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Just wonder if anyone has any comments to help me. I am on the local arena board and the sound system seems to have little to no bass. I am not sure what the system is they are using but it does have a powered mixer. They have a few speakers hung from centre ice and a horn and bass speaker on the side of the wall. Just wonder if there is anyway to get more bass from a system in general. Can a sub be added? or bass modules to the centre ice speakers? I realize I am way short on details but I am looking to see what one does in a larger building to add bass response. I have seen other arrays in other arena and although they don't have many more speakers, they do have a fuller response, meaning bass of some sort. Thanks for any help or comments.
Follow Ups:
Audius, post an email address, phone number, or city facility name. I'll give you 3 hours of my time at no charge, just because I dislike taxpayers' money being wasted.
I am going to get had for this, but have you ever tried to contact Bose Corporation? They may not get much respect for the home environment, but the arena installs are VERY good. An arena local to myself (Carrier Dome in Syracuse) has a Bose horn loaded system, and legibility is very high. It also sounds great for music playback due to the utilization of woofer modules.In a concrete walled venue with aluminum bleachers and a canvas inflated top, that alone is an acoustic nightmare, but the Bose sounds great in there.
But how's the intelligibility?Horn-loaded speakers generally are best for large, reverberant environments, because of the control over the angle of propagation, i.e., where the majority of the sound goes, so it goes where we want it to go (i.e., acoustically soft, absorbing humans), thus improving the ratio of direct-to-reverberant sound, thus improving intelligibility.
Secondly, even an "average" system can sound good, if the installation is well done, and the EQ is also well done.
So, whether it's Bose, Community, EAW, JBL, Meyer, or whatever, horn-loaded speakers have fundamental advantages which are unrelated to the brand, and so the decision regarding what to do or what to buy or how to install it or how to EQ it should still be left to someone who knows what they're doing.
And someone who calls it "legibility" doesn't qualify, any more than someone who asked the original question.
So, I refer to my original post: Another poorly managed project. (But at least they're spending someone else's money.)
I'm puzzled as to why we haven't heard back from the original poster, just to say "thanks for waking me up".
I was half asleep when I wrote that. I meant to type intelligibility. And to answer your question, the intelligbility of the bose system is very high. I have yet to sit in a bad seat.
Do you mean grammar?
You won't see any sound pros jumping in on the side of Bose, unless you consider guys who install Muzak systems sound pros.
It might work out best if you just brought in your own PA and didn't use the house system at all.Big arena systems are quite often delibertly installed wihout any bass reenforcement ... and the audio lines from the control room may be nothing more than telephone equipment and amps = passing the mid audio range only ... in the audio range of 500 to 5000 htz = no bass, no tweeters ... :> (
Cost verses what works now is an issueMy question is why add subs to a system that runs in the upper
90% of the human voice?I realize they run music a bit in an arena but why bother adding
subs?Adding low end in an reverberant acoustic nightmare is
gonna cost you big time and having someone come in and do it
for you is gonna cost you even moreI suggest this...if you can hear the vocal well above the ambient
noise of the crowd in the rink then stick with what you have
and dont worry about subsIf you cant hear the vocal well defined over the crowd then
I suggest you spend your money on some new full range
loudspeakers (horn loaded) that will do the job well and give you coverageDont hire some local music store clown to do it either
Get someone who specializes in installs in arenasBe prepared to pay out the ying in cost
Now that I've defined how the project is run so far...In all seriousness, you need to find a competent consultant. It doesn't matter where you are in the country.
An airline ticket, a hotel night, and a couple days of car rental are a small price to pay if you can't find someone locally.
Read your own post. You already said you don't know what you're doing. So the next obvious step would be...?
It almost sounds like the arena has some money to spend, and they're determined to spend it, whether they need to or not.
But if you want good sound, get someone who is knowledgeable. They can assess the current system, and either fix it through basic system settings adjustments and/or recommend equipment changes.
Funny story... almost 30 years ago, I did an ice hockey arena sound system project. A couple years later, it turned out that the arena manager was my new bride's uncle!
More info about the venue needed. Is seating all around the ice? How large is the seating capacity? How high is the ceiling, and is it a flat roof, peaked, or slant? Is there any acoustical treatment in the arena?
Are the speakers over center ice used just for voice(announcers for instance?), and the speaker system on the wall, is that just the one horn and one bass speaker, or are there say a pair(for stereo), or are there a set in each corner?
Is the desire to have a system that sounds good playing recorded music from a CD or other source, as well as for the announcers for hockey or other skating events?
Best regards,
John
As Bill states, they certainly may be using better loudspeakers in the other arena you were at.
Quote: "I am on the local arena board and the sound system seems to have little to no bass. I am not sure what the system is they are using but it does have a powered mixer. They have a few speakers hung from centre ice and a horn and bass speaker on the side of the wall. Just wonder if there is anyway to get more bass from a system in general. Can a sub be added? or bass modules to the centre ice speakers? I realize I am way short on details but I am looking to see what one does in a larger building to add bass response. I have seen other arrays in other arena and although they don't have many more speakers, they do have a fuller response, meaning bass of some sort. Thanks for any help or comments."
Either the other arenas have far better main speakers than you do or they have subs. Adding subs, along with the required amps and peripherals to drive them, is probably the least expensive alternative for you. Putting them at the center ice position is the worst possible place for them. You should invest in this book before spending money on gear that you don't understand. Once you've read it through a few times then you can ask questions more specific to your particular needs.
- http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&PartNumber=500-340&DID=7&raid=29&rak=500-340 (Open in New Window)
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