There is a photo at the bottom that will give you an idea of the space and I'll add more drawings when I get back to work.
Long story (skip if you don't care). This is a small, non-profit theater black box. 60' long (in the direction the camera is facing) and 50' wide. Grid is installed at about 15' above deck. Important part, the whole theater is modular. I can set up a stage anywhere and seating risers can move to any configuration; in the round, one-sided, two sided on an angle, 3/4 thrust, darn near anything. Even the tech booth on the far left, near, is on casters, so it goes where I want it. Current sound reinforcement comes from a Yamaha 750x2 with a few more amps on standby. They feed four Yamaha 12" cabinets (unseen) just above the lighting grid hanging from swivel links so I can spin the speakers to point toward the audience wherever I put them.
Two of the Yamahas have blown horns, and a third one has a replacement paper woofer that looks like it came from a 1968 Magnavox Phono console. Sound sucks unless I unplug the two with blown horns, but that can only happen for certain seating configurations. I'm also having the trouble of the sound system helping AND hurting simultaneously. It amps voices, but also amps room reverb. It makes it loud, but it also makes the room loud proportionally because they're basically set up in an array as far as possible away from ears.
I'm thinking about making a couple handfuls of smaller active cabinets (maybe 6"/horn) that can hang from the grid much closer to the audience. More speakers closer means less stuff bouncing off walls. It also means (potentially) less opportunity for feedback from the stage mics. It ALSO means that I can toss a digital snake in the grid and XLR each cabinet for ultimate control. That way I can wheel the booth where I want it, plug in a Cat6, re-aim the cabinets toward the seats, done. Depending on how I address the snake, I can just do a couple channels for a regular show, or have SFX routed to a specific one, etc. I realize it can also mean phasing issues, which I already have, but for the most part the audience walks in and sits still.
Long story short: Looking for whether or not some powered SLA pros on a digital snake would be good for hanging in a grid to configure per show. And before you ask: I'm a trained, experienced, and certified rigging specialist, so we can hopefully skip the warnings
Also, before you ask, the budget is somewhere between non-existent and shoestring. I know the answer here is to buy 4-6 new QSC 12s, but that isn't the name of the game. This would be partly an attempt to save money (more gear for the dollar) and also an opportunity to give a master class to local students who are interested. Group build with some education kinda thing.
