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[Bob Teorey]

Looking for a small outdoor sound system with a long throw. One division of our company offers standalone laser light shows for small fairs and festivals. Typically 500 to 1,000 people. Have used tripod mounted powered speakers. They can work just fine except the short/wide throw. Line array will be too large for our van and setup. My problem is most of my shows are in large fields bigger than a football field. With such a small crowd and with mostly families. I do not require that much sound. However I need long throws to reach them. Looking for solutions and ideas. 

[Don T. Williams]

Looking for a small outdoor sound system with a long throw. One division of our company offers standalone laser light shows for small fairs and festivals. Typically 500 to 1,000 people. Have used tripod mounted powered speakers. They can work just fine except the short/wide throw. Line array will be too large for our van and setup. My problem is most of my shows are in large fields bigger than a football field. With such a small crowd and with mostly families. I do not require that much sound. However I need long throws to reach them. Looking for solutions and ideas.

Read and follow the forum rules.  You must use your real first and last name.

[g'bye, Dick Rees]

Looking for a small outdoor sound system with a long throw. One division of our company offers standalone laser light shows for small fairs and festivals. Typically 500 to 1,000 people. Have used tripod mounted powered speakers. They can work just fine except the short/wide throw. Line array will be too large for our van and setup. My problem is most of my shows are in large fields bigger than a football field. With such a small crowd and with mostly families. I do not require that much sound. However I need long throws to reach them. Looking for solutions and ideas.

Reality check:

Whatever you decide to use, to achieve your stated goal in full will require more.  More (or much larger) speakers, set-up time, power and deployment rigging whether scaffold (least expensive) or towers.

PS

What you're talking about is output SPL over a defined area.  When you know what sound level you want at what distance, then you can begin to look for the speaker system to achieve it. 

And there is no such characteristic as "throw".  Physics is physics and sound falls off at a steady rate over distance no matter what.  How coherent the sound remains over that distance is the factor.  Speakers (or speaker systems) which have very high coherency are often characterized as having more "throw, but that's intelligibility, not sound level.

The step you're wanting to take is a big one...

[Cailen Waddell]

Dick has broadly addressed the technical points.

What's your budget?  If it's less than 5 figures, don't try, how much more than that will determine how close you can get to achieving your goal.

500 people spread over a square mile is different than 1000 on a field.   How far is the first audience member from the speakers, how far is the farthest?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Dave Garoutte]

What are you amplifying?
Music, speech?
The normal way to do low volume long distance is with delay speakers.
This does require power and wiring (or wireless) to get to them and more speakers.
As well as a way to time delay the output.

[Bob Teorey]

So I am at a fair performing my laser show. I rented 4 QSC K12s. They were just OK. Now I rented 4 JBL PRX815s. Better sound and more punch. Now I am thinking of buying 8 of the JBL PRX815s as they should do the trick. Considered the JBL PRX835 as it is two-way vs three-way. At almost twice the price not worth it to me.

Any other suggestions that would be better than the JBL PRX815s, but at a similar price and package.

[Don T. Williams]

So I am at a fair performing my laser show. I rented 4 QSC K12s. They were just OK. Now I rented 4 JBL PRX815s. Better sound and more punch. Now I am thinking of buying 8 of the JBL PRX815s as they should do the trick. Considered the JBL PRX835 as it is two-way vs three-way. At almost twice the price not worth it to me.

Any other suggestions that would be better than the JBL PRX815s, but at a similar price and package.

I'm wondering how you are deploying the loudspeakers?  Two stacks of two or spread along a line? It may not make a difference in which brand you choose, but it could.

Yamaha, Turbosound, and Alto are some of the names that pop up a lot in this forum as reliable products and competitors for JBL and QSC.  The JBL SRX815A is considered to be a very high performance product in the active speaker category.  There are certainly others.

[g'bye, Dick Rees]

So I am at a fair performing my laser show. I rented 4 QSC K12s. They were just OK. Now I rented 4 JBL PRX815s. Better sound and more punch. Now I am thinking of buying 8 of the JBL PRX815s as they should do the trick. Considered the JBL PRX835 as it is two-way vs three-way. At almost twice the price not worth it to me.

Any other suggestions that would be better than the JBL PRX815s, but at a similar price and package.

The notion that doubling the number of this type of box will be "twice as good" or even "better" is a common fallacy.  You're looking at $6500.00 for 450 pounds of boxes designed to be used in pairs, not blocks.  They are not arrayable. 

For around the same money you could get a pair of serious Danley boxes which will go farther, sound better and minimize setup logistics with greater  functional output than 8 hobbyist PA speakers.

[Jeff Lelko]

4 K12s vs a crowd of 1000 outdoors?  Even if the result was only truly "okay", you might be overestimating your needs.  Logic tells me though that you might be underestimating them instead (and this is coming from a QSC HPR user doing outdoor shows).  Dick's advice is spot on.  What are you doing for subwoofers? 

[Bob Teorey]

I have 2 sets of 10' scaffold towers. 2 a side then hope for 4 a side. I already own 2 lab subs with my old sound system. Wont fit in my Sprinter van. Thats why I want powered speakers. I have just enough room for 8 tops. No room for a amp rack and subs. Can you be more specific on Danley as there seems to be lots of options.

The past nights were only about 200 people. That is why what I had was OK. For larger I need more.