What PA should I buy? Why with a mixer?

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musicsdarkangel

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hey, uhm, i'm looking at PA's, and I noticed, many of them have mixers on top of them in this Musician's Friend magazine (Rogue PRM1208). Well, I have a band and we just play at local places, yes we play loud, but not professional loud, just distorted band in local area loud. What PA's would anyone recommend to me?? SHould I get one with a mixer?? I'm preferably going for under 500 bucks. Please help!
 
i dont know how much "loud" you will get for $500. the thing with those mixer-amps is convience, not power. if you were playing acoustic guitar and singing, in a small to medium sized room, you would have no problems. but if you are going for loud, i think you would need something bigger.
as for a mixer, you will definatly need one. they allow you to adjust the levels for your sources, and fix room frequency problems with the EQ. as i mentioned before, sometimes the mixer is built in to the poweramp. these are usually not as good as a seperate mixer and seperate amp. just my 2 cents, hope it helps!!! :)
Matt
 
hmmm

Alright, lets see, my band is playing at 100 watt amps at local places, and on my Crate GX212, its about a third the way to the top of the volume. What wattage would you suggest?

i have NO clue heh. Uhm, if I'm not too brilliant, should I just get a PA with the built in mixer?
 
Yamaha makes some decent PA heads. They have a 200Watt head w/6 channels, I believe its the EMX620. It sounds pretty clean. It sells for $299.99 at GC. If you can afford about $600.00, you can get the mackie powered heads, which come with their EMAC effects (pretty nice). The mackie head is much nicer, but the yamaha head will do the trick.
 
uh

is that mixer and amp??

cause i guess i need both
 
Yea - Its essentially a powered mixer. Its good for practicing or small coffee shop gigs.
 
and if you are cranking 100 watt guitar amps....you *might* hear the singer if they sing loud....not to mention the drummer trying to keep up too with the guitars. If the drums blend good with the guitars (no mics anywhere), a portable PA (amp/mixer) and a pair of speakers on stands (to project best) would probably serve your needs for a couple of vocal mics ONLY.
 
check out www.speakerhole.com

I ordered a pair of speakers from them, and they're REALLY nice...

As for an amp and mixer, welll....if you're doing alot of recording at home, i'd get an unpowed mixer and then a separate power amp. That way, you can use both the amp and mixer for recording AND for live gigs...save that cash for other musical nonsense ;)

Anyway, check out Speakerhole for the speakers...good stuff...

***Justin***
 
Any PA needs speakers, something to power the speakers, and something to feed the amp a line-level signal. If you were ONLY going to feed your PA a single mic you could use a mic pre-amp, but usually a mixer is pretty much a requirement.

First, set your budget (in your case $500). Then the questions to ask are -

1) How many mixer channels do I need (i.e. how many mics and instrument sources) and/or can I afford?
2) How LOUD do I need to be?
then (once you have answered the first two)
3) Do I get a combo mixer/amp, or seperate units? Or do I get an entire packaged system with speakers?
4) If buying speakers seperate, what will work well with the mixer/amp I picked out?

Now I agree you will be hard-pressed to find anything new in a store for $500. Used stuff might be the way to go. Since you are starting out on a tight budget, and it sounds like you guys have decent guitar and base amps already, you might want to concentrate on finding a PA for vocals only. A lot of bands do this starting out. Also you will probably want to look at a combo mixer/amp. As JDavis & Cave Dweller said, a seperate mixer and amp is more flexable, but you will get more bang per buck with a combo. Peavy makes some decent cheap combo units. Check Guitar Center, somtimes they have sales on beginner PA packages that include mixer/amp and speakers.

Also remember that if you do well and start getting large bar gigs a lot of bars have their own PA equipment, or you can rent it per gig. Right now look for something for doing house parties or street corners and such.

Good luck...
 
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