Musician Gear & Tech Discussion

In your opinion, what is the best/least expensive wireless in-ear monitor for bass? I don't mind spending money to get quality, but I don't want to spend $1,000 if $600 will be good enough and I don't want to spend $600 if $400 will get me something quality. I also don't want to spend $200 if I will have to turn around and spend $400 later on.

More details:

My band plays out about every 2-3 weekends.
I am typically standing within 20' of the mixer but sometimes up to 50'

I have the Carvin's EM900 and been using them for over a year and never had a problem. As a drummer I use Koss Pro 4A's as the headphones and not the ear buds. They were around $400.00

Is the whole band going to IEM, or just you? the Sennheiser bodypacks alone are $500+. We used a Shure system (now gone due to the FCC frequency changes) with $200 bodypack/earbud packages that were ok. The transmitter can easily be $600-$2000 depending on how many channels you want, etc.

I called my last bass player and asked him what he uses. What he told me was kind of a surprise. He uses the Nady PEM-1000 UHF Wireless In-Ear Monitor System $300.00 but he said his ear buds are Westone UM2's dual driver, hundred and some dollars.

Didn't Nady pioneer this technology?

There are many claims about who invented in-ear monitors, but it is generally considered to be sound engineer Chris Lindop. He was working with Stevie Wonder in 1987, and on that tour Stevie had a a full-blown, mobile, broadcast-standard FM radio station, Wonderland Radio. On stage, Wonder used a standard Walkman FM radio receiver tuned to Wonderland Radio, which broadcast his mix to him via a pair of earbuds. When I learned of this back then I made a set of wireless head phones using a RadioShack 1/2 watt fm transmitter kit. In turn that got me into heathkit and dynaco tube amps. If I still had all those amps today I could buy a 2017 Ford GT "cash".

Before purchasing any wireless IEM's you can save yourself a lot of trouble by referencing this site for available frequency's in your area.
http://www.shure.com/americas/support/t ... cy-finder/

Good link, Jeff. I'm so glad I dumped my IEM system when the Beatles band broke up - would have been useless except as a wired monitor now. I lost about $70 selling my bodypack, earbuds (the single driver Shure ones) and battery bypass supply (for practices), glad I didn't wait around. The Shure earbuds were good, came with a whole kit of foam and rubber pads to find the best ones for your ear (my ears don't take standard ones very well).

The reason I posted the link is because some wireless manufactures have at least two versions of IEM's, wireless mic, wireless instrument systems with differing frequency's depending on what is available in a given area. It is best when considering a purchase to do a little research. That way you have a piece of gear that does not become obsolete in a year or two. my previous post contains a link that is a very useful tool.