Taking the accolade of being the largest in Poland, the Kraków Arena has a capacity of 20,000 and is one of the most modern entertainment halls and sports venues in the world. With a 500m-wide LED screen on its exterior, it hosts wide variety of sports events, exhibitions, conferences and trade fairs.

The contract to design and supply the audio system for the Kraków Arena was won by Konsbud Audio, who used three Allen & Heath digital mixers as key elements. Located in the control room of the main hall, a GLD-80 is used for mixing and signal distribution between all audio systems. There are also two Qu-16 mixers: one in a mobile rack that can be used on the floor of the main hall, and another in the control room in the smaller, secondary hall.

‘We decided to use GLD-80 and Qu-16 because of their compatibility and functionality,’ says Konsbud Audio Director of Design & Integration, Piotr Jankiewicz. ‘Both mixers are compact and have the key features of a large console. They work with the same expanders and AudioRacks, so it is possible to use the same connections. Thanks to the dSnake protocol the connection is over a simple Cat5 cable.’

The audio signals from different parts of the venue are fed to the GLD-80 via AR84 and AR2412 AudioRacks. The mobile Qu-16 is also compatible with the AudioRacks, giving it the flexibility to act as a secondary mixer or as the main mixer, managing the whole system. Thanks to the Qu-Pad and GLD OneMix apps the audio team also has the ability to control the mixers via iPad from anywhere in the venue.

Since its completion, the Kraków Arena has won praise as the best-sounding sports venue in Poland.

More: www.allen-heath.com