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<blockquote data-quote="Jason Glass" data-source="post: 125350" data-attributes="member: 2167">Re: Paddles limitationsHi David,It is not mathematically possible for a passive RF splitter to have less than 3dB of loss.&nbsp; Even the best of them usually have around 0.5dB of insertion loss in addition to the splitter loss for total loss of 3.5 dB.&nbsp; The product page also says, &quot;Shure recommends using UA820 1/2 wave antennas with UA221&nbsp; Splitter/Combiners. The UA820 provides up to 3 dB of additional gain&nbsp; compared to standard 1/4 wave antennas. The additional gain compensates&nbsp; for signal loss in splitting applications.&quot;&nbsp; They may be using a system loss spec rather than the more appropriate component loss when stating 2dB loss.With that in mind, 3.5 dB of loss from a single component is not necessarily a problem, as long as the total system losses end up in the neighborhood of 0dB or better.&nbsp; Since LPDA&#039;s have typically 6dBi of axial gain, and most of the 1/2λ dipoles have around 3dBi, they can sometimes make up for other lossy components with room to spare.The whole RF game is about optimizing the system gain in order to reduce the chances that one or more of a gazillion signal-degrading scenarios will cause a dropout.&nbsp; It may seem like overkill to try to squeeze one more dB of gain out your system until you consider that a single factor like polarization orientation mismatch loss or body absorption loss can suddenly drop a signal level 50dB when a performer turns his body or moves in space by mere inches.&nbsp; At levels that low, one dB can very easily be the difference between a complete audio dropout and an inaudible glitch.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Jason Glass, post: 125350, member: 2167"] Re: Paddles limitations Hi David, It is not mathematically possible for a passive RF splitter to have less than 3dB of loss. Even the best of them usually have around 0.5dB of insertion loss in addition to the splitter loss for total loss of 3.5 dB. The product page also says, [I]"Shure recommends using UA820 1/2 wave antennas with UA221 Splitter/Combiners. The UA820 provides up to 3 dB of additional gain compared to standard 1/4 wave antennas. The additional gain compensates for signal loss in splitting applications." [/I]They may be using a system loss spec rather than the more appropriate component loss when stating 2dB loss. With that in mind, 3.5 dB of loss from a single component is not necessarily a problem, as long as the total system losses end up in the neighborhood of 0dB or better. Since LPDA's have typically 6dBi of axial gain, and most of the 1/2[FONT=Arial]λ[/FONT] dipoles have around 3dBi, they can sometimes make up for other lossy components with room to spare. The whole RF game is about optimizing the system gain in order to reduce the chances that one or more of a gazillion signal-degrading scenarios will cause a dropout. It may seem like overkill to try to squeeze one more dB of gain out your system until you consider that a single factor like polarization orientation mismatch loss or body absorption loss can suddenly drop a signal level 50dB when a performer turns his body or moves in space by mere inches. At levels that low, one dB can very easily be the difference between a complete audio dropout and an inaudible glitch. [/QUOTE]

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