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EV ZLX-15P Review - Used hard this past weekend!


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I finally got a chance to push my EV ZLX-15P's this past weekend. We played a benefit up in NY for an old high school friend battling cancer. My old band who hasnt played together in over 5 years got back together for the benefit. We all had moved on to other bands and so did all the old PA gear we used to play with so we had to combine what we had together and just go for it.

 

I have a brand new pair of EV ZLX-15P's that havent left my basement yet and only used for vocals during practice. We got to the bar where we were playing and since it was in the low 70's in Upstate NY, Yes low 70's this past Saturday, The bar opened up its Tiki bar/patio for the benefit which ran 5pm-9 or atleast it was supposed to, went a little later....

 

We ended up setting up outside under 2 10x10 canopies. We used my ZLX-15Ps for mains on stands, used a double 18 Community cab for subs and a pair of Mackie SRM450s for monitors. We used a DOD crossover for the Subs and used the built in crossover on the EVs at 120hz. Had a Carvin 2000 watt power amp to push the subs.

 

I was a little nervous about using the EVs but I couldn't be any happier. The EVs rocked and sounded great. The mix was good and we were almost too loud even outside. I couldnt believe the thump of the Community double 18s, really made the ground shake. We had 2 guitars, bass, kick, snare and 2 toms mic'd up and 3 vocal mics. The EV speakers were clear and ran fairly cool. We had to keep them in the shade of the canopies as well as the Mackies so they wouldnt overheat with the sun. Only once towards the end of the night did I have to back off the inputs to the EVs for exceeding the limit but it has a built in limiter on the inputs and was flashing LIMIT at me but never clipped or distorted. Once I turned them down a little at the inputs we were good and there was no noticable volume change after that.

 

I recommend these speakers to anyone on a budget looking for good sounding powered speakers. We play hard classic rock. 2 marshall amps half stacks and a heavy hitting drummer and they worked perfect for us. The bass was hitting nice in these bounjcing back and forth between the tops and the subs and no issues there either. Good bottom end.

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Own a pair of ZLX12's, indeed great speakers. Question for op: Curious about what frequency did you set the xover at? around 100 hz or higher I assume cause you set your ZLX at 120 hz? Good to see it worked with a mixed environment with passive.active! My own experience too is that if you push it them to limit lights coming on they don't sound distorted at all and have a little more to give after limit lights kick on.

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I've got one zlx15p and one zxa1sub in my rehearsal room and really the sound great for running EVERYTHING direct into the board as well as edrums. Wasn't sure if the zxa1 sub was going to be enough at first. I'm used to a yorkviille 720p but really the little sub is just fine for this, I think you could put a couple zlx12p or 15p together with a couple of the zxa1 subs and have a really nice sounding system as long as you aren't trying to make peoples ears bleed. My biggest concern there would be the 12 or 15 would just be a little to much weight on top of the subs. I could see them

getting knocked over if you put the mains up to high.

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Own a pair of ZLX12's' date=' indeed great speakers. Question for op: Curious about what frequency did you set the xover at? around 100 hz or higher I assume cause you set your ZLX at 120 hz? Good to see it worked with a mixed environment with passive.active! My own experience too is that if you push it them to limit lights coming on they don't sound distorted at all and have a little more to give after limit lights kick on.[/quote']

 

Speakers and external crossover were both set at 120hz.

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Speakers and external crossover were both set at 120hz. We had a Peavey Mixer which had 2 main outputs. We ran everything mono, ran one main output to the ZLX's directly using the built in crossover and then ran the other output to the external crossover and then to the power amp and sub. Worked just fine. Just a little confusing at first but once we figured out our options that was the easiest. Gave us a little extra control of the level of our low signals.

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We were right at the limit while we were playing, only noticed because I sat out a couple songs and let someone play my guitar. I was checking the backs and they were flashing LIMIT. Now this is just the input signal coming in. I backed the inputs off a little and we were good. You couldn't notice any volume changes as we were so dang loud as it was. We were crossed over at 120 puting more into the subs giving the tops a little more to play with.

 

Great Speakers and I would recommend them to anyone on a budget.

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