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Topic: Speakers suggestion for a small club with max.. capacity of a 500 people.

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What could be some reasonable speakers for a small club that can hold 500 people? two brand i have in mind already, are two QSC full range speakers or Yorkville set.

What is your take on this?
 
Posted Wed 29 Jun 11 @ 2:50 pm
Well if you are looking at QSC I'm guessing you have a good budget for this system. I would recommend the EV LiveEX 115's and 18's for subs. As stated before several times I own these simply because I listened to everything available currently and they are the best (To my ear).

They are absolute quality and cheaper than most other options out there in the same quality bracket.

 
A club with a capacity of 500 people is not small. The club owner should hire a local sound production company to come in a look at the space.
They will be able to make a recommendation based on the room shape and size, as well as based on the number of human bodies.

The fact that you think 2 QSC speakers will be enough sound when the room has 500 people in it tells me that you have NO business choosing a sound system. What about subs? Do you know how to hook up all the gear AND tune it to the room properly?

Unless YOU own this club, this really isn't anything you should be asking about. If the system sounds like shit, the ONLY thing you can do is suggest to the club owner that he call in a sound expert .
 
^^^^ what he said.... you're going to need at least 6 18" subs to get professional club sound.. with 500 people..
 
Hold on guys. The club is over seas In Haiti. It' s for friend of mine. I do know how to hook up a system, and it' s a passive system with tops and bottoms. I myself own the Dynacord D-lite 2000 system. Included in that system is an audio signal processor called the Dynacord DSP 244 and one Dynacord amp.

Can you guys be more specific about the EV system for tops and bottoms?
 
I completely overlooked the fact that he stated "2" speakers and thought he said two brands QSC and Yorkville.

Yeah the size of the room has less to do with bass than the number of people. 500 people eats up a LOT of bass or 80-90mhz and below range of sound. Bodies absorb this range of sound so the more bodies you have the more subs you need.

Is this going to be a permanent install? being its a club I'm guessing the sound system is going to be a permanent fixture. I do not know of many clubs that change systems every week or night.

EV Speaker info

Electro-Voice ELX118P Live X Series Active 18 Subwoofer
Electro-Voice ELX115P Live X Series Active 15 Loudspeaker

These are Active speakers, they also make the same in passive but I would HIGHLY recommend active OR purchasing EV amps for passive. These are specifically designed to work optimal with EV amps.
 
I would look into a pair of JBL MRX dual 18's, probably get two pairs and a pair or 15" full range MRX's to match.
 
I would use 4 speakers and two subwoofer. I would spread out the speaker tops for more coverage.
 
dydy1 wrote :
What could be some reasonable speakers for a small club that can hold 500 people? two brand i have in mind already, are two QSC full range speakers or Yorkville set.

What is your take on this?

I would need to know if this is a permanent or temporary setup..

How is the club setup? (IE wheres the dance floor in relation to the DJ and the tabels) (a drawing & pictures is worth a thousand words)

What other equipment is already in the club?

Can any speakers be flown from the roof?
 
He did mention two QSC's. I don't care which speaker you use, two will not be enough for 500 people. The more important factor is, how big is the dance floor. Your main focus is pumping up the dance floor, not the whole club. Is Haitian music anything like Caribbean music, where they use a lot of bass? If so, you will need a minimum of four subs.
 
A floor plan and the materials present would be essential in determining the needs of this system. Based on our local fire codes to handle 500 patrons the club, when taking into account space for storage, bars, VIP, restrooms etc would need to be about 3,000 square feet with 4 emergency exits. I have played a place around that size that had the bar in the center with the dance floor surrounding it. VIP was on elevated sections to the right and the DJ booth elevated to the left. Ceilings were about 20ft high. They had 8 or 10 JBL PRX612 flying in the ceiling pointed at an angle in several directions toward the dance floor and I believe 12 JBL 618xlf Subs in clusters of 4 under built in seating along 3 walls - no subs under the the VIP section.

While not huge I don't know if i would consider a 500 person club a small undertaking. It might be worth it to get a sound engineering company involved. There will be a big difference in sound quality and necessary output based on the finish materials used in construction.

An onsite professional will be much better at determining the proper setup.


Good Luck :)
 
jbart19 wrote :
A floor plan and the materials present would be essential in determining the needs of this system. Based on our local fire codes to handle 500 patrons the club, when taking into account space for storage, bars, VIP, restrooms etc would need to be about 3,000 square feet with 4 emergency exits. I have played a place around that size that had the bar in the center with the dance floor surrounding it. VIP was on elevated sections to the right and the DJ booth elevated to the left. Ceilings were about 20ft high. They had 8 or 10 JBL PRX612 flying in the ceiling pointed at an angle in several directions toward the dance floor and I believe 12 JBL 618xlf Subs in clusters of 4 under built in seating along 3 walls - no subs under the the VIP section.

While not huge I don't know if i would consider a 500 person club a small undertaking. It might be worth it to get a sound engineering company involved. There will be a big difference in sound quality and necessary output based on the finish materials used in construction.

An onsite professional will be much better at determining the proper setup.


Good Luck :)


I am still waiting on my friend to get back from Haiti to bring all of these infos you guys are asking to help me. The equipments will be permanently installed.
 
Hi mate.

Once you get the info on floor plan,room layout and furnishings. Let us know. One other usefull bit of info would be to provide an idea of what sustained sound pressure levels you want to have in different areas of the club.

Ie concentrated at say 110-115db on the dancefloor area. 90 or below around the bar. 86 in the entrance way and so on. Are there any local sound level limits that you need to operate within?

You may well have thought of this already but sound level management is seriously important in any venue, especialy when you may well have many different Djs who will all have their own ideas as to how loud they want it. System processing/eqing and level limiting become as important as how many speakers and amps you shell out on.

As several of the other posters have mentioned people suck up sound. If you listen to a sound system in an empty club it will normaly sound very bright and toppy. This is because it should have been eqed ,at install to take account of the effects of people in the room. There is also a reference quoted in WPH. Watts Per Head that is used for calculation when designing a new install. This will give a good basic figure for whats needed for how many people. More of that later. Once you get all the gen I am sure we can all help you out.

cheers

Daz
 
The example I gave was given from experience of having worked in many a 550 capacity club with an audience of between 250-550 people depending on what night it was etc, I experimented a lot and could of got away with a pair of tops n subs off one amp if I'd wanted to!

It comes down to what your level of exception is and what your idea of good sound is?

I know one guy that thinks a pair of 250w Peaveys is more than enough for 350 people in a marquee, where as I would use RCF or FBT and take 2 pairs of subs and a pair of tops.

Struggling isn't fun! I hope your choice doesn't come doesn't to money.

Now show respect to the RCF
 


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