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Powered pa speakers or passive?

alaskaleftybass

alaskaleftybass

Will Hanbury, Jr.
In Memoriam
Mar 21, 2012
9,920
22,352
Sitka, Alaska
#1
I've noticed all over the internet stores the explosion of Class D amplification, and it's heralded as the Next Big Thing, if not already.

I own a p.a. system with a powered mixer and passive mains and monitors. Although they sound nice, I had a chance to try a 15" powered pa speaker with Class D amplification and a sophisticated crossover, feedback control, and equalization. The thump was unreal for the size and weight of the speaker.

I don't know how many more pa's I'm going to buy, but if I were to sell my system and move to the powered speakers, I guess I'm asking is that something you'd do? Is Class D powered active speakers with non powered mixers the wave of the future/already here?

Thanks :bassist:
 
#2
Powered speakers and digital boards will be the norm soon. Both have a lot of upsides and very few downsides. With powered speakers, there's no rack of amps (on larger PA's). And with digital boards, there's no rack of effects, crossovers, compressors, gates, EQ's etc. And you can store bands and venues in the memory of the board. It's a win win. I would do it (again) in a heartbeat. In your situation, I would probably still get an analog mixer with a couple of effects for now. The fact that you use a powered head tells me you are talking about a pretty small operation. Unless money is no object, a digital board wouldn't be worth the money in that case. But we went from a huge box truck with thousands of pounds of gear to a regular van that holds a PA that will do anything the huge boxes and racks would do. No contest.
 
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#5
alaskaleftybass said:
Thanks two fingers. I got my wife to agree to a new pa system for me, woo hoo, and I'm going to go this direction. Yes, very small operation, but if she's opening the checkbook I'm looking at the digital mixers too lol.....
Click to expand...

If the opportunity comes up, get a look at the Presonus StudioLive. That board is a real game-changer. Looks expensive on the face of it, but once you hear how good it sounds, and realize how much virtual rack gear is in there, it's a real bargain.
 
#6
I will eventually go the Presonus route. When you compare the price of one of their boards to a good analog board, eq, crossover, effects, compressor, etc, their isn't much of a price difference, if any. Actually, a little quick math makes the Presonus cheaper. With IEMs and powered speakers, load-in/out would be a breeze.
 
#7
For most local bar/club setups that 99% of working musicians play, powered IMO is the way to go. Obviously you're not gonna link up a whole lotta powered JBL EONS for Wembley Stadium gigs, but if I ever buy one I'll get the Crown-powered JBL PRX stuff. My last cover band had 'em w/ the 118 subs and 215 mains and they were just awesome. Add a DriveRack and you're set.
 
#8
If you can get by with 12 mic pres then check out the Presonus studiolive 16.0.2. Very compact in size with lots of features. You have the ability to have 4 monitor mixes. The only downside is no graphic EQs for the monitors. The 16.4.2 has 16 mic channels and the ability to do 6 monitor mixes. It also has Graphic EQs for the monitors. For speakers look at JBL PRX, QSC, Yamaha DXR or DSR, EV Live x.
 
#9
With the current (and I expect future) gas prices, it only makes sense to go with gear that's as self-contained as possible. If you're in a situation where you have to supply your own P.A. all or most of the time, self powered cabs and a digital board warrant serious consideration. This summer my band downsized its trailer (which meant downsizing our P.A. and backline) and our gas mileage went up 50% which on some of the trips we take can translate to a couple hundred extra dollars in our pocket that didn't go into the gas tank.
 
#10
Lots of great suggestions here appreciated. I think I'm going to go the digital route, although my PA system is paid for and here, everyone I talk to in town says they're seeing stacks of passive speakers retired to the corners of garages.
 
#12
I've been mixing on the 16.4.2 for 6 months and there is no way I'd go back. One of my bands, the bandleader owns the a and insists on using it. Love the guy, love the band, cringe every time I hear that PA though. Hopefully in time he'll figure it out...

I mixed a 6 piece indie rock thing last weekend. Archtop guitar, violin, accordian all on DI's, bass, drums, vocalist. All told, 4 lead voices. 3 monitor mixes. The bandleader owns a 16.4.2 so I brought DI's, stage snake, a couple of mic's. It was close quarters and not quiet so i wanted the higher feedback rejection of OM7's on the voices. I also brought my Macbook and Ipad. Once we had the monitor mixes eq'd and roughed in, I did everything else from out front on the iPad... Board remained on stage.

