Bose L1 system probs

[population]

So I have owned one of these for the last six months and thought I had it sussed.

Essentially it's just me, backing tracks, my guitar through a pod xt live, and the seat of my pants.

In small pubs, the PA is a gift, I can set the gain seeting on the disc at 2, and have my desk mixer up at 0 and we are good to go. I have actually had compliments on the sound and I only use good quality backing tracks and a good Audix OM3 mic with mild use of digital fx on the vocals.

However, as the small gigs have gone well, my agent has been sticking me in larger venues which is good fun and all, but my sound seems to be severly compromised at high volumes. I have a friend who is a novice sound engineer come to both a small gig and a big gig and he was shocked at how bad the sound was when I turned the amp on the disc over number 4, (the max it will go before feeding back like a banshee) at the big gig.

Also management at the venue were going nuts because they thought the sound was far too low regardless of the quality. They kept asking me to turn it up, but each time I did turn it past 4 the howl was piercing. Tried using a behringer feedback buster the next time I played, and though the squeal was reduced, the overall sound was even worse!

My mate recomended getting a seperate amp and two 200w tops and running them in tandem with system to give it more drive in the larger venues, but though it might give volume, surely the sound would be all over the place even more???

Im no expert and if anyone has any ideas at all it would be very much appreciated.

Chheeeerrrsss

[Danny1969]

Maybe you could get a real PA for the larger venues and use the L1 for the little gigs. I know the Bose system is clever and for it's size very effective, but you would need to triple up on that system, and add a load of subs to stand a chance. The trouble with any small system is that they will tend to start sounding very harsh when pushed, as the small drivers used are most effective around the 1 to 3K range.

If you don't want to spend much then a set of JBL JRX125's and a QSC amp would only be about £900. If you don't mind spending some more then there's loads of powerful systems from Electrovoice, HK, Turbosound that will pump out 2Kw all night long but still fit in a large estate car. The current trend of putting the amps, controller and limiters in the actual enclosures makes setting the system up idiot proof and very quick.