Line6 P180 Antenna Placement

[voicemaster]

Hi,

I just bought 2 P180 antenna to use for my line6 XD-V75 system. I am using six XD-V75 for a church in RF2 mode. I put the antenna on mic stands and raised around head level. I put them side by side pointing to the stage from right side of the stage. The "front" (which is written on the fin) side of the antennas are pointing to the stage. It has been working fine until 3 weeks ago, ever since we installed a new wireless alarm system, the signal has been dropping out constantly on 4/6 of them. Now, I moved 1 of the antenna to either side of the stage with distance about 15 feet to the center of the stage l -----O----- l like that.

I also have tried to use RF1 mode on all of them, but it makes the sounds distort so much that we decided to revert back to RF2 mode. I boosted the antenna to 23db and the mics are on high power. May this be a problem to the distortion?

We also only have 2 Wifi on our church with both 2.4Ghz and 5 Ghz.

 

[dboomer]

Switching modes won't cause distortion. Remember you are only dealing with digital data and not audio itself. Something else must have changed when you switched if you and now hearing distortion.

 

Depending on what wi-fi channels are operation and which Line 6 channels are running you may have difficulties running in RF2 mode. Ideally you should not run more than 1 wi-fi channel when operation in RF2 mode. That way you should be able to run 8 Line 6 channels.

 

If possible you should align your antennas with your WAPs on the dead side of the antennas and your wireless mics on the live sides. You don't want to use any more gain than necessary as it can overload the receivers' front end and you may get dropouts.

[voicemaster]

Yesterday after service, I have changed back to RF1 mode to all of the mics and also switch the gain on the antenna to the lowest setting and also switch the power to low on the mic. So far, the sound is clean with no distortion (I think it is due to the gain being too high) and there are little to no drop outs on the signal. We will see how it goes next week, hopefully everything is working fine next week in the service. Will report back next week.

[dboomer]

You could get distortion by setting the receiver's output gain too high.  I would recommend that you not boost it at all unless you have no other means. Boosting the output cuts down on headroom (same as just about every other piece of gear).  You'd be much better off to just turn up the gain on the mic preamp.  You are running into a mic input (and not a line input) on your mixer aren't you?

[Sheriton]

I suspect the word "distortion" is being used in a very broad sense here. For example, an analogue radio mic suffering from intermod issues could be described as distorting, which although technically true, is very different from the distortion caused by audio signal overload.

 

Perhaps Voicemaster could elaborate on what this distortion sounds like - is it the type of effect you get when running a signal too hot? Or something else? Perhaps posting up a small recording would help us pinpoint the problem.

[sdevino]

When using directional paddles it is just as important that the paddles be pointed AWAY from interfering sources as it is having them point towards the transmitters.  On pro tours we recommend using boom stands with the boom on an angle. Set the Paddle above head height and angle it so the paddle points towards the performers and away from anything overhead. 

[sdevino]

See the photo below for how we configured the paddles for the last Black Sabbath Tour.

[sdevino]

More Paddle focusing ideas

[voicemaster]

*update:

The handhelds are pretty solid in 4 to 5 bar, but the belt pack still dropping pretty badly especially if the signal is blocked by the speaker's body, it will drop to 0 bar.

 

So it is better to set it on an angle with boom stand rather than straight up using regular mic stand? I might try the ideas and see which one works the best.

 

I suspect the distortion might be coming from the E6 mic that we use. It only happened when someone is talking through the mic and it sounds like the sound is breaking faintly but noticeable when talking normally. Any recommendation for wireless mic for the belt pack besides E6? 

[voicemaster]

By the way, I saw in 1 of the pictures that you can have more than 2 paddle antennas. How do you do that? 

[dboomer]

Are you still running in lo-power mode. If you are not getting signal then you must move up to high power. Are you running in RF1 mode?

