help choosing the right power amp (live)

  • Thread starter Thread starter viva_zapata74
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I am curious Ford Van, what kind of PA stuff does Phoenix light and Sound run? I could not find any actual details on the website...
 
xstatic said:
I am curious Ford Van, what kind of PA stuff does Phoenix light and Sound run? I could not find any actual details on the website...
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Consoles are all Allen and Heath

Ashley EQ's and X-over's

Crown Macrotech for FOH, Powerbase series for monitors.

JBL components (except subs which are EV) in custom made boxes. 4 way systems.

Lexicon effects usually. Behringer dynamic processors. A few dbx processors for good measure! The usual assortment of Beta 58's, 57's, AT 4041's, D112's, a few Audix mics for punk shows (I HATE the D series stuff!). Even some c3000b's if I care to whip them out.

Just good standard stuff. Our base "festival" systems are about 14k FOH, and around 6k for monitors, up to 8 mixes, but usually 4-6. If we needed to go bigger, we could combine systems.

The owner about two years ago started getting away from the festival thing. Too hard to compete in that. Most of the systems are now club installs. He is looking to sell off the company in the next year or two. There is NO WAY I would buy it! :)
 
Cool. The website made the company sound a little bigger:( Right now I am running custom RCF loaded boxes and a bunch of Turbosound (Floodlights and some TXD). Console wise I do have an Allen Heath, but its an ML5000 and I have a Midas Verona. I work at a club though that has a Meyer MICA array installed with a pair of yamaha M7 consoles. Talk about an easy room;)
 
xstatic said:
Cool. The website made the company sound a little bigger:( Right now I am running custom RCF loaded boxes and a bunch of Turbosound (Floodlights and some TXD). Console wise I do have an Allen Heath, but its an ML5000 and I have a Midas Verona. I work at a club though that has a Meyer MICA array installed with a pair of yamaha M7 consoles. Talk about an easy room;)
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Isn't that the idea of a website, to oversell your product? I am glad I accomplished that! :)

I have mixed some fairly big time artists on our systems with no complaints! Around these parts, it comes down to money issues. We got along fine for quite a while with somewhat "second tier" gear because the three engineers are VERY experienced! All three of us have mixed several dozen big time artists. Our systems always work too! The owner was a bench tech and really stays on top of the gear. He can't mix to save his life, but he understands about making solid connections, and keeping stuff clean.
 
guys, thank you very much!

As I understand it, I should get one poweramp that pushes out (per stereo channel) about twice the declared power of the speakers (which is an average...) and be vey careful about the final level of the mixer's master output going into the poweramp

I'll read your posts again more thoroughly when I get off the hook (yes, me weekend warrior :-) ) because I think you guys know your stuff very well

cheers
 
Be careful about setting levels at EVERY gain stage before the amp! But, for the best signal to noise ratio, you want to get the most gain as early as you can in the signal chain.
 
Ford Van said:
You should get an amp that is capable of the Peak wattage of the speaker.

The safe range was suggested earlier, 2 to 3 times the RMS of the speakers. In this case, that would be about a 500 watt per channel amp (rated at the same ohm load as the speaker cabinet). You could go higher, but then you need to be VERY careful
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the peak is W900 according to manufacturer. The "safe range" could be 500/600 W then.

Yeah, it takes some reading and thinking to get your head around the fact that underpowering is more dangerous to the speakers than overpowering...

I had a chance to have a good look at the PA setup of the cabaret band I played for a good few years and I remember the amplifier always was at full blast, both channels... don't even remember if there were one or two amplifiers, but the black box which I assume was the poweramp was definitely at full blast. Now that conveys an image of having the amp shooting out max and we control everything else through the levels and, ultimately, through the master output on the mixer. Right? :-)

Now I can assure you guys that the dude who was doing the sound in that band knew and knows the stuff inside out, man. But of all the things he taught me on the subject I don't remember this one!

Anyway, if I got cusebassman right, I also understand that no damage is done to the speakers if there's a X2 300W @ 8 Ohm at full blast powering a set of two 225 W @ 8 Ohm speakers.... or is there? Can't get my head around it

Ford Van and pretty much everyone else assure me that more damage is done when I, say, put the poweramp's controls down at 2 and I shoot the mixer's master output at full blast. mmhh.. did I get that right?

the safe range sounds good, guys. 500 W @ 8 Ohm it is!

thank you very much
 
after much pondering...

... and good advice from this forum, I went for:

QSC RMX 2450, Power amp, 19"/2HE, 2 x 750W/4 Ohm, 2 x 500
W/8 Ohm, 2 x 1200W/2 Ohm, 1 x 2400W/4 Ohm bridge

666 eurobucks

cheerz!
 
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