d&b audiotechnik at USITT

d&b audiotechnik's USITT stand featured two major elements this year. The first was the new D80 amplifier, a 21st century response to the technological expectations of the digital era and the xC-Series, comprising the very latest loudspeakers from the fertile minds of the d&b R&D department. The second was more cerebral, a workflow that took students who attended the Sound Lab sessions in the Fort Worth Convention Center Arena from system design, through setup via remote control, and to a fully functioning system.

The D80 amplifier is, in fact, the final component of this d&b workflow. With a bulging feature set, the D80 provides more power (4000W per channel) and more channels with individual inputs (four) than any previous d&b amplifier yet packaged in just 2RU. Efficiencies of amplifier design and Power Correction Factor (PCF) achieve significant savings in energy consumption, while onboard EQ functions include two 16-band parametric equalizers per channel, with notch, shelving, and asymmetric filters.

Revealing how the d&b ArrayCalc simulation software, R1 Remote control software, and the D80 amplifier act in concert to form the d&b workflow is exactly what the Sound Lab was about. The session presented by Jason Waggoner from d&b education and application support included a clinic on this workflow: setting up the arena system using ArrayCalc software, followed by a demonstration of how simple it is to export all ArrayCalc settings directly into R1, and from there, straight into the D80. Students were then given the opportunity to mix live acts on the resulting full scale d&b system.

The xC-Series is a new area of sound reinforcement for d&b and true to the brand this has been addressed using distinctly different techniques.

Cardioid by design, this range of column loudspeakers delivers high levels of speech intelligibility in difficult acoustic environments. The largest element of the Series, the 24C loudspeaker, can effect a broadband attenuation of -18dB between front and rear propagation, down as low as 190Hz with the addition of the 24C-E extender, or to 370Hz when used alone. All six LF and HF drivers in the 24C are passively crossed over, thus they can be driven by a single amplifier channel. In fact, two 24Cs can be driven from one channel. The 24C produces a five-degree downward tilt in the low and mid range, while a variable adjustment in the high frequencies is steerable between zero and minus fourteen degrees.

See d&b audiotechnik at PLASA Focus: Baltimore, May 8 - 9.