Low budget sound equipment

[Daniel D. Teoli Jr.]

Some sound options for low budget filmmakers.

https://learnaboutfilm.com/making-a-film/equipment-for-low-budget-filmmaking/sound-equipment-for-film/

[Vital Butinar]

I actually bought the Tascam DR60 M2 and it's a really nice sound recorder and for our small production of short films it's great.

I don't see the need to buy too much equipment because if there are bigger project the clients always pay for renting the equipment but for our smaller projects stuff like the Pocket 4K and the Tascam DR60 are great.

[Phil Rhodes]

It's never been easier to get good sound recording equipment. Even if you need to do advanced things, a Zoom F8n or similar is relatively inexpensive and has a list of features that'll barely fit on your desk.

[David Peterson]

On 2/25/2020 at 3:32 AM, Daniel D. Teoli Jr. said:

https://learnaboutfilm.com/making-a-film/equipment-for-low-budget-filmmaking/sound-equipment-for-film/

Ugh! That's got so so so many issues with it, I could be here all day. 

Yet another clueless "writer/journalist" who knows nothing about production sound who is attempting to write about it. 

Even my out of date blog post from 2017 about what indie sound recorder to buy has better content of relevance. 

[Vital Butinar]

4 hours ago, David Peterson said:

Ugh! That's got so so so many issues with it, I could be here all day. 

Yet another clueless "writer/journalist" who knows nothing about production sound who is attempting to write about it. 

Even my out of date blog post from 2017 about what indie sound recorder to buy has better content of relevance. 

Nice blog post. Thank you.
You made quite a few valid points and I agree with you.

[David Peterson]

Cheers. Your Tascam DR60Dmk2 is not too bad for zero budget films, but definitely think about getting a Zoom F4/F6 or MixPre with a Tentacle or two sometime in your future. 

[Vital Butinar]

5 hours ago, David Peterson said:

Cheers. Your Tascam DR60Dmk2 is not too bad for zero budget films, but definitely think about getting a Zoom F4/F6 or MixPre with a Tentacle or two sometime in your future. 

Oh yeah I completely get that. Thank you. 
But you know how it its. I don't buy equipment that I know I'm not going to be able to make money off when I can I upgrade.
That's why we shoot our own stuff on DSLRs for so long and why the first drone that I'm getting is a Mavic Mini and not something more expensive and it's the same thing with the sound recorder. The DR60mk2 was the best bang for the buck at the time and as usual I know we're going to squeeze every thing that we can out of it before I know that we're ready to upgrade. 

I also always buy equipment with future compatibility in mind. Like the next thing I'm probably getting is a better shotgun mic which I can then use on a better recorder eventually. Same thing with lenses, tripods, basically everything and I think it's a good way to go because we never over extend our means and as a result never have financial problems or even have to worry how we're going to be able to pay off a peace of equipment because I always buy it after I already have saved up the money for it and I'm sure that this is the peace of gear that we really do need. 

But heck I've done that my whole life that's why I drive a 20 year old car that I love and works great and don't have any debt to my name. ?

[David Peterson]

19 hours ago, Vital Butinar said:

Oh yeah I completely get that. Thank you. 
But you know how it its. I don't buy equipment that I know I'm not going to be able to make money off when I can I upgrade.
That's why we shoot our own stuff on DSLRs for so long and why the first drone that I'm getting is a Mavic Mini and not something more expensive and it's the same thing with the sound recorder. The DR60mk2 was the best bang for the buck at the time and as usual I know we're going to squeeze every thing that we can out of it before I know that we're ready to upgrade. 

Definitely, if you're not making any money from sound then don't spend money on it! And the Tascam DR60D can serve you just fine. 

Although if you're being paid as a videographer, to shoot a lot of content with a DSLR/mirrorless then I'd *very* highly recommend an upgrade to a Sound Devices MixPre3. As it would just make your life so much more pleasant, and you're doing enough content to justify the improved quality too. 

Or if you're a director, shooting entire feature films / documentaries, and needing to rely upon sound guys without their own gear (although, that's a big red warning flag!) then I'd highly highly recommend getting a Zoom F4 or F8/F8n

As the leap from a Tascam DR60Dmk2 to a Zoom F8n is a very small increase in costs, but it is like going from a Canon 60D to a Panasonic EVA1, it is not just simply a leap forward in quality of image, but also a very very big leap forward in features / design / ergonomics / etc!

