Bluetooth Speaker question

[Jeromy Hopgood]

Got a production coming up where I need to have a portable wireless speaker for a prop and I am considering using a Bluetooth speaker. Has anyone had experience with this in QLab? Any recommendations as to a brand or model. I am concerned for the transmission range. The computer is typically around 30-45' from the stage. Is this even a good idea? If not, do you have any other suggestions?

Thanks,
Jeromy Hopgood

[Sam Kusnetz]

Jeromy Hopgood wrote:

Got a production coming up where I need to have a portable wireless
speaker for a prop and I am considering using a Bluetooth speaker. Has
anyone had experience with this in QLab?

Jeromy

I would like to advise against this plan. The Bluetooth audio spec, amongst other issues, has no built-in guarantee against latency and, more infuriatingly, against variable latency. So you might see a Bluetooth device pass audio with no latency at all at one moment, but then many tenths of a second of latency later on. This unpredictability renders Bluetooth rather useless in a theatrical setting, in my opinion.

The generally accepted way to do this, when there is budget available, is to use an in-ear monitor transmitter and a battery powered speaker (Altec makes a nice one that looks like a hockey puck, X-mini has one that I think sounds excellent but can be awkward to secure in some places).

If you're short on cash, another way to do it is to pick up a set of these babies: http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2464775 which are sold as intercoms, but which have an aux input perfect for use as a quick and dirty wireless speaker.

Regards
Sam

[Pierre-Luc Brunet]

I don't think Bluetooth has this big of a range. To get something more reliable I would get either already made battery powered speaker or make your own and send the signal  to the speaker using an in-ear monitor system.

I just did a small googling here is something I found. There are different classes of bluetooth.

Bluetooth Range

Among different bluetooth specifications, there are 2 most popular classes (types) of devices:

• Class 1: range up to 100 meters (in most cases 20-30 meters)
• Class 2: range up to 30 meters (in most cases 5-10 meters)

Additional facts:

• the range depends not only on the transmitter, but also on the mobile phone which is receiving files;
• the range depends on atmospheric, geographic, urban conditions (vendors provide the best achievable range in perfect conditions)
• the bigger range, the slower transmission speed;
• Class 1 devices might be boosted to work on a better range (like 200 meters), however you should not believe it is possibile to broadcast files (in a bluetooth marketing sense) to mobile phones over 1000 meters range, as some vendors suggest

So I suppose If you have a Class 1 device perhaps... but I'd be more confident using the in-ear monitor system.

[Brendan Aanes]

I'd recommend against it. That's pretty long-range for Bluetooth, and it's 2.4ghz protocol that's going to be seeing activity from phones etc. Also bluetooth audio is a lossy compression codec, which may or may not matter to you.

The best solution I've found: a wireless IEM transmitter coupled with a battery-powered speaker. Unfortunately not cheap, but is usually on a relatively usable space in the frequency specturm. At least assuming you invest in a good IEM system.

I have in the past used a low-power consumer FM transmitter which worked OK, but wasn't ideal. Had to get it extremely close to the receiver, and check the frequencies daily. It all depends on if there are any unused FM bands in your region...

In any case, it can be really useful to rig a backup speaker as close as you can get with wires, and have an option for the operator to switch over in case the wireless unit has issues.

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[Jeromy Hopgood]

These were some of my fears as well. I did see a model through B&H that advertised a 100' range. http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/882109-REG/Wolverine_bt100ft_BTunes_100_Range_Bluetooth.html Not sure what to make of that. I had not considered the question of possible Bluetooth interference from other devices. Good points, all.

[Mike P]

Bluetooth is often suspect as a performance killer too. There's quite a bit of anecdotal evidence for this like the link below. I just leave it off.

http://blog.afandian.com/2012/03/crazy-high-cpu-usage-on-snow-leopard-and-a-surprising-culprit/

Mike Post
(601) 307-8657
mdp...@mac.com
http://mdpostdesign.com