A Guitar And Gear Support Forum

Been looking around for something like this. I know they aren't so cheap but it seems there would be a product that was basically a headset mic with a simple feed to your own ear as a monitor. It's a compromise not getting the full monitor but it should give me a zero latency monitor for myself and add very little to the cost. Anyone know an agile priced option like this?

Nope! I have looked, and I can’t find anything that is:

Wireless
Low enough latency
Decent sound quality
Reliable enough to be usable
Affordable

I don’t fully understand why I can buy a low latency guitar wireless system for $50 (and it works great!) but I need to spend more than 10x to get similar product for monitoring. It would be a bit clunky, but I have thought about using a cheap Chinese guitar wireless in reverse. Connect the transmitter to a mixer out and the receiver to a battery powered IEM amp. If it works, a little soldering and a plastic project case could eliminate adapter cables and shrink the footprint way down to a small box to clip on your belt.

It's a great question for which I have no answer, but a couple of thoughts...

A lot of wireless earbuds have too much latency for musician because they were not designed with low latency requirements.

I would suspect guitar wireless transceivers lack the flat response 20-20K frequency range that monitoring really needs because guitars are not full-range instruments.

I agree, if they do exist with monitor-worthy flat response and full range in a budget form, I'm in too.

If it's analog RF, there will be no latency. If it converts it to digital then back to analog to hear, there could be latency.

mozz wrote: ↑Fri Mar 05, 2021 12:01 pm If it's analog RF, there will be no latency. If it converts it to digital then back to analog to hear, there could be latency.

There are digital guitar solutions with very low latency. Barely more than analog and not any more noticeable than standing a couple feet further from your amp. The problem with wireless headphones and earbuds is they all use Bluetooth which is a very high latency protocol in terms of live music.

The technology exists to build a suitable system that would retail under $100 but the market is so small, no one has jumped on it yet, and the Chinese will likely wait until there is a proven product for them to copy.