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Post subject: Adding another speaker to Fender Passport 300
Posted: Mon Jul 04, 2011 5:25 pm
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Hi, I recently bought a Mackie Thump 15-A to get more tone and volume out of my 300 pro. I just don't know how to hook it up to the all-in-one. Would I plug it into the sub-out? Sorry I'm clueless and I have no idea.


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Post subject: Re: Adding another speaker to Fender Passport 300
Posted: Sun Jul 10, 2011 1:13 pm
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The Mackie Thump 15-A can be connected via the 1/4" sub-woofer port and you would get better sound out of the resulting system, though in a sense, this is not the best use of the Mackie speaker system. According to what I've seen on the Web, this is a "two-way" speaker. In other words, it has a woofer and a tweeter. If you plug it into the subwoofer port, the Passport will only give it very low notes to play, and that tweeter will have nothing to do.

Meanwhile, what you'll get is 400 watts to play bass notes louder than the Passport 300 can play them, and you reduce the load of carrying those bass notes by the Passport 300, so more of the watts of the Passport 300 can be used to play non-bass notes louder. It will probably sound really good.

So, the Mackie speaker is probably not the best choice -- an actual subwoofer would have been perhaps better, but it's a nice speaker with a lot of power behind it, and the actual result you'll get will probably be very pleasing.

Hooking up that one speaker to any other port on the Passport 300 will get complicated. There are issues relating to stereo vs. mono, going from 1/8" stereo to 1/4" mono... You are probably better off just connecting to the subwoofer port. Don't use a speaker cable, though. Make sure you are using an "instrument" cable designed to take a line-level signal. The sound will be much better with an instrument cable than a speaker cable. Some get confused because both use the same 1/4" TS plug, but the thickness of the wire and the shielding is different for those two functions.

Enjoy.


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Post subject: Re: Adding another speaker to Fender Passport 300
Posted: Wed Jul 13, 2011 4:14 pm
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Thank you for the reply, ContraCaller I already bought the Mackie Thump 15-A because well, it was cheaper than most subwoofers, and at least i got the 400 watts of bass from the woofer. I was at guitar center and was originally looking for a subwoofer, but this girl told me to get this one since it had a tweeter as well, but i dont think she knew about the ports from the Fender Passport 300. She thought that there would be a stereo out that i could plug into the Mackie.

I do realize that there is a stereo out port on the Passport, but it is a 1/8 jack, and you said that there might be problems with that. what are they? Is the stereo out just used for audio recording and whatnot? and on the back of the mackie, the input is actually an XLR, not a TS input. Luckily i do have an instrument TS to XLR cable.

I guess the subwoofer out option works for me, i would just want to know how hard it would be to try the stereo out to plug the Mackie in.


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Post subject: Re: Adding another speaker to Fender Passport 300
Posted: Sat Jul 16, 2011 12:25 pm
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Also, another question. If the passport only has a max of 300 watts, and if perhaps i had a subwoofer maxing out at lets say, 800 watts, does that mean that the subwoofer is only getting 300 watts sent to it? does that mean i should look for a sub that maxes out at 300 watts?


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Post subject: Re: Adding another speaker to Fender Passport 300
Posted: Tue Jul 19, 2011 5:43 am
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I just pulled up the manufacturer's Web page on your speaker at:
http://www.mackie.com/products/thump/

It looks like it actually has a 300 watt bass amp and a 100 watt treble amp, so you'll be getting 300 watts out of it as a subwoofer. That will still improve the sound of your Passport 300, since you'll have a total of 600 watts applied toward making joyful noise. The Passport will get louder because it doesn't have to carry the bass notes, and the Mackie will apply all of its watts to bass without having to carry treble sound as well.

You can technically hook up the Mackie to the stereo out jack, and if you are only using mono sound sources, it would work. You'd have a third speaker playing the same sound as the other two speakers. The Passport wouldn't play as loud because it would still be pushing bass notes, and the EQ on the Mackie might be a bit different simply because of the characteristics of its built-in amps and the speakers themselves. It has its own EQ controls, so you can adjust for that, though that gives you more knob twiddling to get things right.

You'd have to get an adapter that goes from male 1/8" stereo to two male XLR plugs, and you'd ignore one of them and use the other for the Mackie. I've never seen an adapter like that, and you might have to have a couple of intermediate adapters to find something that would work.

I really think it would be simpler to use the subwoofer port, since it is a mono signal, and the 1/4" mono to XLR cable is, as you have found, a commonly available adapter. Some of these adapters use a 1/4" TRS instead of a 1/4" TS, but that shouldn't matter. The Passport doesn't have an internal connector for the Ring part of TRS (Tip, Ring, Shaft), so it will just ignore it.


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Post subject: Re: Adding another speaker to Fender Passport 300
Posted: Tue Jul 19, 2011 1:15 pm
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I went to Guitar Center just recently and asked one of the guys again. What i really want is some bass booming sound. I have a Roland Electronic Drum Set and i would like to hear more kick out of the bass pedal, and i also play music on my Passport but would like to hear more bass out of that as well. When i went to guitar center i do notice that there are some cheap powered subwoofers, like the Peavey 188D, and the Gemini series of subs. They are only a few hundred dollars more, but are they worth it? Would i be happier with the bass from the real subwoofers? I do intend to use the sub out from my Passport. A guy from guitar center told me to check out the Harbinger series subs, only from Guitar center, but the price is 700, twice of the Mackie. Therefore i looked at the Gemini series and the Peavey. Are they good enough?


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Post subject: Re: Adding another speaker to Fender Passport 300
Posted: Tue Jul 19, 2011 3:37 pm
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Im really liking the Peavey 118D and got a good deal with it. Good for the Passport? anyone have one?


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Post subject: Re: Adding another speaker to Fender Passport 300
Posted: Fri Aug 12, 2011 8:34 am
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I just realized that I didn't address a point you asked about earlier. The wattage of the Passport has nothing to do with the "power" of the signal going out of the Sub-woofer port. The signal at that point is "line level", which is a standard signal strength for communicating between a line-level device (often called a "pre-amp") and an amplifier.

The wattage of the Passport describes the power going to the speakers.

There's a pre-amp stage inside the Passport that supplies a line-level signal to the amp stage in the Passport and to the Sub-Out port. So, you have three "power" amplifiers. The left and right channels of your Passport 300 are 150 watts each, plus whatever the wattage is of your Peavey sub-woofer. Online, that looks like the Peavey is 300 watt, so you have 600 watts total pushing speakers in and out.

If you like the Peavey, then you like the Peavey. Nobody else's opinion counts more than yours, since you came up with the money for it, and you are providing the music with equipment that nobody else at the party has invested in. If it's a powered sub-woofer, it ought to do the job, especially if you actually like the sound coming out of it.


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