Electar 4 Special PA Gig Rig
(Rick Stukus | Posted 2001-07-24)
When I received the call from our front offices that they had a $199.00 Electar 4 Special PA Gig Rig from MusicYo! for me to pick up and review, I immediately thought they had made a mistake. There is no such thing! So with some trepidation ( big word for all you gear heads, go look it up ), I drove over in my van to load it up.
Well it was all in one box about 4’ x 3’ x 1’ weighing about 70lbs. It fit neatly in the back of my Plymouth Voyager, without even taking the seat out. It’s a pretty cool van, dingle balls and all. I dragged this sucker into the studio and pulled out the trusty razor. Upon opening the outer and then the inner cartons the first thing I noted was how well this thing was packaged. As I began to pull the stuff out, I was still impressed. I opened yet another inner carton containing the speaker stands. That’s right - speaker stands, and found this neat gig bag containing two awesome fully adjustable folding speaker stands. All right, they’re not the best on the market, but they are pretty damn sturdy, and they come in their very own padded zippered bag, with a handle no less. I pulled out the two speaker cabs, yes two, and in seconds had them both up on the stands and locked into place. Yes, I said locked into place. I then pulled out the 4 channel powered mixer head and plugged in the speaker cables, which by the way are about 30’ long, with ¼ inch jacks, into the two clearly labeled speaker outputs on the back of the powered mixer. Immediately, I noticed the other two clearly marked effects loop input and output. By now I’m starting to wonder, "How in the hell did they do this for $199.00?".
I quickly surveyed the front of the unit and noticed two RCA input jacks labeled for a CD or Tape input, with it’s very own volume knob, in addition to the other 4 channels, which support a balanced or unbalance input. This is really great, because you are not tying up one of the 4 mixer inputs, for your between sets entertainment. I flipped the switch and the power light came on. With nothing plugged into the mixer I cranked all the knobs to their max and there was no perceptible noise or hum. Right then I figured the unit is probably DOA. I just happened to have my trusty portable CD player lying about, and all of the necessary jacks and stuff, and I fired up some Satriani. Well, what do you know, I got sound. Hmm. A part of testing this stuff is to let you guys know how it will hold up when some KTA, ( knob twisting a$$hole ) walks up to your equipment and performs their normal ritual. So I put on my KTA hat and cranked this sucker up, and while it did clip, it never even thought about puking it’s guts up all over my studio floor.
So by now I’m thinking, 2 low end Speaker Stands with gig bag at $80, 2 speaker cables $35, a 2 channel 60 watt ( 100W MAX ) powered mixer with 4 inputs at about $100, and 2 speaker cabs with one 10" speaker and one dome tweeter, at lets say $100. That totals to over $300.00. Got’s to be something wrong somewhere.
My next test was to take my Ovation Electric Legend and plug it right into the mixer and see how it sounds. No problems here. Very responsive, clean, clear, and loud. Mix a vocal mic ( Shure SM58 ) with it. No problem. The Treble and bass EQ are very responsive and just require a tweak to get the system EQ’d for the room.
OK, what about something a little harsher? I plugged my Jeff Beck Signature Strat through the POD 2.0 by Line 6 into this PA and set it to the MAX. After I had run through everything the POD could offer, I considered getting rid of the rest of my stuff and keep this Electar 4 and POD for my entire set up. Unreal.
Bottom Line:
All in all, the Electar 4 Special PA Gig Rig is a pretty decent little starter PA system. This system is perfect for a duo of acoustic performers. It’s not going to fill the High School Gymnasium or large VFW, but for those small clubs and bars this little thing should do you proud. MusicYo! has a habit of providing some really nice gear at ridiculous prices. Although some of the brands may not be that familiar to you, more than likely they are manufactured by top factories that are also producing the gear whose brand names you have come to know and love. Previously we've been super impressed with the Kramer Focus VT111S and most recently we've received a Slingerland Jam Session Drum Kit that is quite impressive as well. Stay tuned for more reviews!