The initial original Zoom F8 was for location sound like the Canon 5Dmk2 / Panasonic GH1 was! Revolutionizing what is possible with very teeny tiny budgets. 

This has had quite an impact on the prices of secondhand professional equipment as well, due to the pressures from low budget gear, it is now extremely affordable to pick up a secondhand Sound Devices 633/664/788T or Zaxcom Nomad/Maxx from eBay

 

19 hours ago, Vital Butinar said:

But heck I've done that my whole life that's why I drive a 20 year old car that I love and works great and don't have any debt to my name. ?

That's great! I too have no debt, and never ever borrowed money (aside from student debt, which in my country has a 0% interest rate, so not such a big deal)

Edited April 15, 2020 by David Peterson

[Vital Butinar]

3 hours ago, David Peterson said:

Definitely, if you're not making any money from sound then don't spend money on it! And the Tascam DR60D can serve you just fine. 

Although if you're being paid as a videographer, to shoot a lot of content with a DSLR/mirrorless then I'd *very* highly recommend an upgrade to a Sound Devices MixPre3. As it would just make your life so much more pleasant, and you're doing enough content to justify the improved quality too. 

Or if you're a director, shooting entire feature films / documentaries, and needing to rely upon sound guys without their own gear (although, that's a big red warning flag!) then I'd highly highly recommend getting a Zoom F4 or F8/F8n

As the leap from a Tascam DR60Dmk2 to a Zoom F8n is a very small increase in costs, but it is like going from a Canon 60D to a Panasonic EVA1, it is not just simply a leap forward in quality of image, but also a very very big leap forward in features / design / ergonomics / etc!

The initial original Zoom F8 was for location sound like the Canon 5Dmk2 / Panasonic GH1 was! Revolutionizing what is possible with very teeny tiny budgets. 

This has had quite an impact on the prices of secondhand professional equipment as well, due to the pressures from low budget gear, it is now extremely affordable to pick up a secondhand Sound Devices 633/664/788T or Zaxcom Nomad/Maxx from eBay

 

That's great! I too have no debt, and never ever borrowed money (aside from student debt, which in my country has a 0% interest rate, so not such a big deal)

Well the thing is I got into film because it was something I had always wanted to do as a kid and when I was able to work as a dancer(I'm a salsa dance instructor) on a shoot, my girlfriend encouraged me to go chase my dream. The funny thing was it was both of our dream. So we learned as much as we could and tried shooting stuff. Soon after that we got working for a couple of our dancer friends making dance video and stuff when everything kind of took off.
We both do a lot of stuff, I used to have a thriving IT company, she used to do makeup on film sets and now is a sculptress, but in either case she became a really good cinematographer and editor and I became a good director, writer and producer. So a lot of the time we do work for TV stations or different type of TVsh productions where she's one of the camera crew and I either plan the shoots or even get to direct and produce some of the lower end stuff. But they're not full time gigs since we don't want that. 
We've done a few shoots with a production company where they do commercials and it was great, nice money but I only did the on set directing and got everything so no pre production and not post production. 

But what we've always loved doing was going down our own path so we kind of love the indie path if you will. We did a bunch of music videos and shorts and it's actually really satisfying stretching the non existent budgets to the point that we actually get something that looks good out of it and at the same time still learn a bunch of stuff doing it. Having creative control over almost everything and in the end getting something you produced and are proud off.

While my hopes and dreams have always been to do "big budget" feature films I'm perfectly fine for the time being doing our own stuff with very limited budgets. So gear had always been a problem. We either didn't have a good camera or didn't have lights etc.
But start of last year we decided to bite the bullet and bought the BM Pocket 4k and a couple of accessories one of which was the Tascam DR60mk2. Just so that when we wanted to do something without a budget we could do it without using crappy equipment or having to rent something on our own dime. It's worked out great.
That's why I'm a little reserved when buying equipment. We upgrade and find a way how to make a little more money on our own with the equipment we've got and then slowly upgrade again not to overextend anything. 

You know I was actually working on a shoot a couple of months ago where the sound guy used SD 788T. I didn't know what it was at first but then had a look and it's funny how this thing really looked like it was from another century. I didn't have anything to do with post production there but everyone knows I'm the kind of person who likes to know a lot of stuff so I hang around everywhere a lot and I did go to check how post was going and there was no problems with sound. So I concluded that the sound guy with the SD788T was well experienced and had the right gear.

