Today we are checking out the PED and goStand from AirTurn. The PED is a double pedal wireless controller that you can use to control your MAC, PC, iPad, or Android tablets. Control what? you might be asking – just about anything! Things like music reading, tele-prompting, guitar tabs, lyrics scrolling, etc. With the PED you can essentially always keep your attention on your music, and keep your hands where they are needed most, your guitar or piano (or violin or noseflute or hurdy-gurdy, you get the idea).
The PED is pretty small and really light, making it highly portable, and has a battery life of around 6 months to a year. I have spent a few months with it and the battery is still strong as ever. If the battery does run out, AirTurn were nice enough to include a spare that resides inside the battery compartment. The two foot switches are touch switches made of a thick plastic membrane. While this makes the PED very durable to many a pounding of the foot, I can’t help but feel the need for some tactile feedback or response from the pedal. That being said, to have tactile feedback in the pedal would inherently mean it becomes less durable and more prone to breaking. Though, having the touch switch means you don’t have to press hard at all on the pedal for it to respond. A light touch of the foot on the pad is enough and I never had any issues with commands not working. A nice feature is the use of a rubbery anti-skid bottom to the PED that helps make sure the PED doesn’t slide on soft surfaces.
The PED uses Bluetooth as its means of wireless connectivity. Bluetooth is very power efficient and has minimal lag which helps explain the long battery life and responsive behavior.
There is a mode switch which lets you change the PED’s mode depending on what you want to use it for. For example there is a mode for giving right or left commands, another for up or down, etc. Last but not least there is a LED indicator to let you know when your battery is low. Overall I was pleasantly surprised by the PED. It’s one of those things that you think you don’t need until you actually use it. Being able to scroll my music with my foot and work it with my iPad to make my own tele-promoter has made things not just easier, but more enjoyable.
And that leaves us with the goSTAND. It’s probably the lightest and most portable mic boom stand I have ever used. But as you might expect, the trade off for having portability is durability. Not that the materials used in the stand are cheap but the stand overall doesn’t have the “solid” feel that you get from more heavy duty stands. There are some design elements built into the stand that AirTurn seem to have made to try and alleviate some of the flimsiness of the stand, and it does indeed help. There are many adjustable points all over the stand, some in places that you usually don’t see. For example the tripod on the bottom have adjustable feet that can lengthened or shortened in case you need the stand to have more leverage to staying center.
A perfect use case for a stand like this would be a local show or some one off traveling gigs or events. But when it starts coming to things like serious touring, I’m not sure how long a stand like this might last for that kind of scenario. If you are looking something good and portable the goSTAND should work out great. But if you want something a lot heavier duty for the rigors of the road, while the goSTAND might work out you will probably want something that has a proven track record of being rock hard. On tour its all about reliability, so you might want to look into something specifically made for it, something that has a solid reputation for being road-worthy.
