University student & budding engineer seeks help

Dear Ladies & Gentlemen of Free Speaker Plans

My name is Steve Wess and I’m am currently a third year student at university, (that university being the University College Plymouth St. Mark & St. John, or UCP Marjon for short)m studying a BA (Hons) degree in Live Music, and of course, being in the third year means writing a dissertation.
I am going to be doing my dissertation on the seemingly eternal debate on which is better; Analogue or Digital sound equipment

The purpose for this subject is to further research and expose, which is better: analogue or digital sound equipment. This will also be expanded into situations such as festivals, open-air performances, pubs, clubs, bars, student unions and fetes. The list is seemingly endless, as well as the sound equipment itself. Be it mixing consoles, backline equipment (speaker cabinets, heads etc) and racked equipment used by the FOH and monitor engineers, such as equalizers, delay and reverb unites, compression and gate units.
As well as to further my own understanding of sound equipment and hopefully that I will be using in my future career using the experience of professional engineers currently working and seasoned veterans of the industry. The finalised piece, the essay and supporting media, could also be used as a reference piece for engineers in training or for engineers just starting for specific equipment they could use for specific scenarios.
My project is not to prove which is better overall, but if analogue or digital equipment is better to be used in certain situations and scenarios. If a part of the FOH, front of house, or monitor configuration would be more efficient, be it in time being used, the amount of tasks it can do or the amount of space it takes up.

I would like people help by commenting on this post, adding me on Skype ( search for scubacrow, name is Stephen Wess please state in the invite that you are adding me because of this so I can accept) to answer some questions, or downloading a questionnaire that I will soon be posting. I will also be creating a survey, using Survey Monkey online.

Any, and all help well be extremely helpful and appreciated and I look forward to hearing from you. smiley20

Steve Wess

hi steve....

Hi Bee,
again, sorry for the FSP mention on Speaker Plans. I had already posted on here and copy/pasted on there and didn't really I had done it until after it was posted.

Would you be able to help me in any way?

yeah sure ill try to, for warmth and sound analog all day but...... what used to fit in 2 racks now takes up the space of 2u in my new rack...... in a digital lms unit. Cost makes a big issue when running systems these days, from setting up times, to number of crew needed, to transport the list goes on. So im now fully digital....

Hi Steve, Digital more precise and analogue is forever messing around trying to get a perfect sound.

The problem is that everyones ears are different. EG. some people like Lady Ga Ga and some people like Bach etc.

A wise amplifier manufacturer once told me that digital can be too precise and can take away some of the listening pleasure of sound. But remeber the debate about vinyl and CD's

Speak to various manufacturers and to sound engineers who have worked with both Analogue & Digital systems. But you will also need lots of evidence.

A good bit of advice for your dissertation is to pick 5 maybe 6 items, or maybe less, at most to write about because you would have to cover a huge amount of information. If you try to cover too much subject matter it will make your project too big. keep the subject matter small so you can concentrate on content because if it's too big it will be very difficult write. The qaulity of your piece will outway the quantity. And remember that word counts are only a guide if say what you need to say in 5000 words why do you need to write 6000.

You will be possibly about to write your proposal for your dissertaion. When you go into your Honors year time will fly by and your work load will increase dramatically. Be precise about what you want to cover in your proposal and look at whats been covered before. Then try to stick to that commitment because even changing it slightly could mean a huge difference in time. Sometimes it's not a good idea to cover a topic that has little or no past thesus. It really depends on what you ultimately want prove or disprove with your paper.

Start gathering your information as soon as you can because your Tutors can steer you in the right direction, keep checking with them what information you should be gathering and try to find out excatly what learning tools you need and if you are not sure about anything ask your tutors as early as you can.

Good Luck with your studies and all the very best, Jim.

P.S. my wife did a BSC honors last year and it was very tough for her even though she is 50. If you know what you are trying to acheive early enough everything is possible.