[voicemaster]

For the handhelds, I run on power saver mode and they are fine that way. I run RF1 for all 5 of them now and it works great, even if the signal do drop sometimes but it only drop to 4 bars most of the time. The only problem is with the belt pack which still has drop outs in some occasions. 

[sdevino]

You can run 4 paddles or antennas with the G90 receiver. 

[Flexwell]

Hi,

 

I am playing with 10 Line 6 XD-V75. I have 7 of them who are linked to the XD-AD8 Antenna Distribution Unit. I have a play called Coup Fatal a play with 14 Congolese it is a play with 6 likembes (this are small hand guitar with a jack input and so I have jacks on my line 6 and 1 mic for a balafon.) I have placed my antennas on the stage right and placed them 5 m of each other to try to have to whole stage. But I still have some drops at some points. Is it maybe better to place them stage left and stage right because they walk around on whole the stage. 

I also have 3 line6 on stage with the amps of the bass and guitar players what is the best way to place the antennas?

And you are talking about the RF1 and RF2 but I can't find it how can you change it?

 

Thanks in advance,

 

 

Max 

[dboomer]

Switching RF modes

 

[voicemaster]

Hi,

Just a quick update on the topic. Everything works fine for now after switching to RF1 mode, but I encountered a drop in signal when the speaker/singer is holding the handheld at the back/end of the mic. I know the transmitter in the V75's handheld is on the back end of the mic, but I am using a directional antenna that is not even 25ft (more like 15ft) away from the handheld. Is the transmitter on the V75's handheld so sensitive that even a slight blockage can drop the signal to the receiver? I am using the "power save" mode because the length of the transmitter and receiver never goes beyond 50ft. Otherwise, the wireless system sounds really good and clear. 

[dboomer]

When you are in low power mode you are effectively dropping the output power from 10mW down to 3.6mW. So if someone is also covering the antenna you don't have a lot leftover. Just switch the power back to normal and you should be fine.

[sdevino]

Hi,

Just a quick update on the topic. Everything works fine for now after switching to RF1 mode, but I encountered a drop in signal when the speaker/singer is holding the handheld at the back/end of the mic. I know the transmitter in the V75's handheld is on the back end of the mic, but I am using a directional antenna that is not even 25ft (more like 15ft) away from the handheld. Is the transmitter on the V75's handheld so sensitive that even a slight blockage can drop the signal to the receiver? I am using the "power save" mode because the length of the transmitter and receiver never goes beyond 50ft. Otherwise, the wireless system sounds really good and clear. 

The problem with covering the antenna with your hand is not just reduced power, it also effective changes the shape and size of the antenna. In other words your hand becomes part of the antenna and your hand is not designed to be a good 2.4 GHz antenna. This is an equal problem for all wireless. In technical terms we say you are de-tuning the antenna. 

[belcourt-2102]

while talking on our mics xd-v70 systems we hear drop-outs at random times,  what is going on ? It is usally 50-80 feet from mic to reciever, clear line of sight.

[dboomer]

Are you running the newest firmware?  There have been a number of upgrades over the history of V70.

 

I'd need to know the technical details of your setup and the venue to offer much help.  But it's usually easily solvable.

[sdevino]

What antennas are you using? What is the gain setting? How are they focused relative to the transmitters and relative to any interference sources? Etc. 50-80 feet is a very reasonable distance, but you have to manage other interference sources and have a proper antenna setup.

[Pristine_Audio]

I just did a conference in a large hotel ballroom with 5 Line 6 XD V70 handheld systems. I also experienced numerous random loud pop sounds, once a minute or so.

 

My receivers are placed at side of the stage, with antenna wired in daisy chained fashion properly per the manual, with terminating caps, and placed 2 original stick antennas on top of the rack pointing up. All transmitters running Mode 1, high power. Receivers all set to talk mode. The line of sight is sometimes blocked by singers' bodies, as the antenna are at the stage side just above stage floor height. Stage is 32' wide, so the furthest distance is 30 from transmitter to receiver is 30 feet.

