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Why I make such a big deal about gain structure


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Ran a few more tests:


Unity reads 4.16dB low on the outputs relative to the input. Output meters also read low.


Limiter indicators are also off by maybe 4-5dB, indicating limiting before actual limiting occurs.


Discovered another anomoly with the metering, when you enter output limiting steady state, the input meter drops 6dB then increases back to the reference reading every second or two. The audio signal levels do not change. There is something very goofy with the metering.


The more I mess with this, the more I see an unfinished or not thoroughly tested design.


Seems like a pretty good idea with a mediocre execution. I do not see any of these problems with the DBX DR products that I rork with regularly. And I so wanted to like it too.


edit: unmuted outputs 7 and 8 and all LEDs came on but there was no signal present at the output jacks. Rebooted unit, the meters returned to normal operation and no cycling of the input meter. Possible that I disrupted something in measurement process, but you can be sure I will keep my eyes open on this.

 

 

Thanks for checking. I always noticed a gain drop with the input at unity although I never checked it.

With you having metering,boot problems I wonder if you have a defective unit? It does happen. Could make all your measurements off.

I've seen many clip/limiter lights that come on before threshold just as a "Hey this is it" kind of light.

 

To me this always seemed like a Home HiFi unit ramped up to a prosumer level. Useable but only within a window of amps, or target useage.

I've had mine for maybe a year or so and 0 problems. Home use or live. My DS24 was a $175 unit shipped total cost. It runs rings around analog crossovers in that price range used (((within))) its limits properly.

 

Kind of like a motorcycle helmet. If you have a $40 dollar head get a $40 dollar helmet.

If you rig is worth 500 then you may be looking for a $175 crossover.

 

The BBEs are a rebadged Digisynthetic

 

A lot of reading here.

http://srforums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/m/317323/0/?srch=BBE+Ds#msg_317323

 

And pages here.

http://srforums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/s/BBE+Ds/all/AND/DESC/0//0/

 

Doug

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I've seen a few of the BBE units in use, maybe a couple. The last one was used with an OmniSystems line array and their 4ch amps. The last guy I saw loved it and ordered another 6 on ebay for under $200ea. Dunno why, if it doesn't work it doesn't work. Certainly wouldn't work for my P7000 amps which require +7dbu to clip.

 

 

I used my DS24 to run a pair of Peavey GPS3500s before. They take 3.5 DBV or around 7.5 or so DBU. (Been awhile so I'll have to check my math.) No problems with plenty of input,output headroom.

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These are exactly the type of conversations I like to see going on. More like reading a "How-To" sound manual written by someone who knows. I guess some of it is starting to sink in. I don't feel quite so overwhelmed with the technical aspect. (or you guys are talking in more basic terms)

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I used my DS24 to run a pair of Peavey GPS3500s before. They take 3.5 DBV or around 7.5 or so DBU. (Been awhile so I'll have to check my math.) No problems with plenty of input,output headroom.

 

 

So for your application, you have 5dB of headroom. Skinny for my tastes, but workable. Some of my amps have 1 or 2dB of drive headroom, not acceptable. Not even close.

 

I don't think the unit is defective, all the analog measurements I made match the math and the chipset specs, so I have high confidence in the data. It's the corrolation between menus and how the unit actually operates compared with the numbers. There are some gray areas that do not track the specs.

 

As long as these are documented, or there is adequate headroom to stay away from the edges, it's probably ok SO LONG AS YOU KNOW IT. That's the biggest issue I have right now.

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Classes begin next week... so I'll need to remember how to build FET amp circuits and remember how all the logic gates work and all that crap...

 

1st year EE stuff but god damn I've been out of school for 3 years!

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Yeah, but what can you tell me about an English saddle?

 

 

Well, for starters, they are not very comfortable. If you have to herd wildstock in one for 10 hours, you'd probably find a new career at hour 1. Unlike Western saddles, which are very comfortable to ride in, English saddles require "posting", which means that you move forward and backwards towards the horses head, using your legs to lift yourself out of the uncomfortable saddle to that you're standing when the most uncomfortable part happens (horse hitting the ground).

 

Unlike western saddles, they are not very useful for work, because they are difficult to ride backwards, or while leaning, and well, doing anything other than prancing and jumping rocks.

