Featured Equipment Of The Week: Mackie SRM150 Compact PA

Mackie SRM150 Compact PA 
Don't be fooled by the small size. The SRM150 is big on features and sound quality. The built-in three-channel mixer features two combo XLR/line inputs (with true 48V phantom power), a stereo channel for CD/MP3 players, and Mackie's powerful 3-band Active EQ. The SRM150 can even be mounted on a mic stand, making it the ideal personal monitor. Put simply, with its tremendous feature set and 150-watts of world-class sound, the Mackie SRM150 is the perfect solution for any application requiring superior sound quality.
Find out more about the Mackie SRM150

TOP FEATURES

• Extremely portable active loudspeaker system
• Built-in Mackie mixer for superior sound quality with:
  • 3-channel mixer with 3-band active EQ
  • Two high-headroom Mackie Mic/line preamps with 48V phantom power
  • Instrument-ready input (no DI required)
  • Dedicated stereo channel for keyboards, CD, MP3, iPods, etc.
  • Combo "line in" for linking or adding inputs
  • XLR "thru" with mic/line switch for linking more SRM150s or direct send to main PA
• 150-watts of high output, Class-D power
• 5.25” premium-quality, full-range neodymium driver
• Frequency Response: 100Hz to 17.5kHz
• Complete system protection with built-in limiter
• 120 dB Maximum SPL@1meter
• Built-in top carry handle
• Integral aluminum heat sink
• Mic stand integration system for use with stand and boom
• Tough, impact-resistant, polypropylene enclosure

Find out more about the Mackie SRM150

Featured Equipment Of The Week: KRK ERGO System

KRK ERGO System
Room correction system and professional quality monitor controller.

A great mix starts with a great recording room. But when it comes to achieving the most accurate mix, your room may have the upper hand. Like any room, your studio's acoustics include offending frequencies and room reflections, and none of these are helping your mix. Getting a handle on these problems has traditionally meant the installation of soft foam or fabrics, and that's a great start. But now you can get even closer to a perfect room, and a perfect mix, because the future of studio sound is here, and it's called ERGO.
Read all the details: KRK ERGO Monitor controller and Room correction system

TOP FEATURES

• Large Volume Knob: Digitally controlled analog volume control simultaneous control of ERGO's A/B/Sub outputs.
• "A" Speakers: Enables or disables the audio being sent to the "A" speakers.
• "B" speakers: Enables or disables the audio being sent to the "B" or subwoofer speakers.
• Focus / Global / Bypass: Our 3D model allows users to preserve the "good" features of the room, while correcting the bad. ERGO also doesn't color the sound or produce an artificial anechoic environment. Normally, ERGO corrects for your monitoring position. This gives you perfectly corrected sound while mixing. In Global mode, the correct spot is widened so that others (producers, musicians, A&R) can enjoy your mix in a corrected environment.
• Headphone Volume (side panel): Adjusts the output level of the headphone jack. The headphones output mirrors the selected monitor outputs.
• Calibration Switch (back panel): This enables the room calibration microphone and places ERGO into analysis mode.

Buy KRK ERGO in the Revolution Audio online store

Noise Gates Explained

Noise Gates Explained

A noise gate is a form of dynamics processing used to increase dynamic range by lowering the noise floor. A gate is an excellent tool for removing hum from an amp, cleaning up drum tracks between beats, background noise in dialog, and can even be used to reduce the amount of reverb in a recording.

Parameters

The common parameters for a noise gate are:
Threshold – sets the level that the gate will open, when the signal level drops below the threshold the gate closes and mutes the output
Attack – how fast the gate opens
Hold – how long before the gate starts to close
Release – aka Decay, how long until the gate is fully closed again
Range – how much the gated signal will be attenuated
Sidechain – the sidechain is for setting an alternate signal for the gate to be triggered from, sometimes called a Key
Filters – the filters section allows you to fine tune the sidechain signal.

What’s It For?

The normal use for gating is for removing background noise. An essential tool for clean dialog recording.
Some other uses for gates are gated reverb and using the sidechain to activate other effects.

How To Set A Noise Gate

To setup a gate properly, start with the the attack, hold, and release as fast as possible. Set the range to maximum, and the threshold to 0dB.
Start lowering the threshold until the sound starts to get chopped up by the gate. Slow down the attack time to remove any unnatural popping. Adjust the hold and release times to get a more natural decay.
If you don’t want the background noise to be turned down as much then you can reduce the range control.

Other Uses

Gated reverb was a popular effect in the 80s, mostly because of Phil Collins records.
To set it up, take your drum tracks and send them to a stereo reverb with a large room preset.
After the reverb insert a stereo gate. Adjust the gate settings so that the reverb is cut off before then next hit.
In this example you’ll hear the unprocessed drums, then with reverb, then adding the gate. Listen

Favorite Gates

The classic Drawmer DS201 is a hardware noise gate that is hard to beat.
The gate on the Waves SSL E-Channel is good, simple and effective.
The free ReaGate VST is quite good as well.
Noise gates aren’t very much fun to talk about, but they are a powerful tool that you need to know how to use.