 

WiFi was pretty strong at the hotel, with channel most of the 12 channels were used by some sort of WiFi detectable at the stage. There were not 5 totally clear channels as far as I could see on the WiFi detector.

 

My question is, why do I hear the pop sound? Even if it gets interfered, shouldn't the digital decoding simply silence the moment due to lack of proper signals? Does it have anything to do with firmware revision of my XD V70s?

 

Also I am not so confident if going to P180 antenna would eliminate the problems if most of the WiFi channels are already used up.

[dboomer]

My question is, why do I hear the pop sound? Even if it gets interfered, shouldn't the digital decoding simply silence the moment due to lack of proper signals? 

 

Could these pops possibly be dropouts?  If so you would see all green LEDs go off and switch to Red on the RF ladder on the receiver.

 

 I suspect the pops are not caused by RF interference.  Do they occur randomly across all five systems or just in a single system?  Just double checking that you are using the factory mic capsules and power supplies, correct?  What firmware version are you running (both TX & Rx)?

 

 

If it is just in one system there may be a hardware failure in that system.  If in all systems that probably rule that out as it would be highly unlikely to have 5 defective units.  You should also check for mechanical issues.  Possible you have a transmitter where the mic capsule is not making solid contact with the transmitter body.  Check the pogo pins.  You also need to rule out that the pop is being induced into the output cables.  When the pops occur can you see them in the LED meters on the receivers? 

 

As far as scanning ... the scanner only indicates RF2 channel availability and can't tell you anything relevant about RF1 channel availability.  In RF1 it doesn't really matter in a practical sense as long as you are not very near any wi-fi access points or transmitters.

 

Adding P180 antennas would probably be a big advantage in your situation.  The first thing is that if you use the whip antennas in the middle of your rack they will only be a few feet off the ground.  That's usually a bad thing for line of sight.  Using paddles will allow you to get them 6-8 feet up in the air where they should have an unobstructed path.  also they have a "dead side" and you can use that to your advantage by pointing the dead side at known interferers (WAPS).  Also the diversity aspect of any wireless receivers works much better when the distance between antennas is 6 wavelengths apart (or more).  The way your's are using the half rack spacing is only one wavelength.

[Pristine_Audio]

Could these pops possibly be dropouts?  If so you would see all green LEDs go off and switch to Red on the RF ladder on the receiver.

 

 I suspect the pops are not caused by RF interference.  Do they occur randomly across all five systems or just in a single system?  Just double checking that you are using the factory mic capsules and power supplies, correct?  What firmware version are you running (both TX & Rx)?

 

 

If it is just in one system there may be a hardware failure in that system.  If in all systems that probably rule that out as it would be highly unlikely to have 5 defective units.  You should also check for mechanical issues.  Possible you have a transmitter where the mic capsule is not making solid contact with the transmitter body.  Check the pogo pins.  You also need to rule out that the pop is being induced into the output cables.  When the pops occur can you see them in the LED meters on the receivers? 

 

As far as scanning ... the scanner only indicates RF2 channel availability and can't tell you anything relevant about RF1 channel availability.  In RF1 it doesn't really matter in a practical sense as long as you are not very near any wi-fi access points or transmitters.

 

Adding P180 antennas would probably be a big advantage in your situation.  The first thing is that if you use the whip antennas in the middle of your rack they will only be a few feet off the ground.  That's usually a bad thing for line of sight.  Using paddles will allow you to get them 6-8 feet up in the air where they should have an unobstructed path.  also they have a "dead side" and you can use that to your advantage by pointing the dead side at known interferers (WAPS).  Also the diversity aspect of any wireless receivers works much better when the distance between antennas is 6 wavelengths apart (or more).  The way your's are using the half rack spacing is only one wavelength.

 

Hello Don, thanks for the quick response.

