How to wire an eq, effects unit, compressor, and crossover?

[paulwannabe]

I've been adding signal processors to my rack so that I will be in shape to run live sound for bar bands. I'm still learning, and I've been advised to get an effects processor, compressor, and crossover. I know the basic functions of these units, but I need to learn how to use them effectively (I've been studying the owner's manuals). With all these signal processors in the path, everything has become much more complicated and I am thoroughly confused. I need to know the order to wire the signal processors in, and/or if I should patch only particular channels to a signal processor. (If I didn't want to add reverb to the whole mix, but just to the vocals)

 

Here's what I've recently bought:

 

2 Behringer GEQ3102 dual 31-band graphic equalizers

1 Alesis 3630 dual-channel compressor/limiter/gate

1 Yorkville EPM508 crossover

1 Alesis Midiverb II effects processor

 

I plan to just use light effects on the vocals, and probably some light compression on the bass, drums, and vocals. For the crossover, I need two channels: one for the mains/monitors at about 60Hz and above, and one for the subs at around 90Hz and below. I'm not sure how this will work, though, because I am using two separate amps. One side of the Yamaha amp is feeding a pair of 15" FOH speakers, and the other side is feeding a pair of 18" subs. The Mackie is used solely for monitors.

 

I'm uncertain about the EQ's, also. Each EQ can be run in dual mono mode so that I can in effect have 4 31-band graphic EQ's. I would need one band for the 15" FOH speakers and if possible one band for each of the floor monitors. The subs don't need EQ, do they?

 

I know this is kind of vague, but please ask me for specifics and I'll help out as much as I can.

[Majoria]

I'll give this the first crack starting with the universal rules and basics.

 

Compressors are inserts and not applied to the AUX channels, you either compress the channel on the mixer or one of the main channels going out to the amp. Therefore your dual channel compressor can either be applied to two main outs or to two seperate channels on the mixer, say the kick channel and the snare channel.

 

The effects processor however should be applied to an AUX channel and then apply as much or as little to each individual channel as you'd like with the corresponding AUX knob. So the cable routing would be AUX send to processor input and then processor output to either the AUX return or to a channel on the mixer. If you have enough channels, return it to a channel so you can apply channel settings (volume, EQ, pan, etc) to the effect. If not, just return it to the AUX return for the same channel number.

 

I'm confused about the two crossovers. Are you intending to have everything over 60hz going to the mains & monitors and everything below 90 going to the sub? If so, why have the overlap from 60-90 Hz going to both? Why not just cross over at one frequency and everything below goes to the subs and everything above goes to the mains? And were you actually going to cross over the monitors? If so, do you have monitor subs? Lastly, are you running stereo or mono?

 

As far as EQ goes, you can EQ your mains and then afterwards send the signal to the crossover to split between tops and subs. So the FOH/sub chain would be mixer main outs --> EQ --> crossover --> amp. For monitors, if they are not using a crossover just eliminate it so it would be mixer monitor outs --> EQ --> amp.

[W. M. Hellinger]

I need to know the order to wire the signal processors in, and/or if I should patch only particular channels to a signal processor. (If I didn't want to add reverb to the whole mix, but just to the vocals) Here's what I've recently bought: 1 Alesis 3630 dual-channel compressor/limiter/gate I plan to just use light effects on the vocals, and probably some light compression on the bass, drums, and vocals.

For that particular compressor, I suggest to get "compressor light effects", just take the inputs for the compressor from anywhere on the board it's handy where those two outputs on the board won't otherwise be used. In my opinion it will be counterproductive to patch the outputs from that particular compressor to anything (unless you're mixing in a church, and there's a cry room, and you want to stimulate the environment in the cry room to promote maximum crying while in there). Set the compressor to a fairly fast attack and release to get the maximum "light" effect from the LED display on the compressor. You could patch the kick drum to one channel of the compressor so you get a "light" effect from the beat, and patch the vocals to the other channel so you have a "light" effect when folks are singing.

