pretty darned sensitive, I have yet to actually ever need a channel on an ADA8K to be turned up more than around 9 o'clock, many inputs are almost too hot turned all the way down, how is noise in the upper reaches of a preamp even relevant? May be for those doing theater work or the like, but at this point I feel pretty safe in saying no band is ever going to have a signal source that is that soft...even the mongolian traditional folk band I ran didn't need more gain on their instrumentation...

I don't know, maybe it's just because I typically like to run preamps at their ideal, getting a good amount of gain prior to clipping (just something drilled into me a long time ago when it was a lot bigger deal than with most modern gear) or maybe it's because I am mostly working in theatre where the players are not always playing at maximum volume (and they are playing honest to goodness acoustic instruments) or something, but I regularly have ADA8000 gain levels set up to 3 PM or so for dynamic mics (your typical Shure 57 or a Beta 57, etc...) and around 12 noon for most phantom powered condensers.

The only channels that are running lower than that on my current show (going from memory here... it's not like I actually have notes about where they are, I just dial them in and forget about it, unless something is going wrong) is kick drum and the electronic instruments (2 keyboards, 1 percussion pad). The keyboard feeds are actually direct outs from a Mackie Mixer so of course their gain is all the way down, since it's really line level, I only go through the ADA for convenience and consistency sake.

That's my experience anyway. Keep in mind that I'm not always using the ADA units with a SAC rig, but the examples I listed above are from my latest show which is a SAC rig.

[RBIngraham]

Given that I don't have any paying clients, I'm a bit more fortunate.

You do all this out of the kindness of your heart? Wow. Really?
Or did you just mean that you don't have clients that are going to be worrying about what gear you're using?

[gdougherty]

You do all this out of the kindness of your heart? Wow. Really?
Or did you just mean that you don't have clients that are going to be worrying about what gear you're using?
I'm a very odd duck. Have a family and not really interested in the hours and work schedule it'd take to make a living doing what I love and am pretty good at. I've had requests to tour with groups, just can't leave the family behind. I got into sound through my church involvement in high school and absorbed everything I could since. The church I'm at is small so my work there is volunteer. We had a portable system with which I stumbled into using to help groups doing various music ministry things. I hooked up with one group that has more extensive needs and used that as an excuse to build a decent sytem to cover 1000 or so with mic's and stuff for a large band with full percussion, lots of vocals and lots of instrumentation. within that range there's not much I can't handle. My mindset was sort of "build it and they will come.". Figured if I had the capability it'd get put to bigger and more interesting uses.

My day job is contract small business IT Management and my fun on the side is providing sound where needed for ministry and non-profits. I get thank you gifts and donations but all of it goes back into gear and vehicle needs.

So, yes, I do all this for my own enjoyment and out of thankfulness for the gifts and blessings given to me.

[Trackzilla]

Maybe they stop quiet sources at the Indiana border ;)

"I'm sorry sir, but this is corn country, if you don't eat that mic you'll never be heard above the Indy cars...now demonstrate or I'm afraid I can't let you pass"

[Wurst Werner]

Concering the ADA8000, imho they sound really good for the money, but the psu can be a real troublemaker. The unit get's too hot and soner or later the voltage regulators and/or the capacitors of the psu might fail. Besides working as a "sound guy" I write for a german pro audio magazine (www.tools4music.de (http://www.tools4music.de)) and a workmate, who is also a electronic technician, wrote an article about how to do a ADA8000 psu modifiaction. He modded my four ADA8000 as well - works excellent! Perhaps this is interessting for certain forums member here. Here is a download link of the article, unfortunatly all in german.:-(
But a eletronic whizkid might understand the mod just because of the pictures.

ADA8000_Mod.pdf - 0.41MB (http://www.zshare.net/download/70569075e1c15ffb/)

@AntonZ: I really would like to see your SAC set up. I have not found a solution till now, that I'm 100% fine with.

[AntonZ]

I started with a desktop like this one:

http://www.computronicsdistribution.com/images/DellOptiplexGx270.jpg
Dell GX270, Pentium 4, 2GB of RAM, DIGI9652 (up to 24 channels in and out).

It's just over 2u high and some 45cm deep. Width no problem, easily fits between the rails of a 19" case.

I took off all the plastic:
http://i295.photobucket.com/albums/mm124/antonz_bfm/SAC/BigIMG_6073.jpg

The remaining metal box is exactly 2u high. I bolted it to the bottom of a 6u rack.
http://i295.photobucket.com/albums/mm124/antonz_bfm/SAC/BigIMG_6070.jpg

I drilled three holes in the pc case and rack. Needed to remove all hardware from the pc case to get this done, and carefully consider where to drill through the pc case. Motherboard, power supply all removed. The 6u rack is high enough to open the case far enough to put the hardware back in. Once the other units are installed in the rack, it's a lot of work to get inside the pc case, so better build and test a pc outside a rack before putting it all together.

