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RE: Pro Speaker recommendation for small dance club

Posted by Inmate51 on June 1, 2011 at 22:09:29

In Reply to: Pro Speaker recommendation for small dance club posted by Qhome on June 1, 2011 at 19:02:54:

It's late, and I just got back from Chicago, but I looked at your question, and wanted to offer some thoughts.

"I have also experienced systems in clubs that were great and some that were horrible and cant pin these to any particular brand. I know all to well that setup and environment make a difference."

That is a significant statement.

Despite every band/night club audio technician being firmly convinced that they actually DO know it all and that their system sounds GREAT, I defy anyone to put a complete high quality system in a nightclub, and have ten such guys, one at a time, position it, hook it all up, tune it, and make it sound great. You'll get maybe two who can do it, and the other eight will make it sound so-so to downright horrible.

"Any suggestions as to a good sounding pro audio speaker solution with good dispersion would be appreciated."

We've already established that it's not necessarily the speaker brand or model that makes it great, but the setup and the tech. ;) You've clearly stated your requirement for very high quality sound, with an excellent high end. As a dance/party environment, can I assume that you'll want fairly high levels at least some of the time? With all that in mind, the typical 2-way P.A. system won't cut it. Although there are some nice ones from several manufacturers (EV, JBL, Mackie, QSC, Yamaha, etc.), I'm not confident that they'd meet your fidelity expectations. You really need to look at 3-way or even 4-way systems.

You noted that you have a high cathedral ceiling. That will help a lot. As you apparently know, if you position the speakers "above head height" and point them across the room, you will not achieve the even coverage that you want. Obviously, they'll be closer to some people than to others, and that means the level will vary from position to position. So, the ability to place them fairly high up is a plus. The goal is to place them such that their output doesn't vary significantly at various locations in the room, and to find models which have wide dispersion (and even dispersion) from low-mid frequencies to some practical upper frequency limit. The necessary dispersion angle is significantly dependent on the placement of the speakers AND the quantity of speakers.

Typically, high output sound reproduction systems are designed with large boxes placed in a few locations. But it may be that, in your situation, a larger number of smaller boxes would better meet your requirements.

So, the type and model of speaker is intimately related to placement and quantity, not just the fidelity of the speaker. This brings us to placement options. The more flexible you are with regard to placement and size, the more readily an acceptable solution can be devised.

Having worked in both the home hi-fi and commercial sound fields, I have to say that commercial sound reinforcement and reproduction easily eclipses home hi-fi as being the more challenging environment to successfully address. What you're talking about is, physically, a commercial sound reproduction system, even though it's in your home. So, although you did a good job of outlining the basic requirements, to arrive at a solution which meets your requirements, the system designer needs more detail and more information, as well as some photos of the space and information about allowable positioning. A big issue is low frequency reproduction. The easy solution is a few large diaphragm (15") drivers, on the floor. A more difficult, but potentially better, solution is a larger number of smaller drivers (10" - 12"), positioned so they don't take up valuable floor space.

In any case, you're obviously a critical listener. You may be best off hiring a competent system designer - people who design high quality systems for a living.

There's a few things off the top of my head. Hope it helps!

Edits: 06/01/11

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