Launching its latest model at the Shanghai Mercedes Benz Arena, leading Chinese mobile phone manufacturer Oppo required live sound reinforcement at the conference to allow the audience to experience the outstanding sound of the new phone. The A/V provider for this event, Lavtech AV Technology, selected Vue al-12 Acoustic Linear line arrays for the task.
In addition to a new range of breakthrough features, Oppo’s new Reno series also supports High-Resolution audio and Dolby Atmos audio. Audiophiles may be familiar with Oppo as their Blu-Ray players supported SACD, DVD-Audio and Blu-Ray high-resolution audio formats with superior digital-to-analogue converters.
‘Oppo started business as an audio company, and it has a high-demand for sound,’ confirms Wu Jiacheng, Technical Director of Vue China. ‘This conference needed to present many scenes in high-definition audio, in addition to playing back the sound of Dolby Atmos surround. There is also a section of the film to highlight the sound zoom function when recording. Therefore, the audio system should have excellent high-frequency definition and low-frequency dive ability, and at the same time have enough power.’
The system Wu specified made use of both al-12 and al-8 line arrays along with hs-221s for the sub frequencies.
‘Because of the difficulty in processing and designing the beryllium diaphragm, there are not many manufacturers using this material. The beryllium tweeter has a higher definition than the conventional aluminium or titanium diaphragm, and it is exactly what this event needed,’ Wu continues. ‘In addition, the low frequency of hs-221 subwoofer can dive to 25Hz – people will feel that the low frequency comes from the bottom of the floor and has a deep feeling of diving.’
The audience area of the conference included in-field seating facing the stage and a fan-shaped two-storey auditorium. The sound system could not obstruct the audience line-of-sight, so the arrays were flown 22m above the stage. The main array comprised eight al-12s suspended at the left and right side respectively. In addition, four al-8s were hung on each side as front fill, covering the 4m area in front. An array of four al-8s on each side were suspended to function as monitors. A total of 12 hs-221 subwoofers were deployed with 2 al-12s stacked on top for fill at the sides of the stage. The system was driven by 12 Vue V3 amplifiers and managed by SystemVue management software.
Vue China faced several challenges during the set-up – the Mercedes Benz Center does not allow equipment to be stacked on the catwalk and the cables on the floor must be hidden. The technical team decided to use Dante as both Vue’s amplifiers and speakers “speak” Dante. This allowed for the use of networking cables to reduce bulky cable runs making it easier to tuck them out of site. The installation was completed in a day by four technicians of Vue China, and system tuning was completed in half a day with SysTune and Smaart acoustic field analysis software.
Lavtech was satisfied with the al-Class performance in such a sonically-critical environment: ‘We have been deeply impressed after listening to Vue,’ reports General Manager, Bai Xiaofei. ‘Vue hit me first when Oppo proposed the audio demand and it turns out that this was the right choice.’
More: www.vueaudio.com