 

All factory capsules, all factory power plugs, as you can see in the attached images. 2 whip antennas were separated by 19" at top of the rack 4' above ground. It is at the side of the stage, so line-of-sight is not the best. I thought by putting receivers by the stage would favorably improve the distance for Line 6 systems vs. WiFi APs. Apparently not good enough.

 

The pops happen random from multiple systems, I am not sure all 5, but sometimes the pops happen when only 1 is on, and sometimes it happens when that one is off and others are on. Sometimes it doesn't happen for 10 minutes; sometimes the same mic pops more than once a minute. The randomness makes it really hard to replicate the error to diagnose. I wasn't at a spot where I can see receiver LEDs, since I was either on stage playing, or at FOH 100 ft back. Unfortunately I am not near that venue to troubleshoot. This only happens at large hotels.

 

I can assure it is not the mic capsules loose. When it is sitting on a stand in front of podium with keynote speaking to it, no touching at all. The capsules are all fairly tight.

 

Power was very stable, supplied by the Middle Atlantic power distribution unit, which also powered the Shure UR system operating in 590 MHz, which was rock solid through the convention, even though its antenna did not have as good line-of-sight as the Line 6 antenna.

 

I used smartphone scanning app Wifi Analyzer on Android. It picked up all published WiFi sources. Most of the WiFi space was occupied with fairly strong signals in most channels by the stage. Just curious, does WiFi "frame bursting" have anything to do with the pop I'm hearing on Line 6 systems?

 

I thought in RF1 mode, the systems are supposed to "lock in", so will still operate flawlessly through interference. Is this a feature available with newer firmware? Or when the WiFi environment is so bad that all 3 or 4 carrier frequencies of a RF1 system go out simultaneously?

 

Sounds like I am not in a game of finding enough clear channels, but forcing my way through crowded bands. If I were to add P180s, would I need the AD8 to boost the antenna, or does the XD-V70 receiver provide enough power for 2 P180s?

[Pristine_Audio]

Hello, the firmware versions are as follows:

 

System 1: MCU 1.04; FPGA 1.03; HHT12 V1.01

System 2: MCU 1.05; FPGA 1.06; HHT12 V1.01

System 3: MCU 1.04; FPGA 1.03; HHT12 V2.10

System 4: MCU 1.04; FPGA 1.03; HHT12 V1.01

System 5: MCU 1.04; FPGA 1.03; HHT12 V1.01

 

I should note that the system with HHT12 at V2.10 is XD-V75 transmitter in RF1 mode, and it pops the loudest. Others pop as well, but not as loud. Again, all 5 are on RF1 mode, and no other Line 6 system in the venue that I know of.

 

Would it make any difference if I match the V2.10 HHT to the receiver with MCU 1.05 and FPGA 1.06? That way I match the newer version HHT with the newer version receiver, and leave the other 4 identical older versions.

 

And I don't have a XD-V75 receiver, so I can't update to V2.0 firmware. Can you recommend a Line 6 rep in southeast Michigan for me to take these systems to?

 

Thanks much!

[dboomer]

You would get better performance by not point your antennas straight up.  they need to each be spayed out by 45 degrees (in a "V").  I hope you don't ever leave the transmitters in that holder.  They will have problems if they are on and that close together.  Also you should not leave any active transmitters within 6 feet of the antennas (paddles would help that as well ).

 

Scanning for wi-fi channels doesn't really tell you very much that is useful.  Line 6 channels (4 per user channel) are scattered across the band and in the guard bands.  I have seen a few instances where big hotels use illegal jammers to blot out the 2.4G band (so that you have to pay them to free it up and use your own equipment).  Have you ever had this problem before in a different venue?

 

XDV-70/75 receivers will power the Line 6 paddle antennas so you don't need anything else.

 

So I still don't  if they all pop at the same time or randomly.

[dboomer]

Updating your systems certainly couldn't hurt although it may not solve your dilemma.

