Karaoke Forums

Hi Guys,

I have just been to a Karaoke Bar last week for the first time. I like it so much that i would like to open a karaoke bar for myself one day.

I have been reading about the Karaoke Solution for 4 rooms of 100sqm each. According to the Unify Karaoke Solution they are recommanding following things
1 x Karaoke Server
1 x Mirror Server
4 x Customer Station (Customer to play songs that has been selected for that room)
4 x Remote or Touch screen device
Audio Systems for 4 rooms
Video Systems for 4 rooms
Reception Station
Waiter Station
1 x Karaoke Software

According to the website it is going to cost USD24000 for all of this.

I was wondering if you guys can help me to find any other solution which i can do it myself.

Looking forward for your advice

Thanks
Sid

here in the states, the karaoke room like you're describing is a lot different than what a karaoke bar is. Here, most of the times, there is a much simpler setup. A KJ (karaoke host), cdgs and a player or a computer with the cdgs ripped to it... and that's about it. You go in, sign up for your turn and sit and enjoy the show waiting for your time on the microphone.

Hi,

I currently use the Unify System in my 14-room karaoke place in Florida. Please feel free to ask me questions about it.

Unify is a fairly cheap way to get started. To get started on a four-room place you would need

1 x Server
1 x Mirror server

Each room needs
1 x customer station software packages
2 remote controls
1 x TV
1 x Karaoke Amplifier
1 x wireless microphone system

You can use the Reception Station to book customers in and out (it's included free with the server software), but it only works for by-the-room billing, not for per-person billing.

For so few rooms I would simply take food and drink orders by hand.

If you are not technically minded you will need to have a tech person available to set it up and close by to fix it if it crashes. It took us a while to get it running well, but now it is quite stable. Unify support, even though they are based in China, is actually quite good.

You can download a demo version of the software at the Unify site, that will allow you to check out all the features for 30 days.

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Kroaky's Karaoke

Hey Spark, Where in Sarasota are you? I'd be interested in seeing your setup some day soon. I'm not far away from you as I reside in Naples.

HI Sparkzilla,

Thanks a lot for offering your help. I have lot of questions. I have been reading all your posts and i see that you have gone through all the questions that i am asking now.

1. Do you have a seperate rooms for smokers?
2. Are you still planning to install touch sreen option?
3. How did you soundproof the rooms?
4. Do you think we should use our own PCs instead of Unify's PCs for the players?
5. Do you use any of the other modules (for room booking/drinks ordering/billing)?
6. Your website is very funky, howmuch did it cost?
7. If you open another place can you use the collection of your songs there without paying more for the licence?


Thanks.
Sid

@spotlight junior. We are here: http://bit.ly/h7ZFi We are open from 3pm every day except Monday. Send me a PM close to when you come and I'll give you the tour

@ccsids: Good questions...

1. No smoking allowed in Florida if you serve food.
2. No, I don't think the touch screen is necessary right now. The customers need a bit of instruction with the remote control. Usually they get it in a few minutes.
3. With great difficulty and expense. We built all walls to the roof using Quietrock, a soundproof drywall.
4. You don't need to use Unify's PCs. I use Lenovo PCs which have a US warranty
5. I made the website myself by hacking some templates.
6. No, each new place needs a new song set licence

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Kroaky's Karaoke

Thanks a lot Sparkzilla,

I have few more questions please.

1. Unify server is it windows based? Does it have a folder structure where you can add songs to the folder and it automatically shows up in the software list for people to choose songs from?
2. Do you offer any other langauge songs?
3. This question is hard for me to explain here but i will try... Last week i went to this karaoke place and they had some similar solution like Unify. I could see that there was a dell PC and monitor and remote. We choose the song with the remote and it plays on the big LCD screen. What they had was when you play the song the original artist's video come up with text and his voice as well and with a remote button you can turn off the vocal only. My question is do Unify has similar thing? or is it mainly a feature of the Karaoke Songs? Does all the SoundChoice songs comes wtih original artist video and text?


Thanks,

Hi Sparkzilla, I live in Scotland, (europe) but I am in Kissimmee every year sometimes 2 or 3 times so I would love to come by and see your setup. hopefully get a few pointers.

Before I got into Karaoke properly I had thought about opening a place in the city to allow people to record themselves singing and your place sounds exactly like what I had envisaged. I don't believe there is anything like this in the UK at present though I could be wrong.

It's about a 2 hour drive from Kissimme by my reckoning but I think I can manage that .

Is there a way to contact members here directly? as opposed to just leaving messages in posts!

@JSM1: I happen to be from Scotland (Europe) too. You are welcome to come by and have a look - it takes 1.5hrs drive from Kissimmee.

There are several places in the UK. Lucky Voice has five places http://www.luckyvoice.com It is partly owned by Martha Lane Fox who set up Lastminute.com

Karaoke-Me is in Bristol http://www.karaoke-me.co.uk/ and there's another company in London called Karaoke Box: http://www.karaokebox.co.uk/

Leave me a private message with your email and I'll get back to you.

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@ccsids

1. It's windows based. The way it works is a bit more complex than you describe. You have to add the song files to the folder then open a Media Manager program, which is a kind of database that links to that folder and also lets you assign numbers to the songs. Then you use the Customer Station software in each room to actually play the songs by typing the number into the remote. It's a bit clunky and you will most likely need help from Unify support to make it work.

I should say that there is much room for improvement in the Unify system and it requires a good bit of TLC to keep it going - but if you want to do computer-based karaoke to multiple rooms it is probably the best ready-made solution available. You may be able to find some other companies coming out with other systems on the web.

2. Yes, we have 2000 Spanish songs and will be adding Japanese songs soon.

3. You can buy different formats for the songs you play. Most places in Japan, for example, play videos like the one you described. Unify sells packages of video-type songs but I haven't listened to the sound quality. Sound Choice is good sound quality of course but they do not have videos, only text lyrics.

I'm happy to answer more questions here or in a private mail.

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Kroaky's Karaoke

@ sparkzilla

Hey, I just got this program and boy am I confused. It seems straightforward but I'm having some problems troubleshooting a cdg/mp3 file with the program. I contacted customer support but I think my english overwhelms them and they never seem to answer my question. I was hoping you could help? I'll pvt msg you my email, and have some sort of hope you will get back to me