Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Bret Welstead]

I need some help. I play in a children's music band. We play a few dozen gigs a year for audiences of varying sizes (as small as 10 and as large as 1000). Most gigs are around 50-100 kids plus parents.

We have a Yahama EMX 5000-20 Powered Mixer. It serves our needs well. We run the mixer with the 500+500W power amp selection. We run the MONO/AUX1 output setting, with MONO (Speakers A) going to the mains, and AUX1 (Speakers B) going to the monitors.

We have decided to look for some lighter speakers. I think we have Yahama S112 speakers. They are HEAVY. We'd like something lighter. I think we want to keep with 12" speakers.

We also recently started incorporating floor wedges, which we borrow currently. Sometimes we are a 3-piece band, sometimes a 4-piece. It would be nice if we all had a wedge. I imagine we could go with 10" speakers for floor wedges.

SO... My question is: how do I determine the right speakers for our 2 mains, and our 3-4 wedges? I get confused when we start getting into watts, ohms, peak, recommended, etc. and I feel like different people recommend different things. What wattage and ohms should I be looking for on the speakers, and on the wedges?

EMX General specs:

Maximum output power
500W+500W/4ohms @ 0.5% THD at 1 kHz
325W+325W/8ohms @ 0.5% THD at 1 kHz

Output specs:

Speakers (A,B)
Actual source impedance: 0.1ohms
For use with nominal: 4/8ohms Speakers
Nominal Output level: 100W/4ohms
Max. before clipping Output level: 500W/4ohms

Can someone help me? Thanks.

[Scott Holtzman]

I need some help. I play in a children's music band. We play a few dozen gigs a year for audiences of varying sizes (as small as 10 and as large as 1000). Most gigs are around 50-100 kids plus parents.

We have a Yahama EMX 5000-20 Powered Mixer. It serves our needs well. We run the mixer with the 500+500W power amp selection. We run the MONO/AUX1 output setting, with MONO (Speakers A) going to the mains, and AUX1 (Speakers B) going to the monitors.

We have decided to look for some lighter speakers. I think we have Yahama S112 speakers. They are HEAVY. We'd like something lighter. I think we want to keep with 12" speakers.

We also recently started incorporating floor wedges, which we borrow currently. Sometimes we are a 3-piece band, sometimes a 4-piece. It would be nice if we all had a wedge. I imagine we could go with 10" speakers for floor wedges.

SO... My question is: how do I determine the right speakers for our 2 mains, and our 3-4 wedges? I get confused when we start getting into watts, ohms, peak, recommended, etc. and I feel like different people recommend different things. What wattage and ohms should I be looking for on the speakers, and on the wedges?

EMX General specs:

Maximum output power
500W+500W/4ohms @ 0.5% THD at 1 kHz
325W+325W/8ohms @ 0.5% THD at 1 kHz

Output specs:

Speakers (A,B)
Actual source impedance: 0.1ohms
For use with nominal: 4/8ohms Speakers
Nominal Output level: 100W/4ohms
Max. before clipping Output level: 500W/4ohms

Can someone help me? Thanks.

What that is saying is that the amp will produce 500w when presented with a four ohm impedance.  Many speakers are 8 ohms so two in parallel is 4 ohms (series connection is additive, parallel reduces).

So you should shoot for two speakers with about 300-350 watts of power handling. 

I am surprised that you can do 1000 folks with this small a system, maybe the requirements are different for this group.

What instruments do you run through the speakers and the monitors?  That would be a good place to start.

Do you have a budget?

[Ray Aberle]

Welcome aboard, Bret!

So the S112 speakers are 43 pounds each -- do you have a target weight in mind? I think you are going to be hard pressed to get much lighter, especially keeping the same quality that you are accustomed to.

Do you have a budget in mind?

Do you want to stick to passive monitors, or are active (powered) an option, using the Aux 1/2 outputs on your mixer?

To be candid, I think you are going to be hard pressed to find passive monitors that will sound good, and be able to work within the capabilities of your powered mixer...

(Scott posted first! What he said, too, about shows up to 1,000 people...)

More about monitors: If you run everything off of one output/AUX send, that's one. mix. Everyone hears the same thing. Which means you can't have "more me" in your wedge-- everyone gets everything. Worse, any feedback introduced by poor gain structure or speaker positioning is then reproduced through everyone's wedges. It'll be super difficult to find the cause of that kind of feedback without being able to narrow it down to which wedge is the problem. Then, if you want to patch an EQ onto that monitor send, changes in one place may cause a new problem to crop up with another microphone. In short, you'll be chasing the problem everywhere without actually fixing it...