The 16.4.2 is a way better board for me than the 16.0.2. I need those aux mixes and eq's... The 16.0.2 is really oriented at singles and duo's that are flying in key's and drum's, etc through midi. Nice board but too limited and specialized for general sound reinforcement. Consider that the 16.4.2 has 8 30 band EQ's and around 24 compressors on it the for under 2 grand... Hell, you can't buy the equivalent outboard gear for the cost of the board - not even close and then you'd still have to own a truck to move all that...

I cut two racks of outbord gear out of my carry with the 16.4.2. To be fari, 1 was my old power rack that also housed the crossover and limiters for the mains as well as power.

The there is it's capability as an audio interface. While the mac is letting me remote control the board, it can also capture all 16 inputs plus the sub's and mains to .wav which you can then edit and remix to your satisfaction or pass off to someone else who can...

So yeah... Digital mixing.
As far as powered speaks go, i went from passive Mackies on top of fearful subs to the QSC K series tops on KSub. I also went Mackie powered for monitors. I re did my power cabling as well buying two multi outlet Rigid extension cords. A 50 and a 25. They each have an outlet ever 6 or 8 feet. The 50 powers the front of the stage and FOH and LED lights. The 25 footer does the back line with a couple of outlet bars.

I hear good things about the JBL PRX as well but QSC has been like a rock for me over the years. I just don't find any reason to stray...

Th whole setup goes up and down much, much faster and cleaner than my old rig and beats the crap out of it sound quality wise as well...
 
#13
I use JBL PRX cabs and a PreSonus 16.4.2. What's cool about the PreSonus is you can record all 16 channels separately into a computer. If you record your gig, you can go back in and remix and EQ everything and get some really decent live recordings. The16.4.2 can be bought for under $1,700.

The only inconvenience with powered speakers is that you have to run two cables to them. Really, no big deal, but just sayin'. We got some 25-foot IEC power cables that work well. Somebody makes cables that incorporate the power cable and signal cable into one unit. I've never tried those.
 
#15
About digital mixers... so no one is bothered by having to scroll through menus and submenus to get at the place where one can adjust what needs to be adjusted? All this while trying continue playing a live show? (I've worked with a Yamaha 01V on a cruise gig, and that was a PITA. It was not ours, and we did not know how to operate it properly. An analogue mixer would have been simpler for us.)

About the Presonus Live lines, does one need to have a host computers in order to do the ipad/ipod touch/iphone control? (It seems to be so. I hope they change that in a future version. They could make a wifi AP dongle or something. It seems to dull the competitive advantage it has over other boards, since if the laptop is there, one can just run all the effects from the computer DAW, meaning that many multi-channel firewire mixer-solution will do similar things.)

And about that, no one worries where the firewire 400 port will be in 10 years? It came out in 1999, FW 800 came out a few years later. Now Apple is all about Thunderbolt, sure there are adapters, but do they work with 100% reliability? Will it be supported in a mere 10 years? (a decade is nothing for a 1/4" or XLR connection format, but for anything computer digital it's a long time.) Analogue mixers have not really changed in decades, are easy to fix if damaged. What happens if you spill beer on a digital board? Is it toast? Can one clean it like an analogue board? How is it affected by smoky rooms, or high humidity conditions?

I'm just wondering...

Are digital mixers like digital multi-effects pedal boards? 400 sounds in a little box, but none of them are great? Better off with 3-4 high quality analogue pedals that actually sound great?

Just asking, I was considering an analogue board, was turned off by the price of the digital boards, but am now reconsidering, if the digital boards can actually do what the advertisements say they can do.
 
#17
The presonus forum has folks using thunderbolt to FW400 w/o problems.

Yes you need a host for the remote iPad. Sub-menu's ? That is exactly why you implement the computer and the ipad. Well that and the RtA and Spetrum Analyzer... I'm using a Mavbook that I bought off CL. 2.4 ghz early 2008 model. $250. I replaced the battery, added 2 gig and a 250 g SSd... I'm just about $500 into the computer. Sets up in 2 minutes and works flawlessly. I am so hooked on this setup...

I'm adding a Mac Mini into my studio setup, just waiting for the announcement Tuesday before ordering...
 

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