Anyway thank you again for the information. I appreciate it and definitely the next thing I'll be upgrading is the shotgun mic. Thankfully I have one lined up from a guy who's got a sound studio and is changing some of his gear and might part with something good for a good price. Then we'll see what's next. 

[Phil Connolly]

I'm a big fan of the Sound Devices Mix Pre 6 - its affodible, sounds good and has great analogue limiters. The Mix Pre 3 is also great if budget is a bit tighter

The other nice thing about the modern Sound devices is the "Wing Man" app for Android and IOS. You can remotely control the recorder, monitor levels and label and annotate your recordings. It saves so much time labeling the tracks as you go. 

[Vital Butinar]

14 minutes ago, Phil Connolly said:

I'm a big fan of the Sound Devices Mix Pre 6 - its affodible, sounds good and has great analogue limiters. The Mix Pre 3 is also great if budget is a bit tighter

The other nice thing about the modern Sound devices is the "Wing Man" app for Android and IOS. You can remotely control the recorder, monitor levels and label and annotate your recordings. It saves so much time labeling the tracks as you go. 

Oh that's true. 

Organization is one of the most important things and if you can do it in the device it makes post much easier.

On the last few projects that we had sound and video I had a PA take notes on an app on a tablet where she noted the scene, take and both file names for the video and audio as well as any other additional notes. Since I was doing the post it really helped because I just checked the documentation and synced up the audio.

The only SD I've be able to hold and play around with was the 788T unfortunately. I wish I could have found something like that and affordable in our area. But in the end it came down to either buy the DR60mk2 or wait for another half a year (with this going on would have been a year) to buy a sound recorder so I bit the bullet on the DR60mk2.

[David Peterson]

16 hours ago, Vital Butinar said:

You know I was actually working on a shoot a couple of months ago where the sound guy used SD 788T. I didn't know what it was at first but then had a look and it's funny how this thing really looked like it was from another century. I didn't have anything to do with post production there but everyone knows I'm the kind of person who likes to know a lot of stuff so I hang around everywhere a lot and I did go to check how post was going and there was no problems with sound. So I concluded that the sound guy with the SD788T was well experienced and had the right gear.

The 788T is indeed quite an old recorder, especially compared to a Sound Devices 6 series or almost any Zaxcom recorder it might look a bit like it is "from another century". 

But in its heyday the Sound Devices 788T was very very expensive, and used on many of the biggest blockbust films there are. The Sound Devices 788T (& Aaton Cantar X2 / Zaxcom Deva IV) would be the oldest recorders still in usage on mid budget feature films / TV series. (and still used as backup cart recorders by big budget production sound mixers)

However the Sound Devices 8 series and Aanton Cantar X3 has helped convert many of the last hold outs still using the 788T / X2 in a professional environment. 

Thus why we see the insanely cheap prices now on eBay of 788T recorders selling for as little as only a grand and a half. 

For most people though I'd just suggest getting a Zoom F8n / Sound Devices MixPre10 Gen2 instead of a secodhand 788T. 
 

16 hours ago, Vital Butinar said:

Anyway thank you again for the information. I appreciate it and definitely the next thing I'll be upgrading is the shotgun mic. Thankfully I have one lined up from a guy who's got a sound studio and is changing some of his gear and might part with something good for a good price. Then we'll see what's next. 

Which mic specifically is this?
 

[David Peterson]

15 hours ago, Phil Connolly said:

I'm a big fan of the Sound Devices Mix Pre 6 - its affodible, sounds good and has great analogue limiters. The Mix Pre 3 is also great if budget is a bit tighter

I was very critical of the MixPre series when first released, because the Zoom F series was so far ahead. (I purchased the Zoom F4 and F8n after all because I believed in them, they've been excellent!)

But since then Sound Devices has been pushing out many more firmware updates, and even releasing a whole new MixPre 2nd Generation of hardware.

These days I'd totally put the Sound Devices MixPre10 Gen2 on par and equal with a Zoom F8n. 

While the MixPre3/6 Gen2 remain the better choice for any solo videographers. 
(but I'd still push the aspiring student production sound mixer to get a Zoom F4/F8 instead)

 

15 hours ago, Phil Connolly said:

The other nice thing about the modern Sound devices is the "Wing Man" app for Android and IOS. You can remotely control the recorder, monitor levels and label and annotate your recordings. It saves so much time labeling the tracks as you go. 