-Ray

[Bret Welstead]

What instruments do you run through the speakers and the monitors?  That would be a good place to start.

Do you have a budget?

Instruments: acoustic guitar, keyboard, electronic drums, bass guitar, ukulele, iPod (tracks) and 4 vocals.

Budget is probably around $750.

[Ray Aberle]

Instruments: acoustic guitar, keyboard, electronic drums, bass guitar, ukulele, iPod (tracks) and 4 vocals.

Budget is probably around $750.

$750 for all 5-6 speakers? Probably.... not going to happen...  I mean, you CAN get some bottom shelf stuff (think Kustom or similar), but you'll be replacing them soon when they either fail or you find yourself unsatisfied with how they sound. As Tim would say, Buy Once, Cry Once.

Now, you can probably get a couple acceptable wedges for that amount-- and then either just deal with the 43# mains, or have some teenager whip 'em up onto stands for you.

[Bret Welstead]

So the S112 speakers are 43 pounds each -- do you have a target weight in mind? I think you are going to be hard pressed to get much lighter, especially keeping the same quality that you are accustomed to.

Sorry... we must have the 115s, then. There's no way those are 43 pound speakers. Closer to 60, I'm guessing.

More about monitors: If you run everything off of one output/AUX send, that's one. mix. Everyone hears the same thing. Which means you can't have "more me" in your wedge-- everyone gets everything. Worse, any feedback introduced by poor gain structure or speaker positioning is then reproduced through everyone's wedges. It'll be super difficult to find the cause of that kind of feedback without being able to narrow it down to which wedge is the problem. Then, if you want to patch an EQ onto that monitor send, changes in one place may cause a new problem to crop up with another microphone. In short, you'll be chasing the problem everywhere without actually fixing it...

I hadn't considered that... We could get 2 monitor mixes out of the Aux 1 and Aux 2 sends to some powered monitors, and then run the mains with the power from the amp? That would be nice.    Yes, right now we've got one monitor mix, and one house mix. Leaves much to be desired.

[Bret Welstead]

$750 for all 5-6 speakers? Probably.... not going to happen...  I mean, you CAN get some bottom shelf stuff (think Kustom or similar), but you'll be replacing them soon when they either fail or you find yourself unsatisfied with how they sound. As Tim would say, Buy Once, Cry Once.

Now, you can probably get a couple acceptable wedges for that amount-- and then either just deal with the 43# mains, or have some teenager whip 'em up onto stands for you.

Good to know. I'll talk with the guys. I don't mind the heavy speakers, but I'm the new guys and haven't been lugging the gear around as long as they have. Maybe we deal with it for a while, though, and spend on some wedges.

[Scott Holtzman]

Good to know. I'll talk with the guys. I don't mind the heavy speakers, but I'm the new guys and haven't been lugging the gear around as long as they have. Maybe we deal with it for a while, though, and spend on some wedges.

Bret you would have to spend a lot more than $750.00 on the mains to get better than what you have.  You don't want to go backward.

Also TS112A's are about $270 and that is the lowest end powered I would go.  It's a decent box.  You could stretch budget to get 4, run two monitor mixes (woo hoo) and pickup 3db more headroom on your mains (to 1000 watts).

 

[Bret Welstead]

Bret you would have to spend a lot more than $750.00 on the mains to get better than what you have.  You don't want to go backward.

Also TS112A's are about $270 and that is the lowest end powered I would go.  It's a decent box.  You could stretch budget to get 4, run two monitor mixes (woo hoo) and pickup 3db more headroom on your mains (to 1000 watts).

Good stuff, all. Thanks so much! This has been a big help already. I've obviously got a bit to learn, so I'm glad I wandered onto this forum. Thank you, guys!

[Scott Olewiler]

Bret you would have to spend a lot more than $750.00 on the mains to get better than what you have.  You don't want to go backward.

Also TS112A's are about $270 and that is the lowest end powered I would go.  It's a decent box.  You could stretch budget to get 4, run two monitor mixes (woo hoo) and pickup 3db more headroom on your mains (to 1000 watts).

Besides what Scott said about getting the Altos (which everyone who has them seems to love), you really can't be safely loading (3-4) 8 ohms speakers on one side of the amp in your mixer anyways. 2 is really the limit per side  as that puts you at a 4 ohm load. 

[ProSoundWeb Community]