Williston-West Church

1) The pulpit - solid black - people do not need to adjust this mic.

2) The 'choir' microphone. - solid black - This one plugs into the jack on the stairs below the choir and should be mounted on the large black mike stand, with the microphone pointed down toward the choir. This stand should be located near the front of the choir.

3) The 'announcement' microphone. - red ring - This one plugs into the stairs directly below the pulpit and should be mounted on the small mike stand, which should be located next to the pulpit. This can be moved to the center of the altar for solo singers.

4) The 'piano' microphone. - silver - This on plugs into the jack in front of the choir. It is normally used for the piano,possibly for a soloist or any number of other purposes

The Williston-West sound system is made up of 4 separate components (hence the 4 power 'on' switches):

1. Wireless set: supplies sound to the hearing aids
2. Mixer/Amplifier
3. Tape player/recorder
4. Equalizer

The wireless receiver pulls in the signal and transmits to the multiple hearing devices we hand out as needed during the service. The only control switch is the ‘AF’ level to control volume.

Below the receiver is the Mixer/Amplifier, which is the main power source and also contains a Compressor/limiter (on the upper right side of the box), which could be looked at as a 'sound leveler'. The compressor is currently in the 'DEFEAT' position (off). If used, it could lessen the volume of 'loud bursts of sound' or increase the volume of quiet moments. However, this would require more frequent intervention to adjust the controls. Along with the controls there is a pair of lights about each input setting. The red light indicates peak sound and would light when the input hits overload. The green light is ‘-10db’ (minus 10 decibels) which lights up when the sound reaches a point 10 decibels below max.

Mixer controls. (Attenuators)

There are 6 individual volume settings - 1 for each of 5 inputs and 1 for the tape playback - plus a master volume control, which controls all at once. The tape playback control must remain in the 'off' position while recording. (There is a note over the volume nob to remind us!)

• Volume controls appear to be numbered in reverse (zero on the right with a counter-clockwise turn to the higher numbers). The technical theory (in non-technical terms) is that '0' is full sound and anything else is considered 'subtracting' sound. (The higher the number, the more sound is 'subtracted' from the volume)
• The base and treble dials are the standard 2-dial equalizer. When they are in the 'straight-up' position, their use is negated (or 'off'). Along with these is a recessed switch called 'EQ'. It can either be in the 'IN' position (or active) or the 'DEFEAT' position, which turns off the base/treble controls. We keep it in the 'DEFEAT' position because the equalizer provides us with a 10-dial setting (which has been pre-set by Steve Crain of Audio Design)

Compressor controls.

The compressor is not used, so the On/Off switch is in the ‘off’ setting. It is on the upper right side of the box, and could be looked at as a 'sound leveler'. If used, the compressor might control the highs and lows of sounf output; it could lessen the volume of 'loud voices or noises, or increase the volume of quiet moments. However, this would require more frequent intervention to adjust the controls.

• Release time is ‘min/max’ setting. This controls how quickly the sound returns to normal after the compressor adjusts the sound.
• Compressor Ratio. Also ‘min/max’ setting. This setting determines how much the system turns down the sound, proportional to the signal. It will not allow any sound above the set 'ceiling'
• Threshhold. Also ‘min/max’ setting. This determines when the system sill 'kick in', or what amount of sound is enough to begin compression

Cassette Player/recorder .

This is a standard recorder with 2 record cassettes which we use in unison. The ‘play’, ‘record’, etc. buttons are standard. The Timer should always be in the ‘off’ mode and the direction should be set to ‘reverse once and stop’. The ‘Play’ lights should always begin in the ‘forward’ direction when we begin recording

• Dolby can be set to 'B', 'C' or 'OFF'. Our system is kept in the 'OFF' position since we have no idea what type of noise reduction system will be used in the playback process. Every system is different and Steve says "the noise reduction process you use for recording should also be used for playback".

• Record Levels can usually be set in the mid to 3/4 range

With all of our systems cleaned and tuned, we should be able to leave all the microphones at the existing 'dots' (or mid-range). We should also be able to set the 'record' level on the tape recorder to the mid-range or slightly above (something else we may need to adjust occasionally)

• The speaker over the altar is designed to provide maximum sound to the main congregation seating area, but not to the 2 side areas. Sound also does not get sent below the speaker (the altar area)
• Feedback occurs when sound from a speaker is fed back into a microphone. This is one reason the speaker was set up so sound would not be picked up on the altar, where most of the microphones are. Eric does use his microphone in the back of the church or occasionally walking up the aisle (a potential source of feedback), but is not close enough to pick up sound from the speaker.
• As described above, feedback does not occur when 2 microphones are too close to each other, so we don't necessarily have to turn the pulpit microphone away each time the pastor steps to the pulpit.