Re: An Argument I've Been Having - ATW 3000 Systems
IMO the ATW3000 series is fine....now....I have never had one dropped...."would it survive"...?
A church I worked at had an elder drop a belt pack in the toilet. I still use it today, though we don't ever tell people where it's been. :twisted:
I find the Shure SLX beltpack to be of terrible design, it's plastic case is easily bent, causing stress to the components inside, and also lacking a proper attinuator...
I actually am using a mixed system of SLX and ATW 3000 at the moment, and I completely agree- the belt packs suck. Minus the fact that it's plastic, the SLX handheld is better, but I've always been fond of the full metal body of the ATW handheld.
If you want to test this theory, take a wired version of the wireless mic that you are using and place it next to the wireless. Grab a small bag of potato chips. Crumple it in front of the wired version. Now, do the same in front of the wireless. You will be amazed at how different that sounds.
Completely agree, though in theater with body packs and headsets it's sadly not a viable option. But if you can find something that DOES have dense HF capacity at less than 1k a bodypack, I'd love to get some of that.
~:-D~:grin:
In the Shure line, I'd not recommend less than the ULX line for anything where actual audio quality matters. The UHFR systems are going to sound the closest to your wired mic, but again, you're spending $2K to get there.
I also agree here. The same friend speced a new wireless system for a local high school, and absolutely refused to sell them anything less that ULX because he didn't want to get the service calls.
Gotta side with your friend on this one. I've had nothing but bad luck with these systems. Yes I know how to properly coordinate frequencies and yes even when done they still seem to randomly drop audio (but not RF). They eat batteries and audio quality wise I have used them head to head agianst Shure ULX, SLX, and even (GASP) PGX as well as Sennheiser ew100 and the ATWs are the clear loser in all cases.
Battery wise, they most definitely do eat battery- but when the Shure body packs tend to frustrate me, I just can't justify them. They are too large and don't feel rugged enough- especially in a musical theater environment. Another thing to consider, however, is that the capsules on Shure microphones may sound better to you. I personally do prefer Shure mics over AT mics, especially in terms of theatrical headsets (Countryman is wondrous when compared to AT), but I still find the SLX to be a worse wireless system than the ATW 3000 because of troubles I've had in the past. Also- the frequency control is not quite as dynamic on the SLX, which is another reason I would rather side with ATW. As for Sennheiser, I've never been fond of the brand. Don't know why. If I had to guess, I just didn't like their competing version of an SM58 like microphone. RF performance wise? I've never- EVER- had a problem with Sennheiser.
So what I am reading here is that as a wireless system that a good engineer uses, ATW 3000 will work as the bare minimum. It has some flaws, absolutely, but it works for the majority of the time and is flexible enough to frequency coordinate. If you're going with Shure, ULX becomes your lowest usable item. I haven't read anything about higher level ATW systems, and I didn't expect to, as the ATW 3000 is properly placed as the entry level system, with other brands filling up the higher levels.
My friend and I have conspired to compare PGX and ATW3k on only the principle of RF performance. Granted, it's not an entirely fair comparison, but the only other option was a ULX-D system with LDPAs and much more extra technology so we decided this should work relatively well. This test will most likely happen within the next month or so, and we'll try to do it as scientifically as possible.
