I wanna start assaulting peoples boring lives with musical happenings in random public places, and am considering purchasing a reasonable PA. (over a period of time, starting off small)

For starters I'm looking at picking up a pair of mackie SRM450's, which I've been told are quite reasonable, yet are still not insanely priced, by a friend of mine who is studying sound engineering.

Anyone got any experience with PAs, in general or specific brands etc?

Going for active mains since it requires less mucking about

Alto (the italian company) makes good PA stuff for little cash - my brother just got a set of Alto active PA speakers and they sound nicely 'club'... they are perfect for anything up to 200 people.

instead of the Mackies I would go with electrovoice SXA100+. They are about the same size and power but I think they sound better (mackies can have an annoying hi end for me) And they are a little cheaper.

thanks. . will look into both of those.. . .hopefully go down and listen to some this weekend