[agedhorse]

Best thing you got is the Midiverb 2. Remember to set the outpout mix to wet (100% effects), return it to a channel and do NOT send anything from that return channel back out on the same aux send that the effects is on. To do so will cause a feedback loop that can easily damage your gear.

[alcohol]

For that particular compressor, I suggest to get "compressor light effects", just take the inputs for the compressor from anywhere on the board it's handy where those two outputs on the board won't otherwise be used. In my opinion it will be counterproductive to patch the outputs from that particular compressor to anything (unless you're mixing in a church, and there's a cry room, and you want to stimulate the environment in the cry room to promote maximum crying while in there). Set the compressor to a fairly fast attack and release to get the maximum "light" effect from the LED display on the compressor. You could patch the kick drum to one channel of the compressor so you get a "light" effect from the beat, and patch the vocals to the other channel so you have a "light" effect when folks are singing.

 

Yeah, but to really get the most out of that "light" effect he would need to buy a "light" amplifier!

[B. Adams]

Alright, I'll tackle some of this one.

 

Set your crossover at 100Hz. The idea is that the subs will be doing everything under 100Hz and the mains will do everything above that. You don't want overlap. You may find that 100Hz is not the ideal crossover point for your speakers, so you can change it, but you still don't want them to overlap.

 

You're running in mono. Send the low signal from one side of your crossover to the amp channel running subs, and send the high signal from the same side of the crossover to the other channel. The other side of the crossover will not be used, because you're running in mono (nothing wrong with that).

 

You need a channel of EQ for each monitor mix, you can run them inline or you can insert them on each aux output if your mixer has that capability.

 

You need a channel of EQ for each main output as well, and yes, you'll want some EQ on the subs. If you've set up your crossover the way I told you before, you should just run one output, like Left, out of the board, into the EQ, then into the one channel of the crossover that you're using. That single channel of EQ will be affecting both the mains and the subs, since the EQ is before the crossover.

 

Your other channel of EQ will be unused, until you either start running in stereo, use aux-fed subs, or find some other use for it.

 

The Midiverb is a decent piece of gear, set it up as described earlier.

 

The compressor isn't the worst, but almost. Use it lightly and pay attention to the noise and artifacts it creates, and turn it down if you can hear it too much. Don't squash the signal too much, it sounds terrible. I recommend inserting it on individual channels rather than over your whole mix.

 

The EQ's are my least favorite. Well, put it this way, I can't think of an EQ I dislike more. Try not to make too many huge cuts, try not to boost at all, pay attention to the amount of noise and phasey-ness they create. It would be easy to turn your otherwise decent mix into a huge pile of crap with these EQ's.

 

In any case, it sounds like you're off to a good start. Learn how to use everything you have, pratice with it before you try to use it at a show, and don't blow anything up.

[JohnnyGraphic]

Is the compressor returnable?

 

The Alesis compressor is fairly inadequate at doing just about anything. They're noisy, don't do what they're supposed to do and take up rack space.

 

I've had one and sold it.

 

Buy a dbx unit if you REALLY need a compressor. If you don't need a compressor return it. While you're at it, return the Behringer EQ too. Then, use the cash towards better gearLike a dbx EQ. Or a Peavey EQ with FLS (good unit for the dough and has the handy "Here's the feedback" light).

 

Johnny

[paulwannabe]

For that particular compressor, I suggest to get "compressor light effects", just take the inputs for the compressor from anywhere on the board it's handy where those two outputs on the board won't otherwise be used. In my opinion it will be counterproductive to patch the outputs from that particular compressor to anything (unless you're mixing in a church, and there's a cry room, and you want to stimulate the environment in the cry room to promote maximum crying while in there). Set the compressor to a fairly fast attack and release to get the maximum "light" effect from the LED display on the compressor. You could patch the kick drum to one channel of the compressor so you get a "light" effect from the beat, and patch the vocals to the other channel so you have a "light" effect when folks are singing.

