|
Review of the ROM/FX voice amplifier
After getting my Stormtrooper costume in a box a long time
ago, I was thrilled to bits. It was something that I’ve
wanted to own since I was 7 years old. And I finally had
one!
Still, there was much other work to be done. I needed to
get a black undersuit, black gloves, white boots and a blaster.
Oh yeah, I also wanted a voice amp, but I wasn’t really
bothered about that.
I spent lots of time and cash on getting the “essentials”
for my Stormtrooper costume, and spent little time, effort
or money buying a voice amp.
Only after my first troop, did I realise my mistake! It’s
one thing to stand around looking like a real Imperial Trooper,
but quite another to be able to interact with the public.
This was a BIG part of Trooping that I’d not considered.
In fact, I’d say that it was 50% of the fun.
Although I had a voice amp, it was really not up to scratch.
I found that people had to get extremely close to actually
hear what I was saying. It was very frustrating, and subsequently,
I left the talking to others.
After that, I spent more time and money on buying an RS/Maplin
voice amp. Proceeded to take it apart, and fit it into my
costume. This was a great improvement, and added a lot to
trooping! But, other than the fact that there wasn’t
any static burst at the end of my sentences, the howling
feedback made it very difficult to find a place to position
the speaker without sounding like Jimmy Hendrix.
Again, I hunted around for a new amp setup. I did find
one, but it was so expensive, that I could have bought a
second set of Trooper armour for the price! This unit could
do many things with your voice, but all I wanted was to
sound like a Trooper. I dismissed the idea of saving up
for one, and managed with my RS/Maplin amp.
Then came along the ROM/FX board……
At the price advertised, I really could not see it being
any great improvement on my current amp. That was until
I heard some of the sound samples of the static burst at
the end of the sentence. Even then, I was worried that it
would still have feedback, or not enough volume. After all,
this amp was quite a bit smaller than the RS/Maplin amp.
I bought one anyway. And to my surprise, it was everything
it was advertised to be and more! That was one of the best
troops of my career as a trooper….and a lot of that
was down to this amp.
It has comprehensive settings that allow you to adjust
the delay before the static burst kicks in, the volume at
which the amp will act is also configurable (so that it
won’t amplify your breathing and then stick a static
burst at each breath), you can configure how long you need
to pause before the burst kicks in too (stops the burst
from interrupting you mid sentence if you pause). There
are other configurations you can easily set (with voice
prompting from the device!), but these are the most important
to me. Version 2 of the amp has even more options!
Built into the amp is a way to reduce feedback too. I say
reduce, because with all amps, it’s incredibly hard
to eliminate all of the feedback depending on where you
have your speaker. However, for me, it has completely disposed
of the whining and howling that I used to have (and I haven’t
had to move the speaker either!). I have not heard other
troopers with the board howl either. This is a huge benefit.
Everything you’ll need is right there in the box…Amp,
microphone, speaker (with Velcro!), battery compartment.
All you have to do is add the batteries and your ready to
go. I have seen these amps fitted in less than 10 minutes
to great effect!
All in all, after wasting a lot of time/effort/money on
other amps, I wish the ROM/FX had been around when I first
started Trooping! If you costume, and you don’t have
one yet…check it out!
|
