The sound from my amp is great the sound coming from the pa is crap. I have tried line outs and shure sm57. I can't figure it out. It sounds very metallicy. Too much gain? Not enough gain? HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hi Tony;
I'm afraid that you'll need to give us some more information. What is your PA equipment? What are your EQ settings? Is it distorted? Does it sound better when you turn down the PA? ... turn down the guitar?
Let us know and we'll try to help.
-Laz
My amp has a line out, but I dont use it because it does not sound too good. Try to mic the amp, maybe back the mic up a little. Then turn the master PA volume up about 80%. Then slowly turn the mic gain up until the desired volume is reached. It seems that the lower the mic gain, the better the sound. However, it can be a balancing act.
The pa is as follows.
Yamaha emx5000 powered mixer
JBL SF25
Yamaha 18" subs
Yamaha cp2000 amp
peavey pv1200 amp
soundtech pl500 amp
qsc usa850 amp
compressors
crossovers
eq's to everything
eq settings on guitar channel are all flat
it is distorted but not a good distortion
The clean channels sound good.
The sound doesn't change when the pa or the guitar is turned down.
Hmmm, this is a tough one. What do you mean when you say the "clean channels sound good"? All the channels on the mixer/PA should be "clean".
When things start to sound strange for no good reason, I look to the compressors. Try bypassing them.
Also, try CD music, does that sound OK?
I'm shooting in the dark here...
-Laz
if you like the tone from your amp, you have half the battle won .. now if we help the PA faithfully reproduce that, you're golden ... very doable ... mike your guitar cab with the sm57 .. the "3'o'clock position is favored, but i dont know why" .. aim the mic parallel to the angle of the speaker, as if it would follow the cone right to the center .. do NOT aim it dead center
now, set the input level on the input to the PA head .. make sure you are not overdriving the input preamp to your mixer channel ... play your loudest and set the input to the optimal level ... use the meters, not your ears ... hopefully you have a pre-fader level (PFL) setting on the PA channel so you can set the input level independent of the volume it will ultimately be mixed at .. this is a common mistake ... some guys peg the input and get all kinds of noise in their channel  - they have no chance of getting a good mix sound if they screw up this step ... when you say it sounds bad even when the PA or the guitar is turned down, that is a big hint to me that you are overdriving the input
the reason your cleans sound good is because that channel is lower volume, so it isnt grinding the mixer pre .. when you go high gain, it is all over
if everything is good up til now, you should be ok to tweak the eq as needed (a little goes a long way, turn the knobs slow) to adjust for the room acoustics and the competition with your band mates .. guitars sometimes need a little upper mid and high boost (a dB or two, not alot) in order to 'cut' through the mix
hope this helps
good luck
Is a PA system like huge speakers? Peavey recently came out with some 4,000W peak handling power, speakers or PA system.
Not sure which.
I noticed you didn't mention a DI box in your list. If you're going to plug your guitar into the PA you NEED a DI box. The signal coming out of your guitar is not line level. A direct injection box will fix that and will help to aleviate some of the feedback problems inherent with micing. If you're micing check the trim on your input strip. If it is set toward line level it will sound like crap.
hueseph,
a DI box only changes the impedance - taking it from high z (unbalanced) to low z (balanced), not the signal strength .. in order to go from instrument level (~-4) to line level (+10), you need a preamp (which also can serve to change impedance)
My mistake on the definition. Excuse me. Being that most modern mixers and I'm pretty sure the EMX5000 as well, have built in preamps, a DI would still work. ::)
