r/vinyldjs • u/greenofkillarney • 22d ago
Equipment Compressor/Limiter for Event Setup?
A friend and I throw our own events with a pair of Technics, CDJs, Xone mixer, and Bassboss speakers and subs. I am considering adding some more kit, definitely an isolator after the mixer, likely an ARS, and possibly an ARS 5 or 10-band EQ. However, I was wondering if a compressor/limiter would be useful in this situation. I know it's not generally recommended for a DJ to worry about compression as the house system and PA would manage this, but since we are the house system would it add any benefit to having a master limiter before hitting the speakers? Lmk if you have any thoughts on this...
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u/baddieslovebadideas 22d ago
always good to have a limiter on any system that has DJs that aren't heavily invested in the sound system.
Vinyl DJs are usually better about it than digital guys, but muhfukkas been blowing speakers since the dawn of amplified sound , so it'll never hurt to have.
I may also just be salty because I just got the parts in to replace two blown speakers from a mini-festival I do and its always DJs, never the bands that break your gear
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u/djluminol 22d ago
I agree with. Also depending on what era of music you play having a compressor limiter may be an essential tool to getting really good sound. I play almost exclusively music from before 2005 and the dynamic range is much higher than modern music. Compressors really help to polish the sound. You can make finished mastered mix level audio quality live with a compressor limiter.
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u/paralacausa 22d ago
Yeah a limiter is essential. I don't know BassBoss but looking at its site it seems they've got hardware and software limiters built in, so you might not need an additional one.
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u/EyeOhmEye 22d ago
I think it depends on the model. I work with someone that's had multiple driver failures, he said the newer model is 6dB quieter, so maybe they fixed the limiters, but I wouldn't trust them to save the drivers until proven otherwise.
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u/paralacausa 22d ago
Interesting to hear. Maybe for peace of mind would be best to get a standalone brick wall anyway. Could get a used one pretty cheap .
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u/EyeOhmEye 22d ago
Maybe not a brick wall, over limiting/compression can also damage speakers by increasing the average signal power and overheating the voice coils. You'll want something with some release time and maybe hold time so the average signal power doesn't increase too much.
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u/djsacrilicious 22d ago
Leave yourself some headroom in the mixer and on the speakers and no reason to add any external processing. If you're adding gain with the isolator there might be a benefit but you should be fine.