Testimonials
With respect to their privacy, we will only list their initials.
It is more challenging than other courses, but signal chain optimization is one of those fundamental courses that you need to have a decent grasp of to be decent in the world of AV, live audio, or pro audio. F.A.
Very Well Done!! A.C.
This course was fascinating and challenging. I am a graduate of an audio engineering program at a 4 year university and haven’t used my physics and electrical skills in several years. I enjoyed sitting down and learning about how everything works in a system. I never really liked live sound and sound reinforcement because I never understood the how and why behind the components that are in a system. I put pen to paper and used the provided calculator program’s helpful features to understand what happens and why it happens. A.D.
This was a lot of information, going especially in-depth on amplifier theory of operation. I did feel a bit overwhelmed but, again, I understand that repeated exposure to the information is what will make it stick. My personal favorite section was the initial section on proper mixer setup; I’ve previously done live sound and studio work and always struggled with having proper settings; I’m not sure I’ve ever had a mixer with faders running mostly at unity. Having done this course, I feel better equipped to handle proper setup in these situations if I ever find myself in them again. J.C.
Awesome info. D.C.
It has plenty of information and gives you a lot of knowledge in understanding audio concept. C.S.
I absolutely loved the examples showing using the mixer and real world applications of this. S.G.
The course is well-balanced and informative. S.F.
It was a challenge, to recall and retain the math, however the course was detailed, I did have to go back to study up. I felt that a few questions material was not written, but may have been covered in passing. W.V.
Course was very easy to follow, and the workflow was broken up into an appropriate number of sections to where every section was understood before moving on to the next. Really enjoyed the live Q+A from Peter – thought that was cool. Z.W.
Thanks again for making an AV novice into a professional who can actually hold a conversation with AV pros, these courses have helped me more than you know. M.S.
I felt that this course was a bit more difficult than the previous courses. I don’t think it was due to the quality of instruction, but rather the content itself and the amount of materials. Letting the contents to soak in required a bit of time for me, and I found myself referring back to notes and videos a lot more during the exam than prior courses. There are still a few things that I feel like I do not understand just well, so I will definitely be looking back at the notes and playing with the CAFviewer a bit more. Again, nothing really wrong with the instruction, but rather the amount of content and the exposure required to fully comprehend everything.
One thing that I really appreciate though, is that this course included SO many things about gain structure and amplifiers that I was unable to find in other resources (books, articles, courses, etc.). They do not teach this at any school that I am aware of either, so in this course I found quite a few answers to questions that I had over the years. D.C.
It’s been a bit since I’ve taken a SynAudCon course, I really appreciated that the quizzes and exams now retained the answers for the questions I got correct. It helped me to focus more on the questions I got wrong and the parts of the material I was struggling with. Out of all the SynAudCon courses I’ve taken, this one definitely felt like it had the most material covered. It also had the largest number of concepts that were unfamiliar to me, so I took a bit more time moving through the material to ensure that I was absorbing everything properly. There was a good chunk of info that probably won’t be relevant to my current job, but I did appreciate learning all of it because it helped give a wider context to the type of work that I do and that better understanding may help with problem solving in event spaces where I did not set up the AV system. W.D.
This is a great course. I.Z.
Very thorough and detailed. A nice refresher of things I learned in college! A.B.
While the material was great, the quiz/test questions seem beyond that taught in the videos or shown in the notes, or the multiple choices can be confusing. Feel like I’m using knowledge from way outside this class, and not audio basics, to have to guess as to the right answers. The questions feel important, but after watching videos multiple times and re-reading the course notes multiple times, still can’t seem to determine the right answers. Amplifier input sensitivity is the most confusing. I can’t seem to understand the relationship between 26dB, 32dB, and 1.2v. These are the only examples provided, but questions all revolve around volts. M.D.
A lot of information to digest, but in a good way! As an AV professional & lifelong “audio guy,” I’ll definitely be applying everything I’ve learned. M.K.