 

Man, I laugh every time I read that. Maybe I should have written "slight" effects. That would probably have been clearer. Anyway, for the blinking lights to be effective, I would need some sort of bulbs, not just the puny little LED's. Unless I got a dozen or so compressors and turned them towards the audience..........

 

I used to have a Fender Rumble bass amp, and it actually did have a blinking light effect. The bottom of the amp had these red lights that would pulse with the music. I thought it was the gayest thing in the world. I ended up getting rid of that amp.

[paulwannabe]

 

You need a channel of EQ for each main output as well, and yes, you'll want some EQ on the subs. If you've set up your crossover the way I told you before, you should just run one output, like Left, out of the board, into the EQ, then into the one channel of the crossover that you're using. That single channel of EQ will be affecting both the mains and the subs, since the EQ is before the crossover. Your other channel of EQ will be unused, until you either start running in stereo, use aux-fed subs, or find some other use for it.

 

 

I understand the way you've described setting this up, but I've got some questions. Is using one channel of EQ for the mains and the subs ideal? To me, it seems better to have a separate EQ channel for each. Is there a way I could achieve this? I think I would have to run in stereo. If I wished to do that, how could I?

 

Next, about the monitors. If I run my mixer in mono as described, I am only using one channel of EQ and one channel of the crossover for the FOH. Couldn't I run a monitor mix via aux send through the other EQ channel and the other crossover channel? I probably won't be sending bass guitar or kick through the monitor, but I'd feel safer if I knew for sure that the monitor was only being fed frequencies that it was meant to produce.

 

Thanks for your help. I'm starting to get the picture now.

[paulwannabe]

 

I'll give this the first crack starting with the universal rules and basics. Compressors are inserts and not applied to the AUX channels, you either compress the channel on the mixer or one of the main channels going out to the amp. Therefore your dual channel compressor can either be applied to two main outs or to two seperate channels on the mixer, say the kick channel and the snare channel. The effects processor however should be applied to an AUX channel and then apply as much or as little to each individual channel as you'd like with the corresponding AUX knob. So the cable routing would be AUX send to processor input and then processor output to either the AUX return or to a channel on the mixer. If you have enough channels, return it to a channel so you can apply channel settings (volume, EQ, pan, etc) to the effect. If not, just return it to the AUX return for the same channel number. I'm confused about the two crossovers. Are you intending to have everything over 60hz going to the mains & monitors and everything below 90 going to the sub? If so, why have the overlap from 60-90 Hz going to both? Why not just cross over at one frequency and everything below goes to the subs and everything above goes to the mains? And were you actually going to cross over the monitors? If so, do you have monitor subs? Lastly, are you running stereo or mono? As far as EQ goes, you can EQ your mains and then afterwards send the signal to the crossover to split between tops and subs. So the FOH/sub chain would be mixer main outs --> EQ --> crossover --> amp. For monitors, if they are not using a crossover just eliminate it so it would be mixer monitor outs --> EQ --> amp.

 

 

How would I send the compressor to individual channels? Should I use the insert option and a y-cable on the individual channels I want to compress, or should I run the compressor through an aux send(s) and target specific channels that way?

 

For the effects, if I run them through an aux send as you described, what should I do with the individual channel faders for the channels I want to add effects to? If I route them to the main mix, won't that leave me with the dry signals from the individual channels and the wet signal from the aux return or separate effects channel? That would be cool.......

 

Thanks for all the tips. I know that this equipment is not top of the line, but I'm on a pretty tight budget. At some point I will probably upgrade, but for now it will have to do until I have a better idea of what I'm doing and have more money to spend. Thanks again!

[Majoria]

To apply compression to an individual channel, use a 1/4" TRS cable (some may call it a stereo cable, has two black rings per end instead of just one) and plug it into the insert jack on the mixer channel and the send jack of the compressor. No need to worry about a return since the TSR cable can do both send and return on one cable.

