Beechtek DXA-4 VS DXA-FX
 

I have two FX1s and just bought a Rode VideoMic and plan to buy a Sennheiser Evolution G2 (lapel wireless). The Rode uses a 9-volt and the Sennheiser 2 AAs, so I'm assuming that I won't need the phantom power of the DXA-FX. Are there other considerations I should make that would put the DXA-FX in the lead?

Dana: Why take the Rode through the adapter. It is a mini plug isn't it ?

Yes, but I also want to receive a track from my wireless lav. From what I've read, the Beechtek would give me two separatly editable audio tracks in Vegas from one camera. That's what I need. Camera B, then would receive from the second wireless unit. Camera C isn't able to receive audio.

The Beachtek DXA has 2 balanced XLR inputs plus 1 unbalanced mono miniplug input that is in parallel with the right channel XLR but unfortunately they haven't provided a wiring schematic on their website, major faux paux IMHO. The Rode Videomic has an unbalanced miniplug using a normally stereo TRS plug that has been wired for mono, with the tip and ring jumpered together so the same signal will appear on both channels when it's plugged into a stereo mic input on a camcorder. Depending on exactly how Beach has wired their jack, they may or may not be compatible. For example, the traditional way of wiring a TRS jack or plug for unbalanced mono is signal goes to tip while ring and sleeve are connected together to ground. If you were to plug the Rode into this, you'd have tip and ring connected together in the plug and ring and ground connected together in the jack with the total result of the signal being shorted directly to ground.

The G2 comes with a miniplug to XLR-M cable that lets you send the output of the receiver to an XLR input so there's not likely to be a problem there. Just make sure you send it to the LEFT channel when you're using the Rode on the minijack input.

Dana:

My DXA-4 has only one input for the miniplug. I am not sure if it will break the Rode from that input to only one of the tracks.... Hmmmm. I'll check it out to see if I can figure it out.

Dana, you might want to wire up a cable that will allow you to do what you want to do. I made one and it works great. Check out this thread:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=54677