Looking to ad wash lights to my two 3 piece cover bands playing small to medium bars. Does anyone have experience with the minis and are happy with them? or should i go big and get the 4 bar regular?
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Chauvet 4 bar or 4 bar Mini?
- Thread starter DONZI97
- Start date
I have a couple of generic 4 bars from mcm electronics. I like 'em. They compare well with the Chauvet 4 bar at approx 1/2 the cost. Check 'em out. And I would do the 4 bar not the mini...
I have the Chauvet 4 bar. It works well. Very bright, almost too bright. I would recommend adding a controller to have some dimmer capability. It is kind of a large apparatus. We place it to one side and try to angle the individual "cans" to provide ambient light. We pretty much "set & forget", since I don't have the desire to make real-time adjustments while playing.
-Alan
-Alan
As a great alternative to the 4Bar, might I suggest a couple of Invalid Link Removed? My band is using two of these as washes, and we have been really happy with them - and they are significantly cheaper than 4Bars.
I have used both, and there some caveats: The COLORstrips are less flexible from a positioning standpoint, as you would expect. They are also a bit harder to mount - we mounted them to the top of a standard light stand by custom drilling holes and using the supports that are included. I have read some feedback from some users that state that the field is much narrower from the COLORstrips, but I haven't found that to be the case at all. I honestly couldn't tell much of a difference in brightness between the two systems, but the specs say that the 4Bar is brighter (725 lux at 2 meters for the 4Bar vs. 618 for the COLORstrip).
The big factor for us was cost: You can have two COLORstrips, two Invalid Link Removed, and a Invalid Link Removed for just over $550 vs. ~$800 for a pair of 4Bars. The same setup is also a few dollars cheaper than a set of 4Bar minis (which come to about $560 a pair).
If the lack of positioning flexibility will work for your situations, I think the COLORstrips are a great alternative!
I have used both, and there some caveats: The COLORstrips are less flexible from a positioning standpoint, as you would expect. They are also a bit harder to mount - we mounted them to the top of a standard light stand by custom drilling holes and using the supports that are included. I have read some feedback from some users that state that the field is much narrower from the COLORstrips, but I haven't found that to be the case at all. I honestly couldn't tell much of a difference in brightness between the two systems, but the specs say that the 4Bar is brighter (725 lux at 2 meters for the 4Bar vs. 618 for the COLORstrip).
The big factor for us was cost: You can have two COLORstrips, two Invalid Link Removed, and a Invalid Link Removed for just over $550 vs. ~$800 for a pair of 4Bars. The same setup is also a few dollars cheaper than a set of 4Bar minis (which come to about $560 a pair).
If the lack of positioning flexibility will work for your situations, I think the COLORstrips are a great alternative!
Nothing to add regarding 4bar vs mini, but I suggest you check out the competing product from ADJ, the DOTZ Tpar system. I believe it is brighter, and more importantly, it's capable of a much wider field, which is important in tight spaces. Comes with a stand, a foot controller and cases. This is what I would buy today for my bar band if I was buying lights.
Price us currently $280 but they go on sale at $199 ...
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I also bought 4 of the Pulse brand led par 56 from mcm and 4 Chauvet slim par 56. The chauvets are slightly nicer but ... The generics are darned good. I like being able to mix the 4 bar fixtures and the individual fixtures. Room depending the 4 Bars are in front up high or on back corners. The individual cans are spread around on other stands or in groups of 4 out front.
I control with the Luminaire iPad app and an eDmx ethernet to dmx interface hooked to a wireless router. Lots of programming to get it done but it works well and packs down small
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I also bought 4 of the Pulse brand led par 56 from mcm and 4 Chauvet slim par 56. The chauvets are slightly nicer but ... The generics are darned good. I like being able to mix the 4 bar fixtures and the individual fixtures. Room depending the 4 Bars are in front up high or on back corners. The individual cans are spread around on other stands or in groups of 4 out front.
I control with the Luminaire iPad app and an eDmx ethernet to dmx interface hooked to a wireless router. Lots of programming to get it done but it works well and packs down small
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I bought one 4 bar to test it with the idea that I would get another if I liked it, decided it wasn't bright enough. Also the presets with the foot switch didn't impress me much. I ended up buying 2 sets of the 4 bar tri. They're much brighter, maybe twice as bright. I use the 4 bar behind the drummer now and the tri's in front. I also got an Obey 70 controller, planning on adding more fixtures. I can set everything up in under half an hour. It was fairly easy to program the controller and now we have a pretty nice light thing going on....very happy with it. Only thing is we need someone to run the controller....but my wife is happy to do it!
Yeah, I should correct my earlier post. What I have is the 4 Bar Tri. All Chavet's model names sound alike. The foot controller doesn't provide much more than basic control.