 

If you return the effects signal to a channel on the mixer, it has to be a dedicated effects channel and not one used by an instrument or voice (what's currently an unused channel). Set the EQ straight up and the volume fader to U for the effects channel. Then apply the desired amount to each channel using the AUX knob. On my 16 channel mixer, I use channels 15 and 16 for effects return and thus if I want to eliminate all of one effect for some reason I just press the mute button for that channel. Or I can raise and lower the intensity of the effect overall by adjusting the slider. The slider only permits the overall potential effect, the individual AUX knobs set the actual amount.

 

I agree that only one EQ channel is needed for running in mono. The same channel does the subs and mains since the crossover comes later in the signal chain and then splits the signal to each side of the amp. The subs are handling everything below say 100Hz and the mains everything above 100Hz. Why would you want one EQ for only below 100 and another for only above when the one you have can do both?

 

Most monitors can handle the low frequencies, they just won't be as ideal for reproducing that low end like a sub. I run no crossover on my hot spot monitors and they've worked fine for years. To answer your question, you could use the other EQ and crossover channel for your monitors but I see no need to do that unless for some reason your monitors specifically state they cannot handle the low frequencies, at which point I'd get different monitors.

[agedhorse]

Perhaps you should not attempt using the compressor until you get the other basics figured out first.

[Unalaska]

Alright, skimming this I haven't seen the answer I'm looking for. To start, do you have an amp rack or are you using powered speakers for mains? If you have an amp rack then put the crossover in the amp rack and use XLR cables to hook everything up.

 

The compressor, not the best obviously but it can be worked with (I used to have 4 of them back in the mid 90's). This will need 2x insert cables, one for each channel and each channel can be patched into any channel on the board.

 

The EQ's should be hooked up between the board and crossover

Mic - Mixer (L/R) - EQ - Xover - Amps - Subs/Tops

(monitor 1/2) - EQ - Amp - Speaker

Use XLR for the EQ's (balanced 1/4 if not available from the board)

 

Effects processor needs 3 unbalanced 1/4 cables: 1 for input, 2 for output. If your system is in mono then one output would be fine. Send to the FX using a POST FADE aux (I don't know what board you have). Returns from the FX should go to an unused channel (keep the post fade aux turned down).

 

Crossover points: Do not overlap your speakers at 90 and 60hz. The crossover will split the freq at one point not two. Really there is no reason to have top boxes try to reproduce something the subs will do so well at. There are some technical reasons too but just know that overlapping is a waste.

 

good luck

[Unalaska]

Alright, skimming this I haven't seen the answer I'm looking for. To start, do you have an amp rack or are you using powered speakers for mains? If you have an amp rack then put the crossover in the amp rack and use XLR cables to hook everything up.

 

The compressor, not the best obviously but it can be worked with (I used to have 4 of them back in the mid 90's). This will need 2x insert cables, one for each channel and each channel can be patched into any channel on the board.

 

The EQ's should be hooked up between the board and crossover

Mic - Mixer (L/R) - EQ - Xover - Amps - Subs/Tops

(monitor 1/2) - EQ - Amp - Speaker

Use XLR for the EQ's (balanced 1/4 if not available from the board)

 

Effects processor needs 3 unbalanced 1/4 cables: 1 for input, 2 for output. If your system is in mono then one output would be fine. Send to the FX using a POST FADE aux (I don't know what board you have). Returns from the FX should go to an unused channel (keep the post fade aux turned down).

 

Crossover points: Do not overlap your speakers at 90 and 60hz. The crossover will split the freq at one point not two. Really there is no reason to have top boxes try to reproduce something the subs will do so well at. There are some technical reasons too but just know that overlapping is a waste.

 

good luck

[paulwannabe]

 

Perhaps you should not attempt using the compressor until you get the other basics figured out first.

