Quote:
Originally posted by David Kulka
Ah yes, solid state dimmers. They were the bane of home studios and low budget outfits for many many years.
While I would never recommend them to anyone building a studio and still cringe when I see them, I'd also have to say that these critters are more common than ever these days, and rarely seem to pose much of a problem.
In general, modern analog gear is much more resistant to RF and line noise than the older gear, digital of course is immune. And the SCR dimmers themselves have improved; they radiate far less noise than the earlier models.
So -- while it pains me to say it -- I think that you can often get away with using them these days, especially in post and mix rooms. One thing's for sure, those "quiet" variac dimmers, which can easily cost $500 + to install, have largely gone the way of the dinosaur. |
Hi
I think that the problem in the studio I used as an example was that the whole darn building was wired up with remote control lamp dimming. The light swiches in every room send control signals to a huge equipment rack loaded with dimming modules. Then the lights were fed from the switched outputs of the rack.
That meant that it was possible for "chopped" ac to be present on bunches of wires throughout the building. It also meant that finding another way of doing it was pretty tricky!
I'd welcome a list of lamp dimming devices, zero-crossing or otherwise, that have minimal EMF radiation issues.
