Karaoke Forums

Hi,

I am not in the karaoke business, but i love to sing karaoke I am looking to buy a karaoke machine that I can use at home, my budget is around £300. Right now I am looking at a machine called the "NEW BKV KP112" This seems to have everything I think I will need. I like that it gives you the option to record yourself so I can play it back later to listen to. Have any of you guys ever used this machine? Is it worth the money or is there a better machine out there that would be a better buy.....I obviously don't want to spend money on something that isn't much good. I would appreciate any advice you guys can offer.

I don't know if it breaks any forum rules to include a link to tje product here, so for now I will refrain from doing so. If someone (moderator or long time forum user) let's me know it's ok, I'll post a link to the machine I have in mind.

Dastardley

Post a link... in this case, sure you can.

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I can neither confirm nor deny ever having or knowing anything about nothing.... mrscott

Thanks Jian, this is the link to the machine I am thinking of buying.

LINK: BKV KP112

For home use that looks like it could be a fairly decent player. Certainly has all the features you'd want to have and then some. Obviously the audio quality of those mics will not be the greatest neither is singing through your TV or Stereo (I'd recommend sending the audio through your home stereo if possible), but again for home use it would probably work out real nice.

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DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke

Thanks for your input Tony. I wouldn't be opposed to buying a decent mic seperately if the machine itself was decent. I didn't realise that I could use my own home stereo for the audio either...Thanks for that info!

What were you planning to use for audio? My (and most forum members) suggestion would be to use some form of professional PA. I guess I made the assumption, wrongly so apparently, that since this was for home use you planned to use your TV or home stereo. Many here can tell you stories of issues encountered with running live audio through home stereo speakers. If you're careful with it, you can get away with it, however as I said, most here including me would recommend you get actual PA equipment instead.

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DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke

Well to be honest I was going to just use my tv, I don't know much about karaoke equipment, in fact I know nothing about Karaoke equipment! I had one of those Xfactor type family karaoke machines that we as a family used and with that I just plugged it into the tv and we sang away merrily. Now though I have really got the singing bug and want to improve on that little machine so thought i would splash out a bit this year and buy a better machine.

I hadn't thought about how to rig it up other than to just plug it directly into my television. If most guys use a PA system then I would be interested in getting a basic one and trying that route. I like to record my singing for my own amusement....and to annoy the wife with...when my throat gets sore and I can't annoy her any more with my 'live' performances.

Could you recommend a PA system? baring in mind it would only be used in a home environment.

OK well first off, TV would work too but would be the least desirable of the three options. Running it through your stereo woudl be the next best option and as I said before, PA would be the ideal option.

Now, on the PA side, I can offer a lot of suggestions but the important thing to understand is what size room and what is your budget. I mean I can offer up ideas for a 10x10 room that would fail miserably in a 20x20 room all the way up to PA that could cover a football stadium. So help me understand what kind of money you have to spend (obviously the most important consideration) and what kind of room we're talking about and I and the other great folks here can give you lots of ideas.

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DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke

Well my room size is 16'x13' , I wouldn't want to go much over £200-£250.

For a room that size, you should be able to get away with a pair of studio monitors. M-Audio has a few in your price range. If you don't mind looking at the used market, I'd say try to find a pair of JBL LSR2328's, they'd be an ideal package for you and you could add on a sub-woofer very easily later on if you chose.

Trying to get a full size PA in that price range would be tough to get anything of any real quality. But in a smaller room like that, studio monitors should work out great.

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DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke

He's not really looking for the pro feel. something like this: http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/pr ... 20807#used should be more than enough for the room.

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The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Just an observation guys, the OP is in Glascow, Scotland. He doesn't have the availability to some of the same equipment as we do, especially the Guitar Center gear.

Before you start looking at PA systems you need to know that there are two basic types: active (powered) speakers and passive speakers. Active speakers have the amplifiers built right into them and you can run an output directly from your karaoke player to the speaker. Active speakers are heavier because they have the amps built into them but the amps and the speakers are matched so there's less risk of blowing them out.

