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What, am I a Wizard?

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  • What, am I a Wizard?

    I love how customers think I must have every piece of peripheral equipment for fixing their specific unit.

    Got a Behringer S32 digital snake in, well you need the mixer to set up the routing!

    Bad enough trying to scrounge up a cassette tape that works for fixing a tape deck, or tape reels for an echo plex.

    Now I have to know how to program something new every other week.

    Most multi-FX units are fairly intuitive, or a quick read of the manual is enough but some stuff you really need to dig deep to make sure all the functions work properly.

    Kind of hard to do without the other needed gear!

  • #2
    Speaking only for myself, and I am getting on in years, I think you gotta know where to draw the line. Personally, I would not even take in a digital snake, whatever exactly that is. Just because it was purchased by a musician doesn't mean I have to try to fix it. But, I market myself as an amp repair shop that will do some guitar work, some pedals, mics, maybe some other stuff, but I say no to studios that try to entice me to go there and work on their big consoles and rack gear, etc. And with all of the new digital gear nowadays, I view it as more like computers that make sound, and I don't really want to be a computer guy. When folks bring me a digital this or that, I say sorry, you'll have to go thru the factory repair route, pack it up. That's just today's reality for much of the new stuff, AFAIK.
    It's weird, because it WAS working fine.....

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    • #3
      Exactly, if it takes too much time just to figure out how to use something!

      Then again, this thing is like $1000! So of course I'll take a look at it.

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      • #4
        "what?! you mean you can't fix my device full of unattainable components in time for my show at the local legion tomorrow?!"

        yea, sometimes you just have to draw the line.

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        • #5
          Originally posted by drewl View Post
          I love how customers think I must have every piece of peripheral equipment for fixing their specific unit.

          Got a Behringer S32 digital snake in, well you need the mixer to set up the routing!

          Bad enough trying to scrounge up a cassette tape that works for fixing a tape deck, or tape reels for an echo plex.

          Now I have to know how to program something new every other week.

          Most multi-FX units are fairly intuitive, or a quick read of the manual is enough but some stuff you really need to dig deep to make sure all the functions work properly.

          Kind of hard to do without the other needed gear!
          I hear ya loud and clear on that one! I've had to stop accepting tape machines of all types, simply for lack of all the test tapes needed for every format, as well as inventory of fresh/workable recording tape for set-up, and a client's unwillingness to spend the money when he hears what it's going to take.

          My church recently invested in new digital consoles, including the digital snakes to replace the copper snake lines that had been in use for years. Trying to direct them in buying the same brand/similar model....the larger one for the main sanctuary, with the smaller one, same model line for the smaller hall downstairs, so there is the same operating system, AND backup for when either system finally begins failing. They instead went for different mfgrs, so different operating systems, NO simple backup when things go wrong. Such is life......the wisdom in that move will show up at some point.

          I've only handled a few of the digital consoles.....my own, and a few others, but, when it gets into the learning curve you have to go thru do find what is going wrong with the gear....if it's NOT mechanical (solder joints, broken parts), I'll only spend so much time before halting and passing on it. Life is just too short, regardless of how clever I might be. I halted with keyboard gear, though I was apprenticing with one of the best here on the west coast for a spell (Tim Conniff). Time & space was mostly the issue.......disembowel keyboards, order parts while they're apart, times how many are now in the shop....ya nearly need the space one requires to fold parachutes!
          Logic is an organized way of going wrong with confidence

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          • #6
            and a client's unwillingness to spend the money when he hears what it's going to take.
            THAT.
            Juan Manuel Fahey

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            • #7
              Got in a JBL 615 powered speaker.

              Ch 2 'signal' led was always on. (replaced the op amp)
              Unit would not go to full power.

              Hah!
              Turns out there is a Bluetooth app that you can use to change the EQ & volume.

              Hold down 'Boot' & 'EQ' buttons & turn the unit on to reset the unit.

              Instant full power.