One word of warning on this particular model: in general I have found Dell hardware to be quite reliable, but the GX270 has a reputation for failing due to poor quality caps on the main board. I think this particular unit has either been lucky with good caps or had it's mainboard replaced. I bought it used and it has worked fine for a long time before putting it to SAC use.

[tatkin]

I'm a very odd duck. Have a family and not really interested in the hours and work schedule it'd take to make a living doing what I love and am pretty good at. I've had requests to tour with groups, just can't leave the family behind. I got into sound through my church involvement in high school and absorbed everything I could since. The church I'm at is small so my work there is volunteer. We had a portable system with which I stumbled into using to help groups doing various music ministry things. I hooked up with one group that has more extensive needs and used that as an excuse to build a decent sytem to cover 1000 or so with mic's and stuff for a large band with full percussion, lots of vocals and lots of instrumentation. within that range there's not much I can't handle. My mindset was sort of "build it and they will come.". Figured if I had the capability it'd get put to bigger and more interesting uses.

My day job is contract small business IT Management and my fun on the side is providing sound where needed for ministry and non-profits. I get thank you gifts and donations but all of it goes back into gear and vehicle needs.

So, yes, I do all this for my own enjoyment and out of thankfulness for the gifts and blessings given to me.

Outstanding! You're probably not so odd... Your history of involvement in sound is almost identical to mine and it wasn't till last year that the Church I've been volunteering for decided to actually pay me for what I do (although only part time). I started and remain in IT also but on the programming/systems side.

We are all given Gifts and abilities for a reason:D

[RBIngraham]

Maybe they stop quiet sources at the Indiana border ;)

"I'm sorry sir, but this is corn country, if you don't eat that mic you'll never be heard above the Indy cars...now demonstrate or I'm afraid I can't let you pass"

I work in Evansville, IN on a regular basis, for the University of Evansville. Regularly have the mic gains turned up there. :p

(just joking around, I understand)

[gdougherty]

Concering the ADA8000, imho they sound really good for the money, but the psu can be a real troublemaker. The unit get's too hot and soner or later the voltage regulators and/or the capacitors of the psu might fail. Besides working as a "sound guy" I write for a german pro audio magazine (www.tools4music.de (http://www.tools4music.de)) and a workmate, who is also a electronic technician, wrote an article about how to do a ADA8000 psu modifiaction. He modded my four ADA8000 as well - works excellent! Perhaps this is interessting for certain forums member here. Here is a download link of the article, unfortunatly all in german.:-(
But a eletronic whizkid might understand the mod just because of the pictures.

ADA8000_Mod.pdf - 0.41MB (http://www.zshare.net/download/70569075e1c15ffb/)

@AntonZ: I really would like to see your SAC set up. I have not found a solution till now, that I'm 100% fine with.


Well, Google translate helped a touch with some of the text, but I'm still mostly at a loss being the unskilled person I am. It may help some like Ogmeister shortcut a lot of planning though on mods they've mentioned.

What I don't get is why Behringer doesn't design something like this mod into the unit in the first place. Seems an update to the unit would be pretty simple, even warranting a new model perhaps with pads and individual phantom power switches on each channel. I know my snare mic needs an in-line pad to not overload the preamp for most drummers.

[gdougherty]

Outstanding! You're probably not so odd... Your history of involvement in sound is almost identical to mine and it wasn't till last year that the Church I've been volunteering for decided to actually pay me for what I do (although only part time). I started and remain in IT also but on the programming/systems side.

We are all given Gifts and abilities for a reason:D

I hope there are more like myself out there. I've been hoping to train up a bunch of people to assist me as well. Not enough competent sound people out there doing what I do.

[RBIngraham]

yes, I do all this for my own enjoyment and out of thankfulness for the gifts and blessings given to me.

The world needs more people like you George.

I do freebies for me church as well, but it's just a set and forget system with a small controller for the music director if they want to turn things up and down. Most of my time given to them is in installing stuff for free and designing the system for free.

The rest of the time I try to make a living doing this. Using the term "living" fairly loosely. :)

[gdougherty]

The world needs more people like you George.

I do freebies for me church as well, but it's just a set and forget system with a small controller for the music director if they want to turn things up and down. Most of my time given to them is in installing stuff for free and designing the system for free.

The rest of the time I try to make a living doing this. Using the term "living" fairly loosely. :)

Cool, I do a bit of the install stuff as well. Mostly for small churches with no budget. Pushes me to remember how to do things without all my toys :)

[RBIngraham]

One word of warning on this particular model: in general I have found Dell hardware to be quite reliable, but the GX270 has a reputation for failing due to poor quality caps on the main board. I think this particular unit has either been lucky with good caps or had it's mainboard replaced. I bought it used and it has worked fine for a long time before putting it to SAC use.

Wow. Interesting way to go about it. A little too Rube Goldberg if you have an end client looking on, but for personal use that's a neat solution.

I do have to say that almost all the computers I've had major issues with over the years have been Dells. Weird issues where a sound card simply would not work. Same card works just fine in my other computers. Stick it in a Dell and you get noise on outputs or the digital I/O doesn't work. All my Dells are quite old since I won't touch them anymore, so maybe they have changed. But the fact that they tinker around creating their own bios and stuff makes me just avoid them. Glad they are working though for several folks in the forum.