Passive speakers don't have the amplifiers built into them. They're normally used with powered mixers (mixers with amplifiers built into them) although you can insert an amplifier into the chain between a mixer and the passive speakers. This system is a bit trickier because you have to match your speakers and your amplifiers or you can damage your components.

One way for you to go would be:

1. Buy the player you're looking at or another one. Make sure you get one that does everything you want it to do and does it well. Play it through the tv and or home stereo for a while. Keep the volume and the microphone level low and don't scream into the microphone or you could possibly blow out your tv/stereo speakers.

2. As your budget allows, buy either one or two powered speakers. You can run your outputs directly from your player to the speaker for a while. You can possibly get away with just one speaker if your player allows you to blend the stereo signals to one output. As your budget allows, you can add the second speaker (if you can still get the same model) for stereo.

3. Add a mixer with some vocal effects as your budget allows. Reverb etc. The mixer would go between the player and the powered speakers.

One thing I discovered was that my powered speakers didn't get along well with my rear projection tv. The magnetic field from the speaker caused some awful convergence problems. Powered speakers supposedly have magnetic shielding but they can still cause problems and I suspect that the shielding quality varies widely between brands. Don't store your audio/video tapes near them just to be on the safe side.

I'm not an expert on this and probably only know enough to be dangerous. I hope someone corrects anything that I got wrong. Then we'll both learn something.

Mr Scott and Tomin are both spot on which is exactly why I suggested the studio monitor approach. Both JBL and M-Audio are widely available throughout Europe, in fact there is an M-Audio dealer in Glasgow (and I'm sure they probably carry JBL too).

The Studio monitors I recommended are active studio monitors (i.e. Amp built in), they take multiple inputs (RCA, XLR and 1/4") and have their own volume controls so they could be used without any form of mixer. That was my goal was to keep it easy for the OP. Once you get into full blown PA with a mixer and amps and everything, this suddenly becomes more of a project that could turn the OP off to the whole idea.

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DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke

Well, I can't believe I am going to recommend this brand but I had a pair for years and used them to sing live in my little studio room 12 x 16, they're powerful and are one of their best product

http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/B2031A.aspx

Tony thanks for taking the time to help me out...Really appreciate your input. I'm going to have to think about what route to go....I don't really want to go the second hand route, not because I don't like picking up a bargain (because i do) but due to me having no knowledge of the equiptment I would never know if what I bought secondhand was working as it should be....where with new equipment...I would at least know that If there was a problem it was more likely done to me not having set it up properly.

There are massive delays in online deliveries all over the UK right now due to the adverse weather conditions. So I won't be ordering anything until after Christmas, so that will give me a chance to read through the forum here to get more knowledge and try to decide what route to go.

Das

Thanks for your input Danny, that system certainly looks worth looking into and is within my budget.

Das

I think we can access most of the stuff here in Glasgow my friend, I see Guitar Center will ship to the UK and when you access their site from here in the UK they will automatically list their items in GBP's as opposed to USD for convienance...Which is mighty nice of them...

Das

Thanks for your great tutorial here Tom, this is a great bit of information for the likes of me......As I have no knowledge of setting this kind of equipment up at all. Other than the simple basic family plug and play karaoke I haven't set up anything else...so this post of yours helps a great deal.

One thing I would like to ask you (and anyone else who wants to chip in) I have a behringer 1204 FAX mixer which I use when singing on an online karaoke site will this mixer and the FX effects work in a karaoke player set up? Or are the mixer(s) i see mentioned something else entirely specific to karaoke set ups? sorry if this is a dumb question, but it will give you an indication of just how little I know about the set up and equiptment.....I'm like an uber newbie!

Das

Das, if you already have a mixer well then thta makes your life that much easier. Yes that will work with the player you're looking at. What's really nice is then you can run your microphones directly through that mixer rather than through the player. Then all you need is a decent set of powered speakers (either the monitors I described or something larger) and you're ready to roll. My recommendation for connecting the player to that would be to use RCA to 1/4" adapters and bring the mixer input in on one of the stereo channels (either 5/6 or 7/8).

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DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke