From 85 to 27 lbs exactly. Or, in plain text – from a Fishman Soloamp (35 lbs with stand) + DB Opera SUB 12 (50 lbs) to a Bose L1 compact.

After nearly five years of carrying the Fishman and the sub from my house to the car (2 flights of stairs), then from the car to the venue (no stairs at all in the best case, but often quite a bunch), then the whole thing back again after the gig when you're well fried, yours truly decided that it was enough.

I tested the Bose L1 in Holland last week-end and liked it. So friday afternoon, I drove to a music store which carries Bose gear. I had the QSC Touchmix 16, the Stick and a Shure Beta 58. I tested the system thoroughly for an hour and ended up taking the plunge.

Back home, I practised my repertoire the whole saturday morning and boy, does this baby sound good! OK, It has a little gap in the medium range (easyly corrected with the Touchmix) but the incredible dispersion makes up for it.

Can't wait to test it live. My back already says THANK YOU!!

...

That Bose system sounds real nice with the Stick....'cause I tried one;....hifi goodness. But Scott, judging from your previous experience, something tells me you're gonna want to melt some faces......including yer own.....thats gonna require more beef patty.

What are you using right now?

cheers,
k

I've always been curious about the Bose Compact, tempted to try one someday.

I also am attempting to lighten my live rig, since if I'm realistic about it I'm not very motivated to drag my 49 lb. QSC KW122 around very much, as good as it sounds. Just lifting it off and on the PA stand in the same room can cause a bit of temporary wrist/hand soreness (I'm just not very manly I guess!)

I recently picked up an RCF HD-12A as a possible alternative (sort of RCF's equivalent to a QSC K12) - it's significantly lighter at 36 lbs. and sounds quite nice - on paper it has better bass response than the QSC although side by side I think the QSC sounds a little "deeper" (and at idle has less hiss), while the slight edge in overall clarity goes to the RCF (while still having a very nice bass response), so I think the RCF will work nicely as a more portable 12" woofer solution. It also has a wider 90 degree dispersion angle.

I also recently evaluated an Acoustic Image Ten2 - bass response specified down to 40 Hz (+/- 3 db) but not nearly as controlled or deep sounding as the QSC (possibly due to the downfiring woofer design), and significantly less high end clarity. Too bad, since it would be nice to have an all in one preamp/eq/reverb lightweight combo with more bass response than the Fishman amps - even if the high end was more like the Fishman Loudbox (leaving the bass response the same) it would have been a very nice solution. The amp is advertised as "full range" but obviously is going for a warmer sort of sound, perhaps more ideal for acoustic upright bass (which is what the amp designer plays).

35 lbs is about my target for a something I can comfortably carry up and down stairs and set up without my hands hurting right before a performance, so the RCF is just slightly more.

When your kid gets to be 40+ lbs and still wants to be lifted up, swung, and thrown about, you won't mind putting the PA speaker on the pole.

Or I just have him carry my gear when he's old enough!

I'm more familiar with home audio gear than live performance gear, and in my (limited) experience I've found the Bose stuff to be good quality but overpriced when compared to other manufacturers. Is this not true of their live music equipment? Maybe I should take a closer look at Bose...

I find their lack of specifications disturbing.

Please, start a thread so that this can be discussed with more depth.

It may well be true, given the limitations of physics and their lack of specifications.

I tried different Bose system with various results : the very old first system with the big ground "base" was very nice sounding. I then tried its successor, with the 4 channel digital mixing table, and it sounded awful to my ears with the Stick. The sound was crispy and I tend to love amps or systems which round off the sound of the Stick which is naturally very bright.
I tried in an outdoor gig this L1 system two years ago as I was comping with a drummer and a female acoustic guitar/singer, and it sounded very nice, but I had to crank it up to go through the other instruments. I'm not sure it's powerful enough to be played in a lively medium sized venue.

This is something which much be considered when comparing powered PA speakers to other solutions (yes, I have addressed that point previously). Bose's lack of specifications makes it impossible to evaluate their portable PA systems in this regard, particularly concerning:

• Frequency Response ±3dB
• Broadband Sensitivity
• Program Power Handling
• Peak Power Handling
• RMS Power Output
• Peak Power Output