 

I guess in reality they work great for lots of the above things, I just honestly prefer to sit my lazy ass in a western saddle.

 

Andy is probably the authority on this topic as well, as I remember seeing a picture of him around riding English on a Friesian.

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Well, for starters, they are not very comfortable. If you have to herd wildstock in one for 10 hours, you'd probably find a new career at hour 1. Unlike Western saddles, which are very comfortable to ride in, English saddles require "posting", which means that you move forward and backwards towards the horses head, using your legs to lift yourself out of the uncomfortable saddle to that you're standing when the most uncomfortable part happens (horse hitting the ground).


Unlike western saddles, they are not very useful for work, because they are difficult to ride backwards, or while leaning, and well, doing anything other than prancing and jumping rocks.


I guess in reality they work great for lots of the above things, I just honestly prefer to sit my lazy ass in a western saddle.


Andy is probably the authority on this topic as well, as I remember seeing a picture of him around riding English on a Friesian.

 

:lol: hahahah this is awesome. i love these forums. :D

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Well, for starters, they are not very comfortable. If you have to herd wildstock in one for 10 hours, you'd probably find a new career at hour 1. Unlike Western saddles, which are very comfortable to ride in, English saddles require "posting", which means that you move forward and backwards towards the horses head, using your legs to lift yourself out of the uncomfortable saddle to that you're standing when the most uncomfortable part happens (horse hitting the ground).


Unlike western saddles, they are not very useful for work, because they are difficult to ride backwards, or while leaning, and well, doing anything other than prancing and jumping rocks.


I guess in reality they work great for lots of the above things, I just honestly prefer to sit my lazy ass in a western saddle.


Andy is probably the authority on this topic as well, as I remember seeing a picture of him around riding English on a Friesian.

 

I needed a good laugh this morning!

 

Since I ride so many different horses while training, I had to standardize on something regarding balance and position, so western it was. Just more practical and more secure when riding unpredictable young horses. Kind of like sound, I choose a solution based on the big picture and being able to have a higher liklihood of success time after time. There's nothing that says you can't jump in a western saddle, but it's not quite as comfortable for such. You sure as hell can't rope in an english saddle however ;)

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If it was anybody else in the picture - I might have to say that is too much power for that driver ;-)

 

 

You might still be correct. That's a Friesian horse (from Friesland in the north of the Netherlands), and they are a light draft so there reallr is enough power to do some serious damage. In fact, there is a good parallel to the whole too much power argument thing...

 

Way too many people, in their quest for "whatever" end up with way too much horse for the rider, and like with speakers, it works out fine until a momentary lapse of good judgement or control and then it ends poorly. Friesians are often way too much horse for the folks who are attracted to them, and though they are very kind, willing, gentle horses 99% ofthe time, that's what makes them so dangerous. When something happens, it happens very big and usually very bad. I have many years riding, and over 10 years working with that breed. I am conservative in my training/riding approach, just like I am conservative with my sound systems, because I know what can happen and I depend on reliability more than anything else in both instances.

 

I do exhibition riding in front of an audience, it can be very dangerous stuff so I have to depend 100% (or as close as possible) on my horse just like my sound systems and here's why:

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At least I've never seen a sound system stomp the $%^& out of it's "rider" :lol:. And as for the picture, the youngin's out here do that from time to time - it's called "Car Surfing" :facepalm:. You definitely need a "Don't try this at home kiddies" caption for yours :).

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Andy, that's quite and interesting way to change a lightbulb....

 

 

Funny you say this, I used to change the flourescent tubes in the barn aisles from horseback (tall horse), somebody on the ground would hand me new tubes as I handed them the old ones. Seeing that there were maybe 50 fixtures, it was much faster than dragging a ladder around.

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You definitely need a "Don't try this at home kiddies" caption for yours
:)
.

 

Good point, I have to remind the kids at the barn that I am 100% confident that we are good to go before doing something like this. It's part of being in-tune. In fact, going back to sound systems for a minute, my philosophy is to design systems that are as reliable as possible and the logic is simple to follow with as few gottcha points as possible. It's good advice for many tasks.

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Was the mattress to get the horse to stand up? Because he doesn't like how soft it is?

