Another sound question???

[groovearteest]

Can you plug to pa systems into each other. I was curious because My church does this. Im not really aware of the full pros and cons of doing this, I just know that the old system is somehow connected to the new one. I wanted to know if this first of all is even safe to do. And second should it be done period. Right now its a real inconvenience for anyone who tries to work the mics right now.pretty much its sort of a big mess, with some of the mics being controlled by one system, and the other being controlled by another, not even all the mics can be heard from a set of heaphones. But i was just wanting to know if its best to only have the one system, or if its ok to have both plugged in.

[truckerdrummer]

it can be done... it's not ideal, but if all the connections are made correctly it will work fine.... it's best if one board is used like a sub mix for a group of similar mics... for example, doing a mix of the drums on one board and feeding that mix into a channel on the other. the downside to doing it that way is that monitor mix is limited. my first choice would be to use the second board for the drums only if possible and if you need the extra channels in addition to the drums, connect what does not need to run to the monitors. i occasionally need to use a second mixer for bigger stuff and that's how i set it up.

[groovearteest]

it can be done... it's not ideal, but if all the connections are made correctly it will work fine.... it's best if one board is used like a sub mix for a group of similar mics... for example, doing a mix of the drums on one board and feeding that mix into a channel on the other. the downside to doing it that way is that monitor mix is limited. my first choice would be to use the second board for the drums only if possible and if you need the extra channels in addition to the drums, connect what does not need to run to the monitors. i occasionally need to use a second mixer for bigger stuff and that's how i set it up.

I'd hate to ask this. But you mind elaborating just a little more.

[truckerdrummer]

no problem at all... could you tell me what model mixers you're using? and is there anything specific you'd like me to touch on or do you like reading? haha

[truckerdrummer]

in short for now... without knowing what you've got going on. you could run all of the mics from the drums into what i'll call mixer 2... take the main l/r output of mixer 2 and put them into a channel (or 2 depending if a stereo mix is necessary) on what we'll call mixer 1. I can get more specific on connections if you need me to if you let me know the gear you're working with. It will most likely be xlr connections. Mixer 1 is your main board, it should be the better of the two or at least the one that has more channels, efx, etc... Mixer 1's main outputs are connected to your amps and speakers. Now the overall volume of the entire mix from mixer 2 will be controlled by one (or 2) channel fader(s) on mixer 1. If this makes sense let me know and i'll continue. I'm not always the best at describing something like this haha. And if you could let me know what everything is that's going into system in addition to what mixers you're working with, I could probably help even more.

[groovearteest]

in short for now... without knowing what you've got going on. you could run all of the mics from the drums into what i'll call mixer 2... take the main l/r output of mixer 2 and put them into a channel (or 2 depending if a stereo mix is necessary) on what we'll call mixer 1. I can get more specific on connections if you need me to if you let me know the gear you're working with. It will most likely be xlr connections. Mixer 1 is your main board, it should be the better of the two or at least the one that has more channels, efx, etc... Mixer 1's main outputs are connected to your amps and speakers. Now the overall volume of the entire mix from mixer 2 will be controlled by one (or 2) channel fader(s) on mixer 1. If this makes sense let me know and i'll continue. I'm not always the best at describing something like this haha. And if you could let me know what everything is that's going into system in addition to what mixers you're working with, I could probably help even more.

Actually you made perfect sense. But our main mixer is a behringer euro power pmp 6000. The other one is so old that im not even sure on the name. I know that some of the mics are running of the old system and some are on the new one. But when I for example plug headphones into the main mixer. I only get sound from the mics plugged into the main mixer, and sound from one of the mics that's connected to the old mixer. I'm supposed to go out to the church later today so if I get a chance I'll record what everything looks like to give you a better idea.

[truckerdrummer]

one thing that you DO NOT want to do is hook up speaker outputs from mixer 2 into mixer 1 if mixer 2 is a POWERED mixer. That would be bad. Like crossing the streams bad, Egon. You'll want the feed to come from an unpowered line level signal... what i elluded to in my first post was that monitoring becomes an issue when hooking the mixers together. you'll want to take your monitor feed from the main board (mixer 1). That only allows you to monitor the mix from mixer 2. You will not be able to adjust the individual volumes of the mics from mixer 2, only the volume of that whole mix. That's why in my first post I suggested trying to group things that aren't crucial to the monitors on mixer 2.

[late8]

it can be done... it's not ideal, but if all the connections are made correctly it will work fine.... it's best if one board is used like a sub mix for a group of similar mics... for example, doing a mix of the drums on one board and feeding that mix into a channel on the other. the downside to doing it that way is that monitor mix is limited. my first choice would be to use the second board for the drums only if possible and if you need the extra channels in addition to the drums, connect what does not need to run to the monitors. i occasionally need to use a second mixer for bigger stuff and that's how i set it up.

Here's a diagram layout for sub-grouping and using (2x) mixers: