elitecore audio pm-16/private cue update, solved...

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pucho812

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Well, well, well.  8) The Studio finally did an upgrade to our cue systems for the musos. After lengthy back and forth with various possible solutions both in the DIY world and commercially available world we found an offer so good we had to take it.,

The end result was a complete PM-16 setup by Elitecore audio that we got used for over half off. The  system  is comprised of the the following components: input box doing 16 inputs to cat5e, A ethernet switch which does POE(power over ethernet) and the PM-16 mixers. We could have skipped the ethernet switch and daisy chained each mixer together along side each mixer having it's own power wall wort but this was more streamlined with the switch. Plus it was a packaged deal and we made out like kings. 
elitecore also makes an adat to cat5e should you want a digital input but for our workings and setup, analog was the way to go.
In our control room we have the input box wired into our patch bay and the a single cat5e cable out to the switch mounted in the live room. From there, we cat5e using neutrik ethercon to each mixer.

The mixers themselves, are constructed of metal chassis and typical neutrik jacks. It feels robust vs the typical plastic ones on the market.  For features the PM-16 mixers have 16 channels of level and pan, which feed  line level outputs and a headphone level output. The Stereo bus has a 3 band graphic eq(low mid and high), a compressor(one knob control) and an ambiance mic. The idea with the ambiance mic, was for stage playing and being able to hear what is going on outside of in ear monitors. The ambiance mic feeds the headphones and line outputs and does not effect any other mixer or signal in the chain.  Our use for it is when the musicians are talking with their headphones on, they can pull up the ambiance mic as they talk and then turn it down before the next take out whatever.  Where it gets more interesting is we are using the line outs to feed headphone amps so that we can get multiple people on the same mix. Makes it easy to cut background singers and choirs that way.
I also have been toying around with the idea of using the mixers as extra returns as I can sum the 16 inputs down to a stereo out pretty cleanly. I have played with it but have not used it on a mix as of yet. In playing around it would be clean returns....
 
I use this system, too, and it's pretty great.

Are you using these during recording sessions? I'm wondering if there is any signal degradation from using the THRU on the IM-16. Currently, my signal chain is mic> preamp> MOTU 16a> IM-16. The MOTU interface has the ability to route with no latency so do it that way to ensure the DAW is capturing the cleanest signal. Routing wise, it would be a heck of a lot easier to just make use of the THRU on the IM-16, but I'm not sure how I could measure whether the THRU has appreciable difference and so I don't use it. Unscientifically, I felt like I noticed a difference with my ears, but I aware it could've been a psychosomatic effect since I was expecting to degrade the signal.  :p
 
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