Karaoke Forums

I saw this on another forum and I would like to get others to help me.

Delay, echo, reverb, compression --> What do each do and do I need it? If yes, what is are good products to buy so I can do it?

Thanks for the help.

It's all effects. Echo & delay are pretty much the same thing. Takes a signal, samples it & repeats it. It can be a real short delay like old Elvis songs or a real long delay like many Pink Floyd songs. Do you need it? No you don't NEED it, but it is a nice feature when mixing, you can get your singers sound to sound more professional if not overdone & it works very well in conjunction with reverb. I use a delay with a blended reverb in my shows & wouldn't run without a delay capability, but generally run some kind of a delay on every singer.
Reverb. A sound like yelling in a large hall or chamber. Not really an echo, but the sound lingers. This also is adjusted for different sized rooms. Go in a bathroom with no other noise & you'll hear reverb, it will be a short trail but it will be there. Do you need it - yes! Any & every song ever recorded has had some kind of reverb on it & any live singer will have reverb on the voice. It helps smooth out the tonal qualities as well.
Compression helps smooth out vocals by lowering louder parts & slightly raising lower parts so the volume remains somewhat constant. Ever get a screamer & you had to turn them down alot, the compressor will help keep the volume lowered automatically. Do you need it - no, but again I wouldn't run a show without it.

Good effects (reverb & delay) can be purchased in units like the Lexicon MPX110, Alesis Midiverb 4 among others. These allow you to run both reverb & delay independantly or together & are pretty cheap.

Compressor the dbx 266XL is nice for the price.

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Well, I had this really nice description all typed out for you and ready to submit and then my laptop rebooted when I installed a new service pack for Office.

Ok, I'll try this again...

You asked about a couple different things and I'll do my best to answer them but I'm kind of new to this myself but I've been reading like a madman lately trying to get up to speed.

Delay - Not sure what you're asking about here. Delay effects are effects that use delay to create the effect. Echo/Reverb are both delay effects. Delay is a setting used in Echo/reverb to determine the amount of delay between the dry sound (the unaltered/original sound) and the wet sound (the modified sound that's been processed by the effect).

Echo - Echo is a term used interchangably with Reverb. You'll find that some equipment uses the term echo and others use the term reverb. If this isn' the case someone please let me know but the reverb (on my Fender PD-250) and the echo (on my 3 tray JVC/RSQ) perform the same function.

Reverb - Ok, so they're the same. What are they? I'm sure you're familiar with the term echo. You yell in a canyon and you hear the sound waves coming back at you in regularly spaced intervals in ever decrasing levels. But what does it do for me? Let's look at sound played in a live venue. Typically, large venues have their own reverb. Reverberation is the result of sound waves bouncing around a room as they're played from a single source and the effect of the overall sound when listened to at a point in a room. If you're in the typical civic center at a concert you'll find that if the music abruptly stops you'll hear the sound bounce around - or reverberate through the room creating the appearance of being in a large listening space. Ok, fast forward to later and you're listening to the CD at home. You're not in a big space anymore, you're in a smaller space with lots of soft stuff that will absorb the sound waves (carpet, couch, drapes, etc). To recreate the reverb effect, they take the original sound and play it back slightly delayed at an ever decreasing level to recreate the effect of the larger listening space. This can be done locally with assorted effects (predefined effects are found on many home stereo components - they're marked 'Hall', 'Concert', etc.) or on the original recording (by recording the effects). Depending on the room and the listening acoutics you might find that a little reverb on the mic inputs can do wonders for a room that has very little in the way of natural reverb.