              Aargh. (2 hours fiddling with this thing)

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              • #8
                Download the EON Connect app and have some fun next time they're playing in the area.
                "I took a photo of my ohm meter... It didn't help." Enzo 8/20/22

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                • #9
                  I have a customer who, after fixing his amp, decides I should overhaul a bunch of his vintage analog studio gear. Today he calls me and says he's bringing me two dBx compressors to (I don't really know what), and that don't worry he's bringing the service manuals. Ugg. I tell these guys I am not set up for calibrating studio gear, all I have is a sine wave generator and a scope, but they don't want to hear it. I did mention a couple of times, I'll have a look, but I'm not sure I can help him or not.

                  Maybe, we'll see soon enough.
                  It's weird, because it WAS working fine.....

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                  • #10
                    Ha.
                    Dig this, my son went on a field trip to Washington today and the tour busses had WiFi the driver didn't know how to use.
                    He tapped into it and him and his friends were playing their music through the sound system.

                    Think I might need his help in the future.

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                    • #11
                      Originally posted by drewl View Post
                      Ha.
                      Dig this, my son went on a field trip to Washington today and the tour busses had WiFi the driver didn't know how to use.
                      He tapped into it and him and his friends were playing their music through the sound system.

                      Think I might need his help in the future.
                      This is chapter and verse of the state of current technologies in many regards. Not so much how it applies to the service tech, because we know the difference even if we don't know the technology. But it's a huge leap for the lay person to differentiate between the digital and analog worlds. Negotiating each is mutually exclusive and the interfacing is yet another matter where so many problems with modern gear seem to occur. I don't like being the old guy on the porch, but I don't like the new technologies as they apply to my beloved genre. Musicians will find a way regardless
                      "Take two placebos, works twice as well." Enzo

                      "Now get off my lawn with your silicooties and boom-chucka speakers and computers masquerading as amplifiers" Justin Thomas

                      "If you're not interested in opinions and the experience of others, why even start a thread?
                      You can't just expect consent." Helmholtz

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                      • #12
                        Originally posted by Chuck H View Post
                        ... The interfacing is yet another matter where so many problems with modern gear seem to occur...
                        Yeah, maybe when digital amps & PAs stop sounding like butt-ass-crap, MY interfacing (my head-side-radar detector flaps) will become a lot easier! Until that day...

                        Justin
                        "Wow it's red! That doesn't look like the standard Marshall red. It's more like hooker lipstick/clown nose/poodle pecker red." - Chuck H. -
                        "Of course that means playing **LOUD** , best but useless solution to modern sissy snowflake players." - J.M. Fahey -
                        "All I ever managed to do with that amp was... kill small rodents within a 50 yard radius of my practice building." - Tone Meister -

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                        • #13
                          I refer to older technology as a romantic era. You open an old amp and the smell of vintage is quite appealing. This new era of technology is the throw it away era and the smell is not so sweet.
                          When the going gets weird... The weird turn pro!

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                          • #14
                            Are you an ex-smoker Doc?
                            Originally posted by Enzo
                            I have a sign in my shop that says, "Never think up reasons not to check something."


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                            • #15
                              Originally posted by Randall View Post
                              I have a customer who, after fixing his amp, decides I should overhaul a bunch of his vintage analog studio gear. Today he calls me and says he's bringing me two dBx compressors to (I don't really know what), and that don't worry he's bringing the service manuals. Ugg. I tell these guys I am not set up for calibrating studio gear, all I have is a sine wave generator and a scope, but they don't want to hear it. I did mention a couple of times, I'll have a look, but I'm not sure I can help him or not.

                              Maybe, we'll see soon enough.
                              Though when you stop to think about it.....you do have your DMM in ACV mode. +4dbu = 1.23VAC, 0VU on most vintage gear. 0dBu = 0.7745VAC. Assuming your sine wave generator provides stable amplitude, and can be dialed in to that level, 400Hz or 1kHz, you have a reference.
                              Logic is an organized way of going wrong with confidence

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