rkwalick
Member
The short version- instead of keeping our 2010 macbook pro, hooked up to a projector with a mac adapter and to the soundboard through the (intermittently evil and annoying) headphone jack, what should we get- the issue is the switch in the headphone jack getting stuck given the sheer number of people in and out of the booth and the number of times the 1/8" cable gets unplugged and plugged back in..
The long version- in 2003 or so Drew Dalzell of Wasted Monkey Sound (now Diablo Sound) in California built the school I worked for a dedicated sound playback PC with two hard-drives, a very lean installation of Windows, and a sweet 8-channel external soundcard locally made in Southern California. It was a work of art and it ran SFX.
Since then, QLab has become the goto, and private schools with nice theatres I've worked for increasingly have students playing music and showing videos and slideshows in assemblies, along with the normal sound cue and projection playback needs of the theatre program. I've done my best to manage last minute media coming to me via flashdrive or email or google universe link played on various phones and laptops via an 1/8" cable through the house system over the years, and I've learned a few things along the way, like streaming media off the internet (embeded vidoes in Google Slides presentations, music from Youtube, etc) is always a dicey proposition and all media should live on the harddrive of the computer from which it is being played because even a wired network connection can fail in front of an audience, and the headphone jacks on macbooks are very finicky (plus there is the issue of the noise you get if the laptop isn't plugged into power, or into the right outlet, or the volume is all te way up). And I will not use itunes for sound cues or music for plays.
I am not a fan of using a phone for live production support EVER, and can see a case for having a DESKTOP in a booth. So, I am open to suggestions, while I ask around for funding- to wit, if Drew (who no longer is the West Coast rep for SFX and has grown his company to where he no longer builds sound playback computers for people) were to suggest something t ome today, that could deal with sound, ppt, movies, projections, run QLab happily, ect, what would DREW DO (I am not in touch with him, or I'd ask HIM)?
Thanks for any insight, feedback, help. I want to retire our booth macbook as soon as I can before I tear my hair out because of the headphone jack!
The long version- in 2003 or so Drew Dalzell of Wasted Monkey Sound (now Diablo Sound) in California built the school I worked for a dedicated sound playback PC with two hard-drives, a very lean installation of Windows, and a sweet 8-channel external soundcard locally made in Southern California. It was a work of art and it ran SFX.
Since then, QLab has become the goto, and private schools with nice theatres I've worked for increasingly have students playing music and showing videos and slideshows in assemblies, along with the normal sound cue and projection playback needs of the theatre program. I've done my best to manage last minute media coming to me via flashdrive or email or google universe link played on various phones and laptops via an 1/8" cable through the house system over the years, and I've learned a few things along the way, like streaming media off the internet (embeded vidoes in Google Slides presentations, music from Youtube, etc) is always a dicey proposition and all media should live on the harddrive of the computer from which it is being played because even a wired network connection can fail in front of an audience, and the headphone jacks on macbooks are very finicky (plus there is the issue of the noise you get if the laptop isn't plugged into power, or into the right outlet, or the volume is all te way up). And I will not use itunes for sound cues or music for plays.
I am not a fan of using a phone for live production support EVER, and can see a case for having a DESKTOP in a booth. So, I am open to suggestions, while I ask around for funding- to wit, if Drew (who no longer is the West Coast rep for SFX and has grown his company to where he no longer builds sound playback computers for people) were to suggest something t ome today, that could deal with sound, ppt, movies, projections, run QLab happily, ect, what would DREW DO (I am not in touch with him, or I'd ask HIM)?
Thanks for any insight, feedback, help. I want to retire our booth macbook as soon as I can before I tear my hair out because of the headphone jack!