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Help Needed On Setting Up House PA System

Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2011 5:36 pm
by GeForce6200
Hi all, been a LONG time since I last posted but have been lurking here and there. To the topic, my college roommate's sub-woofer (Cerwin Vega powered15") decided kick it, so it was decided to replace it with the Cerwin Vega Folded Horn Subwofer with the mains being Community, inputs being TRS and Speakon. We however thought we knew how to hook it up, but have hit some snags. The mains will work without our crossover but not with. I have read the manual multiple times but can't figure out what to set the crossover to and where to even have our input/outputs. This is our current order of in the audio equipment which I think is correct, audio source- Mixer - Crossover - Amp to the speakers/subwoofer. I reliaze that another amp would be a better setup, however if anyone knows how to hook it up using this hardware (we have a variety of cables and can get most anything) it would be very helpful. Thanks for any replies in advance and it feels good to back.

Re: Help Needed On Setting Up House PA System

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 5:23 pm
by ludi
The crossover you have linked, when used with a stereo source, is intended for biamping of the mains. That means two amplifier channels per mains, one medium-to-high power channel for each woofer and one low-to-medium power channel for each tweeter. (This also requires that the mains be biamp capable.) The sub then needs a fifth channel.

Your minimum number of amplifier channels with this hardware is three. You will need to feed the two-channel amp to the mains directly from the mixer outputs, but can still use the crossover to obtain a mixed and filtered subwoofer output, which will require the third amplifier channel.

Re: Help Needed On Setting Up House PA System

Posted: Sat Dec 24, 2011 11:36 pm
by GeForce6200
Thanks Ludi, got it working somewhat by just using the crossover for the subwoofer. Was planning on either getting another, hopefully better quality, amp or a mixer with a dedicated subwoofer output. Thhe folded horn just doesn't sound as maybe what we though. It's barely "louder" than the self-powered 15" cerwin vega that was replaced. I definitely need to reed more on setting and tweaking this type of set-up.

Re: Help Needed On Setting Up House PA System

Posted: Sun Dec 25, 2011 12:27 am
by ludi
A self-powered 15-inch is almost always a premium subwoofer, as most of the cheap consumer-grade units end at 12-inch models. So it's reasonable that an 18-inch folded horn seems only marginally more powerful. However, you might want to check that the crossover is set up correctly, as you might be attenuating the input too much relative to the mains.

Re: Help Needed On Setting Up House PA System

Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:56 pm
by GeForce6200
We've been messing around with the input to sub woofer via the crossover. Since the mains go straight from the mixer to amp, this appears to be the only way. One of the mains actually blew a fuse for the tweeter, so it appears the Behringer has the power to support the setup. Cerwin Vega now has some new front firing sub woofers that probably would have been better suited for a house rather than a folded horn, but it will do. One thing I heard about was having a dedicated subwoofer out from the mixer, but haven't found one that wouldn't be overkill for this type of setup.

Re: Help Needed On Setting Up House PA System

Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2012 12:19 am
by UltimateImperative
The Crossover you have should be able to do what you want. That is, two way mono. (first way = sub, 2nd way = mains)
1) set the sub x-over freq to 10 Hz.
2) set the unit to stereo (you'll only use one side of the x-over)
3) set the low-mid freq on the left side to, say, 120 Hz

Connect the output of your mixer to the left input of your crossover. (just use one side of the main outputs) -- XLR Cable
Connect the "low" output of your crossover to the side of the amp you'll be connecting to your Sub; XLR cable
Connect the "high" output of your crossover to the side of the amp you'll connect to your mains (in parallel). XLR cable.

Your sub should sound very "one-note", which is the main characteristic of these CW things. Also, distortion. Lots of it.

Re: Help Needed On Setting Up House PA System

Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2012 12:30 am
by UltimateImperative
The gear we're talking about is very different from home audio stuff. The CW are pretty awful as far as sound reinforcement subs go, but they should be able to make a good amount of noise. The "classic" sound reinforcement sub is the double-18 direct radiator, like this JBL. But there are also some very good horns out there, like the Danley stuff.

These will likely be out of your price range for the forseeable future, but you might want to look into better gear, stuff like QSC for amps, Yorkville, EV, JBL for speakers, maybe Allen+Heath for a mixer, but consider a Yamaha 01v or 01v96 digital first.

Re: Help Needed On Setting Up House PA System

Posted: Fri Jun 29, 2012 11:14 pm
by GeForce6200
Thanks UltimateImperative for the links on some better quality products to purchase. I realize this is lowend amp really isn't cutout for the job and a folded horn isn't the best for a home setup but that is what roomate decided to purchase. We were thinking about a crown or QSC amp for the Community mains and Behringer for the sub, as to have a stereo setup. For now it works but there is definitely room for improvement. Also thanks for the link to the Danley products, never heard of them before.