Duke Ashton takes Yamaha's new compact PA speakers out to dinner — well, to a dinner and dance gig anyway! Read on to find out how well they coped with the usual trials of gigging.

Yamaha's latest compact YS Series sound reinforcement speakers are designed to be mixed and matched to meet the needs of a variety of live performance situations. A small band working in a pub, for instance, might choose to use 312Es on their own, but at larger venues, they are likely to supplement them with matching YS sub-woofers. The YS Series supporting documentation provides useful technical information, along with suggested configurations for a variety of common applications.

The YS312E has a 600 x 450 x 300mm cabinet manufactured from 19mm high density chipboard and finished with a fairly conventional, but practical, dark grey vinyl covering. There is a spring loaded, plastic carrying strap mounted on one side, and chunky plastic corner protectors afford the usual defence against the rigours of the road.

The drivers are mounted on a recessed baffle and are easily accessed by removing a protective metal grille, which is itself mounted on an MDF frame and held in place by a Velcro pad at each corner. Through the two trapezoid ports a foam lining can be glimpsed, which assists in damping mid and high frequency cabinet reflections. At the rear of the cabinet is a recessed mounting plate, carrying a pair of quarter-inch jack sockets and a pair of XLR sockets (one male, one female), all in parallel to facilitate daisy-chaining. Speakons obviously haven't reached this far yet!

These functional looking cabinets are sturdily built. They will easily tolerate being heaved in and out of estate cars or vans. I would, however, have felt more comfortable with a thicker, more durable vinyl coat. There were already a couple of scuff marks when I received the speakers, and although I handled them with care during the test, in real life, the occasional bashing into hard, pointy objects such as fire exit crash bars or drummers' heads is inevitable.

"The YS312Es' strength lies in their ability to project vocals with clarity and power without having to run a huge amplifier."

ON THE MENU

The 312E utilises a three-way driver system, comprising a 12-inch woofer, a 6.5-inch midrange cone driver unit, and a bullet tweeter. Many similarly priced units are only two-way, which means their mid-range reproduction can suffer, through asking the woofer or tweeter to extend its performance into frequency areas in which its performance is less than optimum. The problem can be overcome by careful choice of drivers and crossover frequency, but it was nice to see Yamaha providing a three-way system for about the same money as a two-way speaker.

A passive crossover, ostensibly of a totally new design, completes the setup, with crossover frequencies set at 1kHz and 7kHz. Yamaha specify a continuously variable HF level in their paperwork, and I expected to find some way of controlling the tweeter output, although none was immediately apparent, and the accompanying documentation provided no clues. The practical benefits of such an adjustment are largely negated if the means of adjustment is hidden somewhere in the box.

The nominal impedance of each cabinet is 8 Ohms, which means up to two cabinets can be run in parallel from a typical power amplifier delivering its output into 4 Ohms. The quoted frequency range is 60Hz to 20kHz. Although this seems pretty good for this type of cabinet, no limits were specified, so these figures mean little. Power handling is 500W maximum, 250W programme, and 125W RMS. Combined with an impressive sensitivity of 95dB at 1W at 1 metre, this means you can put together a compact and relatively loud system without having to buy a massive power amplifier. In practice, you'll need an amp capable of handling peaks of 300 Watts or so without clipping to make the best of these speakers. Because they're 8 Ohm rather than 4, you'll probably be better off using an amplifier rated at closer to 450 Watts (into 4 Ohms) per channel. Working this way leaves you with the amplifier capacity to add a second pair later if the need arises.

"...the YS312Es deliver a very open sound with plenty of mid-range detail, good presence, and a crisp top."

WINING & DINING

I took the 312Es out to two gigs, one an up-market dinner dance requiring a smooth performance from a polished act, the other a rock'n'roll bash where they had to compete with a thundering rhythm section and screeching guitar.

The first thing they scored points on was their true portability. At 22kg each, it was perfectly possible to carry one in each hand, and they're small enough for you to squeeze sideways through a standard door, then dodge the crowd at the bar, without the aid of a truss.

The handles are soft and placed so that the speakers balance naturally when you lift them. This degree of portability saves trips to the car — which I approve of. If you're a reasonably fit, largish sort of muso, you'll lift them onto speaker stands quite easily, without calling for help.

Yamaha kindly provided a P3500 stereo power amp for the review, which was duly hooked up along with a Fostex 350 desk and a few Shure SM58 mics. We also took along a Midiverb IV for effects. The P3500 outputs up to 350W RMS per side (8 Ohm), and apart from providing far more power than I needed in a medium-sized hotel function room with a clientele indulging in after-dinner brandy and foxtrots, foolhardy use could damage the speakers. It's always a good idea to use an amp that can provide clean power in excess of the peak rating of the speakers, but you have to make sure the amp is never driven into clipping. Fortunately, the P3500 had clip LEDs, but they weren't tempted to light.

ROCKING'N'ROLLING

As you might expect, the powerful P3500 did its job very well indeed, but I also wanted to test the speakers with a budget amplifier, so for the second gig I used a 150W RMS (4 Ohm) mono five-channel MAJ mixer amp with the speakers wired in parallel to present a 4 Ohm load.

Yamaha's claim of high efficiency is no idle boast — these speakers easily projected the vocals throughout a packed room with the master volume on the little amp only halfway up, with the band playing very loud rock'n'roll. Notably there was very little spill from the rear of the cabinets, and it was possible to work quite close to them on a small stage with little fear of feedback. This may well be due to the cabinets' traditional wood construction rather than the plastic mouldings that are becoming more common nowadays.

THE SOUND

In use, the YS312Es deliver a very open sound with plenty of mid-range detail, good presence, and a crisp top. They were very good for vocals, and it is a tribute to their clarity in this department that we didn't need any foldback despite the fact that we were standing in front of cranked up Trace Elliot and Fender amps. To my ears, there was a slight harshness somewhere around 6kHz to 8kHz and a little too much middle between 500Hz and 1kHz. I confirmed this when I got them home by connecting them to my studio monitor system and doing some serious listening tests. This isn't too serious though, and a little extra top helps PA speakers project, especially over long distances where air absorption has a detrimental effect on the top end anyway.

They were, however, decidedly lightweight at the bottom end, and I would hesitate to use them alone when running a backing track, keyboards, or any other combination of sounds requiring full-range amplification. For this, you would need to use them alongside the previously mentioned YSSW12E subwoofers, which have an internal low-pass filter and a frequency range extending from 180Hz down to 42Hz. Of course, this is a different ball game on the portability front, but it's offset to some extent by the fact that he combined impedances of the 312Es and the YSSW12Es present a 4 Ohm load to your amplifier. Unlike active sub-bass systems, these just plug into the same amplifier.

CONCLUSION

At the price, this highly efficient three-way system is certainly worth an audition. The YS312Es' strength lies in their ability to project vocals with clarity and power without having to run a huge amplifier. They are solidly built and truly portable. Rectangular boxes also stack more easily in your van or hatchback than some of the more interestingly shaped opposition.

There is plenty of choice in the way of PA speakers, both conventional and moulded, and you can buy similarly sized cabinets at a similar price that have a better bass response. However, these YS312Es are great for vocal applications, they produce plenty of level, and you can always add the sub-bass speakers later on, when you can afford them.

YS312E £249 each inc VAT.

Yamaha-Kemble Music (UK) Limited, (Contact Details).