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A complete sound system for church worship is four purchases sized to the room: the best speakers for a church sound system (two powered 12 inch mains cover a small church of under 150 seats), a digital mixer (the Behringer X32 for a band, an XR18 under 16 inputs), a wireless microphone system in the legal 470 to 608 MHz band, and either powered boxes or an amplifier for the church sound system rated at 1.6 to 2 times the speaker rating. Add in-ear monitors for the church band once stage volume becomes the problem, and the portable PA roundup if the room is set up every week. Each roundup below has a small-church, mid-size and multi-campus pick.
Every page is researched from manufacturer specifications, operator manuals, FCC rules, published standards and the consensus of verified owner reviews, not hands-on testing. Every table on this site is plain HTML you can quote, and every calculator shows its formula on the page.
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A belt-clip headphone amplifier that takes an aux send on XLR and drives in-ear earphones. An under-$50 amplifier turns a spare aux into a wired in-ear mix.
Best for: The cheapest possible way to try in-ear monitoring before committing
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The default answer for a church main speaker, and the one most rental companies own. A 2,000 watt class D amplifier, a 75 degree conical pattern that throws evenly to the back, and preset voicings that get a volunteer close on the first try.
Best for: A 150 to 400 seat sanctuary on stands or flown, for almost any service style
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A cardioid headworn capsule on the EW-D platform. The directional pattern plus the fixed mouth distance is the most feedback-resistant combination a preacher can wear.
Best for: The hardest rooms: high ceilings, hard surfaces and a wireless preaching microphone
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The entry point of the Crown DriveCore range, with crossovers, limiting and delay built in so a small system needs no separate processor.
Best for: A pair of passive mains in a room up to about 150 seats
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