[sjpaul]

I don't know, maybe it's just because I typically like to run preamps at their ideal, getting a good amount of gain prior to clipping (just something drilled into me a long time ago when it was a lot bigger deal than with most modern gear) or maybe it's because I am mostly working in theatre where the players are not always playing at maximum volume (and they are playing honest to goodness acoustic instruments) or something, but I regularly have ADA8000 gain levels set up to 3 PM or so for dynamic mics (your typical Shure 57 or a Beta 57, etc...) and around 12 noon for most phantom powered condensers.

The only channels that are running lower than that on my current show (going from memory here... it's not like I actually have notes about where they are, I just dial them in and forget about it, unless something is going wrong) is kick drum and the electronic instruments (2 keyboards, 1 percussion pad). The keyboard feeds are actually direct outs from a Mackie Mixer so of course their gain is all the way down, since it's really line level, I only go through the ADA for convenience and consistency sake.

That's my experience anyway. Keep in mind that I'm not always using the ADA units with a SAC rig, but the examples I listed above are from my latest show which is a SAC rig.

I find my "rule of thumb" for gains to be 9 o'clock for kick and toms, turned all the way down for snare, 11 o'clock for mic'd guitars, and 3 o'clock for vocals using SM58's (but I had an issue with 2 58's clipping the pre a couple of nights ago so I'm going to go with 12 o'clock for vocals from now on and use the input gain on SAC to make it up. I thought the non remote gain pre thing would be an issue but it hasn't really been as I'm usually able to tweak it all in advance of going to FOH.

[gdougherty]

I find my "rule of thumb" for gains to be 9 o'clock for kick and toms, turned all the way down for snare, 11 o'clock for mic'd guitars, and 3 o'clock for vocals using SM58's (but I had an issue with 2 58's clipping the pre a couple of nights ago so I'm going to go with 12 o'clock for vocals from now on and use the input gain on SAC to make it up. I thought the non remote gain pre thing would be an issue but it hasn't really been as I'm usually able to tweak it all in advance of going to FOH.

My settings are pretty much identical.

[AntonZ]

Wow. Interesting way to go about it. A little too Rube Goldberg if you have an end client looking on, but for personal use that's a neat solution.

I do have to say that almost all the computers I've had major issues with over the years have been Dells. Weird issues where a sound card simply would not work. Same card works just fine in my other computers. Stick it in a Dell and you get noise on outputs or the digital I/O doesn't work. All my Dells are quite old since I won't touch them anymore, so maybe they have changed. But the fact that they tinker around creating their own bios and stuff makes me just avoid them. Glad they are working though for several folks in the forum.

Thanks. I agree, my system is not one for beauty contests :D . If looks matter, a 2u black faceplate with a few holes for air, power switch and USB would go a long way. I don't bother, as I don't do audio service for pay. Just a weekend warrior, slowly building a small scale PA on minimal (=no) budget for my own band needs, no more. Music costs me money, brings me joy.


At work we used to have Dell pc hardware for office use. Mostly Optiplex desktops and some Lattitude notebooks, not the consumer grade hardware. Other than the GX270's we did not have much problems with most of it, usually worked fine until performance needs made us upgrade to newer hardware.


The german PDF that Christian linked to describes a mod for the ADA8000 power supply section. The author finds the regulators (7815 and 7915) run rather hot. He measured about 65 degrees Celcius (145 Fahrenheit) after running for a very short while with the cover removed. Certainly much warmer with cover on and racked without extra space for cooling. Furthermore the main caps in the power supply are too small for the needs of the unit. The heat will make the caps which are already too small degrade quickly. That makes things worse and typically causes gradually increasing noise on inputs/outputs as well as radically shortened lifetime for components.

The mod is basically bigger main caps (from 470uF to 1000uF) and the addition of a small fan right in front of the main voltage regulators (7815 and 7915). The 12V fan runs from it's own 7812 regulator. Also, if I understand it correctly, the holes for the rear XLR connectors can be made a bit wider in order to get some hot air to go out and fresh air to come in, rather than just distributing the heat more evenly inside the case. I'm no electronics expert and will not translate the entire story, but will gladly answer more questions on the german text if needed (and within my abilities).


My hat off to George for how he works with his church and others by the way. I like your attitude, wish there were someone like you around here to learn from.

[gdougherty]

My hat off to George for how he works with his church and others by the way. I like your attitude, wish there were someone like you around here to learn from.
Between hanging here and over at the BFM forums I've learned almost as much as anywhere else. I was taught the basics but the rest I've gathered from online reading on how to use things live and in the studio. Besides the use of mic's there's a good amount that's translated pretty well from the studio world to improve my live mixes.
Having all the toys to play with in SAC is a great way as well to learn how things function. I find many peoples knowledge is limited partly just by what they've had exposure to and available on hand to mess with.