Anymore details, sightline requirements, flown or ground stacked, music type, time pressures to get setup and ready to rock...

 

As you can see, most of the above factors have nothing to do with sound quality or right tool to do the job well acoustically!

 

 

Dupe...

Ground stack Martin MLA mini, Digico Desk, power distro, two labour, delivered set-up and taken away for a grand inc VAT around here! And that was a well known company, fully reputable and insured, etc.

The Nexo Geo S12 is quite a useful ideal, in that they do 10 or 30 degree boxes, with either 85 or 120 horizontal, but they do rigging kits for either point source arrays, or traditional line arrays.

Whether it is a true line array, or a true point source, is for others to debate, but the concept of having one hire fleet, which is arrayable to either way round makes some sense.

I am sure others offer similar concepts.

Nexo are even doing flying frames for PS15R2, hung under the LS18 subs, as some form of "line" array. I am sure it makes a noise, but to get it to form a "line" would take some gargantuan processing...

However, when you look at boxes like the JBL Vertec 900 mid tops, and how they are supposed to form an "array".....perhaps coupling from 5K and up?

Don't forget that 1KHz wavelength is approx 0.34m, so two boxes, short array, will have some effect, probably cancellation and lobing, but 500Hz is 0.68m, so to get proper cylindrical wavefont to 500Hz will require an array of at least double that length. At the top end 5KHz wavelength is 6.8cm, so your drivers need to be closer than that together, or Young's Double Slit type artefacts will come into play. As the HF gets higher in frequency, your drivers/waveguides need to get even closer together.

Line array is nice in theory, but very few actually achieve, and the ones that come damn close, are very rarely hung in long enough lengths to give them a fighting chance.

However, the fashion, and riders, dictate.....

If you have some money to spend go with a mid size array, used Meyer melodie, DV dosc etc but be prepared to buy minimum 12 boxes plus subs and be prepared to take min 6 a side out on each gig.

 

Or they're willing to actually take a loss to keep their profile up and try and get more work in the future, or to try and keep staff engaged  & on-side.

 

 

 

1: Whatever's on the actual riders you see

2: Whatever has good local service/support

3: Whatever you can easily cross-rent more of.

 

In other words, it's a business decision, not a sound quality one.

 

If no-one in your market has ever heard of F1 or Danley, but is happy to have Vertec all day, then you're shooting yourself in the foot buying the former two even if you can make them sound better.

 

That's perpetuating the old myth that line source array systems don't or can't sound as good as an arrayed point source system. Just a myth.

look at v12 instead.

 

Not really, I only said if he can make then shound better, wasn't any intent to say they would sound better.

Each market has its own preferred brands. Once you get to the riders, forget what sounds better, you go with what is in demand.