A Barking Dog

A couple months back I noticed that Yamaha was holding PM1D training and thought it might be nice to attend. I’ve used the PM1D before, but not to the extent that I have other units. Plus, it was a good way to kill a couple of days, network with other noise boyz and grrls and might look pretty good on the old resume (which I’ve had to update and dust off over the last month or so). It starts with going to a page on the Yamaha site where you fill out a form that asks a few basic questions as to your familiarity with control surfaces and what you do in the sound world. A week or so later they send you a confirmation and you’re good to go. Two full days, hands on. Breakfast and lunch included. The best part though is that they provide the training free of charge. Did I mention free food?

The day starts with a continental breakfast in the lab. This lab is equipped with seven PM1D V1.7 units the new mic pres that are specifically configured for the class and an additional PM1D V2 as the instructor console. We divide ourselves into four person teams per surface, just like in high school and college (what little college I attended) lab class. There is of course a projector that is fed the console display out and the now ubiquitous Power Point presentation that looks good, is relevant and appears to have been honed quite well for the presentation. A CD is distributed with the presentation and the copy of the PM1D editor software to install for those of use that brought Bill Gates boxes to run the software. A PC card adapter loaded with Smart Media with PM1D branding is also distributed so you can save your settings. The format is very loose and you are encouraged follow along on the surface and be very hands on as well as ask whatever questions you need to get grasp the subject. Of all the events of this nature I’ve attended in the last quarter century or so, this is one of the best. Excellent material, excellent presentation, awesome format.

The class population was pretty diverse. Mostly church sound types. A couple of theater house guys and a small contengent from LV. Four of us if I’m not mistaken. Some from as far away as NY and Texas. I can’t help to think it was the free food that brought them this far. There was even a drum tech that has become a sound guy. I was pretty much the only one of “my kind” there, that is long hair rock roadies trying to break into the big time Vegas production show scene though there were a couple of other touring guys that were working with well known acts. A few others (pretty much the churches) had PM1Ds installed, a few of us used them as touring sound guys. Others were there just to learn the surface. The first part of the morning starts with an overview of the systems capability and features. It’s a good soup to nuts presentation about what this particular piece of gear is about. The second portion of the morning touches on the basic operational features. If you’ve been using the surface for a while most of it is pretty basic at this point, though all of us, even the guys that have had them installed for a year or so picked up some tips. Of particular note for me were the use of the shift key and touching various keys to bring the effects or graphics to the encoders and faders. The one bummer, big bummer is that the version 2.0 files are not backwards compatable with version 1.7 surfaces. That particular trainer didn’t have quite the same perspective as I did as to why that’s a bad thing ™ for touring guys. While the V2 will read your 1.7 files, if you make changes on the V2 to the file and save it, the 1.7 will not be able to read it. That means two sets of files, one for each version and having to replicate any changes made on the V2 by hand or on the computer to the 1.7 files. The factory line was that the owners need to upgrade to V2 and I agree, but it’s not practical in all cases and this would impact non owners, such at those that do one offs or festivals with the surface using different pieces with different software versions. I’m somewhat surprised as Yamaha is usually pretty good about that sort of thing.

After a nice catered lunch in an adjacent room (did I mention the free food?) we were to then settle down to a more in depth tour of the software. During lunch we were joined by several folks from the factory from tech support and sales and marketing. I know for a fact they came for the free food. At our table, we were talking about various surfaces and reliability when I remarked that I had locked up a PM5DRH hard a couple months back. In that crowd saying something like that will get you noticed. The gent seated next to me quizzed me a bit about it, saying it’s the first he’s heard of one crashing. I can believe that very few have crashed, but not that none have. Then again, the factory doesn’t hear of all crashes for all types of gear and that particular one seems to be pretty rock solid. But like I say, it’s not IF it breaks or crashes, it’s WHEN. True for all gear.

After lunch we started in with the software portion of the day. It was a good presentation with more little nuggets for me to remember. As we approach the end of the session, I decide to ask more of a marketing/sales question. If there is anybody that can drop a turd in a punch bowl, well, how you doin’? My question was this (paraphrased) “What is the current status of this product with respect to its life cycle”. Translated to roadie that means “when are you going to replace this with a better, cheaper faster version”? The trainers explained that they just released a V2 and that as a practice Yamaha sourced parts that would be available for years. No doubt, others could learn from Yamaha in this regard as the support for end of lifed product is exemplary. I complemented them as such, explaining that I had a long history of the console line beginning with the PM1000. I explained that with the adaptation of surfaces the PM1D, while considering it’s still an nice piece, is the grandfather of surfaces at this point and using v1.7 is showing some chinks in the armor. The V2 software and new pres will help but it won’t be too long before the surface needs an overhaul. I used the example of the Heritage 3k being all the shizzle for the last while, now looking to be upstaged by the PM5D and even in a year the 5D sold almost twice as many units as the 1D has in almost five years. I explained a rental company needs to stock what people want, not necessarily what is older and proven. At about this point marketing got involved in the discussion.

I was told that my question was “moot” because if you needed a surface now for a job, this was suitable and available. I countered that it was anything but moot and for such a significant investment in the neighborhood of US$200k the customers should know what the road map might be. An attempt was made to correct my pricing info, but I explained that for an appropriate config, two surfaces, two engines and all the frames and cards I was quoted nearly US$200k. I was quoting street price though I know the dealer price and I don’t think they would have appreciated me sharing that with a room full of end users. At that point it was brought up that I wasn’t comparing apples to apples as that was for two surfaces. Yes, but my point is that we buy and deploy console sets in pairs. Even then a used PM1D from Hi-Tech is about US$125k for a single 96×48 config. I was then a bit more direct and asked if there was a replacement or upgrade product in the pipeline (you know there is) and at what point would it be introduced. I was told that I would not be given any advance product info and that they are constantly working to develop improvements in existing product and create new product. Of course they are, that’s why they have the advantage they have. At that point I specifically stated that with the introduction of the interface on the M7CL (they have one in the room, more on the next post after I get a chance to drive it a bit more) I thought that the Centralogic interface was a precursor to what the next gen PM1D interface might be. I couldn’t get anyone from the factory to comment on or off the record.

At that point we’d steered well away from the training and it was suggested that we continue this discussion over drinks in the bar. I don’t want to give the impression that this was advisarial. It was spirited for sure but a good discussion all in all. Like Aaron Brown, not so much like Jerry Springer. I don’t agree with their position but as I was a guest in their house I didn’t want to bust balls too much. If nothing else it was entertaining and perhaps informative for the rest of the class. I was approached by a couple of people in the class as well as a staff person saying that it was a good question and the discussion was insightful. I thought it was a good question and something that Yamaha should be addressing head on, instead of dancing around. Granted, these were rank and file troops without the authority to issue definitive statements on the issue but the Yami brass need to know that by keep us in the dark, they aren’t doing themselves or the users/dealers/customers any favors. King of the market status can be fleeting. Just ask GM.

We ended the day with an excercise that I consider to be very appropriate to configuring and using the surface in a real world environment. We used 24 tracks from a well known act to configure and operate the surface using a pre determined config. We were to set the surface, from scratch to mix these tracks, set up front fills and delay stack sends and mons for the act. It pretty much gives you a chance to set up several different configs as how the surface would be used at a gig. There are ear mixes, house mixes, wedge mixes, thumper/sub mon mixes, dynamics processing and effects use. They’ve really done a good job on the excercise and left the lab open for more than four hours after the presentations. If you operate or may soon operate a PM1D you should attend this workshop.

If nothing else for the free food.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 8th, 2005 at 11:27 pm and is filed under Barking Dog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.