I went to engineering school in 2005, I’ve been a dsp programmer for 10 years and STILL, WOW this was tough! What a great class. J.R.
Great work, would appreciate larger dive into newer digital amplifiers and shared load circuitry. A.M.
Very informative course. The final exam was challenging. J.Z.
Awesome and thoughtfully presented, great and informative content. R.M.
Lots of informative content. calculators are handy. J.W.
More demo will be great. This course was the best course of the SynAudCon so far! S.L.
I appreciate that Pat calls out the “snake oil” topics and “specmanship” in general. D.A.
This class is very full of a lot of good, good information. It really brings out designing details that need to be configured and planned with building a system and testing a system. B.E.
Great material but it makes it a bit difficult to remain engaged since im not a SME. like the examples shown for the CAF calculators ; I think it would be of great value if there were follow along for set ups while explaining the theory and reasons of why . R.V.
The course is designed very well, I`ve learned a lot from it. I.S.
Thank you very much! It was a very intense and knowledgeable course. D.V.
Loved the course and learned a lot. Thanks for being able to extend my class so I didn’t have to rush through it during a busy time of the year for me. C.A.
This course was AMAZING and truly life changing. Earlier this year, I was promoted to leader of a local outdoors and hiking group in Central IL (Peoria Area YASM). We originally started helping local park districts by doing clean-up work, and after building some rapport, got in touch with their Perfoming Arts directors. Over the year, we were able to help both indoor and outdoor theatres in the Central IL area with the knowledge of this course. This included setting up a PA from scratch at a local indoor performing arts center, helping others troubleshoot audio gain structure and noise issues, and system tuning.
I combined my knowledge from this course (along with knowledge from an introductory SMAART course) and our group helped deploy sound systems that had patrons walking up to us after shows stating “the sound was amazing, I’ve never heard this show (e.g. Lion King Jr.) sound so good here.
I am truly impressed and owe a ton to you, Pat and Brenda.
Thanks so much for making my 2023 AMAZING and I look forward to an even better 2024 with your courses! A.C.
The calculators are a great tool for solving problems. They are simplify the work invested in one solution. H.I.
I found the course very helpful in understanding the science behind things I’ve been doing for years from just doing what I know best from work experience. The gain structure and mixing console setup was very helpful. I’ve never been able to run a console since I’m more in the corporate environment and have been exposed to live sound too much. It really helped me to watch all of the courses, see the calculation demonstrations at the end, and then go back and watch the videos over again. It really put things into perspective the second time around. B.A.
Always a pleasure. Really enjoy the case studies and real world applications. S.B.
I enjoyed learning about the voltage rating of loudspeakers, this is something that hasn’t really come up in other audio training I’ve had. G.S.
Been a fan of Syn-Aud-Con when Don Davis taught courses, and a bigger fan of Brenda & Pat. Looking forward to taking another course. . . . D.O.
Excellent info! J.P.
I’ve been in the industry for 25 years (mainly networked audio and DSP) so I’m familiar with the concepts in this course, yet I’ve still been absolutely delighted with how this training has advanced my knowledge and filled gaps in my understanding. I’ve never seen the concepts explained so simply and clearly, and the associated materials and calculators are excellent resources.
This is the first course of yours that I’ve done, but I got great feedback from members of my team who did courses last year. I’ve just signed two of them up for new courses. I really like the look of 140, 210 and 300. B.W.
I plan to take many more SynAudCon courses and assign them to my employees as well. His teaching style with the practical examples was exceptional and I enjoyed trying them for myself. B.R.
I really enjoy the training, though having so many questions on the final exam based around using the software tools provided that are not accessible with mac computers was challenging.
Good point. I will share this with Pat. I know a lot of MAC users that work in the AV industry installs a program on their computer that enables them to use Windows programs. L.N.
I know a lot of MAC users that work in the AV industry installs a program on their computer that enables them to use Windows programs. Brenda Brown
I love your courses. This was great! One of the best audio courses I’ve ever taken. A.B.
