mic cable splitters

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coplinger

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Has anyone used any of these? I need to get a few & am curious whether there's a difference between the Rolls & the Art. I would think the Radial is much better than both, but I'm on a budget.
 
what excactly are you planning on doing with that??
 
I'm recording a band live at a club & want to split the vocal mics to send to both myself & the sound man.
 
coplinger said:
I'm recording a band live at a club & want to split the vocal mics to send to both myself & the sound man.
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I've had good luck with these. You can buy them for about $70 each at many different online vendors. Fullcompass, Music123, Sweetwater, even Amazon. They sound good and are nearly indestructable.

http://www.procosound.com/images/MS2.PDF#search='Pro%20co%20MS2%20mic%20splitter'

They also sell a 4 channel and an 8 channel version.

DON'T take the directs from the FOH board. It's WAY too easy for the house sound guy to screw up what he's sending you. Many, many house boards have direct outs that are post-EQ or even post-fader. And even if his are not, he can still screw you up by tweaking the channel trim pot while you're recording (thereby messing with your levels). Not a good idea.

You can sometimes get by with a simple Y-splitter (which you can make yourself if you really want to save some money). But it's a much better idea to use a transformer, and you want to make sure it's a decent one, because a cheap one can really kill your sound. If you decide to try it without an isolating transformer, make sure that you and the sound guy take your electrical power from the same point to avoid ground loops.

Have you checked with the club to see if they might already have a split that you can use from their main stage box? Many of the clubs where I record are already set up for me that way. It's really nice when you don't have to haul all that extra snake and related stuff.
 
Gilliland is right. Use your own feed whenever possible. A lot of boards are post EQ and/or post fader, and you may also end up with your track being compressed or something to your recording. Even if you can just get kick, snare, bass, guitars, and lead vocals from your own feed it will usually make a big difference. When I do have to take feeds from house stuff, I prefer to get it from the monitor console whenever possible. One thing you could consider is using your splits to put the channels you want seperated at the far end (i.e. work form channel 48 backwards) of the FOH console. This way the FOH guy really won't screw you.
 
Sure, the FOH guy could fuck it it up for you, but just wait and see what happens when you show up with a couple dozen splitters and tell him you want to repatch his shit.
 
I'm going to meet with the house engineer this week & find out exactly what he's using & what my options are. I would only take a direct feed from him if it's pre eq & fx. I may just put my own mics up for guitar amps, etc.
 
markitzero said:
Sure, the FOH guy could fuck it it up for you, but just wait and see what happens when you show up with a couple dozen splitters and tell him you want to repatch his shit.
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If you just "show up" without coordinating it with him (or his management) ahead of time, you deserve what you get. I've got great relationships with a lot of local sound guys, and they repatch their stuff for me all the time. It's part of the job - for both of us.

When you're going to record a show, you need to make sure that you have clear permission to do so from both the artist/management and from the club owner/manager. You don't really need permission from the sound guy (since, after all, he works for either the club or the artist), but you do need to demonstrate a lot of courtesy. If you treat him well, he'll do the same for you.
 
I could use something to split mic signals too. I'm using a bunch of outboard preamps that are feeding my sound card line inputs. I want to be able to send those same signals to my mixer for monitoring. I could run my mic pre's thru the mixer, but I don't want to screw up my signals by running thru additional circuitry and adding the noise of the mixer to the signals. Any ideas here?
 
markitzero said:
Sure, the FOH guy could fuck it it up for you, but just wait and see what happens when you show up with a couple dozen splitters and tell him you want to repatch his shit.
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If he has a problem patching some XLR Y cables, then he/she needs a new job. I am a FOH engineer and system tech for a living. Even without any advance notice, this is a simple and basic operation that can be done in a matter of two or three minutes. Not only that, but I would be more than happy to not have to accept responsibility for the recording and still try and mix FOH at the same time. Basically, there are a lot of reasons to not take the FOH consoles direct outs, but no valid reason why you should have to. Do the math:D
 
Well, I spoke with the house engineer last night. His direct outs are post fader-no good. But my mixer can send 2 direct outs: one from the direct out & one from the insert. I checked it out & both can be sent pre fader simultaneously. So what I can do, if he agrees, is send the balanced direct outs to disc & send him the unbalanced insert send. I won't get to eq on the way in, but i can always do that later & this way I can get good solid levels to disc. Going to buy an apogee mini me & a pair of peluso cemc6's for the stereo pair out in front. If this recording goes well, I'd like to try to get some more jobs doing location recording.
 
ART is pretty solid

I have a couple of the ART splitters. They're inexpensive and they get the job done, with no real signal degradation that I could discern. I needed them for a choir I was recording that had a couple of solo mics going out to the PA and I wanted them going into my recording rig as well. They worked perfectly (although the mics that were being used is a different story...). Anyway, good luck.
 
Paj said:
How many pieces/vocals in the band?
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2 bands 3 piece/3 vox
1 band 4 piece/3 vox

I'm going to split the 3 vocal mics, kick & snare, DI the bass, mic the guitar amps, and put up a drum oh mic.
 
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