Sorry, I'm way off topic - just curious...

 

It' was part of qualifying this horse as a possible police horse candidate, not going to happen but she did qualify as suitable. The reason I took her through the program is that I spent quite a bit of time and effort training her to be reliable (oh, there's that word reliable again ;) ) and her normal rider is blind, so I thought it would be a good idea to push her to see where her "edge" was. We (I) found it, the good news is that it's plenty far away from where her usual rider will ever push to.

 

The reason for using mattresses is the change of ground/footing, a horse likes solid ground. When they step on a mattress, it's anything but solid and that photo was the first time she stepped on it and did not like the feeling. The second time was 1/2 of the first reaction and the third time was fine. Some horses just come completely apart. My training method involves staying out of the horses way and not making things worse, allowing them to learn without us messing them.

 

Reliability, one of the most important words in the sound (and horse) trade. When providing sound for events, the most important thing (assuming the system is otherwise adequate) is reliability. There is nothing worse than a sound system failure at a show, and if you are a paid provider you can be sure that a sound system failure will give you a learning opportunity for things like liability, future career, word of mouth, vulnerability, etc.

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"There is nothing worse than a sound system failure at a show, and if you are a paid provider you can be sure that a sound system failure will give you a learning opportunity for things like liability, future career, word of mouth, vulnerability, etc."

 

My feeling is that a lot of effort has gone into taking what was a commercial endeavor and splitting it up so that masses of folks can access the equipment. Since they don't have the real capital to use the equipment (in recording the distribution system, in the concert industry the demand for small and mid-sized SR systems) reliability no longer matters.

 

IOW mission critical performance no longer matters because missions are no longer critical.

 

But that is just my feeling-- I don't know if it is accurate beyond what I have seen.

 

Do you think that there has been a shift in marketing/selling AV equipment away from building things to be reliable, long lasting, and requiring business capital towards building equipment that "sounds good", has lots of features, and can be purchased on a credit card?

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Do you think that there has been a shift in marketing/selling AV equipment away from building things to be reliable, long lasting, and requiring business capital towards building equipment that "sounds good", has lots of features, and can be purchased on a credit card?

 

 

I do agree with this, though sounding good and being very reliable is not mutually exclusive. It's like computers, there are the computers for the general masses where reliability does not matter all that much, and there's computers for (real) business, where the cost of failures (and the support, the data recovery, the inconvenience, the cost of an employee sitting unproductive, around, etc.) is very real and goes to the bottom line. Also, there's a reputation for reliability, and if there are computer problems, it gpoes back to possible questions about the reliability of the other parts of the business. There's also the loss of revenue.

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Ok, it's going back and I'll get a replacement next week. Way too many goofy things for me to be convinced it is just design errors.

 

The limiter threshold changes with output gain about 2-3dB, Limiter attack and hold adjust in 1mSec increments but the release adjusts in 10mSec increments, the limiter values will go up and then go down then back up again with clockwise turning of encoder. Suspicous of an encoder quadrature tracking glitch here.

 

The other thing I discovered, and Doug discovered as well, was a 4dB difference between in band unity measurements. the output is 4dB low, and this is why I encountered the predominant gain structure error in conjunction with the already low output. After running wide band signal and music through it, I was able to clip (or limit without indicating since there is some kind of limiting function on the DSP side input section software after the ADC) the input without reaching rated output on my biger QSC amps. That was the original suspicion, and there's limiting going on before this point as well.

 

No question that this unit would benefit from proper input and output scaling (I think +20dBu to +22dBu input clip point and output maximum output level before clip) would be just about right and push the limiter quirks far enough away to be reasonably uesable. Limiter action MUST be verified with a scope and/or a meter after the amp to be sure that the combination of gains and limiter thresholds resolve to the desired value. You can not use the menu numbers, they are not accurate enough (they vary by over at least +/- 2 dB and maybe even more than that since they seem to work a little differently with different scenarios.

 

This is too bad, the DSP sounds totally adequate, has plenty of features, a goofy buy workable user interface, is plenty quiet, etc. They are about 70% of the way to a good product, the cost of finishing it up right is really tiny within the context of the big picture IMO. The hard work is already done.

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