ProSoundWeb: One year ago, the U.S. pro audio industry was anxiously awaiting the impending outcome of the 600 MHz auction. We didn’t know much except that RF products operating in the 600 MHz band would likely be phased out over the next three years.
When the auction was completed in April 2017, the big winner was T-Mobile, which spent just under $8 billion for its share of radio spectrum across the country and immediately announced plans to start testing by year’s end.
1 comment:
It seems that any time a major company does something, our industry has to be the ones that suffer. In this case, wireless. Everyone in theatre uses it. Mics, lighting, sound, automation, communication is all done with wireless now. Yes, we have places where wired is the standard, but if you are a band or show on tour, wireless is your friend. No one wants to spend time unwrapping and laying down cables for a two hour concert only to have to re-wrap and take them up again to move onto the next city. In many cases, it can’t be avoided, but minimizing the amount of cables that have to go down is important. I wish there were a company that was an artistic organization that would be able to buy these wireless spectrum's for theatre use. Hey, if T.Mobile can do it, why can’t we? The other factor is the cost. Anytime the spectrum changes, so does the need to replace or reprogram equipment. It’s not cheap when you consider that one wireless lav could run into the thousands of dollars and when you have to by 60 of them for one show? Oh boy. It would be nice if all of these companies talked to each other so that every time the government auctioned off a spectrum, we weren’t scrambling to get new equipment to keep our shows going. One can dream.
Post a Comment