7
Questions & Answers
Questions about your FP410E installation? This section
lists the most common questions asked about Shure’s auto-
matic microphone systems. Maybe your question is among
the following. If not, contact Shure’s Customer Service Depart-
ment.
Q. Why don’t I get any sound output from my FP410E?
A. Assuming that your power amp, tape deck, speakers, etc.
are good, possibly it’s because:
•
The Channel or Master Gain controls are turned down,
•
A microphone is not connected,
•
A rear–panel Mic/Line input or output switch or the Phan-
tom On–Off switch is improperly set,
•
The FP410E isn’t plugged in or doesn’t have batteries in-
stalled, or
•
The Power switch isn’t on.
Check these items and make the required correction.
Q. Still doesn’t work. Why?
A. Maybe you have a defective microphone or cable. While lis-
tening to headphones plugged into one of the front–panel
Phone jacks, try replacing the suspect microphone or cable
with one known to be good.
Q. Why does a microphone turn on or off erratically, causing
speech dropouts?
A. Excessive room noise (such as from air–handling or audio–
visual equipment) can be a cause. Reduce the room noise, the
proximity of the noise to any mic, and/or the talker–to–mic dis-
tance. A loud talker close to their microphone or with their
Channel Gain control set too high can sometimes inhibit prop-
er microphone activation by a “weaker” talker who is too far
from their microphone or has their Channel Gain control set
too low. Balance the microphones by repositioning and/or re-
setting the Channel Gain controls in accordance with the
Op-
eration section.
IMPORTANT: Best results are generally obtained when the
Last Mic Lock–On is
not defeated and the Off–Attenuation is
13 dB (modifiable function switches up). Difficult situations
may be aided by changing the Hold Time from 0.4 to 1.0 sec-
ond (modifiable function switch down).
Q. Why am I getting howling through my loudspeakers?
A. For the same reason that howling is present in any PA sys-
tem: your mics are picking up the speaker sound and reampli-
fying it. Move the speakers or mics, or turn down the gain con-
trols, to avoid the howling. Automatic operation
does provide
more output level before howling than manual operation, but
the system still can howl.
Q. Why does the FP410E output sound distorted?
A. The Channel, Master or Phones Gain control may be set too
high. Set the Channel Gain according to the
Operation section.
Set the Master Gain to avoid excessive red LED indications on
the Output Level meter, or switch the Limiter in. Turn down the
Phones control. Check the following equipment levels.
Q. Why does the speech level go up when I switch from Manu-
al to Automatic operation?
A. This is normal and proper operation for any automatic mix-
er.When switched to Automatic, the FP410E attenuates any
input channel not being used. Internally, this removes the inac-
tive channels from the FP410E mix bus. This action increases
the perceived level of any
active input channel. For example,
the audio gain increase will be 6 dB when going from four to
only one activated microphone channel.
Q. Why is one of my four mics very noisy?
A. Assuming the mic is operating properly (you can check this
by substituting with another mic), you probably have a con-
stant noise source such as air–moving equipment or a defec-
tive fluorescent light ballast in the trouble area. This ambient
noise source can be unnoticed until it’s picked up by a mic:
then it’s extremely annoying. If you can’t repair, turn off or lower
the noise source, try relocating the mic to eliminate or at least
lower the noise. If this is not possible, use the FP410E in the
Manual mode to avoid microphone activation problems and
accept the noisy output.
