DriveRack PA2 : Wish I'd bought it earlier!

I had been considering the Behringer DCX2496 Ultradrive Pro, because of the third input, but very glad I chose the DBX PA2 instead.

I had a really weird problem with my sound system... One of the radio mics started to ring slightly so I turned the gain down... and that caused it to howl round completely... so I shut the fader and the howl round continued... so I shut the foldback fader and the howl round continued... so I shut the main output fader and the howl round continued... this is impossible!

I eventually traced it to either the 31 band stereo equaliser or the crossover. I replaced both with a DBX DriveRack PA2 (DBX DriveRack PA2) and DBX DriveRack RTA-M mic to go with it (DBX DriveRack RTA-M).

Yesterday a friend helped me take the system with the new DBX digital crossover and equaliser to his warehouse for testing (pictures below). I had been hoping to do some other housekeeping (some new connectors to simplify wiring) with the money in 2017 for the sound system, but the new DBX unit is fantastic. It is quicker and easier to setup!

I used to have use a Phonic PAA (Phonic PAA3) and send pink noise through the system then manually set 64 faders to the correct settings. This was a pain. Pink noise isn't pleasant to hear, especially as there are often many other people in the venue while I'm setting up. The DBX PA2 uses sweep tones and not only is it quick and easy the sound is a lot more pleasant. You can also take readings from multiple places (to correct for acoustics better.

It is also controlled by an app (iOS and Android) and will make my job doing sound for events a whole lot easier. The app walks you through all the settings with wizards (it already knew the Behringer speakers I use so I just selected them from the list, but not the Behringer amplifiers). The wizards are powerful and will help make setup a lot quicker.

One thing I liked was the fact you can make changes on the fly without any glitches, noises etc, so if you want to change eq mid show that's no problem.

Having the system set up in a warehouse away from everyone I could test every setting... and I did! Compressors worked well, as did the limiters: I'm in small venues a lot of the time (200 seats) with occasionally large ones (1,000+) so being able to reset the positions the compressors or limiters cut in will be helpful. The limiters are designed to stop clipping on the amplifiers, and although I use compressors on all the vocal mics (to make the mix more solid) having catch all limiters set on the output will be helpful.

The subharmonic enhancer worked will, producing a warmth to the sound that I liked.

Cons? No third input is the only con I can see so far.