Sennheiser XSW-D XLR Base Set

I use a pair of Lucas Nano 608i's to provide PA for a church worship team. The system works great and I wanted to make it super quick to set by replacing the cabling with wireless units.

When choosing the wireless components, the BIG question I had was: "Will these 2.4Ghz wireless units operate correctly when the receivers are plugged into the mixer in very close proximity to each other"?

I read many reviews, watched loads of YouTube reviews, spoke to techy people, and yet I could not find an answer which would give me confidence that it would work. So I bought five Sennheiser XSW-D Base Sets to try it out for myself.

After charging all the XSW-D units and learning about the function of the single button and LED on each unit, I plugged the receivers into the mixer XLR sockets, plugged the transmitters onto SM58 microphones, and it all works great. It could not be simpler.

I personally cannot tell the difference between the wireless versus cable performance. I’m really impressed with both the simplicity and performance of the XSW-D units, and excited to use them for real with the worship group. I can now set up the two portable Lucas Nano 608i's, with singers and instruments and be ready to go in minutes.

I also feed a separate guitar signal into the mixer using a 2.4Ghz Line6 G50, and everything works without any issue.

Each unit can operate for up to five hours on a charge, which is plenty for our worship group. However, to provide 100% confidence on it's first live outing, I will provide each singer with a K&M Smartphone holder mounted to their mic stand, to hold a VARTA Powerbank, with a short USBA-C lead to connect the VARTA to the Sennheiser XSW-D Transmitter. And similarly, I'll use a powered USB hub at the receiver side.

(I’ve since learned that a maximum of five XSW-D transmitter / receiver pairs can be used at the same time. I have asked Sennheiser if this is literally a system limit, or if it is the number that would guarantee a good performance. I’ll update when I get a response.)

I've used this with my Sennheiser E945 and it's just fantastic. I've tested it first during a rehearsal and then on the stage. In both cases it performed really well and I haven't noticed any dropouts even when it was in a really noisy environment (lots of Wi-Fi routers). The sound is clear and without any interference.

It's really easy to use, you just click a button on both devices and they pair. Altough it's mainly made of plastic it feels pretty sturdy.

I can't tell much about the battery life as our gigs are usually about 1 hour long and I haven't tested it all the way down to 0 %. A better battery indication would be good though.