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The Peavey 32FX

By Roddy Pahl

Greetings! I'm Roddy Pahl, sound engineer of 20 years — long-time reader, first-time reviewer. I have done everything from duos to orchestras, rock to country, punk to jazz, full-on production shows to my daughter's 2nd grade school production and 10 years of touring. I am currently the lead audio engineer for the Fremont Street Experience 3rd Street Stage, and I am an audio tech for the New York New-York Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. Since this is the first time I have written for FOH, I thought I oughta clue you in and let you know who I am. After working with some of the FOH crew at a Fremont Street gig a few months ago they asked me to review some gear, and the first piece they gave me was the Peavey 32FX mixer.

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Yamaha EMX 5016CF Powered Mixer

By Jamie Rio

I think it has been as least eight years since I reviewed the first Yamaha EMX board. It was nice, but really didn't have enough features and horsepower to propel a band or sound company into the big leagues. So here I am nearly a decade later. I don't know how many versions of this mixer have been produced, but I haven't reviewed one since the first incarnation. So, let's take a look at this unit.

SLS 8290 Dual-Purpose PA Box

How many times have you been shown a vaguely trapezoidal box and then been promised that it can serve as a mid-high box or a full-range monitor? And how many times have you actually dared use the "multipurpose" box as a monitor and then as a house box? And how often do you keep using it for two different applications? The point here is that, multi-purpose or not, a box will generally end up only getting used for whatever it's best at — no matter what the manufacturer says. So let's say we are skeptical when we take a multipurpose box out on both MON and FOH duty.

Mackie Onyx 24.4

by Jamie Rio

Everybody needs a mid-format, midsized board. Well, maybe not everybody. My grandmother doesn't need this size of a mixer, but you know what I mean. If you supply sound reinforcement for some of the millions of school, city, church, club, park, small fair and carnival shows that happen every year in this country, then you need a midsize board.

Camco Vortex 6 Power Amplifier

By Mark Amundson

I have been hearing great things about Camco amps from visiting sound engineers from Europe in recent years. Now that the Camco Vortex series of amplifiers is distributed in the United States by Ashly Audio, it's easier for us all to get a look at these amps.

I was sent a Camco Vortex 6 amplifier, the mainstay of many Euro touring sound companies. The Vortex 6 puts out 2100 watts per channel into four-ohm loads with both channels driven with less than 0.1% distortion at 1kHz. And the Vortex 6 comes in a two-rackspace size with a 12.4 kilogram weight (27 pounds), and draws a polite 16 amperes at the 1/8th power representing normal operation at 120V.

Sony PCM-D1 Linear PCM Recorder

by Steve La Cerra

[Wait a second, what the hell is a recording device doing as a Road Test in FOH? This is a LIVE audio magazine. OK, cool your jets a second. Yes, we have drawn a real line in the sand between live and studio, but that line is increasingly blurring and we have to address that fact. Also, when I saw this at a recent trade show all I could think of was how cool it would be to use to make real "room" recordings of gigs. So, that is the method to this particular madness. Read on…-ed.]

Hear Technologies Mix Back and Hear Back Combo System

By Bill Evans and Jamie Rio

Monitor World has changed. Blame it on the increasing use of personal monitors and higher expectations on the part of performers, but the bottom line is that three or four mono mixes and a couple of sidefills will most likely not do the trick on most gigs. Especially in venues–like churches–where a small footprint is needed and where you need to squeeze maximum flexibility from a crew with often limited technical know-how. We have found a solution that works well for us. At a trade show in 2003, we went introduced to an affordable, easy to use and flexible system called the Hear Back from a company called Hear Technologies.

When we first heard about the Audio- Technica AT2041SP Studio Pack we asked them to send one out for review right away. Why, you might ask, would a magazine that covers LIVE audio want mics that are being marketed to home and project studio guys? Because this is one of the best values out there and we knew that regardless of the name it was marketed under, at a price point of $249 MSRP (and available online for a lot less than that; $149 estimated street price) we were going to see a bunch of these on a bunch of stages in the near future.