New Music Gear Monday: Optogate PB-05

Anyone involved in live sound either as an engineer or a player knows that the biggest problems with a lot of open mics on stage is leakage and feedback. You don't always have enough gates at your disposal to clean things up, and setting them up can be tricky, especially if the band uses a lot of volume dynamics. Here's a little inline device that can solve all of those problems - the Optogate PB-05.

While not exactly a new product, the Optogate PB-5 is still pretty cool in that it uses an infrared beam to sense if there's someone in front of the mic. If there is, it'll open the gate and the mic turns on. When the singer steps away, the mic turns off.

I first spotted this device on the mics of the Doobie Brothers on their World Gone Crazy show that appears occasionally on the Palladia hi-def music channel. If it works for them, it might work for you too. The Optogate PB-05 retails for $249. There's some additional good info about it here.

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