Powered Speakers

Gary Blanchard

Gary Blanchard

beloved, local musician
I have played a couple of gigs where the PA included powered speakers. Both were outdoor gigs in August, both 5 - 8 hour festival gigs. In both cases, they had trouble with the speakers by the end of the gig. Is this unusual? Would the heat play a role, or the length of use?

I have been considering 2 powered speakers with a passive mixer, but have been reluctant due to the above related experiences. Please share your wisdom and knowledge with me!
 
We've gigged with Mackie SRM450 powered speakers for about 10 years or more. We have had them go into thermal shutdown a few times when playing outside on a hot day when the speakers are in direct sunlight.

And then I completely smoked one of them at Pragestock. :facepalm:

That said, with the amount of abuse we've put them through over the years, I've been very happy with them, and I think that I can probably get the blown one working again with a new woofer, fuse, and possibly some new filter caps.
 
I rarely do outdoor gigs, and certainly don't tax my system. I'd need schooling on the hookup, but am really leaning in this direction. The all-in-one Peavey Escort is a good idea in theory, but not so good in practice.

I'm open to suggestions as to just how cheap I can go without having crappy sound.
 
Gary Blanchard said:
I rarely do outdoor gigs, and certainly don't tax my system. I'd need schooling on the hookup, but am really leaning in this direction. The all-in-one Peavey Escort is a good idea in theory, but not so good in practice.

I'm open to suggestions as to just how cheap I can go without having crappy sound.
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The ones we use hook up with mic cables. A lot of the newer ones have several different input options.

We run 1/4" lacks out of the mixer to an EQ and then 1/4" to XLR from the EQ to the speakers. Or that's how we used to do it. I think Lino put a new EQ in a while back that actually has XLR outs on it, but I'm not sure. When we use the sub, the mic cables run from EQ to sub, then from sub to tops.

I've also got a Yamaha mixer that has XLR main outs on it.

As for the speakers, I think ours are 450 watts each with a 12" woofer and a high frequency driver. The sub is a 15" speaker running 500 watts IIRC. That's plenty of punch for rock music in a medium sized bar. A little lacking in the low end if anything, but only a little. It's a little underpowered for outdoor gigs, but we generally just throw two more powered tops in the mix for outdoor stuff (between the three of us we have 4 Mackies and 2 JBL powered speakers).

A pair of these would probably be more than enough for the stuff you do.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/pro-audio/mackie-thump-series-th-12a-12-2-way-powered-loudspeaker
 
Heat can be bad whether it's powered speakers or a separate amp. The one plus about a rack of amps is you can set a big fan next to it and add to the cooling, but when it's really muggy and humid, that won't help much.

One tip I researched with powered speakers is not to buy ones that only have as much power as you need.... get bigger ones and then run them at 75% instead of wide open. That way you have some room to work with and the amps in the speakers aren't over-taxed.
 
baimun said:
Heat can be bad whether it's powered speakers or a separate amp. The one plus about a rack of amps is you can set a big fan next to it and add to the cooling, but when it's really muggy and humid, that won't help much.

One tip I researched with powered speakers is not to buy ones that only have as much power as you need.... get bigger ones and then run them at 75% instead of wide open. That way you have some room to work with and the amps in the speakers aren't over-taxed.
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True. We never turn the Mackies up over about 75%, and usually closer to 50% for indoor gigs.
 
baimun said:
One tip I researched with powered speakers is not to buy ones that only have as much power as you need.... get bigger ones and then run them at 75% instead of wide open. That way you have some room to work with and the amps in the speakers aren't over-taxed.
Click to expand...

Shouldn't be hard for me; I don't use much volume when I play. That makes sense, though.
 
Gary Blanchard said:
I rarely do outdoor gigs, and certainly don't tax my system. I'd need schooling on the hookup, but am really leaning in this direction. The all-in-one Peavey Escort is a good idea in theory, but not so good in practice.

I'm open to suggestions as to just how cheap I can go without having crappy sound.
Click to expand...

Gary - with what you are doing I would really lean heavily towards getting one of the Bose L1 systems or something along those lines. They are not cheap and might be out of your reach, but they a light and compact but really do sound very good. Especially in the kind of context you play in all the time. Fishman has a similar type of system.
 
Denverdave said:
Gary - with what you are doing I would really lean heavily towards getting one of the Bose L1 systems or something along those lines. They are not cheap and might be out of your reach, but they a light and compact but really do sound very good. Especially in the kind of context you play in all the time. Fishman has a similar type of system.
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I have been looking at the Fishman, but it really is out of my budget. I sometimes have a third mic, for a poet or vocals; the Fishman only has two inputs. Thankfully the Fishman does have two XLR inputs, since I do not use onboard electronics.
 
We have the same speakers as Prages does for the All Star Trio (they belong to Dominic) and we've never had a problem with them. Dom wants to upgrade to a set of QSC speakers but the Mackies have been bulletproof. I wouldn't buy another PA setup with passive speakers myself.
 
Gary Blanchard said:
I have been looking at the Fishman, but it really is out of my budget. I sometimes have a third mic, for a poet or vocals; the Fishman only has two inputs. Thankfully the Fishman does have two XLR inputs, since I do not use onboard electronics.
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Yes, but if you already have a small mixer, you could run the output of the mixer to the inputs on the Fishman and be set.


I have heard that unit and I think I like it better than the Bose.
 
baimun said:
Yes, but if you already have a small mixer, you could run the output of the mixer to the inputs on the Fishman and be set.


I have heard that unit and I think I like it better than the Bose.
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Hmmm...

Maybe if I turn a few tricks at the Senior Center...
 
So, what about this one?

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00721DMSC/ref=olp_product_details?ie=UTF8&me=&seller=

31LFMUrz8CL.jpg
 
baimun said:
Yes, but if you already have a small mixer, you could run the output of the mixer to the inputs on the Fishman and be set.


I have heard that unit and I think I like it better than the Bose.
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Exactly what I was going to say.
 
Another one to consider is the Yamaha Stagepass system.

http://www.zzounds.com/item--YAMSTAGEPAS300

You can use it as a pair of powered speakers (the mixer fits in the back of the master speaker and powers it and the slave speaker) or you could pull the mixer out of the back of the speaker and control it next to you, gives you the extra channels, or you could use one as a main and one as a monitor.

And the 500 is the same thing but bigger with more power (and is still cheaper than a new Fishman)

http://www.zzounds.com/item--YAMSTAGEPAS500

STAGEPAS%20500_enl.jpg
 
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With some equipment, it's ok to go a cheaper route. But if you're looking at powered speakers, you will be very glad if you get something powerful and reliable. The Mackies are a good way to go. Yamaha makes some good powered speakers. I don't think I could recommend in good conscience that you go any cheaper than that.
 
Anyone using Mackie Thumps?

I'm thinking about replacing my passive system for powered and these seem to get a lot of good press.

It's just for DJing so really doesn't need to be as powerful as a band PA (I think :shrug:) for bigger gigs (200+ and corp) I could keep the passive subs and run them off a single power amp.
 
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