Artistic Controls Blog

Sekolah Kebangsaan Seri Putra

Sekolah Kebangsaan Bandar Seri Putra Primary School has recently been open for the new students intake. The AV System has to be easy to use as most of the time the teacher will have to operate it. For this Artistic Controls has been asked to supply and install the PA system, Ring Bell System and MATV System for the school building and AV System for the Multipurpose Hall.

With this in mind for the school building to have a good PA system for normal announcement and for emergency, we recommend to use the Amperes Public Address as they have complete PA equipment.  For the MATV we used the Ikusi MATV system. The Ring Bell system consists of 12 x 4” ring bell with ring bell panel and timer with DC power supply.

For the Multipurpose Hall AV System we were recommended to use the column speaker as distributed sound. So we installed 6 x Amperes 30W column speaker and backup by 2 x Amperes horn speakers. Since budget is an issue this system will still work as most of the time they use it for speeches during the assembly.  For that they use 2 x Mipro Wireless Microphone to avoid wiring on the stage. The equipment rack and sound mixer is located at the back of house. Cabling is done using Belden cable.

Artistic Controls finish the project on time and the most interesting part is to teach the teachers on how to operate the system. Surprisingly It was easy as they seen to have experience in operating them perhaps from their previous school.

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Bistro Paradiso Klana Resort Seremban

Recently Bistro Paradiso in Klana Resort Seremban has upgraded their sound system for the live sound and music. Bistro Paradiso is an entertainment hub where people can dine and enjoy their live band’s performances. So having good sound system is the important.  All this while they have been using rental equipment from outside as their existing system cannot cater for the live band.

After finalizing their AV contractor to provide cabling and equipment, Artistic Controls was asked to help up with the sound system equipment supply and installation. To start with we suggest them to add a pair of full range loudspeaker but maintain the subwoofer as it can be used. So we recommend them to use the 2 x EV Klub KS115 15” full range speaker with the EV Klub KSA800 amplifier to match the speaker.  We added a new Yamaha MG166CX sound mixer with Yamaha Q2031 equalizer and DBx 166XL Compressor Limiter to complete the system. Speaker cabling is new and the arrangement of the speaker and mixer has to redo for better coverage.

The Bistro Paradiso Stage Area

For the live band singer we introduce 2 x  Sennheiser ew135G2 wireless microphone on top of their existing vocal microphone. Some of the singer has their preferred microphone so we use the microphone as backup.

During the live band singing we tested the sound and it was quite good. The F&B manager added that not only having good sound system is important as it will attract more crowds and how true was that.

By admin

Yamaha Staying Ahead 2009

Recently Yamaha Malaysia organized Yamaha Commercial Audio Annual Meet 2009 at Thistle Hotel Port Dickson on 17^th, 18^th & 19^th November 2009. It is a way for the dealers to get together for 3 days at Port Dickson and at the same time learn the new Yamaha products.  The theme for this year is “Staying Ahead”. The dealers consist of mainly two groups which is the Yamaha Dealer and the Yamaha project dealers or the system integrator (SI).

The day starts with the welcome speech by Mr Hitoshi Mochizuki the Managing Director of Yamaha Malaysia followed Mr. Chiam the General Manager PAC to address on the marketing issues. One of the key point mentioned is they will staying ahead of the competitor by adapting the digital network audio system in the sound equipment and soon a new fully digital Yamaha Mixer will be launch. During the presentation they just show briefly the new Yamaha Mixer on the slide and judging from everyone curiosity it should be a great product.  As the pace of digital technology continues to accelerate, the professional audio market demand is growing and rapidly evolving and staying ahead.

Mr Chiam giving his speeches

The beautiful Thistle Hotel Port Dickson

The organizer team really takes care of the dealers and I must say they did a wonderful job for this three day’s event. They are Simon Chin, Patricia Leow, Ivy Ong and Alvin headed by Mien Jee.  We had a wonderful time to interact with them.

The content of the seminar concentrated mostly on the Digital Network Audio system which will be the next fully happening in Audio Industry. In the afternoon section the participants was break out into two groups mainly the Yamaha Dealers and the System Integrator dealers group to discuss about the business ideas, ways to improve on products and delivery issue and problem that face by the dealers in promoting the products. This was in fact a very good way to interact among our self with Yamaha team. Well done.

For the last Yamaha staying ahead seminar events is the presentation of the award to the best performance dealers. They are the AV United, Concept Associates and Chan Lee Prosound. Well done to this young and energetic business owner.

