New Church Audio System

The set up you have chosen is fine. I was going to suggest a second hand digital mixer as your FOH desk but they can be expensive. The upside is fantastic automation control and integration with your laptop and they come with transparent 32 bit dynamics processors/44 bit parametric EQ's/DSP effects, on all channels. I've picked one up second hand; it's 13 years old but dang it sounds good and the processing really is transparent.

Try and use capacitor mic's. The Rode NT1-A's are pretty much one of the best budget capacitor mic's you can get - you cant go wrong with them!

Together with a nice mixer with built in dynamics processing means you can control the levels much better than having to ride the fader as the speaker moves away/closer to the mic, etc. Playing music while speaking? Then set up one of the 'ducking' profiles that will 'duck' the music as you speak.

Even if you go with the Alesis at least consider capacitor mic's. The mixer has space for four and can provide the +48V phantom power for them.
 
The set up you have chosen is fine. I was going to suggest a second hand digital mixer as your FOH desk but they can be expensive. The upside is fantastic automation control and integration with your laptop and they come with transparent 32 bit dynamics processors/44 bit parametric EQ's/DSP effects, on all channels. I've picked one up second hand; it's 13 years old but dang it sounds good and the processing really is transparent.

Try and use capacitor mic's. The Rode NT1-A's are pretty much one of the best budget capacitor mic's you can get - you cant go wrong with them!

Together with a nice mixer with built in dynamics processing means you can control the levels much better than having to ride the fader as the speaker moves away/closer to the mic, etc. Playing music while speaking? Then set up one of the 'ducking' profiles that will 'duck' the music as you speak.

Even if you go with the Alesis at least consider capacitor mic's. The mixer has space for four and can provide the +48V phantom power for them.

Wow. What a thoughtful post Remeniz! Thank you! Most of this was just a welcome reminder, but useful nonetheless.

I don't see it in our budget to get any fancy-ish mixer. Our total budget needs to be $1,000 and under, and that's with all the wiring and stuff. Right now we are sitting at about $860, so we'll be cutting it close the way it is.

Also, as for the microphones, like I mentioned, the ones that are used for speaking (pastor and assistant) are like this. Not the exact brand or model, but I just wanted you to get a picture of what they were.

I do have 2 condenser microphones like you linked to about (MXL V63M). They are wonderful for home recording, but almost have to be shock mounted and pop-filtered to be used in even a semi-noisy environment such as a church. But I do agree, you really can just set the levels and go because of how universal they are (for lack of a better word). Our current microphones are sufficient for now, though.

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Not really related to your post, Remeniz. I'm wondering if anyone has more info on what Berry suggested for the 1/4" powered cable runs from the amp to the speaker. Has anyone used electrical wiring to do this, before? I'm surprised that it won't affect the sound...just wondering. Not opposed to it, since I've got some spare stuff lying around (used for 110V wiring) to use. It's a 3 wire, of course. The jacks would have to be clearly marked, to make sure no one thought it was an input :p. That wouldn't be good. Haha. Anyways, that run wouldn't be too long. I imagine it would be less than 15 feet for both left and right channel speakers.

Speaking of channels. It would be okay to mix down the output on the mixer to mono before running the cabling, correct? I see no need to run right and left runs from the mixer to the amp since I was planning on doing a mono setup anyways. This way, people on both sides of the church hear the exact same thing. Then I don't have to run 400ft of audio cable. Just 200ft.
 
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