Communications on the Cheap

[cyburdine]

Originally Posted by dareallyst

I'm interested in knowing more about this setup. I need to be able to communicate with 2 musicians, 2 camera operators, and maybe 1 usher. Thanks

Do you have specific questions? If they are general, post them here and I'll reply and hopefully it will help others if they are interested in hearing more. I'd be glad to help you directly if you have more site specific questions. pm me with your email.

-justin

[allyour]

Hello,

I would also be interested in setting up a system like what you suggest. We purchased some standard broadcast headsets and system (2nd hand) but have the problems mentioned by others. Do you have any notes to share on the "How To", how all the gear is connected together, etc.? Thx

[Esoteric]

Originally Posted by cyburdine

the cool part is that you can hook this up to your existing phone system so that anyone could pick up a phone in the church and dial up the director/producer etc...

Actually this is the largest drawback of the system. *lol*

Mike

[cyburdine]

Originally Posted by allyour

Hello,
I would also be interested in setting up a system like what you suggest. We purchased some standard broadcast headsets and system (2nd hand) but have the problems mentioned by others. Do you have any notes to share on the "How To", how all the gear is connected together, etc.? Thx

I keep threatening to actually write up a tutorial, I need to just do that. Below are my cliffs notes on how this system is setup

The pbx is the heart of it. (i used an asterisk phone system) free open source system that essentially turns an old pc into a phone system. It is a phone system that you can manage and maintain via a web based interface.
-cost: free if you have a spare pc

I then have a pair of sipura spa-2100 ATAs. These guys are the bit of magic that connect back to the PBX via a LAN. Each ATA (Analog Telephony Adaptor) has two rj-11 jacks (standard phone jack) This allows you to hook up two phones to each ata giving me 3 camera stations and 1 production booth station.
-cost: (aprox) $35 each on ebay

At each station I hooked up plantronics T-10s which are small phones that hook up via a headset.
-cost: (aprox) $10 each on ebay

You will want to replace the T-10 single muff headset with something much more substantial. I built an adaptor that converts the headset jack to a standard PC gaming headset adaptors (1 mic, and 1 stereo headset jack) this enabled us to buy much nicer headsets that were dual muffed (needed to hear over the band playing)
-cost: $35 per headset
NOTE: you CAN buy $4 headsets on ebay... but they sound terrible (believe me we tried) we ended up spending more on name brand plantronics headsets.

So to actually use the system, all participants dial 401, which is a conference room I setup on the phone system. Then all parties can talk, but I can also mute them remotely via the Asterisk web console. The stations can also dial each other, although we never really use that. Other features (or downsides) are that it can be integrated or even act as your church's phone system. Allowing them to shed that 10k block they have in their closet. or expand past that miserable 3 phone lines that everyone shares. But I digress... the upshot is that if you have a spare pc... this costs you nothing to get started tinkering.

There is alot of technical "how to" that I'm leaving out that I'd be glad to share if you want to know more. Hopefully this helps those who are looking for an alternative to $3-5k production comm systems.

[allyour]

Thanks for the Cliff Notes Cyburdine,

I'm definitely interested in finding out more but I need to talk with our Video person to be sure it works for him.

A related question - since we already have a building PBX, would it make sense to work with that, or, to go ahead and create a separate setup like yours? (I'm guessing some of that may depend on the capabilities of the current PBX we have.)

Thx

[cyburdine]

Originally Posted by allyour

Thanks for the Cliff Notes Cyburdine,

I'm definitely interested in finding out more but I need to talk with our Video person to be sure it works for him.

A related question - since we already have a building PBX, would it make sense to work with that, or, to go ahead and create a separate setup like yours? (I'm guessing some of that may depend on the capabilities of the current PBX we have.)

Thx

yeah, I'm betting that you could make it work with an existing pbx... but most church pbx's that I've seen are a box on the wall that no one knows how to tinker with. This offers a break from the old ways of telephony.

Another advantage of building a new system is that you can leverage existing cat5 networks. So you can put your ATAs down in the production booth and run short cat3 runs to each of the stations.

-justin

[dareallyst]

Originally Posted by cyburdine

Do you have specific questions? If they are general, post them here and I'll reply and hopefully it will help others if they are interested in hearing more. I'd be glad to help you directly if you have more site specific questions. pm me with your email.

-justin

Thanks Justin, as of now, the info you provided in the cliff notes is enough to start with. Correct me if I'm wrong, but this would mean at least a telephone cable is running to the camera operator correct? Meaning, I'm trying to have them totally wireless to roam around and not create potential trip hazards. Our church is not the norm by far... People are always up pacing the floor praying and so on so I would really need to keep the wires to a minimal.

[cyburdine]

one solution to that would be to get a cheap wireless phone. (make sure you aren't impeeding on existing freques for wireless mics etc) Make sure it has a headphone jack and then hook up a good headset to it. Certainly alot cheaper than a clearcomm wireless beltpack.

[allyour]

Hello again,

I think I'm going to build a simple "proof" system to verify it would work for us. Could you show a quick sketch of a basic, 2 node system with interconnection, parts needed, etc. That might be all that's needed for many to be able to build and expand a system. (BTW, my Video person likes the idea.)

Thanks!

Randy