Presets 2.0

This is from a post on the Bose^® Pro Portable PA Community by Cliff-at-Bose December 6, 2004.

It is here because it gives some interesting insight into the thinking behind this next generation of presets. You might also like to read about Presets 1.0 from a year before.

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Presets 2.0 An informal Discussion

Listening to our customers and noting our own reactions to using this system, we have upgraded the current presets and added some new ones too. I basically did the work of developing these, simply by listening and tweaking the sound to be “right”. I think we have a really improved set here. This is an overview of these from what was, for me, a really fascinating experience. I hope these make your artistic lives better and better.

First of all, here’s a complete list of the V2 presets for reference, lifted directly from our website:

Personalized Amplification System™ family of products

Presets 2.0

No Instrument Category

00 "Flat (for pre-recorded music, most instruments and mics, Line6 Pod XT, Line6 Variax Acoustic 700)" General

01 Handheld Microphones Vocal Microphones

02 Headworn Microphones Vocal Microphones

03 "Vocal Mic High Gain, Bright" Vocal Microphones

04 "Vocal Mic High Gain, Normal" Vocal Microphones

05 Audix OM-5 Vocal Microphones

06 Audix OM-6 Vocal Microphones

07 Beyer M88 Vocal Microphones

08 Crown CM-310 / CM-311 Vocal Microphones

09 EV N/D357 Vocal Microphones

10 EV N/D767 Vocal Microphones

11 EV N/D967 w/ highpass Vocal Microphones

12 Neumann KMS 105 Vocal Microphones

13 Shure SM57 Vocal Microphones

14 Shure SM58 Vocal Microphones

15 Shure Beta 57A Vocal Microphones

16 Shure Beta 58A Vocal Microphones

17 Shure Beta 87A Vocal Microphones

18 Sennheiser e855 Vocal Microphones

19 Sennheiser MD431-II Vocal Microphones

20 Sennheiser MD441 Vocal Microphones

21

22

23

24

25 Electric Guitar Direct Electric Guitars

26 "Miked Guitar Amp w/ SM57, ""Rumbly"" " Electric Guitars

27 "Miked Guitar Amp w/ SM57, ""Normal"" " Electric Guitars

28 Fender Stratocaster Electric Guitars

29 Fender Telecaster Electric Guitars

30 Gibson ES-335 / ES-345 Electric Guitars

31 Gibson ES-335 / ES-345 w/ split neck pickup Electric Guitars

32 Gibson Les Paul Classic gold-top Electric Guitars

33 Gretsch Country Gentleman Electric Guitars

34 Ibanez Artist Electric Guitars

35 Paul Reed Smith Custom 22 Electric Guitars

36

37

38

39

40 Acoustic guit w/ piezo Acoustic Guitars

41 Acoustic guit w/ dynamic mic Acoustic Guitars

42 Acoustic guit w/ condenser mic Acoustic Guitars

43 Guild D25 w/ Fishman Piezo Acoustic Guitars

44 Guild D25 w/ Fishman Piezo and sound hole notch Acoustic Guitars

45 Martin Backpack w/ pickup Acoustic Guitars

46 "Martin DC16, pickup only (no mic)" Acoustic Guitars

47 Martin D28 w/ piezo pickup Acoustic Guitars

48 Martin D45 w/ condenser mic Acoustic Guitars

49 Taylor 810 w/ Expression System pickup Acoustic Guitars

50 Electronic (keyboard/synth/digi piano/module/EWI) Keyboard

51 Fender-Rhodes 73 Keyboard

52 Hohner Clavinet D6 Keyboard

53 Wurlitzer 200 Keyboard

54

55 Accordion w/ LIMEX Micro Pro Special

56 Audio-Technica 35 Pro Clip on for trumpet Special

57 Low Volume Pre-Recorded Music EQ Special

58

59

60 Upright 3/4 Bass w/ Fishman pickup Basses

61 Active Bass 1 Basses

62 Active Bass 2 Basses

63 Active Bass 3 Basses

64 Fender Active Jazz Bass Basses

65 Fender '66 Passive P Bass Basses

66 Fender '69 Passive J Bass Basses

67

68

69

70 Kick Drum Drums

71 "Kick drum, Audix D6" Drums

72 "Kick drum, AKG D112" Drums

73 "Kick drum, Sennheiser 601" Drums

74 "Kick drum, Shure Beta 52a" Drums

75 Generic Area/Overhead Drums

76 "Drum overhead, Differential SM57*" Drums

77 "Drum overhead, Differential Electret*" Drums

78

79

80 50 Hz High Pass Filter Utility

81 80 Hz High Pass Filter Utility

82 5 KHz Low Pass Filter Utility

83 50 Hz / 5 KHz Band Pass Utility

84 80 Hz / 5 KHz Band Pass Utility

85 "200 Hz, 1 oct, -6dB Notch" Utility

86 "500 Hz, 1 oct, -6dB Notch" Utility

87 "500 Hz, 1 oct, +6dB Boost" Utility

88 "Flat, -70dB Gate" Utility

89 "Flat, -80dB Gate" Utility

90

91

92

93

94

95

96

97 1kHz Bandpass (debug) Utility

98

99 Flat Utility

Notes

1. Mic presets: We (and you) all love the basic sound of the Shure 87a/Preset2 combination, so I started here as a reference. Of course, every microphone has its own character. These include how the mic responds to proximity, how its sound changes with close-vocal sound pressure, how its polar response integrates vocal sound, how high and low it goes spectrally and how it integrates feedback into its total sound. And so, you can turn the knobs all you want, but these qualities (and others) will still be there. That’s why you like that mic you’re using.

