A question to IEM users (not solo gigs) and recommendations?

[Winds]

Do you guys use IEMs directly into your Nord or do you place it in your individual mixer which you may be able to control the levels of other signals you're playing with? I'm pretty sure the 2nd one seems more suitable in general but I am wondering if there are Nord users out there that does the 1st option? Especially with an ensemble, specifically top40s style (band) or acoustic lineups (with vocal and possibly other addons like guitar, cajun, sax, etc).

The westone am pro 30 seems to get a lot of good feedback around here after searching through the forums, but maybe there are other decent iems too out there? I think what really got me was someone said the westones are great as you can sort of hear well, through and outside the iem, without having to take your iems off. I remembered using horrible iems and I felt I had to take if off time and again just to be back in what I though I should be listening (aasuming the audience is listening the exact same sound) instead of just listening to myself.. and I remembered they hurt like a *****

[Winds]

IEMs are the best investment I ever made in any musical gear. I use Ultimate Ears UE7s with a wireless Shure PSM900 rig. I run my signals into a Radial KL8 that feeds IEMs and FOH perfectly. I get a send of the band and mix that accordingly. Best stuff ever.

[FZiegler]

The little experience I've got for the moment says:
a) You need to find out if standard IEM would fit into your ears - if not, custom molded IEMs are way more expensive (like ericL's ones), but can be worth it;
b) I first was looking after IEMs with ambience sound, but finally bought closed models: There aren't so many ambience models, they cost more and some people told me they'd lack bass.

So if in the end, you have closed IEMs, there is no option to play them without a mixer. Or you just want to hear yourself. The question pending is: own mix (with signal splitter) or mix out of a monitor AUX from FoH. Or combination of both. As the band won't have a IEM setup in the near future, I went for the combi solution - my instruments plus standard mix from FoH mixed together.

My remaining issue with that solution: I seem to deal with partial phase cancellation of some frequences - sometimes, I can hear myself clearly, sometimes not. Anyway, it's already way more relaxed than before.

[Elias]

I seem to deal with partial phase cancellation of some frequences

This is one reason why I fear the main mix + own signal solution instead of an aux mix.

[Winds]

I seem to deal with partial phase cancellation of some frequences

This is one reason why I fear the main mix + own signal solution instead of an aux mix.

Help me understand, what's the difference between the main mix and an aux mix? I've played around in situations where I had my own mix and I can alter however I want other instruments essentially obtaining my own mix, is this an aux mix? And I imagine another situation where you directly get a full compilation of what the foh is sending out and your own input (so only 2 signals), is this using a main mix?

[catosim]

Help me understand, what's the difference between the main mix and an aux mix? I've played around in situations where I had my own mix and I can alter however I want other instruments essentially obtaining my own mix, is this an aux mix? And I imagine another situation where you directly get a full compilation of what the foh is sending out and your own input (so only 2 signals), is this using a main mix?

Main-mix is equal to what the audience is listening to.
Aux is another mix, which gives the opportunity to separate the signal in multiple monitor-feeds; aux1, aux2, aux3 etc.
Each aux can be adjusted to receive the volume wanted from each channel/instrument, so you can customise what you want more/less from in the monitor.

[Winds]

The most simple version is that a sound guy on a central mixing console provides both main and AUX mixes. But there are other solutions nowadays.

The band may have splitters for all single audio sources, forward one version of each signal to FoH without any change for the main mix, but use all the secondary signals to get their own monitor mixes through a second (digital) mixing console; which leads to a reproduceable monitor sound on any stage, adjustable by yourself - that solution is the most expensive for the band.

If you don't have that, you may try to get your own monitor mix through combining a copy of the main mix together with your own signal (coming from a single splitter or a DI box with second out) by a small personal mixer; which is technically as poor as the sentence sounds. Those two signal paths may have different latency and you might get into phase cancellation.

If you are on a duo gig or the like in a small venue, you may find other solutions with everyone having his/her own amplification.

[Winds]

I definitely remember loving the ability of using an aux mix where I could control individual instruments so I can focus on what I wanted to hear and what I didn't need to, fun times!

[Winds]

After browsing through the forums I thought the radial engineering key-largo seemed ok to pair the iem with mixer but the monitoring needs balanced cables.. would using 2 balanced converters and then a female to male splitter work???

The chain would be from the mixer -> balanced converters -> female to male splitter -> iems

https://www.ventioncable.com/product/6- ... adapter-2/ <- balanced converter and
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/ ... _to_2.html for example.

[FZiegler]

What do you mean by "the monitoring needs balanced cables"? My cheap Behringer P2 accepts balanced mono or unbalanced stereo.

What I meant by "splitter", is something like this: https://www.thomann.de/de/palmer_pls02_ ... litter.htm.