I read with interest on one article that appeared in the Star Paper on 26 October 2009 that says “Layers of Sub-Contracting add to total cost” and “Are Tenders Open and Fairs? The articles said there are some company who won lucrative government tender to sub the whole project to the third party who may then further sub-contract down the line. The articles claimed that this has becoming a common practice for some company and all they do is lobbying for large development projects, expensive maintenance contracts. This also one of the factors that increase the government cost of purchase.

The issue of the winning bidders sub contracting the jobs to another contractor is not new. Among the usual reasons cited are a shortage of capital and manpower or a lack of a certain skills to complete the job. But in the end it is up to the contractors themselves to decide what is best for them.

This sometime pushes the cost of the contract substantially because each contractor has to make his own profit margin. Some projects have three or four layers of “Sub-contractors” which add to the final project cost.

As I looked back to our project list over the last 12 years I must say that most of our contract is directly from the owner or from the privately owned company. We will bid for any open tenders that call for light and sound system. If it is government tender then we will quote to the interest bidder with the hope that they will win the contracts and we will be the sub-contractor.

As an Audio Visual system integrator we were probably the last company to be sub to undertake to complete the project installation. We have our in house technical team to produce drawing and site team to implement the project. We purchased the equipments directly from the oversea manufacturer or through local distributors. Our reputation is important as we have to follow strictly on the agreed BQ and follow the written specification in order to complete the project without problem.

We don’t really care who won the contract and how they won it but if we agreed to undertake the project then the payment terms must be right. We must get paid once we deliver the equipment or completed the project.

But I fully agreed to have the open tender system whether it is a public listed project or government project. This will ensure that every qualified and interested company can bid for the project. The government policy will have all major public projects go through the open tender process. The threshold for the open tender is from the projects valued above RM500,000. Only by this way the projects will carry out professionally. Try to reduce direct negotiation contract unless it is a special contract like the arm forces or specialize project. Without the open system government can’t get the best deal. The government will win and the public interest will be protected.

By Admin.

Sennheiser Launched Wireless G3 at Renaissance Hotel Kuala Lumpur

Sennheiser Asia finally launched Evolution Wireless Microphone G3 in Renaissance hotel recently. The theme “You Know You Can” is the new catch phrases. That’s mean the G2 series will be discontinued and will be replaced G3 series. The Sennheiser G3 series offer 100 series, 300 series and 500 series. It is a multichannel system with its bandwidth of 42 Mhz and 1,680 switchable frequencies.

The introduction of evolution wireless G3 (stand for “Generation 3”) is capable of handling any kind of live event. The preset transmission frequencies make the system ready to use immediately. Various microphone systems can be operated simultaneously. The easy set-up application also saves a lot of time when setting up. Other new feature is available like Ethernet port for connecting to the WSM (Wireless Systems Manager), infrared interface for wireless synchronization of transmitters and headphone monitor.

Another highlighted was the new animated instructions for use are available in the sennheiser website: www.sennheiser.com. On the website you can find animated instruction for using evolution wireless G3. Online application enables you to simulate a realistic stage situation. You don’t have to carry manual as you can watch it on the website.

The participants at tea break

Sennheiser New Wireless G3 Showcase

Quite a lot of dealers and SI from the sound and AV industry attended the events. With the large crowd they held it in the ballroom with a  well prepared presentation showing all the new features with demonstration on how the new G3 work and for the finally event singer and the band perform the singing using the Sennheiser microphone.

After the show the participants were given a Sennheiser bag with T-shirt and the new G3 catalogue.

For more info visit www.sennheiser.com

Harman Roadshow Penang 2009

Electronics & Engineering Pte Ltd Singapore together with Harman group has done it again. They organized a Harman International Roadshow in Penang on 10 November 2009. This time they held it at Tanjung Bungah Beach Hotel in Penang for one full day events. Participants are by invitation only from Malaysia and even Sabah and Sarawak. They consist of System Integrator (SI), End User, Rental and Dealers.

The show was kick start by Mr Ronald Goh the Managing Director of Electronics & Engineering Pte Ltd Singapore given the welcome speech. From there on ward he and his team lead us with the introduction of Harman Company and products showcase. The products cover in this one day event mostly from the latest from JBL, Crown, AKG, dbx, Soundcraft, Lexicon, BSS Audio.

JBL EON on display

JBL Loudspeakers

Among the highlight was the JBL VRX900 and new JBL EON and JBL PRX series, JBL AE Compact Models, new Driverack PA+, AKG DMS700 Digital Wireless System, Soundcraft New notepad Mixer and Soundcraft Si2 Mixer, Crown XTi series and Crown CDi series.

Every section of the products was delivered in a short and simple presentation leaving the participants more room to digest the material.

Finally was the lucky draw where the lucky person will be walk away with AKG headphone from various models.

Arms with new Harman products knowledge, everyone went back and eagerly wanted to try on the products.

For more info please go to www.enepl.com.sg

Shenzhen City is located in the southern of the Guangdong Province, just a train ride from Hong Kong. It is a is a fast growing city there are many interesting places to visit. But one of the interesting places to visit is spending some time in the vast electronics market in downtown Shenzhen like in SEG Electronic Market.

The moment I step in I was stunned by a massive display of electronic components. Tapes of resistors and capacitors, LEDs, ICs of every type, inductors, relays, voltmeters, trays of memory card, all crammed into tiny six-by-three foot booths with a sales person playing at their laptop, sometimes chatting, and browsing website. Some booths are true family business, with women tending to babies and kids playing in the aisles. I never saw anything like that.  People are constantly eating, chatting, smoking, talking on their phones, playing video games, watching streaming videos, watching DVDs, humming, napping, and working.

I was told that in Shenzhen Electronics market you can buy almost any electronic component and computer parts from any brand like Sony, Samsung, LG. If you spend RMB10,000 to buy the electronic component here you can save one air ticket return Kuala Lumpur and have extra money to spend here compare to if you buy the quantity in Kuala Lumpur. Mind you their electronic stocks also come from here.

Inside Electronics Market

I wonder with so many vendors how they survive the competition. A small booth with the glass cabinet where some stuffs are displayed, and each booth you will see a sales person with lap top. Most of the booths are run by a particular distributor or factory, and what’s behind the counter are (more often than not) small quantities intended as commercial samples. This LED vendor, for example, only has a few of each type of display. If you need more than the display stuff they’ll often send a runner to pick them up from another booth or storage location.

After chatting with one of the vendor while waiting for the stock to arrive, he says they represent factory or agency and have their regular customer who buy in large quantity and they will use online messenger to chat and do all the transaction over the internet. If the prices and quantity is agreeable then the sale is done. The seller will pack and courier the electronic component to their customer. Payment is via paypal, western union or bank transfer. It is that easy. No wonder they are many electronic store here in Shenzhen but they can still survive. All they need is laptop, internet, and payment gateway and build their regular customer over the months. Some time they advertise in Ali Baba website the most popular buyer and sellers online in China.

Market is big and price is cheap and stock is plenty. The only things we have to be careful is to beware of the cheating and imitation. If you buy in bulk or large quantity then be prepare to have at least 20% of them faulty and not functioning. Then the transportation to bring back to Malaysia is quite troublesome. Unless you have the freight forwarding to arrange to bring back then don’t buy many.

Security Expo China

This year the 12th China Public Security Expo was held in Shenzhen Convention & Exhibition Center from November 1 – 4, 2009. True to the name the expo was mainly in Security and Protection. Even then it is a big show in term of large numbers of exhibitors and large turn up.

There are about 1100 exhibitors participating in this expo and was spread over 90,000 sq meter space. The last time was help in 2007. The show was organized by Shenzhen CPSE Exhibition Co Ltd one of the pioneer in security show.

The expo featuring  CCTV camera, speed dome camera, camera casing, monitor, security bullet proof uniform, security control system, motor and lenses. Video Surveillance  , Intercom & Access Control  , Intelligent Security  , Anti-Burglary & Alarm  , Security Hardware  , Biometrics  , Information Security  , Police Equipment  , Anti-Counterfeiting Technology  , Secured Communication  , Fire Fighting  , Personal Protection.

We were happening to be here in Shenzhen visiting a few light and sound company in China and we took the opportunity to visit the security show. Even on the first day it was crowded with so many people. I wonder where they come from. I was told that most of the shows in China managed to attracted big crowd locally and abroad.

The product I was looking is CCTV camera for surveillance.  As the technology progress even the CCTV camera come in different system. There is already IP camera, 3G camera and conventional camera using RG6.

Intelligent Surveillance Security

For the building security system I notice this manufacturer is promoting a high tech security featuring intelligent surveillance security called Guard Robot like this one. It is full motorised with pan & tilt and has high resolution camera day and night, spotlight and gun built-in.

The Expo CCTV

Security Camera

The Expo