What are some quality speakers for my price Range?
i just bought the stanton SCS.4dj and it is great with headphone but im soon going to be doing some parties and im in need of a pair of quality speakers for around 150-200 , i know thats not much but im on a cheep budget as my dj system was 600. i know that i can do reaserch and find some but im not sure if i need a special pair of speakers since my system is slef powered and has a built in cpu. any sudgestions??
No such thing- you can’t even get really bad speakers that cheap.
Triple your budget and you can get some budget PA speakers but even spending $500-$600 they won’t be quality.
You might be able to find a usable pair of powered speakers on craigslist for like 300-400 if you’re lucky.
oh…ok then well what about used ones?
Mackies would be the old stand by I guess for loud, cheap PA’s if you don’t care about sound quality.
But you’re still looking at about 400 to 600 a speaker if you even want to attempt to provide sound for a party. Plus you would still need a bass
Or build quality, they are known to spontaneously catch fire.
I your into DIY check this out. I’m building a tuba 30 bass cab. http://www.billfitzmaurice.com/
JBL EON 15" G1 run for about 180$ used. The 10" run about 150$
Not all series (assuming the SRM 450), USA & Italian are fine while Chinese need some care and love.
+1 on the billfitzmaurice designs.
I took a gamble on a 15" set of these a few years ago to take to the local bars and I always got tons of compliments on the sound quality. http://www.thedeepdiscount.com/p-3429-acoustic-audio-br12-2000-watt-pair-pro-dj-123-way-pa-monitor-speakers.aspx Even made some people’s eyes bug out in amazement compared to what they were used to hearing. My mobile dj friend who has three different pa setups even admitted that they sounded better than any of his. It looks like they discontinued the 15" 3 ways version, but this is basically the same thing only in a 12. I ended up cooking the voice coils by overdriving the rms rating by 100w with some really heavy bass, but you’ll have that with any speaker. I kind of felt like Kramer in the episode of Seinfeld where they kept driving the car to see how far they could go past empty. Lol But yeah, I would buy them again if I wasn’t already making the billfitzmaurice designs.
Given your price range, used is the only real option.
Based on availability, and robustness, I would suggest an amp and a pair of full range speakers. The Yamaha S-115 series are widely available, well built, inexpensive used, and sound OK. I prefer ebay with local pickup over craigslist. In my area a pair can be had for $300-ish…sometimes with speaker stands and some cables, sometimes just the tops.
For amps, the venerable Peavey CS-800x is rock solid reliable (and rock solid heavy). These can be had for $200-250, and you will NOT want to pay for shipping. These amps are legendary for reliability, and underrated in terms of output.
If you had $1000, I would recommend the B52 Matrix1000v2 system. The price is “out the door” with a set of speaker stands and all needed cables. This is the best bang for <$1000. The dedicated sub makes a big difference in the overall sound of the PA system. For parties up to 100-ish people, this is a good system to have.
Alternatively, you could spend the same $1000 on the RFC 312A powered tops…and a set of speaker stands and signal cables. The tops are slightly better than the B25 Matrix 1000v2 tops, but there is no sub…so the overall sound is not a full.
I have build a LOT of Bill Fitzmaurice speakers for my own use. The designs are great, but you can not build a full system for less than about $2000…assuming that you need amps, crossovers, EQ, and limiters too. Also, you need to have and know how to use some basic woodworking tools. It’s not hard, but if does require some care. If you do spend the $2000, the resulting sound will rival anything you could by for <$4000.
B52 system is what i use.. great system for the price and easy to move and set up.. STAY AWAY from audio acoustic.. price may look good but build quailty and specs are shit… bought a so called 300watt mini stereo system and had to rip it apart and resoder every connection for it to work, not to mention it was not even close to 300 watts of power..
may sound kinda ghetto but if ur playing small house parties get stero system like this >shelf system.. this is what i started with and worked fine.. plus makes it easy to swap to ipod when u need a break..
I forgot to mention, audio acoustic has a forum for their home powered subwoofers, and if you read peoples posts on them, they make great subs. The speakers I had were cheap, definately not crap. The Official Acoustic Audio Subwoofer Owners Thread - Blu-ray Forum
Here’s a quote from that forum. Like I said, they are excellent. Buy the PAs from my first post, and you will be very happy you did.
I ran test tones through it starting with 20Hz. It had no difficulty playing them. Even when I increased the volume, it handled them with ease. I also played a few Blu-ray movies and SACD music at loud volume. It handled everything I threw at it.
I have three other subwoofers in my home theater room. Two of them are 12" Hsu vintage subwoofers that I had upgraded with enhanced drivers. The other one is an old 15" DBX subwoofer that I rebuilt with a very powerful driver. All three are passive. I use the Cinepro amplifier to send 700 watts into each one of the modified Hsu subwoofers. The 15" subwoofer is powered by a 1,500 watt powerful Carver amplifier. In addition, my two Definitive Technology speakers have 15" powered subwoofers inside (300 watts RMS each). I can only tell you that this new subwoofer has not been outclassed yet.
I bought this subwoofer with very low expection for my sister. I had originally intended to replace the driver with a high-end aluminum driver. As I stated earlier, it looked so beautiful and performed so well that I decided to keep it and order another one for my sister. I don’t think I will be changing the driver in the immediate future. I may eventually move it to my two-channel room for 2.1 playback. The cherry finish matches my Polk vintage speakers perfectly. I have a 12" black DIY subwoofer there. It works great, but doesn’t match the Polk speakers.
EDIT: I just ran the pink noise from the receiver through it and measured the output with an SPL meter. When I turned the volume knob on the back of the subwoofer to the three-quarter point, the SPL meter hit 110 db about a foot away. The subwoofer showed no sign of stress or distortion. I turned it off after this. I didn’t want to take a chance and go all the way to the maximum level. As far as I am concerned, the subwoofer passed with an A.
I’ve got a set of Jbl 515xts with cases that were used once that i can sell for 1100
The demands of small room home theater and the demands of Pro-Audio are two completely different ballparks.
I know. I was just using that as a reference that the PA speakers I linked in my first post are good speakers for the money.
but still out of his 200 dollar price range
questions — how big is the room you are trying to fill? Perhaps you can buy one speaker at a time. One powered speaker (even a crappy one) can fill living room, or a patio area, etc. You might get lucky find a Mackie Thump brand new for about 275.00. While it’s not the loudest, people will dance in a small sized room.
hey ive found what your looking for behringer b210d are great speakers and there probably the best the best low priced speakers around, im going to buy some myself
Why buy shit speakers? IMO you are going about it backwards.. If you are going for a budget build, speakers should be where most of your money is going.. Especially with all the budget controllers out there to be had.
Beg, borrow, sell grass, be a whore, live off ramen and koolaid for awhile, do whatever it takes! Just don’t skimp out on your speakers..