To start, preset 17 is the same as old preset 02. We added a lot of popular mics as you can see. The Crowns (“Differoid” mics) include the 310 handheld and the 311 “drummer’s mic”. Both sound great with their preset. The 310 has very high gain before feedback. About the only downside here is that you really have to be on the mic hard, more so than, say, the 87a. Try the new SM57 and Beta57. The 57 in particular is considered by some a “cheap mic” ($89 at Musican’s Friend), but give the SM57/Preset 13 a try. I’m really happy with this one, a very attractive vocal presentation. Also, many are happy with the new high-gain and high-gain bright presets (Hilmar’s work). He worked in some aggressive high-end filters for control of that little high squeak you might get playing loud, especially in close proximity to the system (like when the club owner backs your band up into the corner). This will help singers who are playing loud with the unusual HF extension of such mics as the Neumann 105. Developing these presets, I made sure a female singer sounded good on all these too.

2. New electric guitar stuff galore-a-rama here. Preset 25 is an averaged spectral response of 12” guitar speakers and is useful in many ways other than guitar. (Use your ears). Basically it bumps up around 2KHz and rolls off about 5KHz on the high end, 100 on the low end. 26 and 27 are very useful and Tony Sarno and I worked on this together, for use with amplifying a small amp with an sm57 pickup. Tube-and-cone freaks; rejoice!! Both presets have a slight “honk” (500 Hz octave) and the “rumbly” one is bumped in the deep bass, for anyone wanting that “stack” sound on full distortion. Tony said “yeah” when we were done. Erik Gustafson of the Brothers Groove liked 26 instantly, playing a Tele and miking his amp. Be careful of 27 because it will do a good job of reamplifying bass guitar and kick drum on a loud stage. The rest are standard from the first batch of presets.

3. We added new acoustic guitar presets, especially some nice Martins sent here for preset work from Nazareth PA. I personally love the pickup-fitted Backpack/Preset 45 combo. Small, inexpensive but big lovely sound. It’s like the sm57; listen with your ears, not with list price.

4. #57 is for prerecorded music at low level, for DJs and for break music at the gig. Sort of like the Fletcher-Munson (Tony Sarno calls it the “Herman Munster”) curve; bass and treble boost, just the right amount if you’re playing at 85 dB or so.

5. New basses! My fave is 66, developed with Bass Monster Wolf Ginandes. Wolf brought in the antique collection, his SVT head and a 2x10 bottom he has used as a standard for years. We used this as a reference on our big stage. You don’t want to lift the head, by the way. I think we got just the right amount of “unh” in and “quack” out for classic Fender basses. The hi-z preamp in our system does not load down the pickup. 65 is also very cool but many love 66. 60 for acoustic basses with Fishman on the bridge is still a fave, read “classic”.

6. For drums, we added the new D6 Audix, very nice, punchy. 76 and 77 are for a pair of 57’s and a pair of wideband electrets connected out of phase. These are placed on either side of the snare, below the cymbals but above the upper drum heads. This gives us a very good signal because of proximity and cancels long bass wavelengths like bass guitar, so they aren’t re-broadcast by the drum “overheads”. Want more hihat?; Move the mic towards the hihat (and so on). Like all good mic technique, the fewer, the better. This also allows a drummer to have a quick setup. It does require a Y-jack as follows: Male xlr into a pair of female xlr’s, one of which has pins 2 and 3 reversed. Try it out. Beats all the complication of 12 mics, submixer, ect. (ewwww). We have been using this setup in our Linemen shows since they started and havn’t wanted to change it.

7. We added some nice “utility” stuff. Preset 85 (-6dB at 200 Hz) is very useful for miking grand piano. When the gain goes up, so does 200 Hz. This makes a fine place to start with any mic setup. I used both a wideband condenser and some 57’s. Both profited from this. The main mic should go over the bass strings, which is where most of the instrument’s tone seems to come from. A second mic over the upper 2 octaves and near the keys can be used to bring up the definition of the upper register. Turn the bass off. The highpasses are always useful and we added a 50 Hz the old 80 Hz. The 50/5K and 80/5K bandpasses are also very useful, like for a noisy guitar amp. We included a few gates. Anyone use these?

8. Preset 97 (1KHz bandpass) is just for us. We get one, you get 98. You come first. On the other hand, this might be a good bongo drum preset, you never know.

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Original Post and ongoing discussion

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