 

 

Words of wisdom. I tried out the crossover today without success. The noise gate was making an annoying clicking sound every time the signal came and went. Once I figured out how to disable the gate, it wasn't too bad, but I still won't be doing much compression until I have a better idea of what I'm doing.

 

I'm not sure if I wired the crossover correctly. I set the crossover point to 100Hz like you guys said, and I was getting a much hotter signal to the subs than I'm used to. I guess that's a good thing, but this seemed like a bit much. Even mic handling was making the subs pulse. By the way, I am using power amps and passive speakers. The crossover has 3 outputs per channel: hi, low, and sub. I think the hi and low are used in conjunction for bi-amping, which I'm not doing. For full range, I think I just use the low out and the sub out. The sub output has an enable/disable switch that I believe routes the low frequencies to either the sub out or the low out depending on whether or not you're using subwoofers. For mono full-range operation, I think I'm supposed to enable the sub switch and run the sub out to the amp channel powering the subs, and then run the low out to the amp channel powering the mains. Is that correct?

 

As far as EQ goes, I've got it hooked up as described earlier. With one EQ channel for the FOH and one channel for the monitors, I probably won't even need 2 separate equalizers until I expand my monitor options...

 

That's another problem I'm going to run into. My mixer (Yamaha MG 16/4) only has 2 aux sends, one pre fader (monitor mix) and one post fader (effects). I know that musicians like to hear themselves and thus usually require their own monitor mix, but at this point I can only give them one. This presents a problem when I get into running sound for 4-6 piece bands. How can I expand to accommodate more monitor mixes? Would I need a larger mixer? I love the simplicity of the Yamaha, but it only has 10 mono mic channels and 4 stereo channels. I have a sub mixer for the drum mix, but I don't know what to do about more monitor mixes.

[Majoria]

You can't use what you don't have. If you need more AUX channels, you have a problem. I even use different monitor sends for a two man band giving each their own as desired. You may have to look at something like a MixWiz that has 6 AUX channels. I am since my Mackie 1604 only has 4 and they are all used, 2 monitor and 2 effects.

[agedhorse]

Very carefully read the configuration part of the owners manual for the crossover. I think you are configuring it incorrectly for the simplest use.

 

You want to be in the BIAMP (2 way) mode, and use the output jacks for that mode corresponding to the low out (to subs) and hi out (to tops).

 

Just put the compressor away for the time being.

[paulwannabe]

 

Very carefully read the configuration part of the owners manual for the crossover. I think you are configuring it incorrectly for the simplest use. You want to be in the BIAMP (2 way) mode, and use the output jacks for that mode corresponding to the low out (to subs) and hi out (to tops). Just put the compressor away for the time being.

 

 

I'm pretty sure I read the manual correctly. Unfortunately it's only about 3 pages long, so it doesn't go into a lot of detail. I thought Bi-amp mode was for those speakers that have 2 inputs and 2 crossovers, one for the horn and one for the woofer. In the illustration in the manual on bi-amping, they have two amplifiers running into one speaker. The only thing that doesn't make sense to me is that it says to run the tops through the low (FULL RANGE) output.

 

And yes, I'll save the compressor for later.

[agedhorse]

Generally, provided the 2 way mode's frequency control goes down to 100Hz, you are better off using it in 2 way mode.

 

2 way (or biamped) doesn't necessicarily mean the horns being actively crossed over, but much more likely that the subs are being crossed over to the top boxes.

 

You may have had difficulty in level matching because some crossovers with a seperate sub output don't always roll off the top end as they are used to drive active subs with built in crossovers that may be set higher than the system crossover point that you are thinking of... especially if run in 3 way mode. You also have the difficluty of high passing the "full range" boxes.

 

This is a good example of where there are a lot of potentially confusing details to work out, and not all owners manuals do a good job of explaining it without the user really already understanding the signal flow process.