More than 650 worship production personnel and live sound operators converged on the Dallas Convention Center in October to check out the third annual Live Sound Compact Systems Demo, held in conjunction with the WFX Conference & Expo.
The demo provides the opportunity to directly listen to, evaluate, and compare more than a dozen compact loudspeaker systems in a controlled listening environment. In addition, all participating companies have representatives on hand to provide technical details and pricing information.
The event is held in a full-size exhibit hall of the convention center, with a 150-foot by 150-foot demo space draped off to define the area and to help eliminate reflections. Carpet that covered the entire demo area furthered this goal.
While the 13 participating manufacturers primarily chose to highlight flown compact line arrays, others took a different approach in showing “single box” solutions, providing an excellent contrast between the types of systems available.
In each one-hour full demo session, all systems were played in a roundrobin, random format, supplied with identical audio tracks until the final round, when manufacturers had the opportunity to play their own select track through their system. Listeners move from system to system, evaluating what they’re hearing and also observing each system’s scale, components and other important details.
Each participating company also presented its own 15-minute exclusive demo sessions each day, further showcasing their technologies.
As usual, Live Sound senior contributing editor Craig Leerman served as the tech director for the event, with veteran engineer Tim Weaver of Waco, TX, at a Yamaha CL Series console managing audio for each demo session.
Gary Zandstra and Josh Maichele of Parkway Electric (Holland, MI), with more than 40 years of system integration and church tech work between them, served as emcees. Preston Gray of Morris Light & Sound (Nashville) was also on hand with a Smaart rig to monitor levels, with SPL readings visible on a large video screen.
Plans are already underway for the next compact system demo – with even more features for attendees – to be held in conjunction with next year’s WFX Expo in Dallas, September 2014. Keep an eye on ProSoundWeb for more details as they become available.
Demo Participants & Systems
Renkus-Heinz IC Live
PreSonus StudioLive 328AI
Martin Audio MLA Compact
Line 6 StageSource L3t
L-Acoustics KARAi
Elipsis Audio LA-205
Electro-Voice EVA-2082S
EAW QX596i
D.A.S. Audio AERO 40A
Danley Sound Labs SH96HO
Bose Professional RoomMatch
Alcons Audio LR14/90
Adamson Metrix-i & Metrix Wave-i
Technology Sponsors
Yamaha Commercial Audio
Shure
Link USA
Mega Systems
DiColor
Images From The Live Sound Compact System Demo At WFX 2014:
