Recommend speakers for a restaurant sound system

All:

Thanks for your generous response to my question. I am sorry that I did not answer you over the last few days. I have been traveling and have not had the time to get back to the posting.

Let me see if I can answer some of your questions and provide feedback where appropriate.

The restaurant is in Cambridge, MA near MIT. We are building what the brits call a "gastropub". The food is not fancy but is made from scratch on premise. We are also installing 100 beer taps and will be serving draft beer from craft brewers around the world. The neighborhood crowd is very smart and sophisticated without being snobby.

The restaurant is in the middle of the biotech corridor in Cambridge so we get a corporate lunch and happy hour crowd. For dinner, late night and the weekends we get a 21 to 35 crowd.

During the day we are planning on playing lighter music like the classic 50's bebop jazz standards. At night all bets are off. We could be playing anything.

We are planning to rip my music collection (CD's and vinyl) to a PC and then use some of the search programs available on the web. I am going to use a touchscreen behind the bar to do the searching. I have been researching external USB DAC's to convert the signal to analog.

Many of the local bars/Restaurants use Pandora (pandora.com) downloaded to a PC or an ipod to do their song programming. We are going to look into that too (I will not do it off an ipod, I don't like the way they sound)

As some of you surmised, we will need more than 4 speakers. I think it is going to take at least 8 speakers (and maybe 12 as LoomisJohnson suggested) to fill the space.

Depending on how it sounds, I may have to install subs too.

Some of you suggested the klipsch speakers. I will audition the the Klipsch but, I am not a fan of the Klipsch speakers coupled with a solid state amp/preamp. I always find the klipsch too bright. (I had in-wall Klipsch speakers in my house. I took them out because they were too bright) I am an old Heresy owner too.

I like the Totem speakers. I think it would be interesting to mount the smaller monitors from the ceiling.

I also like planar speakers (I own a set of heavily modified maggies). I did not realize that ML was making a variety of in-wall speakers. I am not sure we can afford to mount 8 of the martin logan in-walls but I will preview them at the local dealer.

I have not heard the TOA's, Westlakes, Genelec, EAW or the Sonance. The Mirage line looked interesting too. I will check out all of them and report back.

I remember how all of the record stores in Boston (way back when) used the Bose 901's mounted from the ceiling. I thought they always sounded good. They are cheap, I have to check and see if they are relatively efficient. I can't afford to buy 6 big amps to power them. Thanks for the interesting suggestion.

I have always had a bias against the commercial speakers and amps. Right or wrong, I never thought much of the quality of the products. having said that, I think the market has changed dramatically.

I think I will have to go with a commercial preamp like the parasound so that I have enough inputs and outputs to have design flexibility. I would love to power the system with a massive Class A amp(s), but as many of you have suggested, it may not be practical (I am going to try it). So I am going to look at the Class D amps like the Sonance and see how they sound.

We are in the process of doing the architectural design we will not be building until late July. I will keep you up to date as I try out your suggestions. I am going to NYC next week and I will go to Daniel to see the installation in that place.

Thanks again for your suggestions.

Ripping your CD collection to play in a commercial establishment doesn't sound like a good idea from a rights/licensing POV. So reserve some of that money for proper licensing fees (or lawsuit settlements!).

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2003815486_royalty01.html

I do appreciate good audio and good lighting and all the things that make up great restaurant ambience. A good audio experience in a restaurant comes from good acoustics and noise control, then good song selection and proper VOLUME settings. Commercial use equipment is designed for ruggedness not high end sound. You'll have all sorts of waiters and bartenders getting their greasy mitts all over the controls in a fairly messy environment - get something rugged and reliable designed for commercial use - with multiple zone volume controls, PA/mic override so you can make announcements over the music - you may not need that. Crown amps come to mind ...http://www.crownaudio.com/ca.htm Good luck and cheers!

Jkeniley,

I still don't get it. You want a high performance system for very low cost (8 speakers and subs etc etc. no less with audiophile quality but industrial ruggedness and all for mere 5 to 7K!!). It does not exist. Panels would be just plain silly. The reason I suggested the cheap robust and relatively good sounding JBL EON 510 - at 600 bucks a pop eight of these would cost you 5K leaving some money for wall mounts and a mixer and perhaps one EON 518S subwoofer (since these speakers all come with built in crown amps).

I think you may need to come down to earth - audiophile like quality in sound systems for commercial venues is actually extremely expensive. You could stick some audiophile speakers in your pub but unless you have complete control on your staff (probably students) I bet they will be blown after the first month. I could recommend some great systems such as what they have at Ronnie Scott's Jazz club in London but your are looking at mega-bucks.

Parasound is an excellent choice for your application for preamp and especially power amps. I recommend their new classic line to my pro customers. Also look at Mogami raw cable. They make a co-ax speaker cable that is very open sounding and inexpensive.

Gdoodle - you are correct that playing copyrighted music in a commercial setting will require a license from ASCAP/BMI to do so - but to clarify, it is the playing (the performance), not the ripping that is the issue. I would have the same issue if I decided to read aloud my copy of Harry Potter to the restaurant clientele as a regular event.

I also think that a nice sound system is generally wasted in a restaurant setting given the volumes.

Funny story - there is a a chain of sandwich/baked-goods restaurants in my area and I noticed that they had Bose mini-speakers located throughout one of the local stores. One day, I was sitting in the back corner of the restaurant on the end of a set of bar stools (where no one often sits unless it is very crowded). I kept hearing this thumping noise. It was sort of a one beat thump, very distorted and "one note". After I finished eating, I looked around and up in the corner mounted against the ceiling was the Bose subwoofer to accompany the mini-speakers positioned at the front of the restaurant. Hilarious.