[Pristine_Audio]

You would get better performance by not point your antennas straight up.  they need to each be spayed out by 45 degrees (in a "V").  I hope you don't ever leave the transmitters in that holder.  They will have problems if they are on and that close together.  Also you should not leave any active transmitters within 6 feet of the antennas (paddles would help that as well ).

 

Scanning for wi-fi channels doesn't really tell you very much that is useful.  Line 6 channels (4 per user channel) are scattered across the band and in the guard bands.  I have seen a few instances where big hotels use illegal jammers to blot out the 2.4G band (so that you have to pay them to free it up and use your own equipment).  Have you ever had this problem before in a different venue?

 

XDV-70/75 receivers will power the Line 6 paddle antennas so you don't need anything else.

 

So I still don't  if they all pop at the same time or randomly.

 

Thanks for the tips. Will definitely point antenna in V formation. The transmitters are never operated in that holder. I took that picture just for picture's sake. The transmitters are always turned on away from that holder, and off before putting back into the holder.

 

Yes, I have this problem at another big hotel 2 years ago. Back then I only had 2 XD-V70 systems, and at least one of them popped. Jammers? It's making sense now. I didn't think regular WiFi could make the Line 6 systems pop. Unfortunately, I am uncertain if we are able to ask all the hotels to back off on the jammers, since the staff on site probably have no idea how to deactivate them properly.

 

They do not all pop at the same time. They all pop randomly at different times. So a cross-the-board jammer is not the likely culprit.

 

The hotel's WiFi networks are pretty strong in 3 of the channels with good separation. Then there are other signals in most of the remaining channels.

[Pristine_Audio]

I found this on another site describing pop noise on Shure PGXD 900 MHz digital wireless system:

 

*******************************************************

In the United States, the PGXD operates in the 908 to 928 MHz band. Though this band is not used for broadcast TV, the 908 to 928 MHz band is used for other non-licensed wireless devices. These devices can be industrial, scientific, or medical.

 

Here are examples of devices that are known to interfere with the PGXD:

 

1) Wireless network that reports a power outage to the local electric company. This device was located on a utility pole outside of a church. The device used “frequency-hopping†and would occasionally “hop†directly onto the PGXD operating frequency. This created an audible “pop†that lasted about 10 milliseconds.

 

2) A security system in a television studio. This device emitted bursts of RF energy in the 900 MHz band. This created re-occurring audible pops and clicks in the PGXD system.

 

3) A commercial phone system, made in the early 1990s, in a church. Every 15 minutes, this phone control center would emit a very strong (almost one watt!), 900 MHz band signal that queried the wireless phones: “Are you on?†“What frequency are you using?†This RF burst from the phone system produced one second of audible interference in the PGXD every 15 minutes.

 

*********************************

 

Could what I am experiencing similar to the above examples, but affected 2.4 GHz devices such as cordless phone control center query, security system, or wireless power outage reporting device?

[FelixAnger]

I was thinking about getting a pair of the directional antennas. I know you recommend placing any wireless IEM transmitters at least a meter away from the Wireless receivers.  Would using the external directional antennas alleviate this problem by moving the reception point multiple meters away, thus allowing me to keep my wireless receiver and IEM transmitter in the same rack, or is the proximity of the receivers to one another still a problem even with external antennas placed at a distance?

[Sheriton]

Putting the receivers & transmitters in the same rack is generally fine. As you say, it's the location of the antennae that's important.

[liyangkuang]

On 5/1/2014 at 7:23 AM, sdevino said:

You can run 4 paddles or antennas with the G90 receiver. 

Interesting, BUT as far as I know you can only use rear A/B to power the P180. I tried with Front C/D it doesn’t work.

 

Please confirm if I am wrong.

best Regards,

Georges.

[danieldee76]

Hi everyone. Is the diagram for connecting 4 receivers with P180 antennas correct?