The Zoom F series app is even better, you can for instance control gain too remotely.

 

15 hours ago, Vital Butinar said:

Oh that's true. 

Organization is one of the most important things and if you can do it in the device it makes post much easier.

On the last few projects that we had sound and video I had a PA take notes on an app on a tablet where she noted the scene, take and both file names for the video and audio as well as any other additional notes. Since I was doing the post it really helped because I just checked the documentation and synced up the audio.

Yup, that one of the many features which made the Zoom F series so revolutionary for their extremely low price point (and why Sound Devices had to respond with their own MixPre series), you've got metadata entry. You can even use a full size PC keyboard for quick entry!

And this is something which no Tascam can do. 
(except for the Tascam HS-P82, but that was priced much much much higher and targeted at professionals as a "cheaper" 788T)

 

[Evan Samaras]

David, 

Thank you for re-linking to your blog. Indeed it seems I have been "scraping by" on the 60d Mkii haha. Your article has been helpful. From what I gather, am I to expect better performance out of my DR680? I've been using the recorder in combination with the Audix SCX1.

[Phil Connolly]

The Zoom stuff is great, but I like the simplicity of the MixPre's. They can't do as much, but they can do everything you need and it's all at your fingertips.  Also the knobs glow red when the limiters kick in 

I rarely do much sound recording beyond, self shooting audio on corporates, but I did a couple of days on a feature last month and was glad of a Sound Devices MixPre6. It was just super simple to operate,  it left me able to focus on battling with the radio mics. I had an option of a zoom - but the sound devices seemed simpler to get my head around when I needed to hit the ground running. The zoom is probably a better deal for an owner operator. But the MixPre's look like they have been idiot proofed to make them easy to jump on in a rental situation

The last time I was a films sound recordist I used a laptop, a Mk1 M-Box and Pro Tools as the recorder. Which was mega clunky, but we got good audio. 

[Vital Butinar]

2 hours ago, Phil Connolly said:

The Zoom stuff is great, but I like the simplicity of the MixPre's. They can't do as much, but they can do everything you need and it's all at your fingertips.  Also the knobs glow red when the limiters kick in 

I rarely do much sound recording beyond, self shooting audio on corporates, but I did a couple of days on a feature last month and was glad of a Sound Devices MixPre6. It was just super simple to operate,  it left me able to focus on battling with the radio mics. I had an option of a zoom - but the sound devices seemed simpler to get my head around when I needed to hit the ground running. The zoom is probably a better deal for an owner operator. But the MixPre's look like they have been idiot proofed to make them easy to jump on in a rental situation

The last time I was a films sound recordist I used a laptop, a Mk1 M-Box and Pro Tools as the recorder. Which was mega clunky, but we got good audio. 

We did that once too. Had a laptop and an external sound card. It was uncomfortable to use especially if the duck tape gave way but the sound was more than usable.  And a cheap solution without having to buy any additional equipment. 

[David Peterson]

11 hours ago, Evan Samaras said:

David, 

Thank you for re-linking to your blog. Indeed it seems I have been "scraping by" on the 60d Mkii haha. Your article has been helpful. From what I gather, am I to expect better performance out of my DR680? I've been using the recorder in combination with the Audix SCX1.

Do you have both a DR680 and a DR60D? I'd say sell both and get a Zoom F4!

There are two variants of the DR680, just like there are two of the DR60D (mk1 and mk2). So would help if I know which DR680 you mean?

Personally I had the original DR60Dmk1, and I didn't use it for very long before I got the Sound Devices 552, then I sold it once I had the DR680mk1. 

This was also quite a long time ago, so my memory is a little fuzzy. And I can't really speak of the mk2 versions of them. But I believe the mk2 had a modest performance improvements, and came with some firmware improvements (which some you could get for the mk1 anyway. Like the DR60Dmk1 had a serious problem when initially shipped out that if you powered it over by USB and it lost the connection then it would shut down. But the firmware update means it would seamlessly switch between external USB to AA internal powering if the connection was lost. While the DR60Dmk2 had this feature from Day 1). 

To give a camera analogy, I'd say it is like this:

DR60 mk1 vs mk2 is like debating getting a Nikon D5200 or Nikon D5300. Yeah, one is better than the other, but you're broadly talking about more or less the same machine. If you've got one, don't bother getting the other one!

Likewise a DR680 mk1 vs mk2 is like a Nikon D7100 vs D7200. Same points I made just above apply here too. 

