Bose equipment across the board is renowned for its sound quality and in the L1 Pro8 they’ve managed to successfully combine true portability with easy set up and excellent sonic performance. As far as the mids and highs are concerned, the C-shape line array speaker system turns in a highly creditable performance. Sound dispersion, considering this is a mono system, is excellent. The eight speakers with neodymium drivers really do scatter the sound far and wide. Straight off the bat, we should point out that channels 1&2 are for instruments and microphones while channel 3 features controls for Bluetooth pairing and line level audio inputs for stuff like external audio sources or even synths. Top to bottom In many situations, unless you absolutely have to have a mic’d up guitar amp sound, or use an amp modeller (yes you can connect a modeller to the L1 Pro 8) these sound quite acceptable even the high gain variants. This neat little app has two basic uses and it connects to your L1 Pro 8 via Bluetooth. Simply press and hold the Bluetooth button on the L1 Pro 8 until it starts flashing, then connect it to your device.

Once you hook up the L1 Pro 8 with the app, this is where things get really good. When you fire up the app, you’ll see it’s an exact replica of what’s on the mixer section on the unit itself. Portability, sound quality and power basically. Line array systems break away from convention in that you don’t have speakers (usually two) placed on each side of the stage.We’ll get onto the specification of the L1 Pro8 a little later, but Bose negates this issue via the incorporation of a C-shaped line array with eight articulated 2” neodymium drivers, delivering 180 degree horizontal coverage with wide 40 degree vertical dispersion. A connected woofer provides all the bottom end.

And with the intuitive L1 Mix app, you get complete wireless mixer control from your smartphone or tablet too. But unless you buy one of the optional (T4S/T8S) Bose mixers or hook up an external one however, you’re going to fall woefully short on enough channels for a full blown band. In its simplest form, ToneMatch is available on the front panel of the mixer. As we’ve already seen, you can select between ‘Mic’ ‘Inst’ and ‘Off’ which automatically sets optimum EQ settings for the mic/instrument you’re using.Inputs 1&2 feature combo XLR/1/4” connections to accept instruments and microphones. Just plug in, select ‘mic’ or ‘inst’ and you’re away. Bear in mind that essentially these are EQ presets only. In terms of what you’re plugging into the inputs, the L1 Pro 8 knows the difference between instruments and microphones and adjusts levels automatically. OK, working from top to bottom on the mixer section – first we have illuminated rotary encoders on channels 1, 2 and 3. On 1&2, the encoders control volume, treble, bass and reverb. On channel 3, it’s volume, treble and bass.

Line array systems are not just about aesthetics – there’s science behind their innovative design and it’s centered around efficient sound dispersion. The problem with conventional side of stage speaker arrangements is that there’s a sweet spot in terms of sound coverage. Assembled, the overall height of the L1 Pro 8 is 78.7” (2m) but the array extension spacer section is totally removable.But this is only the tip of the iceberg. There are two ways of accessing Bose’s full ToneMatch library. The first is via optional Bose T4S and T8S mixers. These are designed to connect to any Bose L1 Pro mixer via the dedicated ToneMatch port located on the mixer panel. A single cable also powers these external mixers. You could also use this output to send to a recording interface, mixing console or another L1 Pro system. Extended functionality We’ll emphasise that these mixers are optional but they are designed to work with Bose PA systems. If you need extra functionality for your L1 Pro system, these are the way to go.