Compression - Ok, to understand compression we need to understand two other things. The first is clipping. Clipping is what occurs when the signal becomes distorted or too large to handle properly (resulting in distortion as well). The second is signal to noice ratio. This is the difference between the background 'noise' inherrent in all circuits (yes, even digital) and the signal of the 'wanted' sound - ie the mic or instrument inputs. Compressors sometimes provide both compression and cut out. Ok, think about your last night at karaoke. A singer comes up and singer their heart out but they're the Kenny Rogers type. Sort of quiet, easy on the ear, but require a little 'boost' to get good volume levels. No problem, turn up the mic input and all is great. Next, up comes Rammstein. Screaming into the mic he's belting out Du Hast. What happens? The mic is overdriven, distorts, that distortion is passed along to the amp/speakers and nasty things can happen very quickly. A compressor cuts the signal before that distortion occurs by applying 'compression' or a reduction in the overall signal levels to keep them within the normal operating levels. Cut out is the exact opposite - sort of. As the wanted signal approaches the noise level it will suddenly go silent. This prevents the ratio from becoming so small that the wanted signal becomes 'lost' in the background noise.


Ok, now the questions come back at you.... do you want to apply these effects in software or hardware? What do you have now?

Software effects can be reproduced by most of the better software packages with varying degrees of success. There are also dedicated hardware selections that perform these same actions. Occasionally, the effects (reverb, etc) are built into equipment you might already have (ie Mackie DFX12 and Soundcraft GigRac both have built in effects). Peavy (among others) make a dedicated effects processor to be used externally (check the Peavy web site). A number of manufacturers produce compressors for use with mics (where the problem is much more rampant than on music inputs).

If you want to learn more about music, mixing, effects, and the like I highly recommend the Paul White basic series. I bought basic Mixers, basic Mixing, basic Effects and Processing, and basic Live Sound. I learned much on the items you mention above as well as other effects like chorus. If you want a little more technical detail I recommend the Yamaha Sound Reinforcement Handbook. All are available on Amazon and through most book resellers.

BTW, if anyone finds anything wrong with what I posted here please let me know. I'm learning as fast as I can but if I stated something incorrectly or steered someone in the wrong direction let me know.


Edit - Ok, I took so long to post this Lonman beat me to it.... maybe I should learn to type faster...

Delay & Reverb are two completely different effects. Some will say they are the same, they aren't. They are technically both an echo effect but they aren't the same.

Delay - imagine yelling in a canyon & you hear what you yelled a split second later. This is echo. The closer or further away you get to an echo source will determine how quick you will hear the return of the original sound.

Reverb - gives the illusion of yelling in a large room. You hear what you yelled, but it is not a defined "echo", but a muddled (or sharp), lingering effect. Again, the size of the room will determine how muddled or sharp the lingering effect or long long it will remain as well.

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Ok thanks alot for the info. I have Delay, echo, reverb on my mixer now.

I need to know where to put the The dbx 266XL Compressor,

ok my set up goes like this

mixer / sonic maxamizer / EQ / amp //////// where do I put it? and do I have this setup right?

Thx

I think I found what I was looking for, hook it up like this Mic/Comp/mixer.. that is the way I would like to do it is this right?

and what about my setup do I have them in order right?


Thx

What kind of mixer do you have? If it has "insert" points, you would hook the compressor up on the vocal channels via the insert point.
If it doesn't have inserts', then you would run your mic straight to the compressor & then to the mixer - not as effective, but works.

Your set-up is fine, I would put the maximizer after the eq. If your mixer has insert points for the main outputs, I would hook the maximizer up via those inserts, otherwise it's fine where you have it.

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Loman I pm'ed you.

Thanks Lonman...

I try but still have a lot to learn!

My mixer is a Vocopro KJM-8000 PRO. and it works great for me. I know some of you hate Vocopro but at the time I did not know any better.

I am not sure if I have insert points, I will try and take a look.

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The KJM-8000 documentation says that it has effect send/return loops on the mic channels.

If that's the case, then it doesn't sound like it's an actual "insert". It will have 2 jacks that say send & return. The send goes to the input of the compressor & the return goes to the output on the compressor. Being VP, they may have used RCA jacks instead of something more solid like 1/4" jacks, but I haven't seen the back as they do not list different angle pics on their site, so I couldn't tell.

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