This looks to be a bit of a game changer for Wireless IEMS

Thank you for this heads up. Looks very interesting. On first glance I'm not clear about the actual IEM. Are you plugging it into your phone... or are they promoting wireless IEM as well?
 
Being it’s wifi and having to go through the phone, I’d be a bit concerned about latency and also range

I work with quite a few hearing aids which have direct audio streaming from smartphones, and it works well, but does have some issues with dropouts, range etc

I think it’s a great concept overall, but I’d be skeptical of their claims of professional level performance, at least without through testing from lots of users in demanding venues and big stages
 
It's new tech, but wow if it works. You just use a computer to connect to a digital mixer (using it as a sound device), and then setup your mixes that get broadcasted to each phone running the app. It has a 15 minute run time free trial, that resets, so you can mess with it. I dont have a digital mixer anymore so I cant test it, but i might be able to cobble something together.
 
Thank you for this heads up. Looks very interesting. On first glance I'm not clear about the actual IEM. Are you plugging it into your phone... or are they promoting wireless IEM as well?

it would use your phone as the Wireless IEM receiver... so no need to buy say a Sennheiser IEMG3 system. Your phone replaces that.
 
Found this on a forum: "You can get to single digit millisecond latency in most set ups. It depends largely on the digital mixer or audio interface you use to do the initial A to D conversion to get the audio into the computer."
 
I'd be more interested in a true wireless earbuds like the apple airpods for monitoring. That would be amazing to have no cable at all. Thought that was what this was at first glance. That would be truly freeing!
 
I can see a number of problems with this system. I had to do a bit of digging to figure out exactly how you get audio INTO this thing, because, as if by magic, the "SoundCaster detects all available channels". I was expecting Dante or AES50/Ultranet support. Nope. You need to give their software (running on your laptop) some kind of audio interface to provide the inputs. Basically, you're buying a mini DAW with a bunch of mix buses that iPhones can listen to.

On the flip side, a good use case I can see is pairing this with something like a Behringer X-Air 18. Connect via USB and you can see all 18 inputs as sources in your DAW.

It's $100/head for a software-only solution and you're providing (and configuring... and troubleshooting) ALL the associated hardware.
 
Been watching the demo vids about audiofusion and it does sound interesting, but I'm not sure it's a game changer.
Few gotcha's that I found
  • It ONLY runs on apple devices.
  • Requires an apple laptop or computer as the "transmitter".
  • It broadcasts over wifi to your phone - so, yet MORE clutter in the 2.4G band.
  • Has THREE different apps required to make it work.. the sending unit (soundcaster), the FOH mix control (director) and your iPhone mix app (Performer).
  • Soundcaster software mixing appears superfluous, and is really an audio interface where the levels for each channel would be a single set and forget affair.
  • If you don't have a USB-B port on your mixer, there's additional interface equipment to purchase to "talk" to your macbook and get the audio into it.
True - it DOES reduce the overall expense of a wireless IEM system at $99 per user, for a full band - assuming you have a mac book lying around and everyone in the band has an iPhone :)

For me - who's NOT a pro musician, but has averaged 85+ gigs a year as a weekend warrior for each of the last 5 yrs.. I want my hookup(s) to be a simple as possible. With my G3 xmitter permanently connected to our X32R IEM console, we power it up and go.
I pop batteries into my receiver (with a built-in limiter) and adjust volume to taste. I "mix" my IEM's onstage via my tablet app (connected to an external router via 5G - to avoid the 2.4G clutter). ONE piece of software, one receiver.
Plus, I have a choice of MANY frequencies (from what I can tell, audiofusion is limited to the 12 in the 2.4G band) to avoid interference.

Based on video's it SURE looks interesting.. not sure how well it will work in the real world.
For me.. the 2 big negatives are
1. too many pieces required
2. wifi based

PS: FULL CREDIT to them for looking at alternatives to our existing wireless interfaces and the associated challenges in that domain :)
 
I think the latency figures are likely for one part of the complete “trip”, but when you add up everything like the USB bus latency etc, I could see it getting to the point where it becomes problematic for some users.

Also I wasn’t clear on how you get the sound from your phone to your IEM’s of choice. The iPhone doesn’t have an audio output jack anymore, and you’d need an IEM receiver which also has an audio input to get the sound from your phone into the IEM’s themselves

I do custom molds for IEMs so have a fair bit of experience with them and today’s wireless sustems are pretty bombproof. They do often require a mixer, transmitters etc, but the current stuff simply works day in, day out, on the largest of stages.

I don’t know if I sell a huge advantage in adding additional layers of tech, potential range issues, dropouts etc by adding a smart phone to the equation

It’s like with wireless for guitar, probably could play into the phone, have that send the signal to a receiver, have that go into the amp, but there are already so many rock solid dedicated units, does it make sense to add a smartphone to the audio pathway?
 
I like the idea.

I wonder if X32-Edit could incorporate something like that? I'm not sure if audio comes into X32-Edit or not. I've only ever used it to mix, not record.
 
The concept is fantastic and long overdue. However this is riddled with too many gotchas.



-Turn off wifi on the mac

-Turn off iCloud on the mac

-Turn off Location Services on the mac

-Put all iPhones and iPads in airplane mode then reactivate Wi-Fi-Only

-Mac OS 10.12 or newer

-The means to get your mix from your mixer into the mac via USB/ Thunderbolt/ Firewire $$$$

-Newer iPhone without earphone port needs the apple lightning to earphone adapter $9



You need to buy a deticated 5G wireless router $$$$$.

If you have a newer mac you need to buy an ethernet adapter to connect to the router $30.



I don’t see any option for EQ of the overall mix or per instrument.

There doesn’t seem to be a text label of what instrument your adjusting on the iPhone.

The Director app isn’t available yet.

$99.00 for each person to use.

3-4 hour of battery life on iPhone 6, not sure on newer devices. Meaning you would need to recharge between sets just to be on the safe side.
 
I like the concept but yea, at this point too many questions. What about people texting you while you're playing? Is that gonna interrupt you every time your text tone goes off?
 
imagine forgetting to configure your phone before the set starts...email notifications, phone calls and texts would be fun. Pretty soon guitar players will figure out how to play with their left hand only and text with their right hand...
 
I’ll find time to try this out. Neat concept for sure. Most musicians/bands I know already do have the gear needed, so I don’t think the requirements are a huge anomaly. Used iPhones with headphone jacks are cheap.
 
I like the concept but yea, at this point too many questions. What about people texting you while you're playing? Is that gonna interrupt you every time your text tone goes off?

Im sure you would put the phone in airplane mode and just enable wifi sam as the mac.

I don't see why an iPod touch latest model wouldn't work being your just using WI-Fi but I'm mostly wrong.
 
I don't see why an iPod touch latest model wouldn't work being your just using WI-Fi but I'm mostly wrong.
It probably would, but I think they don’t really sell them anymore and phones usually have more power, so maybe they need that? Not sure.
 
I’ll find time to try this out. Neat concept for sure. Most musicians/bands I know already do have the gear needed, so I don’t think the requirements are a huge anomaly. Used iPhones with headphone jacks are cheap.
A simple headphone adapter on the new iPhones (I bought four of them, and keep one with my IEM's, one in my truck, one in my work laptop bag and a spare at home) for about $4 will do that job :)
 
A simple headphone adapter on the new iPhones (I bought four of them, and keep one with my IEM's, one in my truck, one in my work laptop bag and a spare at home) for about $4 will do that job :)
Oh I agree. But many people won’t spend $4 on an adaptor and would rather buy a $200 used with it built in *shrug*
 
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