Quick way to cut XLR feed to monitors?

mrkb

I’ve replaced my digital mixing desk and am using more monitor sends, and there’s now a loud pop though the PA when I shutdown the equipment. 

Due to the way I’ve setup the rooom, there Isn’t an easy way to switch off the PA monitor power first. Is there a better / cheaper way than using a passive attenuator like the Palmer Monicon to cut the XLR  feed from mixer to PA?
Cheers.

https://www.thomann.de/gb/palmer_monicon.htm

Whistler

A different approach: our church has one power switch for all the musical equipment and PA. A clever solution has been two timer boxes which means when we power up, the PA speakers are powered up with a 30 second delay, and when we power down, the speakers go off immediately and the rest of the equipment shuts down 30 seconds later. I have no idea what the two little grey boxes are but it has silenced the thumpy-bang which bothered us for years.

Roland

The manual option has two separate wall switches

mrkb

Roland said:

The manual option has two separate wall switches

Thanks, I am considering that as well. Need to make sure moving the mixer onto the other socket (it’s a double socket) doesn’t cause other issues.

Snags

Do you still get the thump if you zero out the faders/sends before powering down?

Back when I used to do the church stuff zeroing the desk avoided it. You could always tell who was paying attention

steamabacus

Can you put a remote control mains socket on the PA power feed? They use radio frequency (rather than infra red like a tv remote) so don't need line-of-sight if the socket is hidden away behind stuff.

mrkb

Snags said:

Do you still get the thump if you zero out the faders/sends before powering down?

Back when I used to do the church stuff zeroing the desk avoided it. You could always tell who was paying attention

Thump still occurs if everything is zerod - its a digital desk so think its a software power off crashing issue.

Have temporarily fixed by adding another extension lead (the 6th ! in a tree branch fashion) which I can manually access and switch off when needed. 

octatonic

I would use one of these:



You would need to change how you are powering the PA though and put it on one (or a few) of these switches.

mrkb

Thanks for all the suggestions - have found a solution that works if I switch on the double socket power in a Left to Right order and off in Right to Left - so happy with that. Though Octatonics solution looks better in the long term as it allows me to zone the music studio feeds - will check out a UK plug based version.

ecc83

Another vote for wireless mains switches here. My living room system is a 40" TV, optical feed to a D/A box to an Arcam amp. That feeds a mixer associated with a MOTU M4. Mixer feeds 2 Tannoy 5As. The TV, amp and Tannoys all are controlled by a remote at my seating position.

I have lights in my bedroom on a remote that also bangs on the kitchen light. Some wireless systems have a 'All On/off' button. Handy for me but not OP.

Dave.

shufflebeat

For the gig PA I have an individually switched 6way power strip, normal (UK) mains sockets. I have all the speakers running off one, desk off another, bass amp, misc (x3).

Everything is labelled and any 2/4way that develops a problem can be swapped for another, no awkward connectors.