It was another great course. The video modules and examples are to the point and well written. The supporting documents were also great, and I will keep for reference. With some of these courses, not just yours, the music at the intro gets tiring when you watch several videos in one session. A.R.
Test was good. V.S.
The presentation was excellent and clear. More examples for the calculators would be great. S.L.
I thought the course was very good. Maybe some more examples with the SPL calculator but once I figured it out I was good. A.B.
Great suggestion and certainly doable. I will add it to the suggestion list for this course. Thank you. Brenda Brown
The most fun and rewarding times in my AV career, were attending the seminars. It was a thrill for someone with no knowledge or experience to be allowed in the room with such accomplished and respected people in the industry. The audio professionals who attended treated the new kids as family and gave time and often offered free resources. Ray Rayburn, Russ Berger, Bob Cofeen and others come to mind who personally offered time, books, and other resources simply because I asked questions and wanted to learn. F.C.
I’ll definitely be encouraging our support technicians to take the online training.
Practical training, easy to understand, allowance of enough time for course completion which is important for working candidates, quality of information, quality of videos, structuring of quiz, each element of the course is excellent. A.R.
Was very in depth, had to really pay attention. J.O.
This course made me go it through twice. Each time I picked up something new. P.W.
Really enjoy the trainings you guys put together! Audio was a weaker area in my skill set and I wanted to fix that. Getting through these a little at a time really helps to UNDERSTAND what is going on, not just memorize some facts. J.B.
I think my brain has atrophied a bit as I have moved further away from engineering and more toward sales and marketing. Harder than I expected, or remembered. T.J.
Excellent course. I had realized good system gain before by clipping amplifiers and working backwards but now I have a larger tool set to input a sinewave, or work with a piezo, etc. to maximize systems potential. Truly helped me to start thinking of system audio design in relation to ohms law and focus on voltage opposed to wattage. M.D.
Good course…. I honestly was way off in setting up mixing boards and now have a better understanding. B.F.
I felt at times it was hard to follow and felt needlessly dense in certain areas. It was also difficult at times to connect the concepts to real world use cases. J.B.
This course was great! These courses are always jam pack with information. Signal Chain Optimization is a great course and it showed me more in depth information with signal flow and amplifiers/loudspeakers. Z.V.
I am a big fan of the CAF calculator I can see myself coming back to use it! A.W.
This is the second time I have taken the course. I find them informative, easy to follow and engaging. R.S.
I’m supper happy with the ability to work with the calculator myself!!! Takes it to a whole new level. D.F.
It was very helpful learning about proper gain structure. It helped to put to practice in real world scenarios in conference rooms and the church sanctuary. D.A.
I thought signal chain optimization was an excellent course. The calculators are a nice take-home gift to use as a system designer. A.K.
This course was very helpful and I learned a ton about system calibration and fine-tuning. The first half of the lessons were much more practical and easier to follow, while the second half was heavily focused on math and calculations, which made for a slow progression toward the end. P.E.
I really enjoyed the format and the opportunity to go back and review things multiple times. That was always a little more difficult in live training. T.S.
I thought I understood all there was to know about gain structure until I went through this course. It was good. F.B.
I really enjoy the challenge of these courses. Admittedly, I have some more work to do to really say that I have this knowledge in my toolbox and can apply all of it in the field. I look forward to breaking out my course notes. M.M.
Loved seeing how you use the XL2 meter. I have one that I use for a variety of other functions but haven’t played much with the oscilloscope function. Now I would feel more comfortable and adventurous doing so. M.N.
I thought it was fantastic how you demonstrated gain staging with a high end NTI RTA/sig generator, and then the same principles with a cheap piezo speaker. In my work I am fortunate enough to have access to the proper measurement tools, but don’t always have them on hand, so it’s nice to have alternate methods using cheaper tools I can include in my field kit. Great info! E.S.
This has reinforced the lessons learned in other courses and in practical AV work around gain structure.
It has helped me get a better handle on the tools in the CAF software. I had mostly been staying with the Amp Calc software.
I have a better understanding of Amplifier selection for a speaker system.
These tools are really practical and I use them daily when designing and preparing quotes for projects. G.P.
This course is very well put together and very easy to follow. D.M.
A lot of great material and examples. I did have quite a few moments where I had to re-watch something to try and understand it, which can be expected. Sometimes the math was a bit confusing but I guess that is why we have the calculators. Maybe an example of running through the selection of loudspeakers, amp, and mixer based on some criteria might be nice to see the whole process and recap what all should be considered based on spec sheets. Overall I am happy with the course and have a deeper understanding of these components, and a new tool to use for calculations and finding max Vrms quickly for loudspeakers. Thank you Pat and Brenda! J.B
Thank you J.B – we like this idea. We hope to add it soon. Brenda Brown
This course was good for me. I was used to breezing through some of the lower level training but this one definitely challenged me and I’ve found some areas of weakness I need to work on now pertaining to my Audio wisdom. Thanks again to you and Pat and your organization for the training experience you’ve offered and for your always prompt response time to my emails. C.C.
I took the Audio Applications training and it was great contents. K.I.
There was a lot of information to absorb from this course, I like how the online course is set up now, reading the information first and then looking at a chart, then watching the video/Audio repeating of what I read is helps me grasp and focus better when watching the video. J.K.
This course really helped me gain more of a foundation and a better understanding of the amp power ratings and loud speaker power ratings. M.L.
I appreciate the training and teaching manner. Very easy to understand. J.M.
I’m enjoying your videos a lot. There is much good information from the physics side of the whole process to achieve good sound system. Thank you again. Hope to see you one day in one of your seminars too:) S.O.
I really enjoyed this course. J.D.
This course is great, a strong fundamental class that really gave me an understanding of acoustics and basic sound physics. A.M.
Good training! Hands on training is always the better way to absorb this intense concepts.
Content great! Concise. Could have a bit more modulation in the delivery – appear to be a machine reading. Alternatively, a small video caption of the trainer at the bottom would help. Would give a small human touch! GP.
The class was very informative. C.D.
The course is awesome, this is the 3rd time for me but still have something different am discovering. J.C.
I think training is pretty good. I don’t think I would change a thing. R.C.
“The course was very intense, I think what is missing is detailed sheets with steps for doing certain jobs like testing a mixer, loudspeaker and more. Separate sheets to use it in our daily jobs. Other than that this was a great course.” A.H.
Excellent real world non-manufacturer specific training so far. J.P.
Great info. I have never had such detail on this one topic. It is normally glossed over in other classes. M.O.
Thank you very much for the training opportunity. Your courses are overflowing with helpful information. I feel incredibly lucky to have access to your programs. L.N.
Nicely done. Foundations well developed and concepts presented in a logical order. S.W.
Thank you for helping me to fall in love with audio/acoustics all over again. My father bought me piles of audio engineering and acoustics books when I was in junior high and high school, and I found myself reading a 3″ thick Audio Engineering Encyclopedia just for fun in between college engineering classes. Previous career choices killed these passions, but they are coming back, thanks to your courses. There’s something about looking at curves and graphs/plots and analysis and formulas that is so interesting… 🙂 This was another interesting and challenging course! I’m really interested in audio and acoustics and measurement/analysis again, and am now trying to figure out how I can apply my newly gained knowledge in my field. Course 200 was full of SO much interesting and challenging information, I found myself looking at other online videos of measurement tools/software to try to reinforce these concepts. M.H.
Great course! My only critique would be working in more real-life examples of the theoretical material. Most of us have grown up ‘playing’ with sound so understand it more from a hands-on standpoint. Relating that with the theory would help it make more sense. C. B.
For someone who has to commission sound systems in various venues (not myself), this is a good course to take. It also provides good insight into some equipment selection during the design process (my position), especially for amplifiers and speakers. G.S.