Likewise don't bother "upgrading" from a D5200 to a D7100, or a D5300 to a D7200. Yes, they're "better", but is it really worthwhile for a non-professional photographer to do this upgrade if they're on a tight budget? Nah. As they're definitely improvements, but fundamentally they're still pretty damn similar at their core. Same general level of tech/processing, same imaging sensor, but just the D7x00 series is dressed up in a semi-pro camera body. 

However a D5200 to the latest Nikon D7500? (I'm not even sure what a "D7500" is in the sound field recorder world... ?? Maybe a Tascam DR680mk3? That doesn't exist! It is high time Tascam updates their entire range of field recorders. They haven't had a new recorder since 2015!!! No wait, I do know what the "D7500" is, that is the Tascam DR701D. That fits my analogy really well)

Maaaaybe go for the D7500. But really you should stick with your D5200 until you can do a bigger leap to a D500/D750/D810/etc (which is what I'd say a Zoom F8n/F6/F4/etc are like, they're the "D500/D750/D810" of this analogy). As that is the kind of improvement you can easily appreciate as a massive leap forward. 

 

Edited April 17, 2020 by David Peterson

[David Peterson]

11 hours ago, Phil Connolly said:

The Zoom stuff is great, but I like the simplicity of the MixPre's. They can't do as much, but they can do everything you need and it's all at your fingertips.  Also the knobs glow red when the limiters kick in 

I rarely do much sound recording beyond, self shooting audio on corporates, but I did a couple of days on a feature last month and was glad of a Sound Devices MixPre6. It was just super simple to operate,  it left me able to focus on battling with the radio mics. I had an option of a zoom - but the sound devices seemed simpler to get my head around when I needed to hit the ground running. The zoom is probably a better deal for an owner operator. But the MixPre's look like they have been idiot proofed to make them easy to jump on in a rental situation

I guess the MixPres having "Basic Mode" (a very crippled mode which strips away and hides a lot of the MixPre's complexity/power/functionality) does make it "easier" for a complete noob beginner to dive in with almost no learning curve. 

But I'd argue that the Zoom F series are even more "idiot proof". 

For instance on a film shoot I gave someone with almost no experience my Zoom F8n (as I was the DoP), I gave all the tracks a safety track level engaged as well. 

That meant all she had to do, was put the boom in "roughly" the right location (heh, you'd be surprised how hard this is for people to do this! But at least I could give her constant direction about this) and press record. While I was just providing "some" oversight (she called me "micromanaging" though! ha), and helped set up with the prep too (read: I did it all!).

Of course now we've got the option of 32bits, but I'd strongly recommend never doing that without checking in with post first.  

 

  

11 hours ago, Phil Connolly said:

The last time I was a films sound recordist I used a laptop, a Mk1 M-Box and Pro Tools as the recorder. Which was mega clunky, but we got good audio. 

Yikes. 

A laptop should never be used as the recorder.

UNLESS: you're a multi person sound department, so you can operate from a cart. But even then you'll only have your PC/Mac be one of the recorders, with either the master or backup recorder being a hardware based recorder such as a Sound Devices 788T / 970 / Deva / etc. 

You'll usually be running on your PC/Mac BoomRecorder or Metacorder, or perhaps maybe more recently it might be Reaper (ProTools is used only rarely, due to stability issues it can't be as trusted to be rock solid):

https://www.pokitec.com/products/BoomRecorder/
http://www.gallery.co.uk/metacorder/intro.html
https://www.reaper.fm/

Edited April 17, 2020 by David Peterson

[Phil Connolly]

5 hours ago, David Peterson said:

A laptop should never be used as the recorder.

Apart from the times when it crashed and ran out of batteries it was totally fine. The wooden "boom pole" was a much bigger issue to deal with. 

 

[Aapo Lettinen]

by my opinion, there is really no reason to cheap on sound equipment. Most of it lasts forever even in professional use and the technology does not get old so you can use the gear until it finally gives up after 20 or 30 years of use. 

the exception is wireless technology which tends to be garbage in all cases and may need to be updated regularly especially if the regulations change (they have banned frequencies couple of times which makes using old wireless gear illegal and everything had to be upgraded to newer versions. this is very expensive if you have multiple wireless sets).  Cables and connectors will break too as well as the antennas of wireless gear. But it is nothing like camera bodies which are like a stick of butter left in the sun, gets old in the blink of an eye and you'll need to buy a new one.

