Karaoke Forums

hi all

i run my vocals through a Wharfedale Pro BX1360SD powered mixer.

My lounge room is 8 meters wide and 5 meters deep.

I have the speekers facing me. I sit on the lounge which is 3 meters from the speakers.

I cant have the vocals up very loud otherwise i get huge feedback.

Any ideas on how to deal with this problem?

Thankyou in advance for your help.

Kev

Turn the vocals (or overall volume down) and/or change the speaker angles.

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I find cheaper mics don't have very good gain before feedback.
A quality cardioid mic like Shure SM58 is good at rejecting most frequencies directly behind it, so they are good if your speakers are directly behind the mic.
If your speakers are in the corners - at 45 degree angle to the mic, then a good supercardioid mic like Shure Beta58a/57a should give you very good gain before feedback.
Can you tell I'm a Shure fan
Sennheiser e945 supercardioid, which I also use, is also very good for gain before feedback, if you like the Sennheiser sound (good on some voices and music styles, not good on others, whereas Shure sounds good most of the time on most people, me thinks anyhow).

That's a pretty small room to try and control feedback in, especially if you have hard surfaces and low ceilings also. As mchin99 suggested, super or hyper cardioid type mics would give you higher gain before feedback. I see your mixer has a small eq built in, try and roughly determine which frequencies are the main culprit. Do this by cutting all the frequencies and bring them up one at a time until the condition presents itself. The individually channels could also be done this way with the dial eq's on them. As mentioned by Lonnie, speaker and mic placement come into play also, try moving things around. Feedback is a nasty critter, but with some patience you may be able to tame it. Ideally, if your system has a means to insert devices, a 31 band EQ is a good tool for stopping feedback. good luck.

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

thanks guys for yuor suggestions

just had a quick look on ebay for sure mics and there are

SB58 & SM58 for around $AU 180 and there is one beta 58A thats aorund the $300 mark.

do others agree that SHURE are the best mics?

my best current mic is this one

Audio Technica ATM41HE
Audio Technica ATM41HE Provides very clear vocal reproduction, even when used ultra close. Features high output, fast transients and clean articulation on stage
Hi-ENERGY® neodymium element. Goes far beyond usual neodymium designs for better sound balance. Patented* floating diaphragm reduces handling noise
$310 rp


but i find that if i sing into it, too close to my mouth (in an effort to get volume minus the feedback) it sounds a bit distorted.

Hmm, that Audio Technica ATM41HE looks to be hypercardioid, so getting the Shure Betas (supercardioid) may just help a bit more with your feedback issues because of your room size. Cardioiod like SM58 may better help with feedback rejection at rear. Note hypercardiod is good for 45 degree speaker placement behind the mic but not good at all with speakers directly behind the mic. Also as posted previously, could be your room size and sound bouncng off the walls to the mic. Is the wall facing the mic pickup area hard surfaced (cement, brick etc)? Maybe try draping a carpet behind there. Also if your speakers are bassy, may want to try rolling off the bass, trying EQ as suggested. Also, do you have multiple open mics? Every mic turned on reduces gain before feedback by 3dB, so turn off any and all usused mics.

Here's a good article on all this stuff:
http://www.shure.com/stellent/groups/pu ... und_ea.pdf

At end of all that, could be back to Lonman's reduce sound level

That Audio-Technica should be fine. You say "best" mic. What are the others? Could they be the source of trouble? Turn down unused channels as the first thing to try.

Are your speakers up on stands with the horns above the head level of the singer? If they aren't, then you are going to have problems.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

That Audio-Technica should be fine. You say "best" mic. What are the others? Could they be the source of trouble? Turn down unused channels as the first thing to try.

The others are cheapies, but i have tried them all one at a time and they all seem to do it.



Are your speakers up on stands with the horns above the head level of the singer? If they aren't, then you are going to have problems.

no they arent, in fact they are right at head height, when sitting down, so you may bo onto something there!

thanks for you responce

Speaking of mics, how close do you suposed to hold it to your mouth?

Do any wired mics have a battering in them? (as opposed to cordless).

I was reading a review on the Shure Beta 87A and they said it was good, but Just remember, as with any condenser, it requires phantom power


what is phantom power?

Condenser mics and phantom power is covered in that Shure article I posted...

Condenser mics have to have a small amount of current in order to function. In the old days they actually had a AA or a AAA battery inside them to supply this voltage. To eliminate the scourge known as "a dead battery" phantom power came into existence. Over the years most mixers incorporated "phantom power" in them to supply the voltage the mic needed and as time went by the batteries in most condenser mics vanished, making them totally reliant on the phantom power from the mixer. The End.

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

The best way to help get rid of feedback is to "ring out the system", which is what I described in an earlier post.

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

arrrhh i see a button on my console that says "phantom power", so i gues i should leave that button truned on?

hey thanks for the tips.

actually i have just come back from the music shop where i took my audio technica mc in to compare it to the Shaw units (feedback wise). the guy plugged it in and he had it going well.


It turns out that i had the gain and channel volumes up near max and the main output volume down near minimum. and he said to reverse that.

I have just doen so and it definatley better now.


I will try all the other things as well though.

Thanks everyone for your help, much appreciated.

No, you shouldn't. That is only used for condenser mics, and those are almost never used for karaoke.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

It's no wonder you were having feedback problems I'm glad to hear you resolved your problem. It sounds like your on your way to better sound now, so all's well that ends well. On the Fantom thing, no condensor mic, no fantom power required. A word of caution, if you ever do use a condensor mic and decide to turn the fantom power on, make sure your mains are down first.

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye