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Meyer UPA-1A |
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100 volt line 
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Joined: 21 March 2012 Location: Harrogate Status: Offline Points: 194 |
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 Topic: Meyer UPA-1APosted: 05 March 2017 at 9:25am |
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Does anyone have any info on these, can find very little on line. I know they need are an old-ish box now, and need the correct controller etc, but what are they like generally?
All comments greatly appreciated.
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I never did understand Millman's Theorem !
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Finjby
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Joined: 19 January 2016 Location: Shropshire Status: Offline Points: 74 |
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Posted: 05 March 2017 at 12:10pm |
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You can get legacy product specifications on all Meyer stuff, if you register your details with them on the product page of the main website.
IMHO, the UPA is still one of the finest 2-way speaker systems in live sound. The 1st ever trapezoidal cabinet, and one of the 1st speaker systems to incorporate a dedicated line-sense controller, offering crossover/eq/limiters. Way ahead of its time. In the past, I toured using two a side (on top of one 650P), and hit every seat in 500-cap theatres with ease doing a rock tribute band.... plenty of vocal headroom, great dynamics and a pleasure to mix on. Many manufacturers current offerings struggle to match the UPA's performance. Do not attempt to use the UPA without the correct controller! (M1 IIRC, you will need two for a stereo system being a mono unit), all the cleverness of this system is based around the correct amp gain structure. There is a Meyer 1000a amp on Ebay at the moment.... specifically engineered for the UPA's and its dedicated controller. To move around they are a bit lumpy (30kgs), but these were the days before Neo, and the cabinets are typical Meyer - built to go to war and win. It all depends on your usage.... If you are wanting to hit larger venues/fields then is not going to impress (that's the MSL-3's job), but if you want sweet, accurate, dynamic audio in a small to medium sized space (10-25m), then I wouldn't consider looking elsewhere for the money.....especially with current second-hand prices. It starts to get expensive when you look at building a system with the correct subs/controllers and amps, but if you look around various brokers you can get a good deal from time to time. (LMC have several offerings in-stock at the moment, worth a call if you are looking for something to complete a system). How do they hold up against new stuff? Well, if you look at current second-hand values, then its in the same market at say an EV elx12? I know what i'd rather have at the end of my multicore! Sure, stuff like KV2 ex12 will play loads louder and with more fidelity, but its loads more expensive. I have access to an old Meyer 500a system.... Single 18" sub, 15" mid and a 3"HF with a dedicated amp/controller. Its bloody awesome! and its circa late 80's. I still use it as my benchmark, and not many similar sized modern systems come close. Maybe, just maybe, all manufacturers efforts in the last 30 years have done very little to actually improve the quality of sound hitting our ears? but at least the marketing department's did their job in convincing us that they have improved..... I guess being an old-fart i'm way too sentimental about all this, but most modern stuff does not impress me!! What were you planning on using the UPA's for? and what other options have you considered? |
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100 volt line
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Joined: 21 March 2012 Location: Harrogate Status: Offline Points: 194 |
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Posted: 05 March 2017 at 12:41pm |
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Thank you for your help. Will PM you for advice on deployment.
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I never did understand Millman's Theorem !
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B_Bender
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Joined: 28 October 2016 Location: Surrey Status: Offline Points: 118 |
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Posted: 05 March 2017 at 1:26pm |
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one of the best 12"+1" boxes in history
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pfly
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Joined: 25 October 2007 Location: Helsinki, Fin Status: Offline Points: 2828 |
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Posted: 05 March 2017 at 2:43pm |
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Our theatre has been Meyer user since mid 80s and on our smallest
stages we are just about to end using UPA-1A. I guess we have around
dozen of them still kicking around but strange thing is that we don't
have enough controllers. Don't really have opinion on how good they are, as I have not used them much myself. I've been wondering on could they be used without controller and
the consensus seems to be "don't". Of course they would make noise with any
DSP handling the crossover stuff, but the controller measures stuff
straight from the voice coil, how hot it is and probably also mechanical
stuff too. As far as I know, these things will affect crossover points
and things like that, on top of the phase correction circuits and all
that.
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Finjby
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Posted: 05 March 2017 at 3:17pm |
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There is a shortage of controllers on the market.... you can hook two UPA's off one controller, so often they were sold/installed paired-up, but when venues come to sell them off, the control electronics units (CEU's) soon fall short.
No one with Meyer experience/knowledge would advise you try and emulate the CEU's functions. This generation of Meyer stuff all had individual controllers, each differs markedly to optimize the response for each model. And features such as the SpeakerSense inputs and limiters were often used along-side dynamic excursion protection circuits and sliding HPF/LPF under onset of overload. Its what gave Meyer the edge over all competition at the time. Save yourself a large repair bill, and go with the dedicated CEU. (John Meyer/Bob McCarthy etc did all the work for us in the 80's!) Looking at my Meyer design ref book they quote..... "A generic electronic crossover does not factor in: - Relative driver sensitivity at crossover - The relative voltage gain from the crossover input to the amplifier output terminals - Efficiency of the horn - The phase relationship between the drivers - the relative quantities of the drivers Yes, you can do lots with new, shiny DSP (especially with FIR filters), but the UPA's work just fine with the correct CEU, connected to the correct sensitivity of amplifier. PFLY, what boxes are the theatre replacing the UPA's with out of interest?
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B_Bender
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Posted: 05 March 2017 at 7:07pm |
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UPA1-p is self powered anyway, so no need to even worry about amps and controllers.
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DMorison
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Posted: 05 March 2017 at 7:12pm |
UPA-1A ≠ UPA1-p. Controller definitely matters.
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B_Bender
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Posted: 05 March 2017 at 7:22pm |
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No, the UPA1p does not need a controller.
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pfly
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Joined: 25 October 2007 Location: Helsinki, Fin Status: Offline Points: 2828 |
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Posted: 05 March 2017 at 8:07pm |
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On the main stage I've been working on last 9 years, we have used mainly CQ-1s along with 700-HP, fills, monitors etc have been assortment of UPA-1P, UPJ-1P, UPJunior, UPM-1P, UP4 and MM4. Before CQ1s main stage had UPA-1P, UPA-1A, USW-1P and Tannoy 3836 dipoles
Small stage has been using kind of crappy small Nexo Geo -system along with some 15" EV Deltamaxes Black box has been equipped with UPA-1Ps as main system, 12" EV Deltamaxes as kind of secondary system and UPA-1As as surround and two X1 Letterboxes built by me :D After building renovation finishes this summer, we will go back to main stage with UPQ-1Ps and 900-LFCs replacing the CQ-1s and 700-HPs with multiple smaller changes to the system. 14 CQ-1s we've had this far are redistributed to other stages. UPJ-1P seems to be replacing UPA-1P as our most common loudspeaker, I'd guess there is going to be some 50 UPJs spread around the building. I see CEU as sort of a stop gap solution on the path towards powered loudspeakers. I've long thought that I could easily take pair of CQ-1s to my front room, maybe with some room correction EQ at that point to really match them to my room. Having listened to pair of UPQs for few hours, I think I could consider pair of them as a studio monitor  |
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TRE4U2NV
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Joined: 21 May 2005 Location: home Status: Offline Points: 2592 |
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Posted: 06 March 2017 at 2:09am |
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IM SO SECRETIVE BUT I CANT TELL YOU WHY
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100 Volt-line
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Posted: 06 March 2017 at 9:14am |
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Thanks for everyones thoughts and help on this.
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B_Bender wrote: