I have had a Yamaha Stagepas 500 system for quite some time now and if you asked if I am happy with it, I would gladly say I am. It has to be one of the cleanest-sounding sound systems that I have used in a long time and its very versatile too.
A short time ago, I was looking around for some powered speakers. When you mention you want to buy powered-speakers in Singapore, what everyone automatically suggests are the Mackie SRM-450s. But to me, once you go the Yamaha route, you never go back. This MSR400 for instance has a 12″ woofer and a 1.75″ horn driver. The amplifier that powers this is bi-amplified, which means no passive crossover inside. That makes it very much more efficient in terms of power. It is able to deliver 400 watts of power. It can be used as a fold-back monitor or even a front-of-house (FOH) system with the aid of a subwoofer. I think a couple of these MSR400s should be able to power a moderate hall pretty well.
This is the rear of the Yamaha MSR400. There is a heat-sink (a rather large one at that) to keep the amplifier cool. There are balanced XLR connections provided, as well as a LOW and HI equalizer. One thing that is not present here is a high-pass filter (HPF) but I think that it is not that important. You can plug a microphone in one of the XLR sockets and use this as an instant public address system
Sound-wise, I was able to hear a demo of it that day. The 12″ woofer provided a lot of punch, but then again, I was listening to it in a shop’s demo room. I have yet to hear it being performed out doors but I have heard that t performs very well. It is not the least expensive of powered speakers available on the market but the Yamaha quality and the clarity of the sound make up for it. Will I get this in the future? Hey…who knows? But I do know one thing. It oozes quality and its a Yamaha. That seems to be good enough for me