Any other gear may break as well if you let someone borrow it or rent it but that applies to pretty much every other kind of gear as well....

[David Peterson]

4 hours ago, Phil Connolly said:

Apart from the times when it crashed and ran out of batteries it was totally fine.

haha, totally fine....  aside from all those times it was disastrously awful and on fire! ?

Exactly, that's why people don't use it as their only/main recording setup on location for films. 

 

  

4 hours ago, aapo lettinen said:

the exception is wireless technology which tends to be garbage in all cases and may need to be updated regularly especially if the regulations change (they have banned frequencies couple of times which makes using old wireless gear illegal and everything had to be upgraded to newer versions. this is very expensive if you have multiple wireless sets).

Wireless is not "garbage in all cases". 

Professional audio wireless works excellently. As you'd expect from professional gear! 

The problem is too many people are not willing to pay for professional gear. (as this runs at retail to a couple of thousand dollars or more per channel of wireless audio)
  

4 hours ago, aapo lettinen said:

by my opinion, there is really no reason to cheap on sound equipment. Most of it lasts forever even in professional use and the technology does not get old so you can use the gear until it finally gives up after 20 or 30 years of use. 

Sound gear definitely needs to be updated more often than once every twenty or thirty years!!!

Sure, a few things such as microphones can last you for decades. But is this any different to the camera world, where they're using lenses many decades after they were first made?? That's pretty darn amazing longevity! 

But even microphones get much better over time, take for instance the ancient Sennheiser 416, we've had so many improvements and advancements since then! You'd could certainly pick a different shotgun as your main first pick. 

Or there are new microphones / techniques that didn't exist (or at least, didn't commercially exist) decades ago, like now you might want to use a SoundFields SPS200 or Rode NT-SF1 in some situations. 

Wireless technology has many light years ahead of where it was 30yrs ago, in so many ways, just massively massively better. That too should be constantly upgraded (even without the hassle of forced upgrades pushed upon us, due to the government selling off bandwidth that we now can't use). 

Likewise with recorders, I've got the latest Sound Devices 833 which just launched a few months ago, and is in many ways an improvement upon all the past models. Sure, there are people who are still trucking along with an old Sound Devices 788T (which is old, but nowhere close at all to 30yrs! Recording technology is again massively massively improved over 30yrs), but that 788T user is no different to someone who's still shooting with the old ARRI Alexa Classic. 

Edited April 17, 2020 by David Peterson

[Phil Connolly]

This is all getting very lardee-dah!! Back in the day my budget alternative to radio mics was to use a portable mini-disc recorder with wired lapel mic, hidden on the actor. Mono mode got you 148 mins per disk, so you'd just leave it recording and hope you got something usable.  When combined with your single K6/ME66 plugged directly into your PD150 camera - audio was recorded...

and sometimes it sounded fine... and for everything else there's ADR. 

[Aapo Lettinen]

6 hours ago, David Peterson said:

Wireless is not "garbage in all cases". 

Professional audio wireless works excellently. As you'd expect from professional gear! 

The problem is too many people are not willing to pay for professional gear. (as this runs at retail to a couple of thousand dollars or more per channel of wireless audio)

by my experience, wireless technology pretty much IS garbage. this includes both wireless video and wireless audio as well as most other types of wireless data like computer and cellphone related stuff. 

Maybe it is a bit subjective and maybe I have just had bad luck with all the wireless gear I've ever used (or maybe I am myself generating so much electromagnetic interference that the devices just freak out :D ) 

Paying 2000 or 5000 or 10 000 for a wireless mic kit does not make it "excellent working" and "absolutely reliable". For example I had some bad experiences with wireless lavalier kits costing from 2.5K to 5K a piece

[David Peterson]

4 hours ago, aapo lettinen said:

Paying 2000 or 5000 or 10 000 for a wireless mic kit does not make it "excellent working" and "absolutely reliable". For example I had some bad experiences with wireless lavalier kits costing from 2.5K to 5K a piece

When there are many thousands of people getting great results, all the way up to hollywood blockbusters with hundreds of millions of dollars budget riding on their performance, perhaps it isn't the tools but the user which is the problem?

Are you using the right frequency blocks for your region? Are you using the built in scanners and external scanners to check and determine the right frequencies to use? Are you doing intermod calculations for frequency coordinations? Is your gain structure right? etc